Authentic Literacy as a Basis for the CRIOP Model in Elementary Classrooms
A Position Paper of the Center for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy
One of the most fundamental underlying assumptions of the CRIOP framework is authentic literacy.
Authentic literacy is the use of oral and written language for real purposes and audiences. In our view,
using written language in real and purposeful ways is essential for all students, but is especially
important for emerging bilinguals, who often come to school having little knowledge of the conventions
of oral and written English. Language learning—any language learning—occurs in rich social contexts.
Yet in our many experiences in elementary classrooms, we have found that written language is generally
taught through a series of decontextualized exercises, removed from real-life uses and applications of
reading and writing. In this paper, we discuss why authentic literacy is important for all students, and
how to make it happen in classrooms.
Whatever happened to authentic written language instruction?
Throughout the past few decades, there have been several seminal research reports that have been
highly influential in literacy instructional practices throughout the US. The most prominent of these
reports was the Report of the National Reading Panel (NRP), published in 2000 (National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development, 2000). It’s important to know that the panelists rather arbitrarily
chose five components of reading to focus on in determining best practices: phonemic awareness,
phonics, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary. Second, they chose to include only experimental
studies in their review, and these types of studies often do not mimic actual instruction in classrooms.
The limitations of the NRP report are well documented, and we will not discuss them here. (See, for
example, Coles, 2000; Garan, 2004; Yatvin, 2002). The resulting report was several hundred pages long
and provided a comprehensive discussion on the five selected components. The authors noted the
positive findings on explicit, systematic phonemic awareness and phonics instruction in the early
primary grades. At the same time, however, they warned that skills instruction should never comprise a
total reading program but rather should be taught within the context of more meaningful literacy
experiences.
Soon, publishing companies saw an opportunity to profit from the findings of the NRP report and began
developing curriculum that was touted as “research-based.” Unfortunately, however, curriculum
developers often ignored the many caveats of the report’s authors and developed explicit skills-based
reading materials that did not allow for authentic, meaningful, real-world applications of literacy. These
curriculum developers also ignored specific statements in the report about the lack of evidence
supporting specific phonics instruction above first grade: “Systematic phonics instruction failed to exert
a significant impact on the reading performance of low-achieving readers in 2nd through 6th grade” (p.
88). Incredibly, some programs not only emphasized phonics over meaningful literacy, but even
controlled teachers’ use of discourse through a pre-determined script.
Highly structured programs such as Open Court and Reading Mastery were sold to districts around the
country to pilot under the Reading First initiative—a federally-funded program that was designed to
raise children’s reading achievement by using the findings of the NRP. Several years later, the federal
government published a large national impact study on Reading First. You can read the findings here:
www.edpubs.gov/document/ed005062p.pdf?ck=83. Essentially what the researchers found was that
teachers in Reading First schools spent more time teaching the five components of reading, but there
were no significant differences in reading comprehension in grades one, two, or three between those
students who received Reading First, and those who did not. The State of California, which adopted Open
Court because it was said to be “research-based,” later reversed its decision because they found no
significant improvement in students’ reading achievement.
That is not to say that knowing letter-sound relationships is not important in learning to read. Research is
fairly conclusive that phonemic awareness and systematic phonics instruction is critical in early literacy.
At the same time, it’s vital that we recognize that written language is language, and therefore to develop
written language proficiency, students must use it and be supported in its use through frequent exposure
to real literacy models.
We believe that one glaring omission of the NRP is that they never looked at the strong link between
children’s proficiency in oral language and their reading ability. The research is compelling: Children who
have a good oral language base tend to be more successful readers (Foorman & Connor, 2011; Gee,
2007; National Institute for Literacy, 2008; Shanahan & Lonigan, 2013). In our opinion, this omission has
had devastating consequences, particularly for students who come to school lacking in oral language.
Research shows that this is true even for emerging bilinguals. English learners who have a strong base
in their native language tend to learn English more easily (in both its oral and written forms) than those
who lack proficiency in their native language (August & Shanahan, 2006; Garcia, 1991).
Why is authentic literacy important?
When children learn to read and write, they are learning the conventions of written language. Just as
importantly, they are learning what written language “sounds like.” This language is very different from
the typical non-formal oral language of students’ homes and communities, which generally occurs within a
specific social context. When we only focus on the “bits and pieces” of written language, children cannot
always understand how the pieces all fit together or how those pieces relate to real reading and writing.
Further, children who lack oral language proficiency are hindered in their language growth through
programs that do not allow for rich uses of literacy. In fact, all children suffer because they are not being
exposed to the more decontexualized language of books. That’s why it’s important that skills are always
applied within real, purposeful contexts and that children are exposed to written language in all of its
forms: poems, chants, essays, information texts, articles, literary texts.
