Showing posts with label Reading Comprehension. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reading Comprehension. Show all posts
Reading Comprehension Strategies 2.0
I do small group reading both decoding and comprehension strategies. It is explicit, intensive, persistent instruction. I do mine in small and large groups. Small groups allow me to focus in on the specific skill the group's needs. I find this is a great easy way to differentiate students because each student does not need to be in the same reading material--they are grouped to practice the specific comprehension skill.
To become good readers, most students require explicit, intensive, and persistent instruction. In explicit comprehension strategy instruction, the teacher chooses strategies that are closely aligned with the text students are reading. The teacher models and "thinks aloud" about what a given strategy is and why it is important, helps students learn how, when, and where to use the strategy, and gives students opportunities to apply the strategy on their own.
Modeling is followed by practice, guided by the teacher, who works with students to help them figure out how and when to use the strategy themselves. As students read, the teacher provides feedback and engages them in the discussion. In subsequent lessons, the teacher asks students to apply the strategy on their own to other texts.
I stumbled upon Padlet. I had used Padlet in professional classes but I had never taught about using it with students. It wasn't until I wanted to replace stickie notes with a paperfree version, I came back to Padlet.
I love not having a billion stickie notes "flying" around lose and getting lost as well. My students love using it on the iPads. I love they can share with each other and give feedback. I use Padlet to help them plan and monitor their comprehension. My hope is this will help them complete their non-fiction projects.
To improve self-monitoring, the teacher may model for students how to do one or all of the following:
- think about what they already know before they start reading and during reading;
- be aware of whether they understand what they are reading;
- employ strategies to identify difficult words, concepts, and ideas;
- ask themselves: "Does this make sense?"; and
- be aware of how a particular text is organized.
One of the most important features of explicit instruction is the teacher's gradual release to students of responsibility for strategy use, with the goal that students apply strategies independently. However, teachers do not ask students to work on their own until the students have demonstrated that they understand a strategy and how and when to use it.
The Primary Comprehension Toolkit from Heinemann (grade K-2) allows me to teach specific comprehension skills in a sequence that makes sense to the reader. The student does the work--I have to listen to how they are applying the strategies to text.
My students LOVE expository text (non-fiction). Most of the reading students do throughout their schooling — indeed, throughout their lives — will involve expository text. Without an understanding of the organization of such text, students often have difficulty understanding what they read. Unlike a narrative, an expository text has no familiar storyline to guide students' reading. To read expository texts successfully, students must learn that authors may use a variety of structures to organize their ideas, including cause-and-effect or compare and contrast relationships, time-and-order sequences, and problem-solution patterns. Indeed, students need to know that authors may use some or all of these structures in any given chapter or section of a text.
They need to learn that expository text can differ from narrative text in the way it is presented on a page. For example, expository text may be organized by means of text headings and subheadings and may contain extensive graphics, such as tables, charts, diagrams, and illustrations. Instructional practices that facilitate students' understanding of expository text include helping them learn how to:· chunk information in a text by grouping related ideas and concepts;
They need to learn that expository text can differ from narrative text in the way it is presented on a page. For example, expository text may be organized by means of text headings and subheadings and may contain extensive graphics, such as tables, charts, diagrams, and illustrations. Instructional practices that facilitate students' understanding of expository text include helping them learn how to:· chunk information in a text by grouping related ideas and concepts;
- summarize important information in a text by grouping related ideas and concepts;
- integrate information in a text with existing knowledge;
- apply information in a text to real-world situations;
- interpret and construct graphics such as charts, tables, and figures;
- synthesize information from different texts; and·
- develop presentations about the text
We have been working monitoring comprehension and knowing when you have fallin' off the road. When reading this lesson in the Primary Comprehension Toolkit, I was thinking no big deal, they've got it. Well for students how have never been asked to really think about what they are reading this was a huge shock.
My hope in using the Primary Comprehension Toolkit and Padlet is to have students think more critically about what they have read to in turn create new works that show how they created meaning strategically in reading and writing. This set of strategies being tied to their Personalized Learning Plans. I'm hoping to see great products but I'll have to wait until next week to see what students do. Be sure to checkout Padlet and play with how it can help your students monitoring their own comprehension.
I also use my Reading Strategy Posters. They are great for reminding students to use strategies while they are working on their own. They are perfect for ELLs, students who need additional language supports, and Depth and Complexity posters to challenge students as well. You can grab your copy below.
