Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Reflection #4
Elizabeth Meyer-Chapman
Reflection # 4
Subjects Matter Every Teacher’s Guide to Contend-Area Reading by: Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Chapters 10-11
Chapter 10 focused on how to planning inquiry based units where students were able to explore big ideas. I have used similar ideas when assisting students in other content areas as I am a learning specialist. I am hoping to have some co-planning time with the science and math teacher and would like to work on planning a unit that could go across the two classes. Math and Science lend themselves to similar vocabulary and we could deepen the students’ understandings. Planning a unit on Acceleration which could be taught in both math and science would be a beautiful thing. My role as the learning specialist would be multifaceted. I could work with the group of students who generally struggle with new content and front load and/or pre-teach the new vocabulary and concepts. Second, I would take on a small portion of the primary teaching duties while the math and science teacher and I both took turns teaching and assisting kids who may be falling behind. During formative assessments I would help identify the students who would need a re-teach and either the content area teacher or I could follow through. Whatever we deem most helpful to students. The Science teacher and I were in our infancy stage with this process last year and now with one year experience together coupled with the new knowledge from this class I feel better prepared to take it on again.
Chapter 11 was about how to help struggling readers. Well it was a rehash of previous chapters and also recommended that teachers ask their Special Education teacher for ideas and/or help. They also referred the reader to a book by Kylene Beers: When Kids Can’t Read. Well, as providence would have it I had come across this book when I bought my professional studies book and got a wild hair and bought it! I looked through it this weekend and it sure looks like something I’d benefit from reading. It had a few more strategies and extensions which appear useful.
Today our group used Written Conversation as our protocol. As pairs we wrote notes back and forth from a prompt and responded to each other written answer. Both pairs wrote similar statements and findings from the readings. I liked this protocol and will use it. I found it to be fun and low stress, which is how I hope my students come to appreciate it after some practice with it.
My reading strategies remain and probably will until the end of my time annotation, questioning and rereading. I also always benefit from partner and small group discussion for deepening my understanding of what I just read.
Reflection # 4
Subjects Matter Every Teacher’s Guide to Contend-Area Reading by: Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Chapters 10-11
Chapter 10 focused on how to planning inquiry based units where students were able to explore big ideas. I have used similar ideas when assisting students in other content areas as I am a learning specialist. I am hoping to have some co-planning time with the science and math teacher and would like to work on planning a unit that could go across the two classes. Math and Science lend themselves to similar vocabulary and we could deepen the students’ understandings. Planning a unit on Acceleration which could be taught in both math and science would be a beautiful thing. My role as the learning specialist would be multifaceted. I could work with the group of students who generally struggle with new content and front load and/or pre-teach the new vocabulary and concepts. Second, I would take on a small portion of the primary teaching duties while the math and science teacher and I both took turns teaching and assisting kids who may be falling behind. During formative assessments I would help identify the students who would need a re-teach and either the content area teacher or I could follow through. Whatever we deem most helpful to students. The Science teacher and I were in our infancy stage with this process last year and now with one year experience together coupled with the new knowledge from this class I feel better prepared to take it on again.
Chapter 11 was about how to help struggling readers. Well it was a rehash of previous chapters and also recommended that teachers ask their Special Education teacher for ideas and/or help. They also referred the reader to a book by Kylene Beers: When Kids Can’t Read. Well, as providence would have it I had come across this book when I bought my professional studies book and got a wild hair and bought it! I looked through it this weekend and it sure looks like something I’d benefit from reading. It had a few more strategies and extensions which appear useful.
Today our group used Written Conversation as our protocol. As pairs we wrote notes back and forth from a prompt and responded to each other written answer. Both pairs wrote similar statements and findings from the readings. I liked this protocol and will use it. I found it to be fun and low stress, which is how I hope my students come to appreciate it after some practice with it.
My reading strategies remain and probably will until the end of my time annotation, questioning and rereading. I also always benefit from partner and small group discussion for deepening my understanding of what I just read.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Cheryl Reflection 4
Cheryl De Roia
Reading Reflection 6/16
Subjects Matter- Every Teacher’s Guide to Content-Area Reading by Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Chapter 10-11 (pages 216-)
When skimming the chapter titles I was most excited about chapter 11 because it promised to offer help for struggling students. While all of our conversation this week has been about reading and how there are some kids that are below grade level, for the most part our text book has been about reaching the average kid. Though I am a learning specialist, I can always learn new ways to help struggling students within the general education classroom. This chapter did not offer any new ideas- in fact it said to call on your special education teacher! What?! This text has been full of great ideas but on this topic, it fell flat.
The inquiry model is interesting and something that I guess I have done for years. Maybe because I do work with really low students, I felt that a lot of teacher pre-work and front loading would be necessary to avoid student frustration and teacher stress. I would like to set up an inquiry model in my academics class.
Today we used “written conversation” as our protocol. I enjoyed this process because it was less formal than some other since we were essentially writing notes back and forth to each other. I found it funny that Christine and I had to same comments on our papers without even talking to each other. It was also nice to end this process with a whole group discussion to share what was written and follow up with any additional comments or questions.
As I was reading today I was mostly trying to stay focused. I knew that I was responsible to discussing the text with my group and that forced me to get the reading done. I found myself having a mental conversation about staying on task and finding relevant and important text. As I read I would reflect on things I have done in my classroom and things I have seen other people do. It was good to compare the text with real life.
Subjects Matter - Day 4
Christine Munzer
Subjects Matter
Chapters 10 – 11
This last section of text wasn’t as rich as the rest of the book. I felt that in the rest of the book, Daniels and Zemelman highlighted strategies that were effective and strong and by the end of the book, they referenced just other authors one should read to gain information about specific strategies to use with kids who simply can’t read. After reading the section on struggling readers, all I left with was to ask a SPED teacher for help or go read Kylene Beers’ book. I’ll have to admit that the chapter on inquiry learning (Chapter 10) was pretty good but I feel that at my school we have build a lot of common assessments around inquiry learning. It did provide me with some additional ideas for inquiry learning based projects that I could use in addition to what we already do.
For our last discussion we decided to use an after reading strategy and settled on written discussion. Since this set of text was less engaging then other sections, this was a perfect strategy. I was able to simply read the text using my own personal strategies and prepare for a discussion. However, I felt the pressure to read the text because I knew I would have to actively discuss some unknown topic that my partner decided to write about. This was a good experience because kids think the same way. They really don’t want to look dumb in front of their peers. After our discussion, I had an impression that this would only really be a good strategy for a text that could be used to introduce a topic or arouse an emotional feeling that they could write about. Beyond this, it would be hard to tell if kids were having a deeper level conversation.
Subjects Matter
Chapters 10 – 11
This last section of text wasn’t as rich as the rest of the book. I felt that in the rest of the book, Daniels and Zemelman highlighted strategies that were effective and strong and by the end of the book, they referenced just other authors one should read to gain information about specific strategies to use with kids who simply can’t read. After reading the section on struggling readers, all I left with was to ask a SPED teacher for help or go read Kylene Beers’ book. I’ll have to admit that the chapter on inquiry learning (Chapter 10) was pretty good but I feel that at my school we have build a lot of common assessments around inquiry learning. It did provide me with some additional ideas for inquiry learning based projects that I could use in addition to what we already do.
For our last discussion we decided to use an after reading strategy and settled on written discussion. Since this set of text was less engaging then other sections, this was a perfect strategy. I was able to simply read the text using my own personal strategies and prepare for a discussion. However, I felt the pressure to read the text because I knew I would have to actively discuss some unknown topic that my partner decided to write about. This was a good experience because kids think the same way. They really don’t want to look dumb in front of their peers. After our discussion, I had an impression that this would only really be a good strategy for a text that could be used to introduce a topic or arouse an emotional feeling that they could write about. Beyond this, it would be hard to tell if kids were having a deeper level conversation.
Dunnington Reflection 4
Deb Dunnington
Multimodal Learning
Chapters 5 and 6 (pages 93-117)
Reflection #4
Instead of focusing specifically on the content of these chapters, our group discussed and reflected on the book as a whole. Oddly, this technique worked because the chapters mostly recapped what the book was about besides a couple sections on rubrics and design. Since we all enjoyed the 4 As so much yesterday, we decided to use this method again, especially since we were focusing on synthesizing the information presented in the book as a whole. Again, I like this discussion protocol, but couldn’t help but trying to apply it to my classes today while discussing. One thing that I think would need to be explicitly taught before this discussion technique could be successful, especially with younger grades, would be the terms assumption and aspire. Some modeling and practice activities not related to the discussion protocol would be great.
Some of the overall assumptions we discussed that the author holds are that these multimodal ways of learning (technology) are easily accessible and available to everyone, teacher and student alike, and that everyone knows the basics. Although technology is great and we are getting the opportunity to have more and more in some of our schools, not every school or student has access. Plus, some of the technology we had, such as MyAccess, is being eliminated because in the current economy, schools don’t have money to pay for some of these programs. Granted, there is free technology that can be incorporated, but even with the poll website we learned about today, with our class sizes, for it to be effective we need to use the versions that are not free. The second big assumption is that all of our students have mastered and know the basics and are just waiting to have a creative, technological outlet to demonstrate and show their wonderful knowledge. This is not always the case. If the students don’t have the knowledge to begin with, it will be difficult to present it or synthesize it in a “multimodal” way.
After reading the book, what I agree with is that technology is good and can be beneficial in the classroom, but I argue that technology is not always the best way to achieve the outcome. We do live in a world where technology is huge and something new is coming out of our technological advancements everyday, and it is important that we adapt to the changing ways. My aspiration is to definitely try and incorporate more technology into my classroom and lessons. I think that this could create more engagement and motivation, but, at the same time, I still feel there is benefit and good in some of the old ways. Sometimes a good old-fashioned poster on construction paper is just as effective as creating something online. My goal is to try to balance the old with the new to create well-rounded learning experiences.
