Journal of Early Childhood Literacy

Drawing on theoretical perspectives related to play and identity, play as a literary and social text, and multimodality, I present an analysis of a play narrative centred on the theme of playing house. The narrative exemplifies the interconnections between literacy and identity in the social and cultural world of a young girl growing up in a multilingual, multi-literate household in an inner-city area of a western Canadian city. The example brings to the forefront how systematic examinations of children’s play narratives have the potential to contribute to current thought on literacy learning and self-construction in early childhood. Understanding the imagined identities children portray in play may be particularly revealing in terms of understanding how they position themselves in the world.

This article draws on evidence from a small-scale study carried out in two early years classrooms. The study investigated an approach that appeared to enable very young children to construct and to write an argument. Multi-disciplinary theoretical perspectives are utilized for an explanation of the findings, with the work of Kress (1989) and Andrews (1995, 1997) on the nature of argument itself, Donaldson (1993) and Bereiter and Scardamalia (1993) on the value of writing to structure and develop thinking, being the most prominent. The case studies discussed here show that 5-7 year olds can engage with contentious, real-life issues and if offered structured support, they are able not only to produce written texts in the argument genre but their thinking also develops. A collaboration between professionals from different fields of education which aimed to support children’s learning in literacy reaffirms the impressive competence of early years pupils.

The study of deaf children’s early literacy raises fundamental issues about their access to language, experiences of early interaction and literacy development. However, we currently understand very little about how young deaf children develop literacy skills given their exceptional linguistic circumstances. This review explores early literacy practices in the homes of young deaf children to identify the commonalities and differences apparent in spoken language and sign bilingual homes. The introduction of the Newborn Hearing Screening Programme (NHSP), which is currently taking place, aims to diagnose congenital deafness in the first few weeks of life, followed by immediate involvement of a team of professionals with the child and family, including a teacher of the deaf. This provides a unique opportunity to explore early literacy practices in homes, and identify ways in which teachers and parents/carers can work collaboratively to facilitate deaf children’s early literacy development.