I also use my Reading Strategy Posters. They are great for reminding students to use strategies while they are working on their own. They are perfect for ELLs, students who need additional language supports, and Depth and Complexity posters to challenge students as well. You can grab your copy below.
Tested--Now What?? Reading Comprehension
A quick note as I'm getting ready for Spring parent-teacher conferences this week. One of the assessments I'm helping my classroom teachers with is the DRA (Developmental Reading Assessment). Even though it has fallin' by the wayside, my teachers and I love having a solid number where students are reading at.
FYI the DRA can be given to students kindergarten to sixth grade. To determine a level students decoding (words on the page) and their comprehension (understanding) and with harder text reading fluency (speed) all of those factors most score at an independent level on the rubric to be at an independent level. The same is true for the Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment Systems.
How what am I going to do with the rest of my year?
Well..what about using the rubric to create skill groups to move students more before the end of the year benchmark get done. After spending the first part of the year teaching decoding with phonics and vocabulary instruction--it know time to really focus on comprehension. One of my favorite ways to work on comprehension is through games. This is one of their favorites, they are always asking for...be sure to get uses here.
More to come on using the DRA or BAS rubric to create goals and instruction. Have a great week.
FYI the DRA can be given to students kindergarten to sixth grade. To determine a level students decoding (words on the page) and their comprehension (understanding) and with harder text reading fluency (speed) all of those factors most score at an independent level on the rubric to be at an independent level. The same is true for the Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment Systems.
How what am I going to do with the rest of my year?
Well..what about using the rubric to create skill groups to move students more before the end of the year benchmark get done. After spending the first part of the year teaching decoding with phonics and vocabulary instruction--it know time to really focus on comprehension. One of my favorite ways to work on comprehension is through games. This is one of their favorites, they are always asking for...be sure to get uses here.
More to come on using the DRA or BAS rubric to create goals and instruction. Have a great week.
February Show and Tell
I'm linking up with Forever in 5th Grade to give you peek into my special education resource room and what my students have been up to in the last month. And wow-have they been busy!
This is one group's comprehension work. I have four groups working through The Primary Comprehension Toolkit at Heinemann Publishing. It takes students' through all the comprehension strategies. I love they can move at their own pace. In my case, I have several the DRA reading levels in each group. The umbrella makeup of each group is the comprehension strategy and the reading material students use is at their DRA reading level.
This picture shows how the group is finishing a "Shared" lesson with a "shared" creation task. They decide HOW they were going to SHOW their meaning. My next step with this group will be to have them do the same lesson on their own. It's great to see HOW they go about SHOWING their meaning.
I have talked in the past about how my school district is very big on higher order thinking skills. Here you can see a different comprehension lesson, where you can see the Essential Question which they have to answer with either an Interim or Summative Assessment--but they do it through the World Class Outcome of "How did you create your meaning Strategically in reading and writing."
In my world, ALL students have to do this. This year my work around has been for students to app-smash their way to creating that meaning. This gets them through their hang-ups of writing or long drawn out projects I don't have time for. Plus, they love any excuse to use technology and I love using it for something other than plug and play. Be sure to follow me on Instagram for great special education resource ideas and more about our reading comprehension work.
So all comprehension groups means a new way to look at IEP goal progress--in the form of Google. This is a great way to be paperless. As students are reading quietly or reading to me I can fill out my notes. I go through everything my decoding and comprehension strategies to target and fluency work.
Stay turned for next months peek into my special education resource room. I'd love to hear how you teach reading comprehension strategies in your guided reading groups. Have a great week.
Ideas to Teach Comprehension Strategies
Reading Comprehension strategies are why harder to see student's use independently than decoding strategies. As a Special Education Teacher, I tend to spend the first part of my year working mostly with decoding strategies and then teaching comprehension strategies the second half. I have found we mat spend weeks on just one to ensure students are using it on their own as they are reading. But their on may bumps along the way.
I have added a couple of examples from my a few groups. You can see how student's make use of their understanding of different comprehension strategies in their reading. These are from modeled and shared lessons. I think the hardest thing for them to understand is how to show hoe they created their meaning strategy and use the keyword #understand what I'm reading. This is what each strategy does in a different way.
A "strategy" is a plan developed by a student to assist in comprehending and thinking about texts, when reading the words alone does not give the reader a sense of the meaning of a text. Reading comprehension strategy instruction has come to the fore in reading instruction at all age and grade levels. By helping students understand how these flexible tools work, I help readers to tackle challenging texts with greater independence.