Reflection #4
Today we used the 4-A protocol again: one assumption, one agreement, one argument, and one aspiration. The author makes a few assumptions. One, he assumes teachers and students have access to a variety of technology. He also assumes students have the basic building blocks to complete multimodal learning. I do agree with Bean about the power of integrating technology and multimodal learning into your classroom. This is one thing I will work on integrating into my classroom. I argue that technology and multimodal learning is the end all, be all. There are still many areas in our life where print and paper is still vital. As teachers we need to balance the traditional with new norm. I agree that technology is the wave of the future and will be a staple in our classrooms. At the same time, we can't jump too far into the future when some of the "old technology" is still relevant today. Bean (2010) writes "...85 percent of new jobs created will involve working with knowledge and problem-solving. During the next seven years, the number of information technology jobs emergining is expected to grow by 24 percent. In the new emerging economy, large hierarchical organizations will be replaced by fluid, small groups of highly educated and creative people who work in a borderless fashion on the Internet" (p. 97). I agree with his statement; however, not every student will be in these small groups (they are called small). Students still need the skills to navigate any type of job. We discussed how some schools today are being too "specific" and not engaging students in all content areas. There has been an influx of speciality schools: arts, technology, health science, etc. Shouldn't we expose students to all these areas, not just one?
I do aspire to intregrate technology into my classroom this year. One way I will is to utilize the Freerice website as a quick open or close of a class period. Students will review vocabulary while contributing to a positive cause. I will continue to explore and increase my knowledge of Google apps, including Google groups, Google sites, and Google Docs. I will also utilize the PollEverywhere site as another way to engage students in the classroom. This is a create formative assessment tool to use.
Overall, this book made me think about many different things: integrating technology, using multiple modalities to introduce information, and it made me think about the future of education. There is so much going on that sometimes I feel overwhelmed. At the same time, Bean made many assumptions about students and teachers that felt unrealistic. He gives many great ideas but he doesn't give the reader the "how to". This is one thing I wish the book had and would have made it a better read.
I do aspire to intregrate technology into my classroom this year. One way I will is to utilize the Freerice website as a quick open or close of a class period. Students will review vocabulary while contributing to a positive cause. I will continue to explore and increase my knowledge of Google apps, including Google groups, Google sites, and Google Docs. I will also utilize the PollEverywhere site as another way to engage students in the classroom. This is a create formative assessment tool to use.
Overall, this book made me think about many different things: integrating technology, using multiple modalities to introduce information, and it made me think about the future of education. There is so much going on that sometimes I feel overwhelmed. At the same time, Bean made many assumptions about students and teachers that felt unrealistic. He gives many great ideas but he doesn't give the reader the "how to". This is one thing I wish the book had and would have made it a better read.
Amanda Reflection 4: Engaging Readers
Today we finished our book. The last section focused on applying inquiry to content areas. Our group chose the protocol of "Save the Last Word" and all of us selected quotes from the same paragraph. The paragraph focused on how students see themselves. If they see themselves as a mathematician then they believe they can solve math problems. In some ways it is a self-fulfilling prophecy as if students believe they can be successful then they will be. What are we, as teachers, doing to help our students see themselves are practioners in our field? Are we really providing them with the skills to meet "the textual and disciplinary demands they are faced with as they move through school"? (154). For me, sometimes my answers to these questions are "yes" but not always. A goal for me is to be more reflective in my teaching as well as the language/word choice I use.
This section also brought up the need for a common language. Initially I didn't really see how the QAR strategy would apply to math but Wilhelm demonstrated how the questioning strategy does transfer. I hope to really work on establishing a common language with my students this year. Even if it doesn't happen school-wide, I think it can with my integrated partner.
This section also brought up the need for a common language. Initially I didn't really see how the QAR strategy would apply to math but Wilhelm demonstrated how the questioning strategy does transfer. I hope to really work on establishing a common language with my students this year. Even if it doesn't happen school-wide, I think it can with my integrated partner.
Sage Rebuehr
Reading Reflection #4
Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry by Jeffrey Wilhelm
Chapter 7
Wilhelm concludes his discussion of inquiry units with a discussion of engagement and content areas. Inquiry lends itself to engagement. Students become active participants in their own learning. They are part of a team of a community. They are making connections to the content. In short, the learning is meaningful to them. I liked this statement: “When all life has been drained from a subject, we’re back to desperately trying to motivate kids with test, grades, stickers, and pizza.” Inquiry gets to the heart of learning and brings out the natural curiosity of students.
I was interested in seeing how the strategies presented in the book could be adapted to content areas. He provides examples of using QAR in a math class as students read a word problem and in a science class where the teacher formats the class discussion of a reading around the 4 levels of QAR. Such a neat way of using it. I had used in small groups, but had never thought of using it as a guide for a large group discussion. Reading more about QAR has also made me think about why and how I use it: it isn’t just about asking good questions as a reading, it is about moving along a continuum of understanding—from literal to worldly.
For a protocol we used Save the Last Word. We actually all chose a different sentence from the same paragraph. Interesting, huh? As someone who usually doesn’t participate a lot in discussions, it was actually difficult for me NOT to say anything until the end. I think in part that was because I just read my passage, I wasn’t able to say what I thought. I know some students who could learn this type of patience J
Final Reflection
Sara Williams
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
It's funny how much easier it is for me to read this book today than it was the first day. When you really immerse yourself in one text, it's as if you begin to "speak the language" of a particular author and fluency skyrockets. I can also attribute my focus to the context - we've been talking teaching and strategy for four days now, so I'm in the zone with it. I didn't find my mind wandering as much, and I didn't have to work as hard to recall, summarize, and process. This is a great takeaway for teaching. When you plunk kids in the middle of a reading, you shouldn't expect them to digest it perfectly and be able to critique and discuss the reading as thoughtfully as they could. Building context through activating and providing knowledge is the key, as we discussed yesterday.
Today we finished the book up and had a really thoughtful discussion using the 4 A's protocol again. This time, we were supposed to consider the book as a whole. I noted that the author's ASSUMPTION seemed to be that readers need to be convinced of the worth of providing multiple modes of learning and assessment, when he's really preaching to the converted. I would have liked to have seen more concrete examples.
I AGREE with his assertion that "curriculum decisions will start to shift toward an emphasis on problem solving abilities and away from recalling facts for high stakes assessments." As my group member Katie noted, we're headed in that direction, but we're not there yet. What do we do in the meantime? We can build all the creative, multimodal assessments we want into our curriculum, but if ACT, GRE, CSAP, LSAT, PLACE, etc. don't change, are we really preparing students? It seems like the assessments should change now - "backwards planning" and "beginning with the end in mind" and all...
I ARGUE that the few concrete activities and techniques he outlines would elicit the type of learning and engagement he advocates. (Wordle is cool, but I don't think it would create a "classroom so engaging that students experience flow in their work, where time passes unnoticed.") He is spot on with his theory, but his practice seems to be a beat or two behind the times. Another example is how he cites Facebook and YouTube as hot and new tech. These are ubiquitous. My 66-year-old mother is on Facebook. What else do you have, Bean? (As a side note, I don't have the answers either. That's what I was hoping the book would provide.)
I ASPIRE to have the type of ideal classroom Bean describes - where daily work is presented in multiple forms, the focus is on creative problem-solving across content areas, my students are engaged and in the "flow" in both individual and collaborative activities, etc. I'm all in!
My overall takeaway from the book is this: there are 4 learning conditions for creative inquiry and problem solving in a multimodal space that I need to foster as a teacher. One, students need free time to process and inquire. Two, students and teachers need to have a tolerance for ambiguity. This is a biggie. There might not be an answer to the question I'm posing, or there might be multiple answers and no way for us to determine which is "right." Three, content knowledge is still critical, or as Bean states, "the primacy of discipline-based knowledge." I took this to mean that without a solid understanding of the task at hand, all of the cool tech won't mean a thing. (Duh.) And four, an opportunity for multimodal representation to engage all students and their abilities.
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
It's funny how much easier it is for me to read this book today than it was the first day. When you really immerse yourself in one text, it's as if you begin to "speak the language" of a particular author and fluency skyrockets. I can also attribute my focus to the context - we've been talking teaching and strategy for four days now, so I'm in the zone with it. I didn't find my mind wandering as much, and I didn't have to work as hard to recall, summarize, and process. This is a great takeaway for teaching. When you plunk kids in the middle of a reading, you shouldn't expect them to digest it perfectly and be able to critique and discuss the reading as thoughtfully as they could. Building context through activating and providing knowledge is the key, as we discussed yesterday.
Today we finished the book up and had a really thoughtful discussion using the 4 A's protocol again. This time, we were supposed to consider the book as a whole. I noted that the author's ASSUMPTION seemed to be that readers need to be convinced of the worth of providing multiple modes of learning and assessment, when he's really preaching to the converted. I would have liked to have seen more concrete examples.
I AGREE with his assertion that "curriculum decisions will start to shift toward an emphasis on problem solving abilities and away from recalling facts for high stakes assessments." As my group member Katie noted, we're headed in that direction, but we're not there yet. What do we do in the meantime? We can build all the creative, multimodal assessments we want into our curriculum, but if ACT, GRE, CSAP, LSAT, PLACE, etc. don't change, are we really preparing students? It seems like the assessments should change now - "backwards planning" and "beginning with the end in mind" and all...
