Scientific Basis

Meaningful Learning

Our Conceptual Perspective

As we know from genetic epistemology and social interactionist theory, mental activity is at the core of the learning process, whereby individuals construct their own representations of knowledge rather than deriving them solely from external objects. Therefore, to be meaningful, learning requires that individuals elaborate and test hypotheses in response to a situation or problem, channeling their own affective, motivational and relational resources. Learning occurs at the interplay between the individual’s developmental stage, their prior knowledge and the quality of interactions with the objects around them.

When interactions are mediated by an experienced partner (whether in an adult-child or adult-adult relationship), the learning context enables individuals to challenge, modify and expand their hypotheses, while establishing connections with their prior knowledge. Likewise, interactions between children may also support this process, regardless of explicit intentionality. Meaning-making requires the construction of legitimate and substantive relations between new objects to which individuals are exposed and their existing knowledge structures (MEC, 1998). From this point of view, education is primarily concerned with mediation as a way of sharing and building upon the knowledge accumulated by humanity over the course of generations.

The Role of Mediation

Cognitive development studies generally recognize children as active agents of their own learning, whose exploration of cultural and symbolic objects is mediated by the adults around them (Teberosky, in press). When it comes to language acquisition and development, for example:

Adults model the use of language by repeating, reformulating, and expanding what children say. However, children do not only learn by listening, they must participate in communicative situations and have frequent opportunities to use (produce) language […]. Children will build a repertoire and develop forms of communication from their own use of language, not mere exposure to it […]. In order to learn a particular language structure, children must first have numerous examples so as to identify regularities and establish patterns” (Sepúlveda and Teberosky, 2016).

In other words, adult-child interactions are interdependent: children need language input from adults in order to develop their own resources, while adults need children’s output to adjust their responses and advance their communicative relation (Teberosky, in press).

For instance, during early childhood, adult mediators help derive meaning from texts for children who cannot yet read on their own: “If and when explored properly, [books] are the starting point for children to talk and ask questions about their form and meaning” (Cardoso, 2014). Parents and grandparents are often the first adults to play this role, and other professionals such as teachers, librarians, and booksellers later join them as children become more familiar with the literate world (Reyes, 2014).

A more experienced mediator can enable children from an early age to talk about different aspects of a text, whether related to linguistics, metalinguistics, or content. By knowing exactly why and how to read specific kinds of text, adults can shed light on their graphic features (e.g. punctuation marks, typography, size, etc.) and other literary choices (e.g. characters, narrator perspective, vocabulary, timeframes, etc.)” (Cardoso, 2014).

In short, adults play a fundamental role in a child’s learning process, in which all that they observe and experience impacts their development, for better or for worse. Therefore, as mediators of how children interact with the world, adults set examples through their attitudes and choices.

SOURCES

BRASIL. National Curricular Parameters (PCNs). Introduction. Primary Education. Brasilia: Ministry of Education / Primary Education Department, 1998. Retrieved from http://portal.mec.gov.br/seb/arquivos/pdf/livro01.pdf

CARDOSO, B. Literary Mediation in Early Childhood Education. CEALE Glossary: Literacy, Reading and Writing Terms for Educators. Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, MG, 2014. Retrieved from www.ceale.fae.ufmg.br/app/webroot/glossarioceale/verbetes/mediacao-literaria-na-educacao-infantil

CASTANHEIRA, M. L. Interaction. CEALE Glossary: Literacy, Reading and Writing Terms for Educators. Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, MG, 2014. Retrieved from http://ceale.fae.ufmg.br/app/webroot/glossarioceale/verbetes/interacao

REYES, Y. Reading Mediators. CEALE Glossary: Literacy, Reading and Writing Terms for Educators. Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, MG, 2014. Retrieved from http://ceale.fae.ufmg.br/app/webroot/glossarioceale/verbetes/mediadores-de-leitura

SEPÚLVEDA, A; TEBEROSKY, A. (2016) Children and Early Reading and Writing Practices. In: Ministry of Education, Basic Education Department. Children as Readers and Authors. Reading and Writing in Early Childhood Project, Vol. 6 (1ªed. pp. 59-93). Brasilia: Ministry of Education / Basic Education Department.

TEBEROSKY, A. (in press) Children and the Construction of Writing Knowledge.

Why Language?

INDIVIDUAL DIMENSION

Language is thought; thought is language

Language acquisition gives children access to a symbolic meaning system, a resource to transform lived experience into knowledge. Language is deeply intertwined with learning: language is both acquired and used in the construction of new knowledge through speaking and thinking. According to Tomasello (1999), just as glasses amplify human vision and megaphones the human voice, language amplifies thinking.

