KidBibs LT#14: Getting to Know Children

LearningTip #14:
Starting the New School Year:
Getting to Know Children
Supports Reading, Writing, and Learning Growth

The child that has traveled to the beach, felt the sand squish up between her toes, collected seashells, felt a wave roll in up to her knees, and watched the seagulls soaring overhead will find it much easier to learn information about the ocean than the child who has never had these experiences. Additionally, the child who has collected postcards from all over the world will be more motivated to learn geography. Experiences build background for future learning, enrich vocabulary, and broaden interests that motivate learning.

Teachers, homeschoolers, and parents who teach content can use the child's interests and experiences to support that child's learning. Further, when children share experiences in class, the experiences of the other children are enriched. Finally, the child that relates his/her experiences to new information will be able to conceptualize the information much better than children who lack those "cognitive hooks." This conceptualization results in strong learning that goes into more meaningful, long-term memory. Children who lack experiences and background often resort to memorizing--this is usually short term learning that will diminish easily with time.

There are several ways that teachers can get to know their students and use this information to support student growth. Parents can also help teachers get to know their child. Homeschooling parents can use interests to strengthen learning and provide relevance for the content.

Teacher Tips

When teachers find out about students' pets, hobbies, interests, and experiences, they can:

establish rapport with the child more easily,
communicate to the child that s/he cares about him/her,
relate the content that the child is learning to what s/he already knows,
help children in the class benefit from the knowledge, interests, and experiences that various children have,
use interests and experiences to motivate children to read, write, and learn,
help children experience more success, and
show children how school content relates to their lives.

1. Administer an interest inventory to find out about a child's interests. Click here for an interest inventory that you may consider using with your students.

2. Implement the "Getting to Know You" strategy as described in Creating Classrooms for Authors and Inquirers, second edition by Kathy G. Short, Jerome C. Harste, and Carolyn Burke (1996).

Students are told that they will be interviewing each other to produce a class newspaper, magazine, Open House scrapbook, or book that people will be reading.
Students read and discuss interviews from previous years, magazines, and newspapers.
The students brainstorm questions to ask during the interviews.
The students pair up and conduct their interviews. They are encouraged to take notes during their interviews so they will be able to remember the information. Each student makes the decision about what and how much to write down. The notes taken during the interviewing can include pictures, words, and phrases.
Students use their notes to write or dictate an article about the person they interviewed.
Once the students produce rough drafts, they take them to Author's Circle to get suggestions for revision. It is better for the person who is the subject of the interview to not be a member of the Author's Circle.
Following the Author's Circle, the interview is revised and sent to the Editor's Table and then put into a publication--magazine, newspaper, Open House scrapbook, or book that is shared with others.

3. Implement a Class Expert strategy. Over the course of the first few weeks of school, have each student identify at least one topic that s/he knows a lot about. Devote a class bulletin board to displaying class expert topics with student names. When children are working on projects, learning new content, or writing reports spotlight children with related topics who can help the other children learn the information and work on projects.

4. Put students in interest groups when teaching them about conducting research. Students who are interested in their topics will ask better research questions and be more motivated to use a wide variety of resources to answer those questions. In addition, grouping by interest makes it easier for students to maintain focus on the topic and concentrate on learning about research procedures and report writing.

5. Encourage children to read about their interests. Read and/or suggest books related to students' interests. This is an excellent way to motivate children to read independently.

6. Encourage children to share their interests, hobbies, and collections in class. This often helps children discover other things that they'd like to learn or read about.

7. Provide almanacs, single volume encyclopedias, and other references for children to peruse in their free time. Some outstanding examples of these resources are included in the KidBibs Virtual Bookstore (in association with Amazon.com) at the beginning of this LearningTips article. Reading these resources often generates curiosity that can broaden interests and stimulate learning.

Parent Tips

1. Encourage your child to share his/her interests, hobbies, collections, scrapbook, etc. with the class during Show and Tell. Talking about something that s/he enjoys and knows a lot about helps him/her speak with confidence in front of a group and broadens the language, learning, and experiential background of the other children in the class.

2. Help your child write a book about him/herself. The name of the book could be your child's name. For young children, one page could be devoted to drawing a picture and completing each of the following statements:

My name is ____________.
This is my family.
My pet is a ____. Its name is _____.
My favorite book is _________.
My favorite toy is _________.
After school, I like to __________.
When I grow up, I want to be a ______.

The pages of the book could be stapled to the decorated cover and delivered to the child's teacher at the beginning of the school year. In addition to telling the teacher about the child's interests, this also tells the teacher about the child's writing and drawing. This gives your child's teacher a starting point for delivering appropriate instruction.