I ARGUE that the few concrete activities and techniques he outlines would elicit the type of learning and engagement he advocates. (Wordle is cool, but I don't think it would create a "classroom so engaging that students experience flow in their work, where time passes unnoticed.") He is spot on with his theory, but his practice seems to be a beat or two behind the times. Another example is how he cites Facebook and YouTube as hot and new tech. These are ubiquitous. My 66-year-old mother is on Facebook. What else do you have, Bean? (As a side note, I don't have the answers either. That's what I was hoping the book would provide.)
I ASPIRE to have the type of ideal classroom Bean describes - where daily work is presented in multiple forms, the focus is on creative problem-solving across content areas, my students are engaged and in the "flow" in both individual and collaborative activities, etc. I'm all in!
My overall takeaway from the book is this: there are 4 learning conditions for creative inquiry and problem solving in a multimodal space that I need to foster as a teacher. One, students need free time to process and inquire. Two, students and teachers need to have a tolerance for ambiguity. This is a biggie. There might not be an answer to the question I'm posing, or there might be multiple answers and no way for us to determine which is "right." Three, content knowledge is still critical, or as Bean states, "the primacy of discipline-based knowledge." I took this to mean that without a solid understanding of the task at hand, all of the cool tech won't mean a thing. (Duh.) And four, an opportunity for multimodal representation to engage all students and their abilities.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Cheryl Reflection #3
Cheryl De Roia
Reading Reflection 6/25
Subjects Matter- Every Teacher’s Guide to Content-Area Reading by Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Chapter 7-9 (pages 166-215)
Reading
Yesterday when I sat down to read these chapters, I was already exhausted and could not concentrate. I skimmed and thought to myself that since I wouldn’t be able to use a book group (club) in my classroom until later in the room I didn’t need to fully read the chapter. However, after some sleep and some much needed nutrition, I found myself enjoying these chapters and learning just as much as I had from previous chapters.
Chapter 8 is one in which I will use to plan my unit for this class. It is about creating lifelong readers and independent reading workshops. According to the text, lifelong readers engage in reading through personal choice. In other words, “Reading flows from intrinsic motivation (curiosity, wonder, pleasure, etc.), and is not driven by external rewards or punishments” (184). The authors argue that to have these lifelong readers, which many of us in this class are, we need to be giving students independent reading time in every class, everyday. No exceptions. Sure that seems almost impossible given all we have to cover but, as shown in the text, the workshops can range from very short articles to longer ones that would take up a class hr. The strategies given are a must use, and I can’t wait to determine the standard I want to use to pick articles and practice with workshops.
I know it takes time to find many texts at many levels covering the same broad topic but it is worth all of the effort if you keep this quote in mind, “…If it’s just one article, only a few people talk…” (186). There is little that bothers me more than having a socratic seminar where only a few people talk.
Chapter 7 talks about building a community of learners. It begins by quoting research on how test scores improve for students in a classroom with high “social support.” Then it continues to talk about creating a great supportive classroom environment.
Chapter 9 covered book groups, book clubs, and the most important part that came from this chapter is that books should be read as homework; yes, I said homework; and that the reading should be quick. Books should not be drawn out over months but rather only a few weeks.
**Just a side note, even though I was exhausted yesterday and frustrated at the amount of time I feel I will have to spend to complete the work for this class, I feel that I am already becoming a better teacher. That in large part, I owe to such a wonderful book.
Reading strategies
The first strategy I used was to stop reading when I realized I was not actually reading the text. I decided to come back to it another day when I would be able to concentrate.
Today I became frustrated with the pounding above my head and had to re-read sentences many times. I skipped over a chemistry section because never took it and I determined it wasn’t critical to my learning about workshops. I also coded the text to use with my group in our protocol. This I found to be helpful, though I might change around some of the coding. I also wrote myself a “cheat sheet sticky note” with the coding symbols and meaning as a quick reference to what I should be doing with the text. I liked the sticky note and since often, we can’t write in our school books, I think I will create sticky notes (using a word program) that are coded so all the kids have to do is pull off the sticky note with the code they want to use and stick it in the margin.
Group Protocol- Coding
I enjoyed coding, and it made it easy to go back over the text and quickly determine the important parts, either because I learned something knew or because I wasn’t sure of a comment. As far as a group protocol, it worked and was nice because we didn’t have to write anything before coming together as a group to talk. I can see this working better with a smaller text rather and three long chapters.
Reflection #3
Elizabeth Meyer-Chapman
Subjects Matter
Chapters 7-9
The theme of chapter 7 was “Students feeling valued”. I totally agree that a sense of community and a predictable classroom structure are key components to better reading and higher student achievement. A feeling of trust breeds a feeling of confidence. What teacher doesn’t agree with that one?
Chapter eight concentrated on examples of and step by step instructions for conducting independent reading workshops in content area classrooms. Included in the instructions were possible pitfalls a teacher or group might experience along the way and suggestions on how to rectify them. I found the suggestions, tips and instructions informational and I had a few light bulbs go off as to why I dreaded planning for and co-teaching reading workshops. Now I have some actual tools to use and I will use them. Just about the time I get frustrated with picking one of the longer books to read a chapter like this come along and it reaffirms my choice.
Chapter ten delves into book clubs of all forms. The most enticing book clubs combine two powerful educational ideas which are collaborative learning and independent reading. This is something I would like to work up to but this coming school year I will concentrate my efforts on explicitly teaching some of the new reading strategies I’ve learned to students and conducting successful reading workshops. I see myself using this book often in my individual planning and co-planning.
The protocol we used today was coding. I was the facilitator and actually picked this strategy for the group. I can’t say that I found it as useful as I would have hoped. I found myself wanting to annotate more than code. I realized quickly that not all protocols will work for all kids or adults. I accommodated for my own weaknesses by writing the codes on a post-it so they were right in front of me as I read. I didn’t like having to stop and say now which code belongs to this passage. But then again with practice and experience maybe I will find value in this protocol.
Subjects Matter
Chapters 7-9
The theme of chapter 7 was “Students feeling valued”. I totally agree that a sense of community and a predictable classroom structure are key components to better reading and higher student achievement. A feeling of trust breeds a feeling of confidence. What teacher doesn’t agree with that one?
Chapter eight concentrated on examples of and step by step instructions for conducting independent reading workshops in content area classrooms. Included in the instructions were possible pitfalls a teacher or group might experience along the way and suggestions on how to rectify them. I found the suggestions, tips and instructions informational and I had a few light bulbs go off as to why I dreaded planning for and co-teaching reading workshops. Now I have some actual tools to use and I will use them. Just about the time I get frustrated with picking one of the longer books to read a chapter like this come along and it reaffirms my choice.
Chapter ten delves into book clubs of all forms. The most enticing book clubs combine two powerful educational ideas which are collaborative learning and independent reading. This is something I would like to work up to but this coming school year I will concentrate my efforts on explicitly teaching some of the new reading strategies I’ve learned to students and conducting successful reading workshops. I see myself using this book often in my individual planning and co-planning.
The protocol we used today was coding. I was the facilitator and actually picked this strategy for the group. I can’t say that I found it as useful as I would have hoped. I found myself wanting to annotate more than code. I realized quickly that not all protocols will work for all kids or adults. I accommodated for my own weaknesses by writing the codes on a post-it so they were right in front of me as I read. I didn’t like having to stop and say now which code belongs to this passage. But then again with practice and experience maybe I will find value in this protocol.
Subjects Matter - Day 3
Christine Munzer
Subjects Matter
Chapters 7 – 9
The text for this go around was not as engaging as the previously read chapters. It could be because there were a lot less useful strategies to use and to some degree, some of the material discussed left me with more questions than it did answers. Chapter 7 had the focus on creating a community of learners. The items discussed in this chapter were nothing new to me as a teacher, as I already know the importance of creating an environment where kids feel comfortable in sharing in the learning experience. However, the chapter did get me thinking of the importance of creating a school wide community of common academic language. How magical would it be if teachers were using the same reading and writing strategies (and calling them the same) across all curriculums? Chapter 8 was by far the most engaging, as it discussed creating an environment with reading workshops. It provided numerous models for creating and running the workshops. I also felt that the “real-life” examples that teachers found effective made it feel that creating these workshops was obtainable in my own practice. Finally, Chapter 9 focused on running book clubs within the classroom. I love the ideas of having book clubs being part of my teaching units but I still just can’t imagine devoting the class time to them and in knowing my students, I just don’t feel they will actually do the readings. I do however see running a book club with my integrated partner could be something totally feasible. Also, a member of an adult book club, I loved the discussion in particular roles you could assign members of the book club to take the experience to a whole different level, rather than just discussing the text openly.
The protocol that we selected to use with our reading was coding. We used the codes already established by our book. As we discussed the book with the protocol, we decided that it would have been nice to maybe create more specific codes to yield a deeper discussion of the text. For myself in using the strategy, I found that I was actually doing less reflection of the text as I read because I simply replaced where I would write a reflection with just a check mark or star.
Subjects Matter
Chapters 7 – 9
The text for this go around was not as engaging as the previously read chapters. It could be because there were a lot less useful strategies to use and to some degree, some of the material discussed left me with more questions than it did answers. Chapter 7 had the focus on creating a community of learners. The items discussed in this chapter were nothing new to me as a teacher, as I already know the importance of creating an environment where kids feel comfortable in sharing in the learning experience. However, the chapter did get me thinking of the importance of creating a school wide community of common academic language. How magical would it be if teachers were using the same reading and writing strategies (and calling them the same) across all curriculums? Chapter 8 was by far the most engaging, as it discussed creating an environment with reading workshops. It provided numerous models for creating and running the workshops. I also felt that the “real-life” examples that teachers found effective made it feel that creating these workshops was obtainable in my own practice. Finally, Chapter 9 focused on running book clubs within the classroom. I love the ideas of having book clubs being part of my teaching units but I still just can’t imagine devoting the class time to them and in knowing my students, I just don’t feel they will actually do the readings. I do however see running a book club with my integrated partner could be something totally feasible. Also, a member of an adult book club, I loved the discussion in particular roles you could assign members of the book club to take the experience to a whole different level, rather than just discussing the text openly.
