read & write

View the following to receive my message this August day!

http://voicethread.com/share/1272642/

I have come to really love twitter as my professional resource treasure.

Today from TeachaKidd Free online graph paper generator. http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/square.html

It is a neat tool.  Thank you TeachaKidd, really Lee Kolbert in South Florida.

In an article from Journal of Addolescent & Adult Literacy February, 2009 by Janis M. Harmon, Karen D. Wood, Wanda B. Hedrick, Jean Vintinner and Terri Willeford, I came across this article that seemed to  be in line with the CLP emphasis on Word Walls.  The study was conducted with 7th graders in a suburban area of Texas.  Some interesting points I found were:

- “word learning is a need for multiple exposure to words in a variety of contexts”  - and helping the kids know in which context to use a particular word.

-”another facet of vocabulary instruction underlying the word wall lessons is associative learning”- visual associations through color, symbols, and situations.

Instruction must not stop with definitions and use in sentences but must be “internalized” and used in criticall analysis and evaluation processes.

-”Student Choice” – Student have opportunity to choose words for the class to study and learn.

Lesson construction ideas and processes were outlined.  Check the article for more in-depth information.

Lesson Plans, Student Activities, Curriculum and Projects | Print |

My daughter Rachel, a fourth grade teacher, had her students experience a new way to present their understanding of their subject/biography study by presenting a wax museum presentation. The students researched their subject by reading biographies and other resources. They wrote a summation that was limited to a minute or less which was practiced memorized and timed. On the day of the presentation the students dressed as the character and added props/furniture for setting. They invited in other grades from the school and the visiting students could push the “button” and hear the character talk, recite his summation of his character study. One of the mothers of a student contacted the local newspaper and a picture of one of the “wax” characters ended up on the front page. Students and visitors learned about the person. The fourth grade students had a purpose and a way to share their learning.

http://daily-journal.com/archives/di/display.php?id=434866

A summary of Peter Johnston’s presentation on 4-5-08 podcast format.

Notes for Words-on-the-move #5
Peter Johnston – Choice Worlds: Helping children build literate worlds worth living in classrooms.
• We as educators array people each day in the classroom through use of language.
• We say we want them to be assertive, independent strong willed people when they are adult but we want submissive students
• Teachers need to say “I just made a big mistake as a reader, I got distracted when someone came into the room, so I’m going to reread this section here. (this statement allows mistakes, errors – and when that happens it becomes no big deal, just try again)
• A phrase to use often in the classroom is “Say more about that”
• Teacher should refer to another child’s point of view or suggestion which then gives that child a place of credence and importance.
• As teachers we teach individual minds as well as collective minds
• “Child’s language reflects the books that he reads.” PJ
• Two children see writing with different definitions:
o One views writing as accuracy, grammar
o The other views it as having something to say
Teacher’s feedback, use of language, feeds the child’s definition of who he is or in this case what writing is about.

Students have implicit questions that they ask during the school day
What are we doing here?
Who am I? Who can I be?
What do people like me do?
How do we relate to one another?
How do we relate to the object of our attention? (reading writing, science, art, math, etc.)

3 necessary dispositions
Toward Resiliency
Tendency to maintain a focus on learning when the going gets tough
Opposite is brittleness – avoidance of challenging tasks
Toward Reciprocity
Engage in joint learning tasks, asking questions,
Take other’s purposes and perspectives into account
Toward Playfulness
Ready and willing to innovate or notice variations in learning situations
Creative in framing problems
Notice unfamiliar
Generate alternatives
Inclinations to play
Opposite – unplayfulness
Inclination to see only in terms of familiar mindlessness
See only familiar uses for objects
Not able to see beyond initial interpretation
Agency – If I act, and act strategically, I can accomplish things.
“What problems did you encounter today?”
Be enthusiastic and celebrate problems – normalize having a problem.
If there is no problem – not learning strategically
Teach looking for options – teach optimism
Problems may be intentional