Recent psychological and linguistic studies demonstrate that language learning is far from a static, external process confined to dictionaries and grammar books. It is instead dynamic and intrinsic to each subject, whose interactions with other speakers engage their perceptions, motivation, emotions, sociability, and cognition.

Sociologists and educators often identify “cultural inequality” as a key source of disparities in language development. Explanations focus on the role of social contexts and practices, irrespective of economic factors.

These fields show us that social outcomes are also related to individuals, although it might be difficult to understand the ‘individualized social experience’. This process is referred to as as inculcation or incorporation. However, we call it ‘social construction’ because it does not result from direct transmission, but from contexts of interaction in which children learn to deduct and reconstruct cultural and linguistic practices for themselves” (Teberosky, 2016).

Early Childhood Interventions and Future School Performance

+11,2%

Children who attend preschool for one or two years are 11,2% more likely to complete high school.

Reynolds et al., 2001

The lack of quality interactions during early childhood affects future academic performance. However, the gaps that emerge in those years become evident only after they have directly impacted a child’s learning opportunities: fewer stimuli often results in lower grade completion and a higher risk of being held back or dropping out of school.

Investments in Early Childhood: Financial Return and Social Impact

$12,9

For every $1 dollar invested in early childhood, society earns $12,9 as a result of higher incomes and lower expenses to mitigate poverty, criminality and disease.

Belfield et al., 2006

Children capable of using language are better able to actively and constructively think and learn. For that reason, investments in language development from an early age impact later educational attainment and influence productivity, income, and quality of life. Studies have shown that the period from 0 to 10 years of age is the most important for individual development, with higher rates of economic return and social impact. Thus, policies that target early childhood may not only reduce inequality but generate significant financial gains for society.

Poverty and Language Skills

Δ 30%

Disparities in early stimuli may lead to a 30% vocabulary gap by the age of two, which can affect children’s future learning trajectories.

Fernald, Marchman e Weisleder, 2013

Researchers have found that parents of higher socioeconomic status (SES) talk to children more than their lower-SES counterparts (Hart and Risley, 1995). This affects vocabulary and language processing efficiency, creating a six-month gap between children as young as two years of age.

SOURCES

Becker, K. L. (2013). Uma análise econômica da relação entre a educação e a violência. Tese de Doutorado, Escola Superior de Agricultura Luiz de Queiroz, Universidade de São Paulo, Piracicaba.

Belfield, C., Nores, M., Barnett, S., & Schweinhart, L. (2006). The High/Scope Perry Preschool Program: Cost-Benefit Analysis Using Data from the Age-40 Followup. The Journal of Human Resources, 41(1), 162-190. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/40057261

Cunha, F., & Heckman, J. J. (2010). Investing in our young people (Discussion Paper No. 5050). Bonn: Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).

Fernald, A., Marchman, V. A. & Weisleder, A. (2013). SES differences in language processing skill and vocabulary are evident at 18 months. Developmental Science, 16, 234–248. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/desc.12019/abstract

Hart, B., & Risley, T. R. (1995). Meaningful differences in the everyday experience of young American children.

Reynolds, A. J., Temple, J. A., Robertson, D. L., Mann, E. A. (2001) Long-term Effects of an Early Childhood Intervention on Educational Achievement and Juvenile Arrest: A 15-Year Follow-up of Low-Income Children in Public Schools. JAMA, 285(18), 2339–2346.

Teberosky, A. (2016). A linguagem de 0 a 5 anos. São Paulo, SP: Laboratório de Educação.

Tomasello, M. (1999). The cultural ecology of young children’s interactions with objects and artifacts. In E. Winograd, R. Fivush, & W. Hirst (Eds.), Ecological Approaches to Cognition: Essays in Honor of Ulric Neisser (pp. 173-150). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Focus Areas

Our work is structured around children's developmental language trajectory from 0 to 10. We focus on three different stages that address key challenges and opportunities facing the Brazilian education system.

0 TO 5

Learning Language

Language learning begins through adult-child interactions and intersubjective processes. The quantity and quality of verbal input that young children hear in everyday communicative situations enable them to gradually build the necessary schema to not only engage others in conversation but also to use language while reflecting on it. In addition to the models offered, adults may contribute to language development by interpreting, repeating, expanding, and/or reformulating what children attempt to say. For this reason, they are not merely "external variables" but rather key components in this process.

Learning Language

6 TO 8

Reading Corner

The ability to comprehend and produce narratives is central to the development of oral language skills, and also facilitates learning how to read and write. However, it requires that children ages 6 to 8 already possess advanced cognitive and linguistic skills. The challenge at hand is not only for children to understand the events of a story but also to use their prior knowledge of narrative structures to establish connections and make inferences. In this context, hearing adults read stories aloud helps children both learn language and about language, even before they are able to read independently.