The protocol that we selected to use with our reading was coding. We used the codes already established by our book. As we discussed the book with the protocol, we decided that it would have been nice to maybe create more specific codes to yield a deeper discussion of the text. For myself in using the strategy, I found that I was actually doing less reflection of the text as I read because I simply replaced where I would write a reflection with just a check mark or star.
Dunnington Reflection 3
Deb Dunnington
Multimodal Learning
Chapter 4 (pages 73-92)
Reflection #3
When I first began reading chapter 4, I was sitting at the table thinking, “Really, Really?” The chapter started off with a vignette about a student who is walking home from school and pulls out her Smartphone and begins narrating notes about her science project using the voice recorder feature. While in a perfect world this might be an awesome resource for education, we have to remember that we don’t live in a perfect world.
Our discussion touched on this idea a bit, and on the fact that in order to make the book universal for everyone, the author needed to write it as if we do live in a world where every student has a Smartphone with a data plan so that we can become familiar with the ideas and adapt them to our circumstances and the resources our students do have. Another technique Bean introduced in this chapter was the ISDAT strategy which means “slowing down to carefully consider and evaluate various sites in a search” (86). During our discussion we all agreed that kids often times take the fastest way of completing something or click on the first website on the Google search just because it’s at the top. We decided that it is important for kids to slow down and carefully consider things. We didn’t necessarily like the worksheet the text provided but we thought it would be wise to create something that we felt would work with our particular classes.
For our discussion protocol we used the 4 As. All of us seemed to really enjoy this technique and think that it can be a valuable discussion tool in the classroom. In our group, the majority of us chose at least one or two of the same parts of our chapter for one or two of our As, but it created a good discussion for our group. My concern with teenagers is that if that happened in their discussion group they might take the easy way out and just agree or say I had the same one. Before using this protocol I would give this some thought so that the discussion would stay rolling.
Our group discussed today that one of the major takeaways from the reading and the class as a whole is that we need to consciously show our students our thinking process. This is not something that is limited to the classroom either, but to life in general. We can’t expect people to read our minds and know what we are thinking when we tell them something, but if we consciously tell them our thought process than it creates a model for them to follow.
This hasn’t been on of my favorite professional books, but I do think it has value, although I am having to stretch my thought processes to find that value. Today while reading about the slow down and think carefully strategy, I realized that is a strategy I have to use with this book. The strategies and techniques are not going to fit in my practice with minor adaptations. I am going to have to slow down and consider their value and then devise ways I can take mini-parts of them or the idea of them and fit them into my practice.
Reflection #3
Robert Samsel
Reflection #3
Chapter 4
June 15 2011
Protocol: 4 A’s
The four A’s are
1. Assumptions of the author
2. Things the reader agrees with
3. Things the reader argues with
4. Something the reader aspires to
Each member of the group took a turn to share their A’s and we commented on each other’s A’s.
This chapter was insightful about really teaching students to evaluate what they find in the Internet. The acronym used was ISDT, Internet Slow Down and Think. I believe this is something that educators can do intuitively at varying degrees of proficiency. However, our students lack the experience and instruction about how to go about doing it. It’s a lot like reading in that although teachers can read they don’t always think about the process consciously and teach that process even less. Not only is there a lack of thought about strategies used. There are many different ones to use depending on the circumstance that it really becomes teaching technology literacy. Therefore, after reading, I have chosen to aspire to cognitively learn how to do this skill my self and then teach how this strategy to my students. However, it would be much more effective if all teachers did this because I alone can only use so many strategies in the time I am allotted and students need many different tools for the different content area specific strategies.
Another insight that I will take from this chapter is to use WebQuest as a resource to model what kids should use and even produce finished projects.
My strategy:
I like to just read everything first and then review the text and go back to big ideas that stuck out along the way. I also made a couple of questions in the margins and then they were answered later in the chapter.
Sage Rebuehr
Reading Reflection #3
Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry by Jeffrey Wilhelm
Chapter 5 & 6
In these chapters we got to the meat of inquiry. Wilhelm explains questioning schemes “to help connect ideas from lesson to lesson and text to text, so that each day’s activities are threaded together, like beads on a necklace.” He discusses ReQuest, Question Answer Relationships (QAR), questioning circles, authorial reading, questioning the Author (QtA), and Hillock’s hierarchy of questions. That’s a lot of questions. The goal is to understand that comprehension is the first step in reading. Each of these frameworks brings to the surface the various levels of meaning. They attempt to show the various levels of meaning readers create as they read.
In various forms, I have tried to use several of these schemes in my teaching, but I usually became frustrated and abandoned them. QAR is the one I use most and I really enjoyed seeing how Wilhelm adapts, modifies, and uses it in his classroom. I always want to jump right in and forgot to scaffold the learning as must as I do. As I continued reading, I was thinking “Gosh, do we really need four different ways to talk about different types of questions?” I am thinking it is best to keep the terminology consistent and simple so the students will grasp it. I did really like, however, when he introduced Hillock’s 7 levels of questions. It would be a great tool to use as a teacher to determine where student’s comprehension stalls (probably at level 4 or 5) and how to push them to high level thinking.
As a discussion protocol, we did “It Says – I Say – And So”. We picked passages from the reading for “It Says” and then added our thinking in the next two columns. I found myself making lots of connections and agreements with the text and I found it difficult to complete the “And So” part.
Day 3 Reflection
Sara Williams
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapter 4
So I have to tell you a secret. This class is making me a better parent and wife. Last night, my husband and I were getting ready to go work at our rental, and we were trying to wrangle our kids and get out the door. My 3-year-old, Cameron, was doing his thing, playing, and not listening to us beg him to get his shoes on and get ready to leave. After asking him for the third time and saying for the millionth time, "Cameron, I need you to make a good choice," I realized that I hadn't told him what a "good choice" looked like in this situation. I made my thinking visible and was explicit, explaining, "a good choice right now would be to say 'Okay mom, I'm getting my shoes' and go upstairs and put your shoes on." Miracle of miracles, he did it immediately. Similarly, I've been frustrated that my husband doesn't make the bed, as if we're teenagers or something. All I did was making my thinking visible - I verbalized why I like a made bed (I think I said something crazy like, "Getting into a made bed is like opening a present for me every night, and it makes the room look so much cleaner.") I have been seething about him never making the bed for LITERALLY years, and it took me 30 seconds to say it out loud, explicitly, and now he does it everyday.
Sorry to get so personal, but those stories just highlight my biggest takeaway from this class and our professional book. We have to say exactly what we're thinking and we must explain the process we go through when reading, when searching a database, when encountering a problem with technology, when we do just about anything, if we want those around us to learn. It seems so obvious, but it wasn't to me. What a revelation! :)
Our group has talked a lot about the author's assumptions that all students have access to the tech he describes and that all of our students have full buy in to whatever project we're working on. (His "classroom vignettes" are especially laughable - it's like he's recording the conversations of perfect little student robots) We've generally been pretty negative about it, talking about how his scenarios just aren't plausible, but today, our tone changed. We discussed that even if we impact 5 kids, or if we teach 3 kids some tech skill they didn't know prior to our class, we are effecting change. Teaching and learning is NEVER going to be perfect, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. Bean's ideas might be pie in the sky (or "pie in the eye" as my sleep-deprived brain spat out in our group discussion) but I admire his enthusiasm. :)
I liked our discussion protocol today - the 4 A's. (Author's assumptions, Agree, Argue with, Aspire to) Typically when I read a professional text, I'm black and white - I'm all in or I think it's all a crock. This forces me to find something good and something questionable in the text, and also helps me to articulate what strikes me as meaningful and authentic or doesn't.
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapter 4
So I have to tell you a secret. This class is making me a better parent and wife. Last night, my husband and I were getting ready to go work at our rental, and we were trying to wrangle our kids and get out the door. My 3-year-old, Cameron, was doing his thing, playing, and not listening to us beg him to get his shoes on and get ready to leave. After asking him for the third time and saying for the millionth time, "Cameron, I need you to make a good choice," I realized that I hadn't told him what a "good choice" looked like in this situation. I made my thinking visible and was explicit, explaining, "a good choice right now would be to say 'Okay mom, I'm getting my shoes' and go upstairs and put your shoes on." Miracle of miracles, he did it immediately. Similarly, I've been frustrated that my husband doesn't make the bed, as if we're teenagers or something. All I did was making my thinking visible - I verbalized why I like a made bed (I think I said something crazy like, "Getting into a made bed is like opening a present for me every night, and it makes the room look so much cleaner.") I have been seething about him never making the bed for LITERALLY years, and it took me 30 seconds to say it out loud, explicitly, and now he does it everyday.
Sorry to get so personal, but those stories just highlight my biggest takeaway from this class and our professional book. We have to say exactly what we're thinking and we must explain the process we go through when reading, when searching a database, when encountering a problem with technology, when we do just about anything, if we want those around us to learn. It seems so obvious, but it wasn't to me. What a revelation! :)
Our group has talked a lot about the author's assumptions that all students have access to the tech he describes and that all of our students have full buy in to whatever project we're working on. (His "classroom vignettes" are especially laughable - it's like he's recording the conversations of perfect little student robots) We've generally been pretty negative about it, talking about how his scenarios just aren't plausible, but today, our tone changed. We discussed that even if we impact 5 kids, or if we teach 3 kids some tech skill they didn't know prior to our class, we are effecting change. Teaching and learning is NEVER going to be perfect, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. Bean's ideas might be pie in the sky (or "pie in the eye" as my sleep-deprived brain spat out in our group discussion) but I admire his enthusiasm. :)
I liked our discussion protocol today - the 4 A's. (Author's assumptions, Agree, Argue with, Aspire to) Typically when I read a professional text, I'm black and white - I'm all in or I think it's all a crock. This forces me to find something good and something questionable in the text, and also helps me to articulate what strikes me as meaningful and authentic or doesn't.
