Beyond Covid: Moving Forward, Healing, and Feeling Grounded in Early Literacy
Online from Monday 17th to Thursday 20th May 2021
In many ways, the Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated shifts in our communicative repertoires and literacy practices, including those of our youngest citizens. Simultaneously, the impact of material, digital and social inequalities on young children’s ‘right’ to literacy have been rendered visible. Political and public concern over children’s ‘lost learning’ and the need for ‘catch-up’, coupled with reductionist approaches to assessment currently dominate debate and pose challenges to broader conceptualisations of literacy in early education.
In the UKLA 2021 Research Symposium, leading commentators in the field of early literacy will look beyond the Covid-19 pandemic and share insights into how we can move forward in thinking about early literacy.
A panel of experts will explore the opportunities that have emerged to further our understandings of early childhood literacy and respond to the question “Where do we go from here?”
Over four days, the symposium seeks to explore:
- What Covid-19 has meant for young children’s literacy practices
- How different theorisations of literacy enable us to overcome deficit views of ‘lost learning’ and view literacy as a space for healing
- What are the most pressing issues for literacy in early education?
- Where research should go from here
