Reading Workshop

Introduction

The metaphor of apprenticeship (mastering a material tool, through observation, guidance and practice) can help us gain insight into Maria Montessori’s approach to reading and writing (mastering the use of the symbolic tools of language). She stated that culture “has to be taken in through activity with the help of apparatus which permits the child to acquire culture by himself, urged onwards by the nature of his mind which seeks and is guided by the laws of his development.”

It is the activity of the hand that fosters the development of the intelligence. This image of the hand training the mind of the initiate under the guidance of a “master” of the language over an extended period of time also reminds us that these uniquely human skills of reading and writing evolved gradually during the progress of civilizations.

Just as the apprentice requires the support offered by the artisan’s workshop over the long journey to occupational independence, so too does the child need a prepared environment modeled on a workshop in which to fine-tune his or her reading and comprehension skills throughout the second plane of development.

Communication as a Fundamental Right of Humans

In The Formation of Man, Maria Montessori points out that the peasants who rose up against the aristocrats in the French Revolution wanted, in addition to bread and work, the right to be educated. Article XI of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen sanctioned in 1791 reads: “The free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of Man”. It took a century after this and the establishment of compulsory education to extend to all the ability to read and write. Written language is, in her words, “a characteristic of civilized man.”

Making Meaning Through Gesture

Humans have been able to survive and prosper because of their ability to collaborate in solving the problems they encounter. This ability already existed in the form of mimetic communication through expression and gesture more than a million years ago, before human speech had developed. We know from archeological evidence that hominids lived in small bands that build shelters and hunted together and were able to pass on these skills to their offspring through demonstrative action and gesture.

The Advent of Speech

With the advent of speech about 50,000 years ago, the ability to communicate was greatly enhanced, as were the functions that meaning-making served, such as planning and reflecting on action, handing on tribal lore and specialist knowledge, and constructing mythical accounts of creation and humans’ place in the universe.

Speech did not supersede mimetic communication, but rather complemented it, as it continues to do today. No matter what language is looked at, spoken language is made up of only a few sounds because of the limitations of the vocal organs. However, these few sounds may be combined in almost limitless ways.

There is nothing in the language-like behaviour of primates that remotely approaches the language abilities of 3-year old humans. We have only ourselves to observe in trying to understand the development of our language competence. Language may have arisen from a precursor mimetic intelligence, and this appearance of language made possible an intelligence that accelerated the pace of evolution by transmitting culture and ideas between generations.

Every known human culture has a language with complex grammar. None of these grammars is simple and the complexity of a culture’s language is not at all dependent on the complexity of its social organization or technology. Not only is having a language universal, but also there are universal properties of natural human languages – a universal grammar underlying all languages. Every sentence has a structure and is governed by rules that may vary from language to language.

All languages use nouns and verbs, subjects and objects, cases and agreement and large vocabularies. Almost all languages have the same basic word order of subject and object. A sentence in any spoken language can be analyzed as containing noun phrases, verb phrases and prepositional phrases.

Recording Through Pictures and Signs

The invention of writing is very recent – a mere 4,000 years old. Just as speech did not replace the mimetic mode of communication, neither has writing rendered speech obsolete. Writing is not synonymous with the alphabet. From earliest days, humans have wanted to transmit their thoughts over distance and time. At first, humans tried to represent the objects of thoughts by means of drawings or pictographs on rocks or on the skins of animals, then they used signs to symbolize ideas and finally, much later, they created the alphabet which permits humans to record the language in its component sounds.

The Alphabet

Writing has become accessible to all since the invention of the alphabet. It also humanized writing because, as Montessori stated, “it has connected written language directly with spoken language and made the former a complement of the latter.” The alphabetically written language consists in giving a representation, or graphic sign, to each sound composing a word.

Writing should begin with an analysis of the sounds of the words, and the signs of the alphabet itself, in order to establish a direct relation between the symbol and the sounds they represent. In this way, “the combinations of the written words could derive directly from the spoken language which already exists in its entirety in the mind.” And, Montessori continued, “(the) alphabet in direct connection with spoken language – that is the way to achieve the art of writing by following an inner path. The ability to write will be acquired as a result of the analysis of the words each one possesses, and of the activity of one’s own mind, which is interested in such a magical conquest.”