What They Are?
1. Activating background knowledge to make connections between new and known information. In many classrooms, this instruction is divided into three categories-- text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world.
2. Questioning the text. Proficient readers are always asking questions while they read. Sticky notes (post-its) have become ubiquitous in classrooms in part because they are such a useful tool for teaching students to stop, mark text, and note questions as they read.
3. Drawing inferences. Proficient readers use their prior knowledge about a topic and the information they have gleaned in the text thus far to make predictions about what might happen next. When teachers demonstrate or model their reading processes for students through think-alouds, they often stop and predict what will happen next to show how inferring is essential for comprehending text.
4. Determining importance. In the sea of words that is any text, readers must continually sort through and prioritize information. Teachers often assist readers in analyzing everything from text features in nonfiction text like bullets and headings, to verbal cues in novels like strong verbs. Looking for these clues can help readers sift through the relative value of different bits of information in texts.
5. Creating mental images. Readers are constantly creating mind pictures as they read, visualizing action, characters, or themes. Teachers are using picture books with students of all ages, not necessarily because they are easy to read, but because the lush and sophisticated art in these books can be a great bridge for helping students see how words and images connect in meaning-making.
6. Repairing understanding when meaning breaks down. Proficient readers don't just plow ahead through text when it doesn't make sense -- they stop and use "fix-up" strategies to restore their understanding. One of the most important fix-up tools is rereading, with teachers demonstrating to students a variety of ways to reread text in order to repair meaning.
7. Synthesizing information. Synthesis is the most sophisticated of the comprehension strategies, combining elements of connecting, questioning, and inferring. With this strategy, students move from making meaning of the text, to integrating their new understanding into their lives and world view.
Ideas for Teaching
Modeling through think-alouds is the best way to teach all comprehension strategies. By thinking aloud, teachers show students what good readers do. Think-alouds can be used during read-alouds and shared reading. They can also be used during small-group reading to review or reteach a previously modeled strategy.I use a think-aloud to:
- Create a record of the strategic decision-making process of going through text
- Report everything the reader notices, does, sees, feels, asks, and understands as she reads
- Talk about the reading strategies being used within the content being read
- There are many ways to conduct think-alouds:
- The teacher models the think-aloud while she reads aloud, and the students listen.
- The teacher thinks aloud during shared reading, and the students help out.
- Students think aloud during shared reading, and the teacher and other students monitor and help.
- The teacher or students think aloud during shared reading while writing on an overhead, on self-stick notes, or in a journal.
- Students think aloud in small-group reading, and the teacher monitors and helps.
- Students individually think aloud during independent reading using self-stick notes or a journal. Then students compare their thoughts with others.
I use a Model or Shared Lesson to:
- Decide on a new strategy or reteach a strategy to model.
- Other things I think about are:
- Choose a short text or section of text.
- Read the text ahead of time. Mark locations where you will stop and model the strategy.
- State your purpose—name the strategy and explain the focus of your think-alouds.
- Read the text aloud to students and think aloud at the designated points.
- If you conduct a shared reading experience, have students highlight words and phrases that show evidence of your thinking by placing self-stick notes in the book.
- Reinforce the think-alouds with follow-up lessons in the same text or with others.
As a Special Education Teacher, I spend at least one lesson a week during a Modeled or Shared Lesson. As a reading teacher, I have had to work not to be afraid of stopping in the middle of a lesson and redoing or doing a new modeled lesson. Teaching comprehension strategy work is HARD and I spend tons of time listening to and seeing what my students do as they practice independently. I take my time and work for skill mastery not accuracy mastery. How do you teach your reading comprehension strategies? I'd love to hear what works for your students!
What is Effective Comprehension Instruction?
It is Explicit, Intensive, persistent instruction. I do mine in small and large groups. Small groups allow me to focus in on the specific skill the groups needs. I find this is a great easy way to differenate students because each student does not need to be in the same reading material--they are grouuped to practice the specific comprehension skill.
To become good readers, most students require explicit, intensive, and persistent instruction. In explicit comprehension strategy instruction, the teacher chooses strategies that are closely aligned with the text students are reading. The teacher models and "thinks aloud" about what a given strategy is and why it is important, helps students learn how, when, and where to use the strategy, and gives students opportunities to apply the strategy on their own.
Modeling is followed by practice, guided by the teacher, who works with students to help them figure out how and when to use the strategy themselves. As students read, the teacher provides feedback and engages them in discussion. In subsequent lessons, the teacher asks students to apply the strategy on their own to other texts.
