Note: For this blog post, I will be referring to concepts that I've read in Strategies That Work by Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis. For this blog post, I will be summarizing the various ideas that I found important throughout this reading. I will comment on their viability (in my opinion) and how they can be used.
One of the most important ideas expressed throughout this chapter regards students' interests in reading. According to researcher Donald Graves, it is recommended that students choose approximately 80 percent of their own texts (Harvey & Anne 29). Based on my personal and classroom experiences, I find this to be true. When a student finds the material they are reading intriguing, he/she will far more likely to read in their spare time and make connections to his/her own life. Self-connections are an important means of drawing meaning from a text and keeping a student motivated to read. The remaining 20 percent of the readings can be teacher chosen. These readings should be used to model specific ideas that the teacher has prepared prior to the lesson.
Reading strategies do not always come naturally to students. Many times teachers get caught explaining to students "how" to use teaching strategies, rather than having the teacher model the strategy (Harvey & Anne 31). Teachers should instead focus on modeling a particular reading strategy. Over time (based on the students' responses), the teacher will gradually allow the students to use the reading strategy on their own. By modeling a reading strategy, the teacher is able to both explain "how" to do the strategy while showing the students how to do it themselves.
Personally, I have always learned best by observing someone perform a task. Directions (written or spoken) are either understood or not. If the student does not understand the instruction, often a teacher will re-explain the directions without providing he/she with any more detail. That simply does not help. When a teacher expresses directions and then shows students how the directions correlate to action, the student is provided with two means to understand the assignment. That is how people learn.
The chapter also provides various techniques that teachers can use for reading instruction in their classes. I will not go into detail about these strategies, as you can read about them yourself. Each reading strategy can be used in different scenarios, and some may be effective for one student but not another. Discovering which techniques work best for you and your class is something that you must explore.
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Dilemmas:
The only dilemma that I am concerned with regards assessing students. I am unfamiliar with ways to assess students at a sixth grade level, and more so, which type of assessment are most effective. I would like to learn about the various ways to assess students and how to perform this assessments.
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Confident:
I feel confident in being able to provide the students with engaging classroom discussions. I believe that I can effectively navigate discussions, link students' ideas, and keep the students interested in the present topic. I also believe that I can effectively model many reading strategies for students.
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-TheMattador
Hi Matt, thank you for your thorough post about this week’s readings. I like what you had to say about the difference between explaining and modeling reading concepts with your students.
ReplyDeleteCurrently in my placement, we are doing an author study in which many short stories and picture books from the same author are examined to get a feel for style. We have used strategies such as small group discussions/book chats, whole group discussion, inferring and visualization during our literacy lesson. However, none of these strategies have been modeled as explained by Matt. Many of my students were confused by the method of inferring as they were told to draw upon their past knowledge and take hints from the author to make their own inferences. I believe many students would have benefited from examples modeled on the overhead step by step.
A question for the other fifth grade interns: Do you have any strategies that could be used during chapter book read-aloud’s to increase comprehension from Ch. 1-4 of our text? I have the duty of reading to our students from a book for about fifteen minutes but no discussion, prediction etc. before, during or after the reading has been suggested by my MT. I am wondering how much they are getting out of this activity.
On another note: what are your teachers basing their literacy lessons off of? Kersten & Pardo (2007) suggest that many current, “teachers hybridize the strengths of their previous best practice and the policy requirements to create an original pedagogy” in their literacy teaching (147). I know that my MT uses lessons from his old school as he just arrived at this placement two years ago, and will most likely use some basal readers later in the year. He showed me a few binders on his self of these resources. Are your teachers specifically using the common core and its standards? Another resource? Their own curriculum?
Thanks! See you in class! -Lauren "Miss Perry"
Just to start this off, I just got a new keyboard for my IPad and finally got this to work. This is a big day for me. But moving on to more pressing things.
ReplyDeleteI would like to start by addressing Lauren's question about strategies that can be used during read-alouds. I think it is important to try to involve as many students as possible in the reading of the book ie giving their predictions, answering questions, and looking at pictures. This way, they will be more in tune with what is going on inside the book. If I were you Lauren, I would choose one (or two) topics to look into every day and talk the class through the thought process. Although the entire class may not be on board with the strategy, this initial (or repeat) exposure to the strategy will prove helpful in its application in the (hopefully near) future.
Not to 'call out' Matt, but I disagree that about 80% of what students read is chosen by them. In my experience as a student and as a teacher, most literacy instruction is based on books the teacher decides to choose for the students or the class. Although I know there are exceptions to this, I think that is true for most of the classrooms I have been in. This is doubly true when you consider readings done for other subject areas as well such as science, social studies and literacy books such as reading street. Students very rarely get choices and it hinders them in the development of their skills.
A big issue I have when trying to teach literacy-related lessons is trying to individualize instruction. Ideally, every student could have their own book that they chose and are very interested in every day. But unfortunately, it isn't quite that easy. Choosing a book to read is one of the most difficult things, trying to decided based on content, reading level, and themes for 29 (in my case) diverse learners is not an easy thing. However, I believe a teacher's attutide and enthusiasm goes a long way in making sure even an uninterested student can still gain valuable lessons from a literacy section.
Just to add onto Matt's dilemna, I find it difficult to assess the level my students are at. The most troubling is when you have literally a 8 grade difference in reading levels between my high and low achieving students. This makes it nearly impossible to be able to teach to all of them. These students need differentiated in struction to allow them to develop and have practical, usable and not frustring lessons. However, it is nearly impossible to have that many lessons ready and to be able to explain and help different groups with different topics. This is somethign I would desperately want to learn this year. I want to challenge all my students, making sure they are all reaching their sky-high potential and not just doing what is easy or convenient.