Montessori believed that if the teaching of writing were begun from books with selected words that had to be learned – then the result would be a separate language derived from the deciphering of syllables or words and lacking interest for the child.

If the alphabet is linked up with spoken language, the process becomes that of simply translating one’s own language into graphic signs. These words then have a meaning and the progress of writing becomes appealing. The language the child already possesses is being fixed in a concrete form. The eyes and the hand act together with hearing and speech. Spoken language disappears into space, but written language becomes fixed and can be manipulated and studied.

The alphabet represents one of the greatest inventions of humankind. It has actually modified humans, giving them new powers. Through this supra-natural language, humans can transmit thoughts to those far away, in different times and places.

Connecting the Alphabet with Spoken Language

Since the emergence of speech, spoken language is developed naturally in every human, a gift of nature and an expression of the intelligence of each person. Without spoken language humans would not be able to achieve a common purpose and perform work.

Maria Montessori understood that the alphabet is a faithful reproduction of spoken language. In Rome, in 1907, she was the first to teach writing by directly connecting the graphic signs of the alphabet with the spoken language without the use of books. Writing came “as an explosion” to the four year old children in her experiment.

To connect writing directly with the spoken language validates it as a form of self-expression and because it is something of genuine interest, sparks an enthusiasm that leads to achievement. The movable alphabet is manipulated into different combinations to construct different words as if they were various pieces of a puzzle. The movable alphabet letters enable the child to construct all the words he or she possesses. This allows the child to consolidate his or her spoken language. Spelling is done according to the sounds of the letters since each time a word is constructed, the child considers and decides which sounds form the word being made.

This process allows the child to explore the language as at the same time awakening interest. It is amazing to the child to realize that all the books in all the libraries, all the information in all the newspapers, all the conversations overheard, all the dialogue on television and in the movies are combinations of the letters of the alphabet. Work with the movable alphabet coupled with this awareness places the whole language in motion.

Preparation for Writing

The exercise of composing words is only a preparation for writing. Other preparation has occurred in the manipulation of the objects used in the sensorial area of the Children’s House programme. In addition, practical life exercises and drawing are indirect preparation for writing.

It is more effective to have the child trace the sandpaper letter by hand than to copy letters already traced and presented as a model. There must be a direct connection between the movements of the hand with the eyes.

Reading is already implied in the exercise with the movable alphabet. In Montessori lessons we start it with a series of small slips on which are written the names of familiar objects. The child comes to recognize the meaning of the word he or she reads and then places the slip beside the object it indicates. After this the teacher gives short sentences indicating actions to be performed. To give names teaches the noun; to give actions teaches the verb. The first reading exercises introduce the grammatical study of language.

Writing has two advantages as a way of representing meaning: it enables meaning to be preserved in a permanent form so that it is available to readers in other times and places and the various forms or genres of writing that have been developed allow complex structures of meaning to be articulated more precisely that is possible in everyday conversation.

Child as a Microcosm of the Evolution of Human Language

The sequence of language development in the history of the human species as outlined in the Montessori Timeline of Humankind is repeated in the development of each individual. The appearance of language in infants follows a stereotyped time course that is similar across cultures. Earliest meanings are exchanged by actions and gestures; when speech develops, it is accompanied and supported by non-verbal behaviour. When children first encounter reading and writing at home, they are in the context of social interaction and part of some larger purposeful activity. Children are not just passively soaking up bits of language; they are actively constructing and inventing language as the brain develops.

Reading to Children

Most children are probably introduced to written language by being read to. Studies have shown that the frequency with which children were read to during the pre-school years was strongly linked to their overall academic attainment at age ten. There are many benefits to being read to. From listening to stories read aloud, children become familiar with the cadences of written language and the generic structure of stories and other types of text. They also increase their vocabularies in areas that are rarely the subject of everyday talk. They learn that books are a source of interest and enjoyment that can introduce them to real as well as imaginary objects and places and events that they do not come across in their immediate environment. The practice of reading to children in the early years enlarges their experience in ways that prepare them to make the most of the instruction they will receive in school.

Talk about Text

While listening to stories or non-fiction books is enjoyable, much of the benefit comes from the talk that accompanies the sharing of the book. Discussing the characters and their actions, predicting what may happen next, clarifying the meaning of particular words and phrases – all the conversations help the child to make connections between the meanings and the text and his or her actual experiences. This knowledge about the relationship between spoken and written language, also known as “phonemic awareness” is a prerequisite for learning to read and write.