Students are encouraged to plan before reading so that reading has a clear goal or purpose, to continually monitor their understanding during reading, and to apply repair strategies when breakdowns in understanding occur. To improve self-monitoring, the teacher may model for students how to do one or all of the following:
· think about what they already know before they start reading and during reading;
· be aware of whether they understand what they are reading;
· employ strategies to identify difficult words, concepts, and ideas;
· ask themselves: "Does this make sense?"; and
· be aware of how a particular text is organized.
One of the most important features of explicit instruction is the teacher's gradual release to students of responsibility for strategy use, with the goal that students apply strategies independently. However, teachers do not ask students to work on their own until the students have demonstrated that they understand a strategy and how and when to use it.
The Primary Comprehension Toolkit from Heinemann (grade K-2) allows me to teach specific comprehension skills in a sequence that makes sense to the reader. The student does the work--I have to listen to how they are applying the strategies to text.
My students LOVE expository text (non-fiction). Most of the reading students do throughout their schooling — indeed, throughout their lives — will involve expository text. Without an understanding of the organization of such text, students often have difficulty understanding what they read. Unlike a narrative, an expository text has no familiar story line to guide students' reading. To read expository texts successfully, students must learn that authors may use a variety of structures to organize their ideas, including cause-and-effect or compare and contrast relationships, time-and-order sequences, and problem-solution patterns. Indeed, students need to know that authors may use some or all of these structures in any given chapter or section of a text.
They need to learn that expository text can differ from narrative text in the way it is presented on a page. For example, expository text may be organized by means of text headings and subheadings, and may contain extensive graphics, such as tables, charts, diagrams, and illustrations. Instructional practices that facilitate students' understanding of expository text include helping them learn how to:
· chunk information in a text by grouping related ideas and concepts;
· summarize important information in a text by grouping related ideas and concepts;
· integrate information in a text with existing knowledge;
· apply information in a text to real-world situations;
· interpret and construct graphics such as charts, tables, and figures;
· synthesize information from different texts; and
· develop presentations about the text
and this one show two examples of the sentence stems.
My hope in using the Primary Comprehension Toolkit is to have student's think more critically about what they have read to in turn create new works that show how they created meaning strategically in reading and writing. This set of strategies being tied to their Personalized Learning Plans. I hoping to see great products but I'll have to wait until next week to see what students do.
Reading Comprehension Strategy: Summarizing
It would come to no surprise to anyone that summarizing becomes more complex as a reader moves from a beginning readers of Level A/1 to those reading at Level 38/P. This makes teaching this reading comprehension skill to a group of readers that span three years-18/J to 28/M to 38/P. (What was I thinking when I agreed to try this?) But this group has made progress than I would have guessed. They have risen to the challenge.
As I started thinking about how I was going to plan the next few weeks with this group, I went back to Fountas and Pinnell's Continuum of Literacy Learning, to see what the summarizing targets looked like. In this case, its the depth that students need to have. (This is a great resource!)
This means my models need to include two different ideas: 1) focusing one beginning, middle, end, with characters, problem, solution, and characters; 2) focusing on summarizing longer texts being more chapter based.
Next, problem what does the summary need to look like and how do I want them to know when they have met the target. But first, I need to find my mentor text to support my modeled lessons. (I could hold story hour for them and they would never mind not working:-))
Knowing I need at least four books covering several different reading levels:
These ones will provide me with different examples for my students.
With models in hand, how do I want students to write their summaries. They will also need the rubric and success criteria. (This is a new push for more. As a building we have just taken on Learning Targets--which my students have loved. This is a tough challenge.) This is success criteria example of a 4 using the DRA scaffolded summary template.
I'll share the examples the group puts together. Have a great week.
As I started thinking about how I was going to plan the next few weeks with this group, I went back to Fountas and Pinnell's Continuum of Literacy Learning, to see what the summarizing targets looked like. In this case, its the depth that students need to have. (This is a great resource!)This means my models need to include two different ideas: 1) focusing one beginning, middle, end, with characters, problem, solution, and characters; 2) focusing on summarizing longer texts being more chapter based.
Next, problem what does the summary need to look like and how do I want them to know when they have met the target. But first, I need to find my mentor text to support my modeled lessons. (I could hold story hour for them and they would never mind not working:-))
Knowing I need at least four books covering several different reading levels:
These ones will provide me with different examples for my students.
