Reflection on School-wide Literacy This course on education has provided me with significant insights regarding teaching and learning in the classroom environment. One of the major insights I have obtained from this course relates to strengthening student literacy. An important aspect of enhancing student achievement and improving graduation rates at a school is strengthening student literacy (Irvin, Meltzer & Dukes, 2007). This essentially means that students’ literacy skills have huge impact on their achievement as well as a school’s graduation rates. This paper provides a reflection of what I have learned in this course on student literacy as an important factor in promoting and enhancing student achievement. The reflection covers various issues including how the course has modified my self-knowledge, observation of the school’s literacy program, and the role of collaboration, technology and instructional leaders in enhancing school-wide literacy.

Impact of the Course on my Self-knowledge

As part of learning about school literacy and other important aspects of promoting student achievement, I completed an analysis assignment that involved reflection on self-knowledge of my beliefs and attitudes regarding language, culture, and literacy. Learning in this course has modified my self-knowledge on these different aspects and their role in the educational environment. I have learned that language skills play an important role in a student’s understanding of learning concepts, particularly those relating to reading and writing. For a student to demonstrate the desired language skills, he/she needs to enhance reading and writing skills. Without appropriate reading and writing, language development becomes a major challenge for...

For teachers, culture affects the teaching techniques or approaches while it affects students’ learning styles and language development skills. This impact is primarily based on the influence of culture on beliefs and philosophies about teaching and learning. In this regard, I have learned that my philosophy about teaching and learning as well as teaching approaches/techniques are influenced by my culture. Through this course, I have also discovered that my perceptions about literacy are influenced by cultural factors. Based on these cultural factors, I have always viewed literacy as an individual component that can only be strengthened when students take responsibility for their own learning or become active learners.
Choice of Literacy Program Improvement Target

The course has shaped my understanding of the need for collaboration and involvement of other stakeholders in strengthening literacy and enhancing student achievement. The application assignments demonstrated the significance of collaboration in school-wide literacy program. As a result, my self-knowledge influenced my choice of collaboration between different stakeholders as a literacy program improvement target. Prior to undertaking this course and the application assignments, I did not realize that parents and other external stakeholders have a role to play in strengthening student literacy.

However, the course has changed my perspective regarding the role parents and other stakeholders play in this process. The role of parents in helping strengthen student literacy originates…