Teachers foster discussions of books, encouraging learners how to talk about the moral and ethical issues presented in literature, or to connect fiction with their own lives. Small groups report on information they have learned from books, or they select a cutting and present it as a reader's theatre for the class. Children turn stories into scripts, rehearse them, and present them as puppet shows, plays, audiotapes, or videotapes. Children usually choose the topics they want to write about. Teachers sometimes demonstrate writing by putting the children's contributions onto experience charts that can then be read together.
Children write and illustrate their own books that are shared with the class.
Children meet in small groups to read their own writing and get responses from their peers. Children meet in pairs to edit their written work together before copying it for publication. Teachers support student-centered learning by creating a literate environment, stimulating interest by helping children connect new experience with previous experience, and facilitating the learners' achievement of their own intentions. Teachers integrate the language arts by developing the curriculum around broad themes, such as Indians or mammals. Whole Language is rooted in the seminal work of John Dewey, Lev Vygotsky, Jean Piaget, James Moffett, James Britton, Michael Halliday, Donald Graves, Margaret Donaldson, Gordon Wells, Glenda Bissex, Kenneth Goodman, Anne Haas Dyson, and Shirley Brice Heath.