With models in hand, how do I want students to write their summaries. They will also need the rubric and success criteria. (This is a new push for more. As a building we have just taken on Learning Targets--which my students have loved. This is a tough challenge.) This is success criteria example of a 4 using the DRA scaffolded summary template.I'll share the examples the group puts together. Have a great week.
Predicting through Synthesis
Last week I shared how I had a reading group where all the students were in different books. Well, this week, they did predicting through synthesis. Predicting is one of those skills that all readers learn how to do early on but well worth revisiting at each reading level because the depth that students must use this skill changes.
I started with a modeled lesson using "Wednesday Surprise." The format was "At first I was think... but while I was reading my thinking change .... Then my thinking changed ... Then my thinking changed again ... My new understanding is ... This format requires students to determine what was important as they are reading so that they can add and change predicting. Remember that synthesis is all the reading comprehension strategies to create a new understanding of the book. The group determining important anchor charts are below.
I started with a modeled lesson using "Wednesday Surprise." The format was "At first I was think... but while I was reading my thinking change .... Then my thinking changed ... Then my thinking changed again ... My new understanding is ... This format requires students to determine what was important as they are reading so that they can add and change predicting. Remember that synthesis is all the reading comprehension strategies to create a new understanding of the book. The group determining important anchor charts are below.
Using "Wednesday Surprise" to get this group started was great but they still need help making the connection between all the pieces needed to using predicting to create a new understanding of the text. So we did "Just a Dream. (I love his books.) We used the same template as before.
This book required the group to also do more inferring because of the pictures. This didn't stop them from creating a new understanding of the book.
This week student's will do this task on their with their own books using the same template. I can't wait to see what they come up with. Tying all these strategies together was not easy for them but in the end they got it.
Have a great week. Stay warm or in my case hang onto something (high winds for yet another day)
New Ideas for an Inferring Unit
This week I have a group of students who are going to move into inferring. Last year, this was one of the best units I taught. I loved watching students make connections between their background knowledge and what they could out of the text. This year, I'm looking to expand what I used.
Why do Student's Need Inferring:
All reading is an active, reflective, problem-solving process. We do not simply read words; we read ideas, thoughts that spring from the relationships of various assertions. The notion of inference equations is particularly powerful in this regard. Readers can use the notion of inference equations to test whether or not the ingredients for a given inferences are indeed present. To show lying, for instance, a text must show that someone made a statement that they knew was incorrect and that they made that assertion with the specific purpose of deception. If they did not know it was wrong at the time, it’s an error, not a lie. If they did not make the statement for the specific purpose of deception, we have a misstatement, not lying.
How Can Inferring Help Writing:
The notion of inference equations is equally useful for writing. Writers must assure that the ingredients of the equation are present and clear, and that the desired relationships are signaled in a clear and effective way. As writers, we must be aware that our readers will interpret our thoughts.
We must strive to make our meaning as clear as possible. We must provide sufficient examples to make our ideas clear, as well as to short-circuit undesired interpretations. We must recognize what evidence is necessary and sufficient for our purpose, and assure that it is included.
And we must choose our terms carefully for accuracy and clarity of meaning, and spell out our exact thoughts in as much detail as possible. We must recognize biases our readers might bring to the text and explain and support our evidence as much as our conclusions. The advice: Buy diapers.
I think I'm going to start out with this video. This video is about synthesizing is closely linked to evaluating. This is a great way to show students how thinking should change as we read...often to a deeper understanding. As older students read more complex plots they will learn to expect the unexpected, inferring meanings and pick up on foreshadowing.
This will make a great opening to the week and help them think outside the box.
From the video, what else do I need to do. Well, I want proficient readers. Proficient readers understand that writers often tell more than they actually say with words. They give you hints or clues that allow you to draw conclusions from information that is implied. Using these clues to “read between the lines” and reach a deeper understanding of the message is called inferring.
Students need to learn how to infer so that they can go below the surface details to see what is actually implied (not stated) within the words of the story. Some meanings are meant to be implied – that is not stated clearly but they are hinted at. When meanings are implied, you have to infer them.
Students make inferences every day without even thinking about it. For example, you can ask children to imagine they are sitting at their desk doing their homework when they hear a loud booming sound and hear pattering against the window. They don’t actually see anything, but they can infer there is a thunderstorm outside. All students recognize the sounds of thunder. They know heavy rain makes a pattering sound. And they know that any time the two go together there is almost a thunderstorm going on.