Build an expectation of change
PJ “Teaching is noticing opportunity and orchestrating change to happen”

Fixed Theorists
Question ability and assign blame for failure
Growth Theorists
Self instruction, self monitoring, don’t see self as failure.
References:
Choice Words by Peter Johston
About the Authors: Writing Workshop with Our Youngest Writers by
Lisa Cleaveland;
Comprehension Through Conversation: The Power of Purposeful Talk in the Reading Workshop, by Maria Nichols
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, by Carol Dweck

Music : Revelation IV from Soundzabound by Barry Starlin Britt

Some thoughts on co-teaching.

With the SAGE program where the state subsidizes teachers in a 16:1 situation, the term co-teaching has surfaced. Through discussions and meditation on the subject, I have a few thoughts that I am working around in my head.

Co-teaching is between two teachers as a marriage covenant is between two people. There must be a personal choice in the choosing of the partner and then a commitment to work together. Co-teaching involves, planning, gathering, researching, executing, evaluating, and celebrating together. A close look at strengths and weaknesses of each individual is needed and then planning to accentuate the strong traits and minimizing the weak ones. A good amount of forgiveness for missed communication, for failing to carry out the responsibilities, for not listening with a open ear is needed to make it work. It will take a lot of work to make the co part work. The two teachers can anticipate each others thoughts and have a common way of approaching discipline, grading, parent relations, and staff relations. The delivery of instruction is so seamless that the students and observers will not be able to identify lead teacher. I really don’t think co-teaching is happening in many classrooms.

I propose that the optimum of co-teaching is not necessary to deliver quality instruction. I think Team teaching is just as valid. The ultimate evaluation of a successful model will be the quality and quantity of student learning. If students excel, what does it matter if the teachers are co-teaching or team-teaching?

My definition of team teaching is when two or more teachers are working together efficiently. They have common goal and produce game plans to reach the goal. Not everyone will do the same route or play in the same quarter of the game, just as in a football team. However they will plan, discuss, and find consensus in how to manage and deliver instruction. If one person on the team is particularly good at explaining math concepts, that should be the person explaining math concepts. If one team member is a dramatic reader, this is the person to do the read-aloud and entice the kids to read in a similar manner. When a team member is technology interested, that person should take the lead in using the computer or software to benefit the instruction of the students. The non-lead teacher is assisting struggling students and is always present and working with students just not in the leaders chair, not taking over the lead at any time. This is the kind of structure I see in many successful learning classrooms.

Another term that defines a classroom with multiple teachers is tag teaching. Like the game of tag, if you are not being pursued, you may take a rest and even tune out the other players in the game. You are really only active when “it” is focused on you or you are “it.” In the classrooms this is evident if one teacher is sitting at the computer, out of the room, or not involved with students while the second teacher is instructing. I have often felt that I was a tag teacher as a literacy coach coming in to demonstrate, model, or share. The teachers run to the office, the bathroom (this may be necessary at times) or use this time to catch up on reading their e-mail, or grading papers. I understand the ability to do two things at one time. They can listen-in to me and still do something else, but this is a clear picture of tag teaching. The classrooms where the teacher remains a part of the group, the discussion, the learning is where I see students grow, participate, and accepting the instruction as important.

What is your term to describe your group of teachers that deliver instruction to your students? Is it co-teaching, team-teaching, or tag-teaching?

I would love to hear your comments.

Words-on-the-move 08#4

Resources and Highlights
Strategies by Patrice Ball District Curriculum Specialist in English Language Arts

A p p r o a c h
Strategies
Activities

Obermeyer, Mark, 2005. When Writing Workshop Isn’t Working , Stenhouse Publishers -Chapter 10 How Do I Plan for Writing Instruction?