Now, think about the demands of our emerging bilinguals as they learn a new language. Certainly, they
need to learn the “labels” for things; but when presented outside of a specific context, these labels
become meaningless. When it comes to learning the language of math, or science, or social studies,
English learners certainly need to learn content-specific vocabulary (as do all learners), but they also
need to learn how those words are expressed within a discipline—those “mortar words” that hold the
“brick words” together within a sentence (Zwiers & Crawford, 2011). Too often teachers teach the
“labels” and the content-specific vocabulary words without providing a linguistic structure for using
those words. Students can only learn that linguistic structure when they actually use the words to
express meaning through speaking or writing.
Students who are learning English also can benefit from knowing letter-sound relationships; but
consider how confusing phonics instruction is to a child when the letters are not put within the context
of a known word. (This is the real problem with those “phonics worksheets” that often accompany our
basal series. The child must know the label for the picture first—a difficult task for many children, but
especially for emerging bilinguals.)
What does authentic literacy look like?
Consider the differences in this example:

The teacher says “short A says aaah” several times and the children repeat after her. Then they
read a list of short A words and complete a worksheet featuring consonant-vowel-consonant
(CVC) words where children circle pictures that represent words with the short A sound. They
continue to review the list of short A words over the next several days.

The teacher teaches a song that features short A words and emphasizes those words in context.
She underlines them in the lyrics and writes the words on a chart. The children contribute to the
chart and then draw pictures and write sentences using the words, placing those pictures and
sentences next to the appropriate words on the chart. The children sing the song many times
over the next several days and follow the lyrics as the teacher points to the words.
Notice that in the first example, the skill that is being taught is divorced from real reading or writing.
Because the words are presented and continually reinforced out of their linguistic context, the students
must rely solely on their knowledge of letter sounds in identifying the words. In the second example, the
teacher illustrates how phonics skills (such as short vowels) can be used in conjunction with other
linguistic systems (i.e., meaning and grammar) to support word identification. Thus, purposeful language
use is always central.
Some other examples of authentic literacy follow:
1. Students write for real audiences, beginning in kindergarten.
2. Students choose their topics for writing. (Topics are meaningful to them.)
3. Students read to find answers to their questions and write their own information books on
topics that matter to them. (They write to inform others.)
4. Students write letters and notes to one another. (Every classroom can have a mailbox outside
the door.)
5. Students keep a dialogue journal where they write back and forth, asking and answering
questions through writing. (Teachers can also keep interactive dialogue journals with students.
This is a great technique to use with emerging bilinguals.)
6. Students dictate sentences and stories and the teacher writes them down (the Language
Experience Approach). This method makes the oral-written language connection transparent to
children: “What I say can be written down.”
7. Spelling words come from the children’s actual writing. They’re learning to spell words that they
actually use.
8. Vocabulary words are those that children really
An Example from Kindergarten
want and need to learn to in order to understand a
particular text. To be truly authentic, students can
The students in Ms. Gannon’s kindergarten class have
determine what words to learn. What words in this
fallen in love with a therapy dog, Jake, who visits the
text did you not already know? What words in this
class periodically. Between visits, the children write
text do we need to talk about? What words and
letters to Jake, and “Jake” writes them back. Jake
phrases in this text would you like to use in your own
frequently asks the children questions that require
writing? (Especially for English learners, it’s
them to provide more lengthy responses. Through their
important that teachers be intentional in what words
writing, Ms. Gannon can determine her students’ use
they teach. Choose words from math, science and
of phonics, sight words, and language mechanics.
social studies texts that might have different
meanings in different contexts and thus might cause confusion. Teach those words that are
absolutely essential for understanding the concepts being presented. Then, teach the “mortar
words” that are necessary for expressing the concepts. )
9. Students learn letter-sound relationships through environmental print that they’re surrounded
with every day. For instance, a digraph chart might have labels like “Cheerios” and “Cheetos”
and “chocolate shake.” Alphabet charts can have pictures of words in the children’s
environment that begin with that letter, e.g. K is for Kohl’s; S is for soccer. Children can make big
books for their own or other classrooms using environmental print.
Authentic literacy assumes that reading and writing are purposeful. That is, literacy is used to entertain,
to inform, to persuade – to give a real message to a real reader. Teaching only the “bits and pieces” of
literacy does not teach children what literacy is used for;
An Example from Fourth Grade
rather, it sends the message that reading and writing are
merely a series of school-based exercises, not linked to
In 2013, the Bluegrass Pipeline was a hot issue in
the real world of written communication. Like oral
Kentucky. Fourth grade students listened to presenters
language, children only grow in their knowledge of
from the Williams Company and from an environmental
written language when they actually use it. To learn
group and took notes on a graphic organizer. They also
language, we must use language.
read about the pros and cons of the pipeline and studied
the features of effective letters to the editor. Finally,
Consider these other examples, which are applicable at
they chose a side and wrote their own letters. Several
more advanced stages of literacy:
of their letters were published in the local newspaper.
1. Students learn about characterization in order to
develop their own characters for a story they’re creating. (The same would be true for any story
elements.)