Inferring with context clues
One way students can infer a word meaning is from context clues within the text. Students have to learn how to work out meanings from these clues. There’s several ways to do this.They can simply make an educated guess using the hints given before the unknown word and the sentences that follow the word. Asking questions is one way to unravel these clues.
I have some ideas for guided reading:
These questions will be very helpful while we are reading to work through unknown words and what they mean. During the guided reading session, the teacher should have these question stems available when students find a word they don’t know the meaning of. The teacher pauses the reading and chooses the appropriate question to ask.
“What do you think the word means considering (a certain action or event) has happened?
“How do you know that the word means (insert definition)?”
“What part of the text helps you make this inference?”
“Where can you find other clues to help you understand?”
“If you substitute what you think is a similar word, would the sentence still make sense?”
My goals for my students include:
Why do Student's Need Inferring:
All reading is an active, reflective, problem-solving process. We do not simply read words; we read ideas, thoughts that spring from the relationships of various assertions. The notion of inference equations is particularly powerful in this regard. Readers can use the notion of inference equations to test whether or not the ingredients for a given inferences are indeed present. To show lying, for instance, a text must show that someone made a statement that they knew was incorrect and that they made that assertion with the specific purpose of deception. If they did not know it was wrong at the time, it’s an error, not a lie. If they did not make the statement for the specific purpose of deception, we have a misstatement, not lying.
How Can Inferring Help Writing:
The notion of inference equations is equally useful for writing. Writers must assure that the ingredients of the equation are present and clear, and that the desired relationships are signaled in a clear and effective way. As writers, we must be aware that our readers will interpret our thoughts.
We must strive to make our meaning as clear as possible. We must provide sufficient examples to make our ideas clear, as well as to short-circuit undesired interpretations. We must recognize what evidence is necessary and sufficient for our purpose, and assure that it is included.
And we must choose our terms carefully for accuracy and clarity of meaning, and spell out our exact thoughts in as much detail as possible. We must recognize biases our readers might bring to the text and explain and support our evidence as much as our conclusions. The advice: Buy diapers.
I think I'm going to start out with this video. This video is about synthesizing is closely linked to evaluating. This is a great way to show students how thinking should change as we read...often to a deeper understanding. As older students read more complex plots they will learn to expect the unexpected, inferring meanings and pick up on foreshadowing.
This will make a great opening to the week and help them think outside the box.
From the video, what else do I need to do. Well, I want proficient readers. Proficient readers understand that writers often tell more than they actually say with words. They give you hints or clues that allow you to draw conclusions from information that is implied. Using these clues to “read between the lines” and reach a deeper understanding of the message is called inferring.
Students need to learn how to infer so that they can go below the surface details to see what is actually implied (not stated) within the words of the story. Some meanings are meant to be implied – that is not stated clearly but they are hinted at. When meanings are implied, you have to infer them.
Students make inferences every day without even thinking about it. For example, you can ask children to imagine they are sitting at their desk doing their homework when they hear a loud booming sound and hear pattering against the window. They don’t actually see anything, but they can infer there is a thunderstorm outside. All students recognize the sounds of thunder. They know heavy rain makes a pattering sound. And they know that any time the two go together there is almost a thunderstorm going on.
Inferring with context clues
One way students can infer a word meaning is from context clues within the text. Students have to learn how to work out meanings from these clues. There’s several ways to do this.They can simply make an educated guess using the hints given before the unknown word and the sentences that follow the word. Asking questions is one way to unravel these clues.
I have some ideas for guided reading:
These questions will be very helpful while we are reading to work through unknown words and what they mean. During the guided reading session, the teacher should have these question stems available when students find a word they don’t know the meaning of. The teacher pauses the reading and chooses the appropriate question to ask.
“What do you think the word means considering (a certain action or event) has happened?
“How do you know that the word means (insert definition)?”
“What part of the text helps you make this inference?”
“Where can you find other clues to help you understand?”
“If you substitute what you think is a similar word, would the sentence still make sense?”
My goals for my students include:
- Draw conclusions about their reading by connecting the text with their background knowledge
- Synthesize new ideas and information
- Create unique understandings of the text they are reading
- Make predictions about the text, confirm or disconfirm those predictions based on textual
- information, and text their developing comprehension of the text as they read
- Extend their comprehension beyond literal understandings of the printed page
And thinking stems to help my learners:
- “Even though it isn’t in the picture, I can see the…”
- “Mmm, I can almost taste the…”
- “It sent chills down my spine when it said…”
- “For a minute, I thought I could smell…”
- “I could hear the…”
- “I can imagine what it is like to …”
- “I can picture the…”
These are going to be great additions to my inferring unit this week. Have a great week.