Reflection #3
Katie Horne
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapter 4
The chapter we read today focused on slowing down and taking the time to evaluate multimodal texts. While the opening vignette showed an utopian setting (a student recorded their notes on their smartphone while walking home), it also showed what teachers can aspire to in their own classroom. The rest of the chapter discussed taking the time to slow down and evaluate websites and multimodal texts. There was also a brief overview of fair use; however, most of the information was from 2008 and as of today, it's outdated :) The chapter also introduced us to the idea of webquests.
We used the 4-A protocol: one assumption, one agreement, one argument, and one aspiration about the text. As we discussed, many of the same themes resignated throughout. Our assumption was the author assumed students had access to all the wonderful technology. Our group pointed out how many students might have cell phones, but not smartphones. We did agree that students need to take the time to pause and evaulate a text and/or website. We argued how not all students have access to technology equally. Finally, we all aspired to integrate more technology into our classrooms.
I used a variety of strategies including rereading, highlighting main ideas in the text, reviewing vocabulary words, and marking the text.
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapter 4
The chapter we read today focused on slowing down and taking the time to evaluate multimodal texts. While the opening vignette showed an utopian setting (a student recorded their notes on their smartphone while walking home), it also showed what teachers can aspire to in their own classroom. The rest of the chapter discussed taking the time to slow down and evaluate websites and multimodal texts. There was also a brief overview of fair use; however, most of the information was from 2008 and as of today, it's outdated :) The chapter also introduced us to the idea of webquests.
We used the 4-A protocol: one assumption, one agreement, one argument, and one aspiration about the text. As we discussed, many of the same themes resignated throughout. Our assumption was the author assumed students had access to all the wonderful technology. Our group pointed out how many students might have cell phones, but not smartphones. We did agree that students need to take the time to pause and evaulate a text and/or website. We argued how not all students have access to technology equally. Finally, we all aspired to integrate more technology into our classrooms.
I used a variety of strategies including rereading, highlighting main ideas in the text, reviewing vocabulary words, and marking the text.
Amanda Reflection 3: Engaging Readers and Writers
This section of reading dealt a lot with types of questions. I already use reQuest questioning: on the lines (identification/comprehension), between the lines (drawing conclusions), and beyond the lines (inference/analysis) with varying degrees of success. I liked how in this section the demonstrated to scaffold these questions more than I normally do. I tend to jump ahead or want my students to just "get" all the levels when really we need to build on them. A drawback for this section is that it goes over a lot of differing types of questions. While it was nice for me to think about the types, I think it would be overwhelming to try to use all of the types of questions Wilhelm explains. It would be good for a school to set a questioning protocol so that students can transfer inquiry based questioning to other classes.
Our group utilized the protocol of "It says, I say, and so" for this section of reading. I liked this protocol because it helped me reflect on what my thoughts, beliefs, and actions actually are then how the reading influences me. I reflected on questioning students over a section of reading.
It says: "What are the most important details so far?" (139).
I say: "What happened in this section of reading?"
And so: I realize that I am actually asking my students for plot:what happened. I really want them to be thinking about the larger implications of the text by my word choice keeps us on the literal level. By asking for details rather than events the discussion shifts to more thematic and insightful topics. Wilhelm also suggests questions to help students take notice of the text. "What do you think the author wants us to know?" (136). This type of a question helps lead students to drawing conclusions and thematic connections. I think it would be especially useful in studying character and setting. This makes me think about the imagery Steinbeck uses in describing George and Lenny in Of Mice and Men. What is Steinbeck saying about Lenny's character when he is compared to a bear? What conclusion can be drawn from this comparison? Again, these questions shift the discussion from plot or on the line questions to more inferencing.
I was surprised to learn that "6 percent of graduating high school seniors are adept at seeing and justifying complex implied relationships and authorial generalizations" (145). I feel like I focus on this so much but when I look closely at my actual word choice I am leading my students more to simple comprehension. I firmly believe that the use of inquiry based learning will support my students in better being able to analyze more advanced relationships.
Our group utilized the protocol of "It says, I say, and so" for this section of reading. I liked this protocol because it helped me reflect on what my thoughts, beliefs, and actions actually are then how the reading influences me. I reflected on questioning students over a section of reading.
It says: "What are the most important details so far?" (139).
I say: "What happened in this section of reading?"
And so: I realize that I am actually asking my students for plot:what happened. I really want them to be thinking about the larger implications of the text by my word choice keeps us on the literal level. By asking for details rather than events the discussion shifts to more thematic and insightful topics. Wilhelm also suggests questions to help students take notice of the text. "What do you think the author wants us to know?" (136). This type of a question helps lead students to drawing conclusions and thematic connections. I think it would be especially useful in studying character and setting. This makes me think about the imagery Steinbeck uses in describing George and Lenny in Of Mice and Men. What is Steinbeck saying about Lenny's character when he is compared to a bear? What conclusion can be drawn from this comparison? Again, these questions shift the discussion from plot or on the line questions to more inferencing.
I was surprised to learn that "6 percent of graduating high school seniors are adept at seeing and justifying complex implied relationships and authorial generalizations" (145). I feel like I focus on this so much but when I look closely at my actual word choice I am leading my students more to simple comprehension. I firmly believe that the use of inquiry based learning will support my students in better being able to analyze more advanced relationships.
Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry ch 5 and 6
Chapters 5 and 6 were interesting and eye opening. These chapters emphasized the importance and value of teaching students to think critically vs factually. The author gave examples of strategies using the inquiry model to take students to that higher level of thinking. He gave examples of how he uses a three-level reading guide to get his students to think about the questions they are asking and their level of sophistication. He discussed the power of making connections through questioning. "If our students do not learn to do this kind of work, they will be mired in information, instead of empowered to create and use knowledge." (129) I thought this quote was so powerful because we have created a society of fact finders versus deep thinkers and problem solvers. According tho the text, only 6 percent of graduating seniors are able to make geralizations and think in a complex manner (145).
As a group, we discussed the benefits of the inquiry model. We were in agreement that we often allow students to stop short at the factual, literal level when all it would really take is a subtle change in the wording of a question to get students to a higher level of discussion and thinking.
The reading protocol we used was "It says...I say...and so..." I have never used this protocol but really found it helpful. The purpose of the protocol is to extend thinking based on what is said in the reading and what one already knows about the topic. I will use this in my classroom because the three step process requires that students make meaning out of the reading versus pulling out information.
While reading the chapters I found myself reflecting about how to better use the inquiry model in my classroom. I annotated and used stickies to mark examples and strategies used by the author. I am really enjoying this book and have not found myself daydreaming and off task at all.
As a group, we discussed the benefits of the inquiry model. We were in agreement that we often allow students to stop short at the factual, literal level when all it would really take is a subtle change in the wording of a question to get students to a higher level of discussion and thinking.
The reading protocol we used was "It says...I say...and so..." I have never used this protocol but really found it helpful. The purpose of the protocol is to extend thinking based on what is said in the reading and what one already knows about the topic. I will use this in my classroom because the three step process requires that students make meaning out of the reading versus pulling out information.
While reading the chapters I found myself reflecting about how to better use the inquiry model in my classroom. I annotated and used stickies to mark examples and strategies used by the author. I am really enjoying this book and have not found myself daydreaming and off task at all.
Robert Samsel
Reflection #2
Tuesday June 14, 2011
Chapters 2-3
In this section of the book I finally got to get into some of the meat and potatoes. There were several websites given that provided resource to enhance the development of vocabulary. Many of which were unknown to me, some of them were. By the end of high school a student could have a reading vocabulary of up to fifty thousand words. This made me pause and wonder how students get there. Several tools were highlighted. All of the tools were just another way to expose kids to vocabulary in a novel way. According to research it takes many repetitions to the same vocabulary in different contexts for it to become part of their reading vocabulary and many more exposures in order to become part of their working vocabulary.
Four key components were given to increase students’ vocabulary
1. Provide rich and varied language experiences
2. Teach individual words.
3. Teach word-learning strategies.
4. Foster word consciousness.
I’m not sold that all examples given in the book accomplish all of these goals so it is probably necessary to use more than one of them to teach vocabulary that will take time. Time that I hope won’t interfere with the amount of content that also needs to be learned.
Amanda Reflection 2: Engaging Readers and Writers
This section of reading focused on the components of creating strong inquiry based questions. Wilhelm views standards as being more “as goals than standards, and they float out there, in isolation” (45). While I, of course, believe standards are important and they help me create a unit of study, they don’t necessarily help me in how to engage my students. The beauty of inquiry based learning is that guiding questions should be open ended, arguable, and addresses the perspective of the student. Wilhelm advocates for a strong personal connection for students to the guiding questions. As an English teacher, I sometimes get too wrapped up in the literature that I almost forget about the student. It’s funny because in my reading class I recognize the importance of personal connections for students but I don’t do too much in a traditional novel unit of study.
