Development of the metalanguage and the acquisition of literacy: A progress report

Abstract

Our research interests over the past decade have focussed on the nature and consequences of literacy. In pursuit of these interests, we have advanced a theory of the relationship between the development of literacy and oral language competence, a theory which takes literacy as involving not only the ability to read and write but also a particular orientation to language, mind, and the world. Our effort has been to contribute to a general theory of the nature and consequences of literacy which would throw new light on the problems of learning to read and write. Our guiding assumption was that reading and writing are not simply skills which children acquire. Rather, learning to read and write are aspects of coming to live in and to understand and participate in a literate society, a literate society being distinguished by, at least, the following four properties: a tradition of writing and accumulating texts; the development of institutions for using texts; an evolved metalanguage for interpreting and otherwise orally talking about written texts; and institutions, primarily schools, for the induction of children into this literate society.Many writers have attempted to characterize these distinctive properties of a literate society, including such scholars as Havelock, McLuhan, Goody and Watt, and Ong. Our stance, based on the work of these writers, has been to look for evidence that a central dimension of literacy is the development of a particular attitude toward language, the treatment of language as an object, or, in other words, the treatment of text as an autonomous representation of meaning. What children 136Interchange 18/1-2 © The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 1987

How literacy in its fundamental sense is central to scientific literacy

“…The above conception of reading implies a relationship between authors, their texts, and the readers of those texts. (Applebee, Langer, & Mullis, 1987;Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987;DeCastell, Luke, & MacLennan, 1986;Torrance & Olson, 1987). The key to reading according to this expansive model is the mastery of literate thought, which brings the thinking involved in interpretation to a conscious level.…”

Discurso Educativo Letrado De Professoras Alfabetizadoras De Diferente Perfil Pedagógico

“…Forma parte das características desses usos da linguagem para falar sobre textos escritos a formulação de perguntas sobre informação conhecida; a solicitude de nomear e descrever; o uso de verbos que se referem a estados cognitivos, emocionais e aos usos da linguagem (TORRANCE; OLSON, 1987;WATSON, 1989WATSON, , 2002.…”

“…Outros autores têm ressaltado que esse léxico é o que se precisa para fazer definições, para citar ou parafrasear partes do texto, para resumir, descrever, explicar, interpretar, contrastar inferências, colocar em relação um texto com outros textos para fazer pensar e falar/ escrever sobre o escrito (OLSON, 1994;TEBEROSKY et al, 2006;TORRANCE;OLSON, 1987). Por isso, os pesquisadores concordam em salientar que essas características se superpõem com aquelas próprias do discurso educativo (ASTINGTON; WATSON, 1989WATSON, , 2002.…”

“…Trata-se de uma medida usada em estudos relativos à fala sobre textos (ASTINGTON; TORRANCE;OLSON, 1987;WATSON, 1996) e sobre o discurso letrado na sala de aula (Teberosky et al, 2006). …”

“…É próprio da fala sobre textos escritos citar ou parafrasear o escrito para comentá-lo e interpretá-lo, isto é, para pensar no que quer dizer, seu significado e sentido (OLSON, 1994). Essas atividades discursivas requerem o uso de abundante terminologia metacognitiva e metalinguística e, de fato, a quantidade e diversidade de verbos que se referem atividades cognitivas e linguísticas constituem um indicador do caráter letrado do discurso (ASTINGTON; TEBEROSKY;et al, 2006;TORRANCE;OLSON, 1987;WATSON, 1996WATSON, , 2002.…”