Take Piaget's theory of cognitive development for example. While learning about this principle, I had to rely heavily on others' research, and while their findings were interesting, I would have liked some sort of example so that I could wrap my head around the concepts. I wish I could have remembered my own cognitive development.
Anyway, Williams's lesson about how we learn to read and write made me feel the same way. I have to believe what researchers find because I cannot really remember what the experience was like for myself. And now what? Now that science has found the best way to teach reading and writing, is the elementary school curriculum going to change to a top-down method?
Even at my tender age of 21, it is amazing to see how things change just during one lifetime. In ten years, I wonder if kids will still take spelling tests. I wonder if college kids will read over one another's essays and poke fun at the spelling errors with their snide remarks like they do today. It has been so long since I have been in grade school that I wonder if things have already changed. Perhaps my daughter will be able to jilt the spelling test!
Speaking of my daughter, this chapter has inspired me to pay closer attention to the way she makes up stories for her books and "reads" her own writing. She can read and write both of our names (Mommy is my name, though she can write "Katie," too if I remind her how), and other short words. Perhaps Makenzie is the insight I need to grasp this chapter and all the research findings within it. I just need to pay closer attention to her behaviors.
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