In my book study group we used text rendering as our discussion protocol. All three of us selected, in some form, a passage that deals with overcoming the “what” type questions. Is it really important in To Kill a Mockingbird for students to be able to identify that Calpurnia makes a crackle cake for Scout and Jem on Scout’s first day of school or that Calpurnia demonstrates her love for the children by making a cake for them? “Facts are important, but only if they are in service of deeper understanding” (56). Do I really just want my students to be able to simply recall information or do I want them to engage in both the reading and thinking? Using “how” or “why” questions help shift this type of thinking. For example, instead of asking students about story elements, ask them how a character reveals her essential character. I know that I know this but I sometimes forget it and slip into lower level thinking and questioning. This leads to another area our group discussed which is the “guess what the teacher thinks is the right answer.” I cringe when I think about when this happens. This tends to happen at the beginning a day’s lesson when students might be simply confused about what literally happened in the reading. A possible solution for this utilizing a summarizing strategy such as “Somebody, Wanted, But, and So” for a warm up at the start of class. Once it has been established what literally happened students can then move on to more of the higher level thinking and questioning.
As I read, I found myself re-reading a lot. Wilhelm suggestions are a shift in thinking for my philosophy of teaching. His teachings build on my beliefs but go about reaching them in a different way. I often found myself pausing and thinking, “Okay, so what do I do when I teach this?” and “How can I apply this to my units?” It appears that, I too, and using inquiry based learning for myself. Hmmm…
In my book study group we used text rendering as our discussion protocol. All three of us selected, in some form, a passage that deals with overcoming the “what” type questions. Is it really important in To Kill a Mockingbird for students to be able to identify that Calpurnia makes a crackle cake for Scout and Jem on Scout’s first day of school or that Calpurnia demonstrates her love for the children by making a cake for them? “Facts are important, but only if they are in service of deeper understanding” (56). Do I really just want my students to be able to simply recall information or do I want them to engage in both the reading and thinking? Using “how” or “why” questions help shift this type of thinking. For example, instead of asking students about story elements, ask them how a character reveals her essential character. I know that I know this but I sometimes forget it and slip into lower level thinking and questioning. This leads to another area our group discussed which is the “guess what the teacher thinks is the right answer.” I cringe when I think about when this happens. This tends to happen at the beginning a day’s lesson when students might be simply confused about what literally happened in the reading. A possible solution for this utilizing a summarizing strategy such as “Somebody, Wanted, But, and So” for a warm up at the start of class. Once it has been established what literally happened students can then move on to more of the higher level thinking and questioning.
As I read, I found myself re-reading a lot. Wilhelm suggestions are a shift in thinking for my philosophy of teaching. His teachings build on my beliefs but go about reaching them in a different way. I often found myself pausing and thinking, “Okay, so what do I do when I teach this?” and “How can I apply this to my units?” It appears that, I too, and using inquiry based learning for myself. Hmmm…
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Reflection #2
Elizabeth Meyer-Chapman
Subjects Matter
Chapters 4-6
New Learnings:
Chapter 4 “Toward a Balanced Diet of Reading” focused on strategies which would cultivate an in-depth understanding of content material. It focused on primary verses secondary sources and how primary can be a real hook for students. The text indicated that an effective hook is created when readers connect with who is being written about. When the reader cares about the writer, or the character being described interest is created and in-depth understanding becomes plausible. According to Zemelman and Daniels, a balance of reading must be struck between textbooks and other genres. Within these other genres a balance of choice versus assigned; fiction versus nonfiction; classics versus contemporary and hard versus easy will also need to be struck. I do have the advantage of my own classroom and I came to classroom with several books already. As I continue to add more books, I will be buying several of the books suggested in Subjects Matter, (the book contains about 20 pages of book suggestions.)
Chapter 5 was a marvelous read. It was chocked full of activities which show kids how smart readers think. The ‘Before ‘activities were activities to prepare students to read. The ‘During’ activities focused on helping students construct, process and question ideas as they read. The ‘After’ activities were for guiding students to reflect on, integrate, and share the ideas when they’re finished. I will most likely pick two to three strategies every six weeks to try and continually practice in my classroom. I can weed out what is the best and keep the rest. It will become a go to book for me while planning until some of the activities become automatic.
Chapter 6 talked about how to use a textbook. It contained several activities which could be used to model for students how to read a textbook and make the independent reading of textbook operational.
Personal Reading Strategies:
Whenever possible I annotate and highlight text while I read. This way I can go back through and look at my questions, short summaries and ah-ha’s. I also employed rereading when I was confused by something.
Discussion Protocol:
We used the Last Word protocol in our group. While reading we were to write a sentence on one side of a note card and on the opposite side, our reaction. We read the sentence to the group and each member had a chance to share their reaction to it. The person who initially shares the sentence gets the last word. I liked it because I was able to get everyone else’s interpretation before sharing mine. Learned a lot, shared a lot and remembered a lot.
Subjects Matter
Chapters 4-6
New Learnings:
Chapter 4 “Toward a Balanced Diet of Reading” focused on strategies which would cultivate an in-depth understanding of content material. It focused on primary verses secondary sources and how primary can be a real hook for students. The text indicated that an effective hook is created when readers connect with who is being written about. When the reader cares about the writer, or the character being described interest is created and in-depth understanding becomes plausible. According to Zemelman and Daniels, a balance of reading must be struck between textbooks and other genres. Within these other genres a balance of choice versus assigned; fiction versus nonfiction; classics versus contemporary and hard versus easy will also need to be struck. I do have the advantage of my own classroom and I came to classroom with several books already. As I continue to add more books, I will be buying several of the books suggested in Subjects Matter, (the book contains about 20 pages of book suggestions.)
Chapter 5 was a marvelous read. It was chocked full of activities which show kids how smart readers think. The ‘Before ‘activities were activities to prepare students to read. The ‘During’ activities focused on helping students construct, process and question ideas as they read. The ‘After’ activities were for guiding students to reflect on, integrate, and share the ideas when they’re finished. I will most likely pick two to three strategies every six weeks to try and continually practice in my classroom. I can weed out what is the best and keep the rest. It will become a go to book for me while planning until some of the activities become automatic.
Chapter 6 talked about how to use a textbook. It contained several activities which could be used to model for students how to read a textbook and make the independent reading of textbook operational.
Personal Reading Strategies:
Whenever possible I annotate and highlight text while I read. This way I can go back through and look at my questions, short summaries and ah-ha’s. I also employed rereading when I was confused by something.
Discussion Protocol:
We used the Last Word protocol in our group. While reading we were to write a sentence on one side of a note card and on the opposite side, our reaction. We read the sentence to the group and each member had a chance to share their reaction to it. The person who initially shares the sentence gets the last word. I liked it because I was able to get everyone else’s interpretation before sharing mine. Learned a lot, shared a lot and remembered a lot.
De Roia- Post day 2
Cheryl De Roia
Reading Reflection 6/24
Subjects Matter- Every Teacher’s Guide to Content-Area Reading by Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Chapter 4-6 (pages 49-165)
These chapters of the book really hooked me in and gave many new insights as to things I could do in my classroom. Again, discussing the idea of using a textbook, the authors write “Are kids actually working, thinking, and engaged with the text we assign- or are they just imitating a sentient life form while remaining functionally unconscious?” (152). I will fully admit that in my classroom, 100% of the kids are not actively engaging and using the text 100% of the time. Do I wish they were? Sure, but I haven’t done a good enough job through planning co-teaching lessons to guarantee that were true. I love this book because not only does it tell the reader the mistake, it shows the reader how the correct way looks in practice and then gives many formulas (worksheets) for bringing the reader into the text. I have been sitting in my chair wondering if the staff at my school would welcome or even use some of these text engagement strategies. And if so, who would it be? Chapter 5 gives “24 essential strategies to promote the thinking students need for learning effectively from what they read” (99). Some are ones I have used prior including brainstorming, KWL, and double-entry journals. There are others that I haven’t used before such as sketching my way through the text, written conversation, and coding the text. In coding the text, students use a specific set of codes such as checks or stars to record mental responses to their reading. According the authors, the reason we use coding is “if students are not accustomed to thinking actively as they read, the needs to make conscious efforts to do so…symbols help students remember a strategy, notice when their thinking has followed it, and then very briefly note the spot in the text where that thinking occurred.” I keep thinking of the classroom where the kids ask why we are doing something. I love that this books gives a clear why and example so that I can share that with the kids.
Protocol
Today we used the “Last Word” protocol in our group. We read independently and then on an index card we copied down a phrase or passage that spoke to us and wrote a response to it on the back of the card. When sharing our card, we were not allowed to speak but instead listened to others comment. We then got the last word on the passage as we read what we wrote about the passage or commented on another person’s comment.
This strategy was effective but since we had lots to say, we ran out of time. I could see it being better used with a smaller set of text and not our long three chapters we covered. Within the strategy there is a listening element while students wait to take their turn to speak. It could present a problem early on as students become accustomed to this process. I found it hard to be silent when someone said something that excited me.
Reading Strategies
While reading today I mostly paced myself to determine if I needed to skim or if I could spend more time digesting the text. I noticed that when I ran across familiar strategies, I quickly looked over them to make sure I have been doing them correctly and then I moved on to non-familiar strategies. Due to a time constraint I feel that I spent less time thinking about how I could use the strategies and more time just absorbing what the strategies are. I did underline important passages or sentences that spoke to me, which made it really easy to go back and find text to use during our group book study.
Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry ch.3
Chapter 3 Asking the Guiding Questions: Reframing the Existing Curriculum into Inquiry Units
This chapter cleared up so many questions I have regarding inquiry, essential questions and enduring understadings. As a district we have focused on writing essential questions and enduring understandings never really differentiating between the two. I knew that essential questions were the big picture, and now know that the enduring understandings are the "absolute bottom line goals for student achievement." The enduring understandings are what we want the students to know at the end of the unit.
The chapter talked about turning standards into essential questions and gave quite a few examples of what that looks like in all content areas. It discussed the importance of writing questions that require evaluation and judgement, essentially asking "how" and "why" instead of "what" questions. There is a section in the chapter that discusses common flaws to watch for when starting inquiry. This section helped me to understand what I did wrong with my inquiry projects last year. It was refreshing to know that the mistakes I made are very common when starting inquiry in the classroom.