Reading Corner

9 TO 10

Learning to Study

Education systems worldwide face the challenge of promoting language as a tool to access knowledge. Towards the end of elementary school, textbooks increasingly employ dense, abstract, and unfamiliar language commonly used by subject-area experts. Therefore, when learning to study content-knowledge, students must become familiar with field-specific vocabulary and textual structures. In order to navigate the world of knowledge with autonomy, children must simultaneously learn about language content, form and function.

Learning to Study

Research

At Laboratório de Educação, we incorporate ground-breaking academic research into our platforms and methodologies, and we also seek to produce new knowledge in the field of education through our work.

Materials and Literate Practice

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Summary

In 2012, we conducted a qualitative pilot study on the use and appropriation of didactic resources available in the Trilhas instructional materials distributed by the Ministry of Education to first-grade teachers in over 2,800 municipal school districts. Trilhas proposes reading and writing activities that use children’s literature to enhance early literacy classes.

Participants were asked to follow the “Guidebook for Stories with Deception”, which proposes eight activities related to children’s books with main characters that deceive others or are deceived themselves. The goal was to compare how four first-grade teachers with different pedagogical and professional backgrounds in São Paulo and Mato Grosso used and appropriated this resource, in light of instructions to reflect on the language they use to introduce and conduct the proposed activities (i.e. the literate discourse suggested in the guidebook).

Materials and Literate Discourse

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Case Study: PNAIC

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Summary

In partnership with UNESCO, we conducted interdisciplinary research on the National Pact for Literacy at the Right Age (PNAIC) between 2013 and 2014.

Through case studies in four municipalities of São Paulo state, we analyzed variables associated with the implementation of this nationwide teacher-training program and examined its impact on educational actors. Our work traced the program from the ongoing professional development of teacher supervisors led by local public universities to the classroom practices of literacy instructors.

Aprender a Estudar Textos

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Summary

Based on results from a 2014 pilot study, we analyzed and improved the clarity of explanations regarding the linguistic and visual characteristics of 4th- and 5th-grade History textbooks. We also enhanced the guidelines for activities that prepare students for text-based study (reading aloud, vocabulary, and communication and comprehension), and detailed the planning process in order to use these didactic materials in teachers’ lessons on specific subject areas.

In 2015, we studied the linguistic and visual characteristics of the most common 4th- and 5th-grade History textbooks distributed through the National Textbook Program (PNLD 2013). The results of this analysis served as the basis for the Learning to Study texts manual and was later replicated by a doctoral student at the Institute of Education at University of Lisbon.

In 2016, we authored three articles that justify the manual’s didactic choices: “Adjusting Text Layout to Analyze Information”, “Creating Visual Aides to Study Texts”, and “The Use of Diagrams in 4th– and 5th-Grade History Textbooks”.

Learning for All

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Summary

In late 2016, we became a partner of the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s “Learning for All” research project, led by Professors Paola Uccelli, Felipe Barrera-Osorio and Sara Dryden-Peterson. “Learning for All” is a comparative, multi-disciplinary, and multi-method investigation focused on two main questions: (1) Why does so little learning take place systematically in urban public schools serving vulnerable populations globally, and (2) What are promising local and global levers to improve learning for all in these schools?

With support from the recently-created Lemann Research Fund, the study attempts to shed light on the conditions that influence educational quality. In Brazil, Laboratório de Educação was responsible for translating, adapting and validating the research instruments, as well as collaborating with São Paulo’s Municipal Secretary of Education to identify the 10 schools that comprised the final sample.

Throughout four months, we administered language tests and socio-demographic questionnaires with students from the Regional Education Boards of Campo Limpo, São Miguel and Capela do Socorro. We also conducted 12 in-depth ethnographic case studies with students and observed in-class practices and interactions using the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS).

Scientific Basis

Meaningful Learning

Our Conceptual Perspective

The Role of Mediation

SOURCES

Why Language?

INDIVIDUAL DIMENSION

Language is thought; thought is language

SOCIAL DIMENSION

Early Childhood Interventions and Future School Performance

+11,2%

Children who attend preschool for one or two years are 11,2% more likely to complete high school.

Investments in Early Childhood: Financial Return and Social Impact

$12,9

For every $1 dollar invested in early childhood, society earns $12,9 as a result of higher incomes and lower expenses to mitigate poverty, criminality and disease.

Poverty and Language Skills

Δ 30%

Disparities in early stimuli may lead to a 30% vocabulary gap by the age of two, which can affect children’s future learning trajectories.

SOURCES

Focus Areas

0 TO 5

Learning Language

6 TO 8

Reading Corner

9 TO 10

Learning to Study

Research

Materials and Literate Practice

Summary

Materials and Literate Discourse

Summary

Case Study: PNAIC

Summary

Aprender a Estudar Textos

Summary

Learning for All

Summary