Guiding Questions Revisited

As the semester comes to a close, I decided to revisit my guiding questions from the beginning of September and investigate what I've learned.

1. Which literacy theory is best for me to use in my future classroom? How will I discover this? How will I modify it to best suit the way my students learn?

I believe that with experience I'll eventually discover a way in which I believe teaching is most effective, and how to best modify it to fit my students needs. I think this is something I cannot read in a book, or as someone else about, it is something I need to discover on my own as I grow and learn as a teacher. I already have so much more of an idea of what I want my classroom to look like in the future (see my next post) because of everything I've seen this year. I now realize that keeping this guiding question was immensely important to my growth as a teacher. The choices I made regarding my instruction of not only Leo, but how I interacted with the children and their classroom environment revealed many opinions I didn't know I had regarding literacy instruction. I believe literacy teaching should be child-centered, meaning it should be based on a child's interests and goals - leading to motivation. It also needs to be authentic and purposeful for a child. Without these things, I do not believe children will learn to love reading and writing, and I think that children who love reading and writing are probably going to be better at reading and writing. 
2. How do children's ideas about literacy and self-efficacy regarding literacy affect their learning? How do they develop this efficacy and can it be changed later in life?

I was not able to focus on this aspect of my guiding questions. It still interests me - but since my target child had reasonable self-efficacy regarding his reading and writing skills (he knew he couldn't read, but it didn't seem to bother him) I wasn't able to examine how if affected him.
(Added October 5th)
3. How do I help children who lack motivation? How do I get a child excited about books and open their eyes to the wonder of reading?

As I learned with Leo, motivation is key to learning. I now believe that children's choice in what they read and write is absolutely crucial to their level of motivation. Leo would not exhibit the same enthusiasm he has for Star Wars books or books about cats if they were basal readers like Dick and Jane. I believe this motivation also comes from a purpose to their learning, and when it comes from real and authentic sources.