Elementary students’ perspectives on a curriculum for literacy education^*

* The research reported in this paper was carried out at University of Minho, Portugal.

Abstract

This article arises out of an initiative to implement a curriculum designed to enhance the literacy learning of elementary school children in Portugal. Researchers explored students’ perspectives about the experienced curriculum through the enactment of group interviews. Thematic analysis of the conversations revealed positive opinions and feelings about the learning experience. It further showed students’ representations about the experienced curriculum, namely their acute awareness of the specialised dimensions of language that shaped the learning content and the importance of such learning. The analysis unveiled the key role students attributed to situated playful practice in the learning process, side by side with agency, collaboration and ICT mediation. Explicit learning, transformed practice and formative forms of assessment were other valued pedagogical dimensions. On the whole, this research brings empirical support to a sociocultural understanding of a literacy curriculum for elementary grades, an original contribution made from the perspectives of learners themselves.

Keywords:

• Elementary school education
• literacy curriculum
• group child interview
• children’s perspectives
• specialised language
• play

Notes

* The research reported in this paper was carried out at University of Minho, Portugal.