Notes: Start by planning for the entire year, making sure all important standards, genres etc. are covered. Next plan units or months at a time. Now we are down to the weeks at a time and the daily adaptation and revisiting of the plan to see what we have done, what we can eliminate, and what do we need to add to assure student learning.

www.all4ed.org
Graham, Steve and Dolores Perin, 2007 Writing Next : Effective Strategies to Improve Writing of Adolescents in Middle and High Schools, Alliance for Excellent Education.

“ The Optimal Mix: In the medical profession, treatment is tailored ot individual patient needs; at times, more than one intervention is needed to effectively treat a patient. Similarly, educators need to test mixes of intervention elements to find the ones that work best for students with different needs. Researchers do not know what combination of how much of each of the recommended activities is needed to maximize writing instruction for adolescents in general or low-achieving writers in particular. Nor do they yet know what combination of elements works for which types of writers.” P.12

“A Note about Grammar Instruction
Grammar instruction in the studies reviewed involved the explicit and systematic teaching of the parts of speech and structure of sentences. The meta-analysis found an effect for this type of instruction for students across the full range of ability, but surprisingly, this effect was negative. This negative effect was small, but it was statistically significant, indicating that traditional grammar instruction is unlikely to help improve the quality of students’ writing.” P. 21

Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, Strategic Learning in the Content Areas 1999.

p. 39 Supplementary Reading Materials
p.53 A Model for Strategic Teaching and Learning

Other helps on the MPS Portal available to MPS teachers are
Instructional Strategies for Writing
BP Writing Tool for MPS
Writing Next

MediaSite the ELA 3rd session ( the last half).

Be a collector of words – these are the bricks of language communication.
Kids can get sick of an activity, but that is not a strategy.

Approach is the goal
Strategy is the map
Activities are the specific mode of transportation

Need to be flexible, adapt, abandon, or modify as one uses a strategy for individual students.

The Education Plan has the strategies and teachers do the activities to support the strategy.

Target (Standard)
Approach
Strategy
Activity
Assessment

wordsetc.edublogs.org
blog for teachers
mathnut.podbean.com for the podcast
podcast hosting site

Words-on-the-move 08#3

Synopsis of four sessions I attended at WSRA 08

The Economy of Words in Action by Linda Kuhaupt, a Reading Recovery Teacher Leader.
The session explored “teacher talk” during a Reading Recovery Lesson. As I listened I realized this would apply to all teachers in all curricular areas and at all levels of education. Teachers like to listen to themselves talk. This session helped me to realize that letting students struggle and not providing those verbal cues may help the student achieve independency sooner. Kids have learned that teachers like to help them by jumping in and telling them the word or a clue. “If I just wait they will tell me the answer” is what I sense goes on in many students thinking. Success is theirs because teachers are “helpers.”

Changing the Friday Spelling Test: Challenges of Spelling Instruction by Robin Umber, Assistant Professor, University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire
This session took a look at the program, book, Words their way: Word Study for phonics, vocabulary, and spelling instruction by Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton &Johnston, 2008
Discussion centered on the developmental nature of spelling rather than grade level designation, and the use of the inventory to determine where students were on the continuum. I really like this program from a personal experience aspect in that I have used it with students I tutored and have presented it to classes. With the latest edition there is a disc that has all of the sorts, and games included so printing them out is easy. Students learn words rather than just how to spell a word. This is as much a part of the reading program as the writing instruction. If one has studied the word as to its origin and meaning, it will be beneficial whenever one wants to read a similar word.

Into The Book: Multimedia Reading Comprehension Resources by Kristin M. Leglar, Peggy Garties, Maria-Christina Jackson, Marini Pingel, Cathy Burge.
Into The Book a series of nine programs (15 minutes each) focusing on comprehension strategies: prior knowledge, making connections, questioning, visualizing, inferring, summarizing, evaluating, synthesizing and one program using the strategies together.
Supported with Strategy posters, Bulletin board/desk strips, Into the Book and Behind the Lesson DVDs ($99), and the web site http://www.reading.ecb.org

iPoetry: Encouraging Visual Literacy in the English Classroom by Jen Scott Curwood and Lora Cowell
Provides a way for students to study poetry and add the media component that they are using in everyday life in a meaningful way. By first studying poetry as to form and nature first, the students are then asked to add the media visuals to help support and deepen the meaning of the poem. They use iMovie, iPhoto, and Garageband on the Mac platform but this could be done on the PC platform with similar tools. – A session that was ripe with ideas for my own teaching.
For further resources shared at the convention go to http://www.wsra.org and look under convention. They have several handouts published there for your download. I wish this part was a little more robust.