Common Core and Shifting the Cognitive Load
Since, coming back from Thanksgiving Break, I have worked to shift the cognitive load in my small groups. This has not been as easy as you may think. Why?? Well, mostly because of the rubric I'm evaluated and I do most of the work. My students will never be able to tackle more complex text, if I can't find ways for them to take that load on.
The Common Core State Standards have changed the way I look at teaching reading. I have had to shift my focus to increase the rigor and cognitive load on my students to gathering evidence, knowledge, and insights from what they read. In fact, 80-90% of the reading standards in every grade require text-dependent analysis — being able to answer questions only by referring back to the assigned text, not by drawing upon and referencing prior knowledge and experiences. This is the first year where 90% of everything my students has read has been informational text.
The hard part getting students to talk more about the text without my direct support--ie; me needing to talk way, way less. But this means that they have to take it having the conversation about the book at a depth that is meaningful and with a high level of rigor.
Gretchen Owocki's book has some many strategies to support reader and show the progression of rigor from kindergarten to fifth grade for the Common Core Standards. My students have been working on Reading Anchor 1: Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite textural evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text. (Key ideas and Details)
Students have to read closely, to determine what the text says to find the evidence to support their thinking. Easier said than done. This can be seen in what students need to be able to do on their own at the end of each reading level. One way that I have been able to build my student's ability to talk about books has been to use Accountability stems. These sentence frames have scaffolded my student's as they move towards these benchmarks.
I have many factors to keep in mind how I introduce students to the advanced language of informational text analysis because they don't have the skill set necessary to access more complex text or the relevant terminology to be successful without direct support.. Informational and narrative text features, organization, genres, comprehension questions, and constructed response tasks differ strikingly.
Accountability talk is one way that I'm able to increase the cognitive load on my students because they get to do all the talking. I have included a sample of the sentence frames I use with my students.
The ultimate goal is to ensure that students are more familiar with the text structure and content. This also gives all students daily opportunities to communicate using more sophisticated social and academic English. The more they talk the better. Have a great week.
The Common Core State Standards have changed the way I look at teaching reading. I have had to shift my focus to increase the rigor and cognitive load on my students to gathering evidence, knowledge, and insights from what they read. In fact, 80-90% of the reading standards in every grade require text-dependent analysis — being able to answer questions only by referring back to the assigned text, not by drawing upon and referencing prior knowledge and experiences. This is the first year where 90% of everything my students has read has been informational text.
The hard part getting students to talk more about the text without my direct support--ie; me needing to talk way, way less. But this means that they have to take it having the conversation about the book at a depth that is meaningful and with a high level of rigor.Gretchen Owocki's book has some many strategies to support reader and show the progression of rigor from kindergarten to fifth grade for the Common Core Standards. My students have been working on Reading Anchor 1: Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite textural evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text. (Key ideas and Details)
Students have to read closely, to determine what the text says to find the evidence to support their thinking. Easier said than done. This can be seen in what students need to be able to do on their own at the end of each reading level. One way that I have been able to build my student's ability to talk about books has been to use Accountability stems. These sentence frames have scaffolded my student's as they move towards these benchmarks.
I have many factors to keep in mind how I introduce students to the advanced language of informational text analysis because they don't have the skill set necessary to access more complex text or the relevant terminology to be successful without direct support.. Informational and narrative text features, organization, genres, comprehension questions, and constructed response tasks differ strikingly.
Accountability talk is one way that I'm able to increase the cognitive load on my students because they get to do all the talking. I have included a sample of the sentence frames I use with my students.
The ultimate goal is to ensure that students are more familiar with the text structure and content. This also gives all students daily opportunities to communicate using more sophisticated social and academic English. The more they talk the better. Have a great week.
Assessing without Language
A little background-This year, I have a student with autism who has limited verbal skills. This poses a small problem when being assessed on the DRA. As all my fellow teachers know the first part of the book is read aloud (depending on the level some more than others) with the comprehension either completed verbally or in writing.
In small group, he has had great success when he has prompts like the 5 "W's" or when he does his retell in pictures. But because the district has said, it must be administered as per the directions-which don't provide accommodations for these sort of things. My team and I have been working on coming up with ways that we could get a better idea of where he is truly an independent reader. Even though we have to us the DRA as written, we can create a way that takes the verbal piece mostly out of the picture and use that to drive his instruction.
