8085 MD4 Discussion 4

Hi, my name is Katie Gonzalez. I am a teacher and a title one school and powder Springs, Georgia. And I wanted to share today with my early literacy advocacy plan is, I first of all, believed that early literacy begins well before kindergarten. Children who enter kindergarten very significantly and language and literacy skills and abilities. Some children with gaps in school readiness, which occur well before kindergarten, may struggle with difficulties of being on grade level for reading proficiency much later. The gaps and school readiness or due to a lack of early exposure to language and literacy development in a child's life. These gaps occur from birth, the issues that need to be addressed. And then is the need for language and literacy development for all children, especially those from low socio economic families. We know that the first three years of a child's life are essential in developing literacy skills through interactions with literacy materials, such as books, stories, papers, crayons, pencils, and other writing materials. The problem is that not all children can access these experiences. Experiences, or materials. As a teacher, I have seen the difference between children who are exposed to these kinds of materials and activities early in life and those who have little experience. There are many organizations currently that advocate for early literacy for young children. Organizations like the National Association for the Education of Young Children. That any YB, YC, they focused on setting a framework for early childhood professionals by offering research-based teacher focused on articles and academic journals about literacy for children birth to age eight, that any EY see values high-quality early childhood care programs. And as a result, they offer accreditation for childcare centers and meet research-based standards based on evaluations done by the organization. Parents and families can rest assured that childcare centers that are NaCl credited or high-quality centers that are used research-based practices to support the development of young children. Macy also advocates for early childhood education by staying informed and public policies and offering opportunities for others to advocate by providing resources to help stay on top of early literacy topics for young children. Now, zero to three is another organization that supports the development and well-being of young children ages zero to three, help families and caregivers as they care for young infant, infants to toddlers. Zero to three uses the science of early childhood development to share valuable resources, tools, and policies that affect parents, professionals and policymakers. These organizational websites offer many practical resources for families and educators. There are opportunities to get involved in events and impress upon Congress the needs of infants and toddlers, which is essential to my advocacy goal of communicating the importance of early literacy for low-income families and communities. Another organization highlighting early childhood literacy importance is the global family research project. Their version believes and the benefits of family engagement and the connections made between school, school's after-school programs, libraries, and digital media. The global research project regularly interacts with local, state, and federal decision-makers to advocate for family and community engagement. This organization uses helpful research-based articles and blogs supporting early literacy for low-income families and communities. There are many policies and regulations associated with early literacy for low-income families. Research, research suggests phonological awareness at the preschool level is a predictor of Early Learning Success. Research also indicates that on average, African-American and Latino students enter kindergarten seven to 12 months behind in reading skills. To counteract these learning gaps, the Every Student Succeeds Act, or also known as essa, is a bi-partisan re-authorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which gives policymakers options to help close the achievement gaps. This new act follows States and allows states more of a voice. And how schools account for school achievement, which includes the achievement of disadvantaged students. Parents have students are also given a chance to weigh in on state run school plants. There are many benefits to policies and regulations centered around early literacy and learning. Specifically in the area of early literacy. One of us is most critical regulations and policies is a need for high-quality early learning programs, which includes high-quality teacher preparation programs. Research shows that high-quality birth through third grade early learning promotes healthy social, emotional, language and literacy development and strong academic achievement. Title one, preschool programs are utilized through essa to promote free preschool education for at-risk students with low academic achievement. Title One funds help students who fail to meet challenging academic standards by offering kindergarten, having full day programs, providing teacher professional development, supporting students transition from early learning to kindergarten, and expanding family engagement programs. Was student achievement a priority standardizing test comes with the territory. Ethical factors that shape the issues of early literacy for low-income students are that not all students fit into a one-size-fits-all mentality. With this in mind, standardized testing needs to account for the different needs of all students. Early literacy teachers understand the importance of data collection to inform instruction, diagnosed and implement intervention plans and communication with stakeholders like parents. However, early childhood literacy assessment needs more and more balanced and a responsive approach. A responsive approach should look at purposeful and ethical data that looks at the child as an individual and focuses on the next steps that will move the student further. Responsive research-based approach to student assessment is necessary to meet the needs of all students. Policy changes need to be made to make that change required to increase early literacy experiences. Education for all students. As an advocate, changing policy begins by speaking up, starting with voting for politicians that support the need for early literacy for all students. Another aspect of advocating is understanding how policies are established. E.g. the Senate and the House have committees that take on specific policy areas. One of these committees is a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, which has to jurisdiction over education and is responsible for the legislation like this committee has advocates that meet with Committee staff to advocate for issues like early literacy for low-income children. Early Literacy for low-income students is an advocacy topic that many stakeholders influence. The first group of stakeholders is the students themselves. Many statistics show that students from low socio economic backgrounds begin Kindergarten below that of their middle socio-economic peers in cognitive skills and remain that way throughout school. Families and families and the home improvement, or excuse me, the home environment affect a child's early literacy because they promote literacy and determine the child's amount of literacy activities that occur in the home. These activities occur through reading, parental enjoyment of reading, oral language and vocabulary, oral language and vocabulary and expressive language. Early childhood educators also influenced the topic of early literacy by offering education