Parents should refrain from deliberately teaching the letter names and sounds and from quizzing the child about the facts of the story, but rather follow the child’s lead and foster a more open-ended exploration of what the child finds interesting.

Reading is a form of thinking stimulated by written symbols. Students need to know not only know to decode the symbols but how to get meaning from text. On occasion, they need to be asked how they arrived at their answers, in other words, to explain their thought processes.

In this way, the teacher can monitor the students’ cognitive development. The classical view of learning suggests that people learn all the time through meaningful experiences and through immersion in a “community of practice” (Frank Smith). Reading and writing are not ends in themselves. The most effective learning occurs in a “community of practice” in which members master the skills necessary to achieve the goals of the classroom community.

The ability to read (and also to write) can be progressively mastered through using written text as tools to achieve these goals. Frank Smith described becoming literate as joining the literacy club and learning how to take part in club activities from more experienced members.

Parents and family members form the first literary club and then the Children’s House (Casa). In elementary, children continue to extend their apprenticeship into the larger community where literacy is a necessary resource.

There should be an inter-relationship between action, talk and text. Each of these ways of making meaning is completed by the other two. Reading is a means of construction and communicating meaning. Texts do not carry meaning in themselves but require readers to transact with the written texts in order to match their interpretations as readers with the cues to meaning that are encoded in the symbols. This match differs from one individual to another.

Reading, or making meaning from text, is essentially social in nature. For example, when the teacher reads aloud in a classroom, the children interact not only with the text, but also with each other about their interpretations and responses. One reason for the teacher reading aloud is to create and foster a community of readers in the classroom. Learning to read and using texts to communicate and learn depend upon collaboration with other members of the community. This collaboration occurs most naturally and easily through talk about text.

Reading and writing are undertaken for a purpose that is significant for the learner. Enjoying a story or a poem, finding out about a topic of interest, communicating important ideas and feelings to others, providing information others will find interesting – all these are reasons for reading and writing. Such occasions for reading must arise naturally. For example, where the text is important to other members of the community, it is natural to talk about it and the reading activities can be undertaken jointly and collaboratively.

There must be frequent and rewarding opportunities for the members to have conversations with each other about what they are doing and why and about how what they are reading helps them understand themselves and their purposes better, as Lave &Wenger expressed it. Explicit talk about texts and about how they are created and interpreted is necessary. Conversation weaves together the connections among readers and texts and gives them meaning. For students to be able to put their knowledge to use in real life, it has to be part of their personal understanding of the larger world and of the activities by means of which it is sustained.

Authors frequently discuss their intentions with colleagues to develop and clarify their plans. They also seek readers’ reactions and suggestions during the actual drafting and revision of text. Readers too, often discuss what they have read in order to compare their interpretations and responses, particularly if the texts demands some form of action. In other words, although the written text can stand alone, independent of any particular context of use, particular activities of writing and reading require the nexus of action, talk and text. For example, the teacher reads a novel, a chapter a day, and follows each chapter with discussion of what has happened, what might happen and what individual children find memorable. This not only deepens children’s appreciation of literature, but the children depend on and contribute to the classroom ethos of caring and collaboration.

Discussions Lead by Children

This will happen to an even greater degree once control of the discussions is given over to the children and if there is the expectation that children initiate and sustain discussions about the novels. One of the limitations with teacher-centered discussions is the issue of teacher control and a focus on learning a single interpretation. Instead there is a need to:

1. 1Establish democratic patterns with the teacher as facilitator rather than as the centre of discussion;

2. Accept and build on multiple interpretations and responses;

3. Situate instruction about how to comprehend texts in actual reading of texts as a group.

The term “grand conversations” has been used to describe literature discussions in which the teacher’s role is as an equal in the discussion – not the leader. The analogy can be made to a curator of a museum leading visitors through and pointing out interesting pieces along the way – but not pointing out everything or insisting that the visitors be as interested in everything as he or she is. A well-rounded programme is necessary – along with multiple approaches.

The teacher as the mentor participates in the discussions by commenting and asking questions that allow the children to work and learn within their “zones of proximal development” to use Vygotsky’s phrase. These comments and questions provide scaffolding for the children, the apprentices, so that they may become full members of the community.