My hope is that I'll have a product that will drive instruction and not just a DRA number. The student I designed this form has been out sick. So I'll have more to share next week. Have a great long weekend.
In small group, he has had great success when he has prompts like the 5 "W's" or when he does his retell in pictures. But because the district has said, it must be administered as per the directions-which don't provide accommodations for these sort of things. My team and I have been working on coming up with ways that we could get a better idea of where he is truly an independent reader. Even though we have to us the DRA as written, we can create a way that takes the verbal piece mostly out of the picture and use that to drive his instruction.
My hope is that I'll have a product that will drive instruction and not just a DRA number. The student I designed this form has been out sick. So I'll have more to share next week. Have a great long weekend.
CBB and Reading Notebooks
iPad technology has changed the way my students and I interact with knowledge and information. I am all about the verbs in my classroom -- what thinking skill am I requiring of my students when I assign this task? How can I create authentic learning using technology that targets critical thinking and bravely and boldly moves use hovering in the highers levels of SAMR. Just as the iPad changes what the physical classroom looks like, the iPad changes the physical construction and layout of what instruction looks like.
I'm going to have students use it this fall to replace their reading notebooks. Instead of having notebooks for reading comprehension with learning targets, essential questions, GRR scores, proof and reflections--student will build a book over the year. Over the summer as I play--I'll share the ins and outs of this app plus my examples. I think students will be able to do tons of things that they would not have been able to do in a notebook like add videos, work examples from other apps, and embed their proof. This will be something that I could bring to IEP meetings and conferences without having to tote several notebooks or binders with me. (YEAH!!!) It's also something I can share with teachers through iBooks. Since, sharing anything with them is always difficult.
Bloom's Questions
The fall weather has hit the Colorado Rockies with it red and golden Aspens, which makes for great fall hiking weather--which I love to do with my Italian Greyhounds. But home planning this weekend after playing last weekend.
A big thing on our teacher evaluation rubric's is asking high order thinking questions throughout the day. I've had a hard time doing this when my students are reading fiction text because all of the question stems I have were all for non-fiction text. So, I created a document that I can use while planning that is just for fiction text.
Bloom's Fiction Question Stems
A big thing on our teacher evaluation rubric's is asking high order thinking questions throughout the day. I've had a hard time doing this when my students are reading fiction text because all of the question stems I have were all for non-fiction text. So, I created a document that I can use while planning that is just for fiction text.
Bloom's Fiction Question Stems
How Should Students With Learning Disabilities Be Identified? and Glogster Pictures
I came across this article posted on Education Week, "How Should Students With Learning Disabilities Be Identified?". It talks about how RTI has become the new "Wait and Fail" model. My team was told at the beginning of the school year, that RTI could not be used to delay or deny access to special education and an IEP. Colorado adapted RTI two years ago as the only means to identify a student with a learning disability. Each year we get a little bit better and create a stronger model to support students before they fail. This year we got really good at hold Student Study Teams monthly with classroom teachers. How does your building/district have RTI set-up?
Last week, I had my students practicing visualization using poetry. They had to pick a poem and them use pictures to describe what they saw while reading the poem. They had a blast using Glogster to create their visions. Here's a couple of examples:
Poetry, Visualization, and Glogster
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| Picturing Penguin |
As a group, we started with Eloise Greenfield's "Honey, I Love and other Love Poems." Rope Rhyme helped students begin to think outside the box. I put both poems on an chart paper without the title. I wanted to group to infer a title before I told them. The group keyed into important words like "jump right in" and "clappedy-clappedy sound" to infer the poem was about jumping rope. As we worked through the poems as a group, we created a list of things they saw. This list would then become the list of pictures they would go and find.
I also used "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to help a new student access the concept. She was able to see the poem and create a list of items that she could find pictures for. She list was more literal but with the help of the others in the group she added a space shuttle, moon,and planets. The students each picked out their own poem to create a list of pictures that they could go and find that described the poem.
Once they had the list of pictures, they went looking for them on Google. When they have their pictures, they will go to Glogster to create the poster of their poem. The only words they can use are their name, the title and author of the poem. Nothing else. Pictures to come. How do you teach student visualization? Which mentor text have you found to be the best?
My new student joined us from out of state four weeks before the end of the year. I created both of these hand outs to help her classroom teacher understand Autism.
Tips for Working With Student With Autism
Teaching Students With Autism
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