Before writing : rethinking the paths to literacy

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Title:

Before writing : rethinking the paths to literacy

Author:

Kress, Gunther, 1940-

ISBN:

9780415138048

9780415138055

Personal Author:

Kress, Gunther, 1940-

Publication Information:

London ; New York : Routledge, 1997.

Physical Description:

xxii, 175 p., [7] p. of plates : ill. (some col.) ; 23 cm.

Contents:

1. Literacy, identity and futures -- 2. "My Gawd, I made it like Australia': making meaning in many media -- 3. Making sense of the world: 'The seagulls are reading the newspaper' -- 4. Drawing letters and writing dinosaurs: children's early engagement with print -- 5. 'You made it like a crocodile': a theory of children's meaning-making -- 6. Literacy and theories of language -- 7. Teaching literacy, learning literacy -- 8. Futures.

Subject Term:

Language arts (Primary)

Reading (Primary)

English language -- Composition and exercises -- Study and teaching (Primary)

Literacy.

Children -- Language.

Copies:

Available:*

Library	Material Type	Item Barcode	Shelf Number	Copy	Status
Searching... 1:IIEMSA	1:GEN-BOOK	33168015702588	372.6 K92B 1997	1	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

Gunther Kress argues for a radical reappraisal of the phenomenon of literacy, and hence for a profound shift in educational practice. Through close attention to the variety of objects which children constantly produce (drawings, cuttings-out, 'writings' and collages), Kress suggests a set of principles which reveal the underlying coherence of children's actions; actions which allow us to connect them with attempts to make meaning before they acquire language and writing.
This book provides fundamental challenges to commonly held assumptions about both language and literacy, thought and action. It places these challenges within the context of speculation about the abilities and dispositions essential for children as young adults, and calls for the radical decentring of language in educational theory and practice.