2. Students use oral and written language to persuade by writing essays or letters to the editor
that are published in the newspaper on a real world issue.
3. Students respond to texts in authentic ways, through “book club – like” discussions, written
responses that are shared with classmates, etc.
4. Students have real conversations about a book with a partner, reading together and then
stopping to make connections, inferences, and predictions.
5. Students read a text and then think about what questions were just answered through that text.
What have they learned? Then they come up with questions that were not answered and do
additional research.
6. Students use drama in authentic ways: to develop reading fluency, to demonstrate vocabulary
words, to rehearse a scene for their own writing prior to writing it, to teach content to others
(e.g., scenes from history), etc. For example, prior to adding dialogue to a piece, have students
act out the scene.
7. Students learn vocabulary in the act of reading and writing. For instance, as they’re reading
their books independently, they can jot down words they don’t know the meaning of along with
the page number. This would be followed by a whole class discussion that examined the
vocabulary word and its context.
Why is authentic literacy important for children who are learning to use written language, and especially
for emerging bilinguals?
Consider how we learn oral language. Typically a proficient language user will be a model for the infant.
We might repeat something like “dad-dy” over and over, enunciating the sounds. Yet at the same time,
we are pointing to that man who is standing next to the crib, beaming at his little girl! When a child says
“ju… ju…” we say back to him, “Do you want some juice?” Then we hand him the cup, reinforcing his
emerging use of language. Thus, we always provide a context for learning language along with proficient
models of oral language use.
An Example from Fifth Grade
Students in this high poverty school often face
violence in their neighborhoods. Late one summer, a
shooting occurred outside a store located very close to
the school. Their teachers encouraged their students
to take action against violence. Working with the local
police department, students planned a “Take Action
Day” at the local park and wrote letters inviting the
mayor, chief of police, fire chief, superintendent, and
other local dignitaries inviting them to the event.
They wrote essays relating to violence on topics such
as bullying, violent video games, and gun control.
Some students wrote raps. At the Take Action Day,
students signed a pledge to practice non-violence and
several read their essays and performed their raps.
Others introduced local officials who spoke at the
event. The next day, the event was prominently
displayed on the front page of the local newspaper.

Written language is language; thus, the context is equally
as important in learning written language as in learning
oral language. We might pull out individual words, or
letter sounds, or phrases, and examine those more closely;
however, without the written context, these sounds,
words and phrases have no meaning.
In summary, there are many important reasons to use
authentic literacy practices for promoting written language
growth. Among them are:
 Written language is language. Similar to oral language
development, the forms and conventions of written
language can only be learned by using written language for
genuine communication.
 Real books, articles, poems, essays, etc. provide
important models of written language for students. These
models are essential for students’ linguistic development.
 Students need to read and write real literary and
information texts versus “contrived” texts to learn
academic language and vocabulary.
When written language is used in authentic ways, students understand WHY they are learning to
read and write, and hence they are more motivated to engage in literacy.
We suggest you take a close look at your classroom. Are your children primarily engaged in literacy
“exercises” (for example, worksheets, filling in boxes, etc.) or are they reading and writing real,
authentic texts? In what ways are you encouraging students to use academic language in writing and in
conversation? How much choice do students have in the texts they read, the subjects they research,
and the topics they write about? How much do children actually use language in your classroom? How
do you scaffold their language growth?
References
August, D. & Shanahan, T. (Eds.). (2006). Developing literacy in second-language learners: Report of the
National Literacy Panel on Language-Minority Children and Youth. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Coles, G. (2000). Misreading reading: The bad science that hurts children. Portsmouth, NH:
Heinemann.
Foorman, B. R., & Connor, C. M. (2011). Primary grade reading. In M. L. Kamil, P. D. Pearson, E. B. Moje,
& P. P. Afflerbach (Eds.). Handbook of reading research (Vol. IV, pp. 136-156). New York:
Routledge.
Garan, E. M. (2004). In defense of our children: When politics, profit and education collide. Portsmouth,
NH: Heinemann.
Garcia, G. (1991). Factors influencing the English reading test performance of Spanish-speaking Hispanic
children. Reading Research Quarterly, 26(4), 371-392.
Gee, J. P. (2007). Reading and language development: Beyond limited perspectives. In J. Larson (Ed.),
Literacy as snake oil (revised edition), pp. 9-25.
National Institute for Literacy (2008). Developing early literacy: Report of the National Early Literacy
Panel. Retrieved from: http://lincs.ed.gov/publications/pdf/NELPReport09.pdf
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (2000). The report of the National Reading
Panel. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
Shanahan, T. & Lonigan, C. J. (Eds.). (2013 ). Early childhood literacy: The National Early Literacy Panel
and beyond. Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes.
Yatvin, J. (2002). Babes in the woods: The wanderings of the National Reading Panel. Phi Delta Kappan
83(5), pp. 364-369.
Zwiers, J., & Crawford, M. (2011). Academic conversations: Classroom talk that fosters critical thinking
and content understandings. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.