I recently worked with a student who, by every measure, is bright and capable. But before we even began each day, the child would tell me how bad they were at reading and writing, listing what they couldn’t do, as though bracing me for some inevitable disappointment.
This wasn’t an ability issue. The student had many strengths, but focused almost entirely on deficits and imperfections, and made little if any mention of any capabilities or accomplishments.
It’s hard not to connect this to a broader culture that prizes performance, competition, and constant excellence. But naming those forces doesn’t help the learner sitting in front of me. What I can do is ensure that in my literacy work with students, every student knows they matter. Not only for what they produce, but for who they are and for the unique, curious, wonderfully specific thoughts and ideas they bring with them each day.
This isn’t just feel-good thinking. There is a growing body of research on what it means to matter, to feel seen, valued, and significant, and the findings are clear: when students experience a genuine sense of mattering, they are more willing to engage, more likely to take risks, and more able to persist through challenges. They become more secure learners. They perform better.
So how might this translate to literacy instruction?
Find the Strengths in Every Student
What we consistently notice and verbalize has an impact on students’ sense of themselves as learners and their identity as readers and writers. When our attention focuses only on errors or finished products, students may begin to internalize a narrow and discouraging view of themselves. Intentionally noticing and naming small, specific strengths, not just the outcome but the effort and the thinking, changes that picture.
In Reading Recovery, the practice of Roaming Around the Known is built on exactly this principle, a deliberate effort to understand what a child can do, what they know, and what matters to them, however meager those strengths may appear at first. That same stance can shape text selection, conversation, and instructional decisions in powerful ways.
Some examples of language might include: “I noticed you went back and reread when something didn’t look right.” Or: “You used what you know about that word to figure it out.” Or simply: “You stayed with that idea and kept working on it.”
Value Students for Who They Are
Beyond noticing what students do, we can also help them feel valued for who they are and how they think. Each student brings unique ways of thinking, expressing ideas, and engaging with texts. We can honor their unique perspectives by inviting multiple interpretations of a text and positioning students’ contributions as meaningful. We can encourage students to draw on their own experiences and perspectives in their writing, and highlight the ways students support and influence one another in discussion.
This requires selecting texts and topics that actually matter to students, ones with ideas that invite students to see themselves and add something real to the conversation. Teacher language can support the visibility of students’ contributions by deliberately naming how one student’s thinking builds on another’s or returning to student ideas and inviting others to extend or respond to them. Anchor charts with language stems for discussion can support students’ ability to do this themselves (“I agree with what _____ said because ____” ).
When students see that their ideas are taken seriously by their peers and teachers, they begin to understand something important: they are not just completing tasks. They are meaningfully contributing to a community of readers and writers.
Be Alert to Anti-Mattering Experiences
We also need to notice language, actions, and materials that may unintentionally communicate to students that they don’t matter, or that they are less visible or less valued than others. This can happen when only certain voices are heard, when instructional materials don’t reflect the diversity of students’ lives and experiences, or when some languages and ways of speaking are welcomed while others are not.
In literacy instruction, where students are often revealing their thinking, these experiences accumulate. When students feel invisible or unheard, they become less willing to take the risks that reading and writing require. By making space for more voices, slowing down to respond to student thinking rather than just listening for correct answers, and reflecting on whose perspectives are present in our materials, we can build more inclusive learning environments.
Bringing it Together
Helping students know they matter is not a feel-good add-on to literacy instruction. It is central to it. When students feel seen, valued, and included, they are more willing to engage in the complex work of reading and writing, more likely to take risks, persist through difficulty, and see themselves as capable.
As we plan instruction, we can ask how our teaching will help each student understand that they matter, and that the class is genuinely different because they are part of it.