to families and children through explicit phonics instruction, read alouds, vocabulary instruction, comprehension, and fluency. Many organizations are linked to advocating for high-quality education and education equality. These organizations promote early literacy and education for the child and the whole family. Educators can also benefit from the work these organizations do in the classroom. E.g. jumpstart works with schools to read for the record. Jumpstart provides books for the classroom and digital readouts for students to access. Everybody wins is a non-profit, volunteer based organization that promotes children's love of reading through read alouds and shared reading experiences with people who care and love to read. The program includes a power lunch where children are paired up with adults for reading. This program and others are based on volunteers, donations, and gifts given to the organization. The organization puts together an impact report that establishes the needs for the programs and students served. Served. Highlighting partnerships with businesses and the impact of their donation may have impact of data report in forums and impacts future decisions made by the organization. The organization advocates for children to not only have passing test scores, but also to support social emotional needs for children who, who need to feel engaged, encouraged, and inspired. Everybody wins, is a wonderful organization that promotes social, emotional, and early literacy skills so that students will gain a love for reading. Everybody wins, relies on donations and money and books, volunteer readers and volunteers to become mentors. Another wonderful organization that advocates for individ, individualized attention for under-resourced communities is Jumpstart. Jumpstart was founded by four college students who wants to serve underserved children before they enter kindergarten to help them attain critical academic and social skills that will jumpstart them to succeed. Early literacy is one of the many JumpStart's needed to succeed. The organization's vision is that every child will enter kindergarten ready to succeed. Jumpstart is founded, are funded through grants, donations, professional fundraising, program, service, revenue, and investments. Jumpstart uses data from comparison studies to look at a number of students who have made gains in literacy skills over the last year. The studies also provide data using a teacher observation tool. Indicates what percentage of students made language and literacy gains and data that measures student gains on district assessments. The data collected gives jumpstart information and how to proceed for the next year. The children's literacy initiative is another organization that advocates for early literacy and children reading on grade level. This organization aims to provide resources and materials to educators through professional development, workshops, coaching in seminars. The target audience for this organization is the educator. The organization donates books and on level reading materials that balanced fiction and non-fiction genres that appeal to students interests. Educators benefit from donations to classroom libraries that make teaching students to read on grade level possible. The children's literacy initiative offers services to school leadership. That offer it offers administrators guidance on what to look for when walking through classrooms. The program offered through the children's literacy initiative or independently evaluated and use data to inform program decisions. The program is funded through school district contracts, government funding, private philanthropy, and investment income. My advocacy plan is to partner with my schools local library to develop partnerships with the public library in early childhood educators in the area to promote family engagement centered around early literacy. The library staff and educators will collaborate to provide workshops for family foot local families discussing literally literacy topics centered around family engagement in activities families can do at home. These advocate, excuse me, these activities center around literacy and include phonological awareness, reading comprehension, and vocabulary. Another workshop will focus on activities offered by the public library in school libraries including mobile book carts, mystery readers, hosting a book ferry to visit classrooms in creating family engagement kits for families to take home. The overall advocacy goal is to ensure that children from low-income families are kindergarten ready and to support families in their children's education. To reach his advocacy goal within the first six months, a team of at least six members, three from the local school and three from the public library, will make up a committee and plan to plan at least five workshop presentations. To make this goal achievable. Educators and library staff will need to be surveyed to, to identify who will be interested in volunteering to leave and help with the workshops. Once teachers and library staff have been identified, they will come together to develop a plan for workshops and family engagement opportunities. For the next two years, the committee will need to find donors, volunteers, partners in the community in grant funding to put together family engagement literacy kits. These kits will include leveled readers, site where games, phonological awareness games and activities, and letter cards and games for three local schools. The goal is to build relationships, relationships with community members, and develop partnerships with organizations to support the plan financially. During these two years, the goal be to partner with schools to provide book carts, mystery reader programs, book fairies, and sponsored events to bring families into the library. Over the next five years, the goal is to increase the area of impact by reaching out to five public libraries and three scores per library, impacting at least 15 title one public schools. The goal is to support families as they educate their children in early literacy and ensure that children have access to education and materials to be ready for kindergarten. The goal of this advocacy plan is to make sure that students who come from low socioeconomic families will have the same opportunities as children who are from middle socio economic status. Support for families and resources will be available in preschool to encourage equity. Ethically, this advocacy plan is supported by the NAC code of ethics. Ideals for children. Ideal 1.9 is to advocate for and ensure that all children, including those with special needs, have access to the support services needed to be successful. The ethics NAC code of ethics also states in ideal 1.12 to work with families to provide a safe and smooth transition as children from families move from one program to the next. These ideals can be measured by impact reports that will be available yearly. Impact reports will include the programs vision and mission, that community's needs. Data collected on how families attend the program. School assessment data from kindergartens of schools involved in the program. Data will be monitored to determine the program's overall effectiveness, to ensure that goals are being met. In conclusion, the early literacy advocacy plan I have outlined is critical to me because of my work with kindergarten in Oakland. In a kindergarten classroom. I work in a title one school and see firsthand the importance of early literacy for future academic success. Poverty negatively affects material and learning resources. My advocacy plan aims to bring support to families and in turn, improve the academic success of all students. Thank you.