My study group used the text rendering protocol while reading the chapter. It was interesting because we had many of the same sentences and passages highlighted to share. We were in agreement that the chapter was invaluable and answered many of our questions regarding inquiry. We talked quite a bit about the impact inquiry can make on student engagement and how we will use it in our classrooms next year.
In additon to the text rendering protocol, I did a lot of annotating and reflecting while reading this chapter. It was a long chapter and easy to read but I noticed that I slowed down my pace while reading and did quite a bit of rereading because I found the material so interesting and useful.
This chapter cleared up so many questions I have regarding inquiry, essential questions and enduring understadings. As a district we have focused on writing essential questions and enduring understandings never really differentiating between the two. I knew that essential questions were the big picture, and now know that the enduring understandings are the "absolute bottom line goals for student achievement." The enduring understandings are what we want the students to know at the end of the unit.
The chapter talked about turning standards into essential questions and gave quite a few examples of what that looks like in all content areas. It discussed the importance of writing questions that require evaluation and judgement, essentially asking "how" and "why" instead of "what" questions. There is a section in the chapter that discusses common flaws to watch for when starting inquiry. This section helped me to understand what I did wrong with my inquiry projects last year. It was refreshing to know that the mistakes I made are very common when starting inquiry in the classroom.
My study group used the text rendering protocol while reading the chapter. It was interesting because we had many of the same sentences and passages highlighted to share. We were in agreement that the chapter was invaluable and answered many of our questions regarding inquiry. We talked quite a bit about the impact inquiry can make on student engagement and how we will use it in our classrooms next year.
In additon to the text rendering protocol, I did a lot of annotating and reflecting while reading this chapter. It was a long chapter and easy to read but I noticed that I slowed down my pace while reading and did quite a bit of rereading because I found the material so interesting and useful.
Dunnington Reflection 2
Deb Dunnington
Multimodal Learning…
Chapters 2 and 3 (pages 31-50)
Reflection 2
The majority of this section of reading in Multimodal was strategies for teaching vocabulary. I think if you have taught in Adams 12 in the last year you have been inundated with strategies and techniques for teaching vocabulary through ELL training and quite frankly, I think that those methods are probably more valid than the ones suggested in Bean’s text.
Some of the things that Bean suggests are cool, but I am left wondering at their substance – are they really going to benefit the students? This is a question I can’t help but going back to as I continue to read the text. I have tried to take a positive outlook and think about how I could use some of the strategies Bean suggests in my classroom. I could definitely see using a few, like Freerice for a warm-up activity or to fill a few minutes, and I tried to find a way to use Wordle, another of his suggestions, but upon further reflection and clarification from my discussion group as to what Wordle really is, I question what it’s purpose would be as far as vocabulary. I think Wordle would be a good tool to use to see the frequency of a students word use, but I question how it could build vocabulary besides helping students to recognize that they might have a limited vocabulary or use the same words too much. I know it is important for a person to see a word a certain number of times before they really know it, but I think for a student to take ownership of a vocabulary word they need to do more with it than see it; they need to be able to use it in context and recognize synonyms or antonyms.
Bean does provide a number of vocabulary websites that could be helpful, my only suggestion would be to check them out to see if they are really valid for the purpose you have in mind. In addition to vocabulary, Bean discussed comprehension strategies like Polar Opposites and Talking Drawings. I think both of these techniques could be beneficial and my group even discussed ways we could adapt the Polar Opposites to fit into vocabulary instruction.
The discussion protocol we used today was the 3 Levels of Text. I thought that this might be a good protocol to use in classes because it doesn’t only practice discussion techniques but oral fluency, as each participant is asked to read their selected passage aloud. This might be a time to allow the students to pick their own groups instead of choosing for them. By picking their own groups, they will be able to work with people they are comfortable with so that reading aloud shouldn’t create any traumatic situations.
The reading strategies I found myself using during this section of the reading was really questioning. I continually was asking myself questions about how I could use the strategies Bean included. I was questioning how they would look in my classroom or different ways I could modify and adapt them for my practice. I also used annotation and highlighting, which to me are just standard practices when I read something that isn’t for entertainment.
Reading Reflection #2
Katie Horne
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapters 2-3
The reading today introduced me to incorporate multimodal strategies for vocabulary development and reading comprehension. Overall there are a variety of websites teachers can use to support vocabulary development. As teachers though, we need to evaluate their authenticity and make sure they have a valid purpose for use in the classroom. Some of the websites include Freerice, VoyCabulary, Babel Fish, Wordle. Freerice would be a good website as a beginning of class or end of class activity. The teacher puts the website up and students chose the meaning of the word. For every right answer, 10 grains of rice is donated to the United Nations World Food Program. Babel Fish will translate a website or block of text. This is a great resource for ESL students. Students need to be engaged in vocabulary learning in many ways: explicit teaching, vocabulary learning strategies, and wide reading. As this book is about "multimodal", vocabulary learning is not one-dimensional.
As for reading comprehension, this chapter introduced two new strategies that I can take into my classroom next year: talking drawings and polar opposites. Talking drawings is kind of similar to a KWL. Instead, students create an image related to a topic and write down information they know. Then they complete research and then redo their drawing with the new information they learned. Unlike a KWL, students recreate their drawing, not just add to it. The other strategy is polar opposites. Teachers create a statement that can be found on a continum and students put an X near the end that is closer to their views. Once a text is read, students learn the information and are able to synthesize the information. Unlike with the vocabulary chapter, there was less of a focus on websites for teachers to use.
The strategies I used were highlighting main ideas and important concepts; rereading; skimming; and annotations. After our discussion, we came to some of the same conclusions as the day before. While many of these websites, especially for vocabulary, are attractive, we as teachers need to evaluate their authenticity and purpose. We struggled to understand the purpose behind Wordle. Babel Fish is a great resource for all students--especially ESL students and students who are learning a new language. VoyCabulary allows students to link to a dictionary online and learn new words. Another website I enjoy using is a visu-dictionary where the words are related visually. One of the main concepts this book really drives at is presenting information in multiple ways; however, sometimes we need to step back and not overload our students. Their lives these days are in technological overload and while presenting information and activities in a variety of modes is good, we need to remember not to overload them!
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapters 2-3
The reading today introduced me to incorporate multimodal strategies for vocabulary development and reading comprehension. Overall there are a variety of websites teachers can use to support vocabulary development. As teachers though, we need to evaluate their authenticity and make sure they have a valid purpose for use in the classroom. Some of the websites include Freerice, VoyCabulary, Babel Fish, Wordle. Freerice would be a good website as a beginning of class or end of class activity. The teacher puts the website up and students chose the meaning of the word. For every right answer, 10 grains of rice is donated to the United Nations World Food Program. Babel Fish will translate a website or block of text. This is a great resource for ESL students. Students need to be engaged in vocabulary learning in many ways: explicit teaching, vocabulary learning strategies, and wide reading. As this book is about "multimodal", vocabulary learning is not one-dimensional.
As for reading comprehension, this chapter introduced two new strategies that I can take into my classroom next year: talking drawings and polar opposites. Talking drawings is kind of similar to a KWL. Instead, students create an image related to a topic and write down information they know. Then they complete research and then redo their drawing with the new information they learned. Unlike a KWL, students recreate their drawing, not just add to it. The other strategy is polar opposites. Teachers create a statement that can be found on a continum and students put an X near the end that is closer to their views. Once a text is read, students learn the information and are able to synthesize the information. Unlike with the vocabulary chapter, there was less of a focus on websites for teachers to use.
The strategies I used were highlighting main ideas and important concepts; rereading; skimming; and annotations. After our discussion, we came to some of the same conclusions as the day before. While many of these websites, especially for vocabulary, are attractive, we as teachers need to evaluate their authenticity and purpose. We struggled to understand the purpose behind Wordle. Babel Fish is a great resource for all students--especially ESL students and students who are learning a new language. VoyCabulary allows students to link to a dictionary online and learn new words. Another website I enjoy using is a visu-dictionary where the words are related visually. One of the main concepts this book really drives at is presenting information in multiple ways; however, sometimes we need to step back and not overload our students. Their lives these days are in technological overload and while presenting information and activities in a variety of modes is good, we need to remember not to overload them!
Sage Rebuehr
Reading Reflection #2
Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry by Jeffrey Wilhelm
Chapter 3
This chapter about questions answered lots of my questions. This chapter focused on developing guiding questions for units. It was full of information and lots helpful ideas. Wilhelm suggests by starting with the standard and turning the standards into a guiding question. This seems so obvious to me now! For example, a common language arts standard is “Students will be able to identify the elements of a short story?” This can become the guiding question “What makes a good short story?” or “How can we write a good short story?” I also like how he talks about different types of guiding questions. All guiding questions don’t have to be application (like writing a short story); they can be conceptual (like discussing the qualities of a good short story). For some reason that makes it seem more manageable for me. He also stresses the importance of front-loading information at the beginning of a unit. This was a great chapter and explicitly outlined how to developed these inquiry units.
As a group we decided to do the text rendering strategies as we read this chapter. I was glad because I was hoping this would help me focus and pick out important information. As I was reading, I found myself highlighting all the example guiding questions he included that I thought I may be able to use in my curriculum. What worked really well for me was I just highlighted as I read. When time was just about up, then I went back through my highlights and chose my passage, sentence, and word to share in the discussion.
