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Concepts About Print
When we’re growing up as children, between the ages of three and five, we all learn how
to read and write. As teachers, we need to let children construct written language for themselves
before they can learn how it works. We read in Owocki’s text that, by letting children construct
their own written language and understand it they build new knowledge in a way that makes
sense to them. Children learn the functions, features, and forms of language and literacy.
The four functions of literacy are environmental, occupational, informational, and
recreational. Environmental print teaches children information about the world surrounding
them; some examples are labeling chairs and tables around the classroom in both Spanish and
English. Occupational print is involved in specific jobs and is different for each job; children
may see this type of print when they go to the doctor’s office or play in dramatic play in their
classrooms. Informational print is print that gives you information about things; some examples
are newspapers, text books, information books. Finally, recreational print is simply books,
articles, letters; any type of print that is read simply for pleasure.
While being read to and practicing writing and reading in the classroom and with their
family, children build on their story knowledge and story schema. Story schema allows us to
understand and organize new stories and experiences within reading (Owocki). Schema building
involves assimilation and accommodation of the knowledge that we learn. Children assimilate
when they make more room for information by expanding a category of knowledge they already
have built. Children accommodate when new information is completely reorganized into their
previous knowledge. This new knowledge and new experiences are of story elements, story
genre, story structure, and text-to-text, text-to-self, and text-to-world connections. Story elements
have to do with the fact that stories have specific settings, characters, a plot and resolution, a
sequence of events, consequences, and lessons or meanings behind them. Children learn different
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Concepts About Print
types of story genres; poetry, folk tales, fairy tales, fables, tall tales, porquai tales, nonfiction,
fiction, informational, expository, and content-area reading. Story structure involves the
knowledge that there is a beginning, middle, and end to every story. Text-to-text connections are
made when children notice similarities or differences between varying examples of print. Textto-self connections are made when children remember and recognize similarities or differences
between their own personal experiences and print. Text-to-world connections are made when
children recognize similarities or differences between worldly experiences and print.
Children also learn the features and forms of print while learning to read and write. One
of the first things that children learn in reading and writing is that print carries meaning. After
this discovery, children begin to make sense of the grapho-phonemic knowledge that shows that
written language must correspond with oral language and the relationship between letter sounds
and written representation of the letters. They also learn that this written language can be easily
interpretable. They learn that letters and words are written in linear fashion and that written
language is predictable. The forms of print have to do with genre and they also teach children
that all print has a purpose.
I analyzed during two different times with two different children. Unfortunately I was
unable to analyze the same child in all of the tasks. I analyzed younger four-year old Rihanna in
a preschool classroom setting during free play on book knowledge and knowledge of story print.
She responded in many of the expected ways for her age and she had a very clear interest in
hearing me read to her rather than answering my questions, which was also expected. During my
analysis of knowledge of story print, she gave the expected responses for most of the questions.
When I turned the book upside-down she still thought that we could read it, but when I asked her
why we could still read it she realized and said “wait, we can’t read it this way.” Also, asking the
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Concepts About Print
question about what ‘by’ meant on the title page naming the author was not applicable because
the story simply said the author’s name. I still asked this question and she gave me no response.
She was very good at interpreting her own stories from the pictures in the book and at
remembering things from the story.
I analyzed older four-year old Aileen, an English-as-a-second-language learner, in a
preschool classroom setting during center time on written language concepts and reading
concepts. She made it very clear that she was an avid reader and writer. When I asked her “why
do people write?” she answered with “because they like to write and make something.” She
answered almost every question about writing and reading in this fashion. She also had very little
difficulty doing the things I asked her to do because she enjoyed drawing and writing for me. She
enjoyed drawing many pictures of her own and writing on her own, as well as drawing what I
had drawn as an aid for the questions on a separate piece of paper. She had a bit of trouble
understanding the difference between writing and drawing though because when I asked her
“what do you write at home?” she said “I can write a sun!” She didn’t have trouble
differentiating between the two but it seemed like the language was a bit confusing to her. She
made it very clear during the reading concepts analysis that a lot of people read to her at home, in
Spanish, and that she had a lot of favorite books that she liked to listen to and look at. She also
asked me what a language was when I asked her if she spoke any, after I explained to her “a
language is the way that we speak” she replied with “I can speak in Spanish.” Towards the end
of this assessment, Aileen got a bit bored and wanted to go to another center, but she didn’t get
upset when I proceeded to ask her a couple more questions for my analysis. She also seemed
very intrigued and excited when I was taking notes while she answered my questions.
