How Children Learn: Getting Beyond the Deficit Myth

by Fayden,Terese

• ISBN13: 9781594511042
• ISBN10: 1594511047
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-05-01
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

The inspirational stories of young learners in this book discredit assumptions behind recent educational reforms, including high stakes testing and No Child Left Behind policies. The experiences of the American Indian children and the author, a kindergarten teacher, challenge the widely held assumption that minority children enter school 'at risk'. Deficit theory assumes that minority children are responsible for their failure by cultural deficiency or family ineptitude. Fayden vividly shows how truly equitable treatment of minority children can improve students' inherent abilities to learn and can result in higher achievement for minority and all young children.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Lalia I. Bartolome	ix
Foreword
Henry M. Levin	xv
Acknowledgments	xvii
Introduction	1	(8)
1 Background	9	(20)
2 A Short History of the People	29	(8)
3 The Social Construction of Knowledge	37	(26)
4 The Children's Pre-History of Writing	63	(22)
5 The Emergence of Writing	85	(26)
6 Curriculum: Two Kinds of Literacy	111	(30)
7 Multiculturalism Enacted: An Equity Pedagogy	141	(46)
References	187	(14)
Index	201	(6)
About the Author	207