The music for the podcast was from Soundzabound Revelation IV 1

Words-on-the-Move 08-#2
podcast found at http://mathnut.podbean.com

Notes from WSRA
Building Deeper Readers presented by Kelly Gallagher

http://www.stenhouse.com/html/authorbios_28.htm

itms://ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=159885407&ign-mscache=1 (visit this site to access some podcasts by Kelly)

Four Questions:
1. Have I provided my students with a reading purpose?
a. Need to frame and give purpose for all passages
b. Need to read passages many times to find understanding
c. Humpty Dumpty – Not just about an egg
d. Yertle the Turtle – Really about Hitler
e. Strategy – provide students with outline of reading passage but leave out a point. The students need to fill in that point as they read it.
f. When assigning homework – give different groups of student a different focus to look for and report back. (reading through different lenses)
2. Are my students able to embrace confusion?
a. CONFUSION is the “spot” at which people learn.
b. Teachers job is to give students confusion.
c. Writing deepens reading comprehension
d. A first read of a passage is survival mode – just getting from point a to point b.
e. Why write –
i. Find out what students know
ii. The very act of writing generates new thoughts
iii. Writing is the vehicle for deeper thinking
iv. No right or wrong answer – a ballpark of right or a ballpark of wrong
v. With any answer need to infer and defend – this is the power point
f. challenge kids to bring in a difficult passage to stump you
i. model how to think through a think a loud.
ii. Show how good readers attack a difficult text

WE TEACH READING BUT DO NOT TEACH READERS
I find this statement to be most thought provoking. How does it impact my teaching? Can we say the same thing for all curriculum? If we turned it around how would it change the dynamics in our classrooms?

3. Do my students know how to monitor their comprehension?
a. 3 strategies
i. Have students take ownership of confusion and work it out (without the teacher interfering)
1. don’t hide confusion, confusion should be the norm in the classroom
ii. score self on comprehension
1. assigning reading for homework or in class – give 8-10 post-it-notes for students to score themselves. In text whenever there is a confusion point place the post-it-note with question on it. Make it positive to be confused and help students to see that they think deeper in process of clearing up the confusion.
2. there can be a concentration issue
3. color code with highlighters on copied passages. Two-colors – one color for words or sections that are not understood and other color for understood. Every word is colored. Should lead them to understand that we read locally (each word) to understand globally (the whole passage)
iii. On going negotiation with text
1. Bring in a line of text from passage assigned. Have students supply the next line.
2. book mark – follows along right side of page. Mark a line where there is confusion. Add notes at that line when further reading, discussion with peers clears the confusion.
4. Do my students know any fix-it strategies?
a. There are many tools for different problems. Analogy: a plumber does not come to fix your “problem” with one tool. He has a large toolchest of tools because he doesn’t know the problem before he gets to your house.
b. Generate a list of strategies that good readers use.
i. Re-read
ii. Slow down
iii. Visualize
iv. Prior knowledge
v. Authors point of view
vi. Stop and think
vii. Confused and monitor as one continues
viii. Read aloud
ix. Ask questions
x. Mark text – underline
xi. Look at topic sentences and conclusions
xii. Look at context
xiii. Attack words
1. prefix
2. root
3. suffix
4. try a different word

a. Tools for reading during a test are not same as reading for understanding
i. Five strategies for timed tests
i. Skim
ii. Read answers first
iii. Guess
iv. Skip
v. Eliminate leftfield answers