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Concepts About Print
At the end of my analysis it seemed that both of these girls had very good presentation of
their skills and their knowledge of the concepts of print. It was indeed unfortunate that I was
unable to analyze one of the two girls on all four tasks, but I learned a lot about how well these
girls have been taught in school as well as at home. Aileen seemed like she had a lot of help in
her language and literacy development and she seemed to learn and interpret with much ease.
Rihanna seemed to have a bit less aid, but had no trouble with being discouraged about reading,
writing or learning in any way. Both girls seemed to be at an average or above average level of
development in their knowledge about concepts of print.
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Book Knowledge Notes
1) What’s this called (showed the Rihanna the book)?
a. “It’s raining.” (Book was Rain Play by Cynthia Cotton)
2) What do you do with the book?
a. “Open it, read it.”
3) What’s inside the book?
a. “The story, pictures.”
4) Can you show me how we would read the book together?
a. Opened the book so that we could read it together and pointed to the writing
on the first page.
5) Show me a page in this book.
a. Pointed and said “this is a page.”
6) Where is the top/bottom of this page?
a. Pointed to the middle, top, and bottom of the page.
7) Where is the beginning and the end of this story?
a. Flipped to the first page and said “this is the beginning, and this is the end.”
Flipped to the last page.
Story Print Knowledge Notes
1) Hand book to Rihanna; read this to me.
a. At the first book she said “I can’t, we can get another book.” She
then walked over to the open bookshelf and chose another, smaller, book to
read together. She came back to me and sat next to me with the book open so
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Concepts About Print
that we could read it together. The book was a series of poems titled by each
month with picture next to them. “Sure, I can read this, which do you want to
read?” Rihanna said. She invented her own stories using the pictures as a
guide.
2) Can you show me where I should begin? Where should I go next?
a. Pointed to the words in the middle of the page and the next page.
3) How about you point to the story now while I read it?
a. Pointed to the second phrase on the page as I read the first phrase.
4) Turn book upside down; can we still read this?
a. Yes.
5) Show me the name of the book.
a. Pointed to the name of the poem on the page that we were currently on.
6) Tell me something about the story.
a. “In the summer we play in the rain and wear sunscreen.” (the book was about
rain in the summer time when it’s hot and still rains out.)
Written Language Concepts Notes
1) Offered five different colored pieces of paper, a white sheet of paper, and a white
lined sheet of paper. Offered markers, pens, or pencils. Write for me?
a. Chose colored paper and began by drawing with paint-glue sticks, and then
Aileen asked for my pen and drew a couple hearts on her pink piece of paper.
She asked for an orange piece of paper next and made a rainbow using the
paint-glue sticks. Above the rainbow, she wrote in marker and asked me to
guess what she had written.
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2) Can you read me what you wrote?
a. “it says a rose!”
i. When I pointed to different letters in the word rose she said “that’s an
r” and when I pointed to the whole word she responded, “that says
rose”
3) What do you write at home?
a. “I can write a sun!” Proceeded to copy the sun that I had drawn on another
piece of paper previously.
4) Do you write at school?
a. “yeah”
5) What do you write at school?
a. “I write everything that I want to write.”
6) Why do people write?
a. “Because they like to write and make something.”
7) I wrote my name and a question on a separate piece of paper. I wrote my name in
print and cursive. I also drew a triangle, a sun, a heart, and a rectangle. Then I put the
paper in front of Aileen and asked “what on this paper is writing?”
a. She pointed to the writing correctly, pointing to my name she said “this has a
‘c’ like ‘see me’ and this is a triangle, and a sun, and a heart, I can draw a sun
too!” She copied a lot of this writing and drawing on her own piece of paper.
8) On the back of this sheet I wrote ‘Aileen, Courtney, Jahvia’, then I asked Aileen if
she could read what the words said.
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a. Pointed to the first name, “This says ‘Aileen’,” pointed to the second name,
“this says ‘see me’” pointed to the last name and said, “this has a ‘j’ like
Jayden and Josue and Jahvia.”
Reading Concepts Notes
1) Do you like to read?
a. “Y
eah”
2) What do you like to read?
a. “A book, a princess book, a basket book.”
3) Do you think it’s easy to learn to read?
a. “Yeah I can read in my house because I like to read”
4) Do the people you live with know how to read?
a. “Yeah”
5) What do they like to read?
a. “Books, but not real books, funny books.”
6) Do they ever read to you?
a. “Yeah, in Spanish.”
7) Who reads to you?
a. “My mom, my uncle, my dad, my brother, and my baby.”
8) What do they read to you?
a. “A princess book, a flower book, a frog book, a bumbaloo book, a tucker
turtle book.”
9) Do you like it when they read to you?
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a. “Yeah”
10) Why do people read?
a. “Cause I like to read.”
11) Do you speak a language?
a. “No, I don’t. What’s a language? I can speak in Spanish.”