3. Use your child's interests to reinforce content learned at school. For example, if your child plays soccer and is learning about fractions at school, phrase fraction problems that use the child's interest in soccer (i.e., There are 12 children on the soccer team. One-fourth of the children got sick. How many children got sick? How many children would be left to play the game?)

4. Encourage your child to read--the more s/he reads, the better s/he reads. Give your child opportunities to read materials related to his/her interests. Subscribe to a children's magazine related his/her interests.

5. Provide almanacs, single volume encyclopedias, and other references for your child to peruse. These also make good books to keep in the car. These books often stimulate curiosity, broaden interests, promote learning, build background, increase vocabulary, and motivate independent reading. Several excellent examples of these books are included in the secure KidBibs Virtual Bookstore (in association with Amazon.com) at the beginning of this article.

Homeschooling Tips

Homeschooling families have several advantages in the use of interests and experiences to support learning. In addition, since homeschooling occurs in homes and other real world settings, parents are able to take advantage of the tools and resources that are familiar to the children. Since homeschooling parents already know the interests and experiences of their children, they can easily relate new information to the knowledge, experiences, and interests of their children.

1. Provide almanacs, single volume encyclopedias, and other references for your child to peruse. These also make good books keep in the car. These books often generate curiosity, broaden interests, stimulate learning, build background, increase vocabulary, and motivate independent reading. Several excellent examples of these books are included in the secure KidBibs Virtual Bookstore (in association with Amazon.com) at the beginning of this article.

2. Use your child's interests to reinforce the skills and content that you teach him/her. For example, if your child plays soccer and is learning about fractions, phrase fraction problems that use the child's interest in soccer (i.e., There are 12 children on the soccer team. One-fourth of the children got sick. How many children got sick? How many children would be left to play the game?)

3. Encourage your child to read--the more s/he reads, the better s/he reads. Provide children opportunities to read materials related to his/her interests. Subscribe to a children's magazine related his/her interests.

Many homeschooling families "co-op" with other families to provide instruction and learning experiences. In this type of situation, the following strategies might be appropriate:

4. Implement the "Getting to Know You" strategy as described in Creating Classrooms for Authors and Inquirers, second edition by Kathy G. Short, Jerome C. Harste, and Carolyn Burke (1996).

The children are told that they will be interviewing each other to produce a class newspaper, magazine, Open House scrapbook, or a book that people will be reading.
The children read and discuss interviews from previous years, magazines, and newspapers.
The children brainstorm questions to ask during the interviews.
The children pair up and conduct their interviews. They are encouraged to take notes during their interviews so they will be able to remember the information. Each child makes the decision about what and how much to write down. The notes taken during the interviewing can include pictures with the words and phrases.
The children use their notes to write or dictate an article about the person they interviewed.
Once the children produce rough drafts, they take them to Author's Circle to get suggestions for revision. It is better for the child who is the subject of the interview to not be a member of the Author's Circle.
Following the Author's Circle, the interview is revised and sent to the Editor's Table and then put into a publication--magazine, newspaper, Open House scrapbook, or book that is shared with others.

5. Implement a Group Expert strategy. Over the course of the first few weeks classes, have each student identify at least one topic that s/he knows a lot about. Devote a bulletin board or book to displaying expert topics with student names. When children are working on projects, learning new content, or writing reports, they will be able to obtain the assistance of the "child expert" who can help them learn the information and work on projects.

6. Put children in interest groups when teaching them about conducting research. Children who are interested in their topics will ask better research questions and be more motivated to use a wide variety of resources to answer those questions. In addition, grouping by interest makes it easier for children to maintain focus on the topic and concentrate on learning about research procedures and report writing.

7. Give the children an opportunity to share their interests, hobbies, and collections with the other children. This often helps children discover other things that they'd like to learn or read about.

LearningTip #15 and #16 focus on helping children read textbooks and other types of informational writing.

The KidBibs Virtual Bookstore! For the convenience of our readers, and in association with Amazon.com, KidBibs offers the following related resources for secure online purchase:
For 5 to 8-year-old children: The Kingfisher First Encyclopedia Our Planet Earth How Things are Built Everyday Things and How They Work The Visual Dictionary of Animals	For 9 to 12-year-old children: The Kingfisher Children's Encyclopedia The World Almanac for Kids Scholastic Encyclopedia of Sports in the U.S. The Visual Dictionary of Everyday Things The Visual Dictionary of Flight