In our discussion, we really didn’t have any trouble talking about what we read as we were all excited to share what we learned. I did notice that we just kind of skipped around. We didn’t go around the circle and start by sharing our passage or sentence. We just jumped in and started sharing our ideas. When the conversations lagged, someone jumped in with one of their passages or sentences. This got me thinking about my students. I feel like they need a structure and an understanding of how to participate in a discussion. I could easily see my students complete their “discussion” in 5 minutes. “We all shared our stuff, miss!” My big question is how to I get them to respond to others and add on to their ideas. To get them to understand that what they bring to the discussion is just the beginning of it, not the end.
Day 2 Reflection
Sara Williams
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapters 2 & 3
Vocabulary. We all know how critical it is to developing reading skills and content knowledge, but how is it best taught? Chapter 2 of our book attempted to tackle this question multimodal-style. Bean discusses the idea of "insider knowledge" and what I found interesting about this phrase was the word "insider." I had never thought of myself as a reading insider before, but I guess I am. I know what to do to work through difficult texts, I use "insider" languge like "reading apprenticeship" and "metacognition," and I feel comfortable when I'm met with reading challenges. As Bean says, my "speech distinguishes [me] from outsiders." Bean asserts that "spending a little time explaining the insider's language of our respective content areas goes a long way toward increasing student comprehension." This made me think of tier I, II, & III vocabulary words we discussed in our ELL training. Some things just need to be made transparent and our teaching needs to be explicit. Another thread running through Bean's discussion is that learning new words is "labor intensive." Funny how we've been saying this over and over about reading - it is work and it doesn't just happen magically. I'm learning that this is something I need to say out loud to my kids. A lot.
In our group, we discussed the specific strategies Bean outlines in these chapters. I think our overall opinion is that the strategies were okay, but would need adapting to work in our classes.
I find myself struggling a little with this reading - it's not holding my interest. Maybe it is because it is a professional text and I'm in summer mode after having been on maternity leave for 8 weeks and it's tough to get in the flow. I'm trying to focus on my purpose for reading by rereading the guiding questions for the book study and also asking the person in my group in charge of facilitating for the day what we'll be doing in discussion so I can read with that in mind.
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent
Chapters 2 & 3
Vocabulary. We all know how critical it is to developing reading skills and content knowledge, but how is it best taught? Chapter 2 of our book attempted to tackle this question multimodal-style. Bean discusses the idea of "insider knowledge" and what I found interesting about this phrase was the word "insider." I had never thought of myself as a reading insider before, but I guess I am. I know what to do to work through difficult texts, I use "insider" languge like "reading apprenticeship" and "metacognition," and I feel comfortable when I'm met with reading challenges. As Bean says, my "speech distinguishes [me] from outsiders." Bean asserts that "spending a little time explaining the insider's language of our respective content areas goes a long way toward increasing student comprehension." This made me think of tier I, II, & III vocabulary words we discussed in our ELL training. Some things just need to be made transparent and our teaching needs to be explicit. Another thread running through Bean's discussion is that learning new words is "labor intensive." Funny how we've been saying this over and over about reading - it is work and it doesn't just happen magically. I'm learning that this is something I need to say out loud to my kids. A lot.
In our group, we discussed the specific strategies Bean outlines in these chapters. I think our overall opinion is that the strategies were okay, but would need adapting to work in our classes.
I find myself struggling a little with this reading - it's not holding my interest. Maybe it is because it is a professional text and I'm in summer mode after having been on maternity leave for 8 weeks and it's tough to get in the flow. I'm trying to focus on my purpose for reading by rereading the guiding questions for the book study and also asking the person in my group in charge of facilitating for the day what we'll be doing in discussion so I can read with that in mind.
Subjects Matter - Day 2
Christine Munzer
Subjects Matter
Chapters 4 -6
The Chapters
Chapter 4 spent a lot of time looking at how a teacher could incorporate reading into their everyday practice. It gave helpful hints for picking a type of text by breaking down the texts into genres, long vs. short, and hard vs. easy. Furthermore, it discussed the importance of building a classroom library. Although they made building a library sound so easy, I still can’t get past my own gut feeling telling me it’s not a great idea. I struggle with the fact that I share my classrooms (yes, I will have 3 rooms next year), it takes a lot of work to build and finally it will add one more thing to manage on top of my already jam packed day.
Chapter 5 offered the most amazing, easy to use activities for reading. It broke the activities down into the three categories of before, during and after reading. Beyond this, the book offers actual student work to show how some of the strategies should work (come on folks, don’t we all like to cook recipes that have pictures attached to them so that we can see what the final product should look like)!
Finally, Chapter 6 offered six suggestions for how to incorporate using the textbook into your class. If you love your textbook then this chapter is a must read because it offers great strategies!
The Reading Process
Now that I have become more aware of how I am reading, I found myself using a lot of strategies to get through the text. First and foremost, I must share that our selected passage was 100 pages long and I had to try and read at least part of it while my two kids (ages 1 and 3) were still up and needing some type of attention. I saw this as an opportunity to figure out strategies that would work well under these conditions, as I know quite a few of my students are expected to work in similar ones as they try to complete homework at a job or within in their own loud homes. The strategy I found to work the best was coding the text. I found myself putting question marks next to passages that I could not focus enough to get through; so that I could go and revisit them in a quieter environment and marking with a sticky note other passages that I could use with our last word protocol. Once the kiddos were in bed, I could go back and look at the marks I made to clarify and reflect on key pieces that really struck me.
The Protocol
Today, we used the last word protocol. Within the protocol, we were to write about one sentence or passage that had an impact on us. On one side of the note card, the reader had to write the passage and on the other their own opinion that would be reported out to the group. I really loved the protocol because it made me really focus on what others were saying before I could input how I felt about the text. I personally feel it will work well with my students because they always like to have the last word and now I am giving them that opportunity. Like that other protocol we used, this is student ran, which gives me more time to check-in with all groups as the discussions are happening.
Subjects Matter
Chapters 4 -6
The Chapters
Chapter 4 spent a lot of time looking at how a teacher could incorporate reading into their everyday practice. It gave helpful hints for picking a type of text by breaking down the texts into genres, long vs. short, and hard vs. easy. Furthermore, it discussed the importance of building a classroom library. Although they made building a library sound so easy, I still can’t get past my own gut feeling telling me it’s not a great idea. I struggle with the fact that I share my classrooms (yes, I will have 3 rooms next year), it takes a lot of work to build and finally it will add one more thing to manage on top of my already jam packed day.
Chapter 5 offered the most amazing, easy to use activities for reading. It broke the activities down into the three categories of before, during and after reading. Beyond this, the book offers actual student work to show how some of the strategies should work (come on folks, don’t we all like to cook recipes that have pictures attached to them so that we can see what the final product should look like)!
Finally, Chapter 6 offered six suggestions for how to incorporate using the textbook into your class. If you love your textbook then this chapter is a must read because it offers great strategies!
The Reading Process
Now that I have become more aware of how I am reading, I found myself using a lot of strategies to get through the text. First and foremost, I must share that our selected passage was 100 pages long and I had to try and read at least part of it while my two kids (ages 1 and 3) were still up and needing some type of attention. I saw this as an opportunity to figure out strategies that would work well under these conditions, as I know quite a few of my students are expected to work in similar ones as they try to complete homework at a job or within in their own loud homes. The strategy I found to work the best was coding the text. I found myself putting question marks next to passages that I could not focus enough to get through; so that I could go and revisit them in a quieter environment and marking with a sticky note other passages that I could use with our last word protocol. Once the kiddos were in bed, I could go back and look at the marks I made to clarify and reflect on key pieces that really struck me.
The Protocol
Today, we used the last word protocol. Within the protocol, we were to write about one sentence or passage that had an impact on us. On one side of the note card, the reader had to write the passage and on the other their own opinion that would be reported out to the group. I really loved the protocol because it made me really focus on what others were saying before I could input how I felt about the text. I personally feel it will work well with my students because they always like to have the last word and now I am giving them that opportunity. Like that other protocol we used, this is student ran, which gives me more time to check-in with all groups as the discussions are happening.
Reflection 1 – Subjects Matters; Chapters 1-3
At some point it was explained to me that reading can be a game; or at least make the objective something to be done and won. Of course, this can minimize some of the other benefits to reading, but it can also be a strategy to get students’ attention and see the purpose to some reading tasks. That is how I approached reading Subjects Matter by H. Daniels and S. Zemelman. How much do I need to read and in what time? What am I suppose to do with the text? And how will I show I read and understood it?....What is my task?
Like too many of our students I strategized how to most quickly read the required text in the time allowed. In that vein, I read the chapter titles and flipped through the pages to peruse the subtitles. Because I was not certain I could read ALL the chapters in time, I started with the one that was most unfamiliar to me (I have to admit here that I had previously been assigned to read parts of this text in a previous class). At that point I began reading.
The text is an easy read, and the examples very applicable and congruent. The anecdotal student and adult reading behaviors are accurate and easy to relate to; therefore, being so business minded about my task was hard to do. Periodically I had to remind myself what my task was: to find words, phrases, sentences and passages that I found to be thought provoking for the purpose of sharing with the group. In my mind I kept telling myself, “Stay on task.” Sound familiar?
Other reading strategies that I used (and always use) are marking my text (A LOT), making connections, posing questions (one of my “markings”) and rereading for the purpose of completing my task. I asked myself, is that the word, phrase, sentence or passage I want to use? After rereading and giving it some thought, I either marked the page (again) or moved on.
As for the protocol, I was a bit familiar with it and had used it as a student in previous classes; however, I have never used it with students. Why? Precisely why I am in this class….to get more familiar with and build an arsenal of tools to use with literature in my classes. This one is relatively easy to follow and can just as easily be altered to meet students’ and my needs. As a group we did surprisingly well following the protocol and sustaining a meaningful dialog about the chapters we decided on.
As for the text, Daniels and Zemelman get to the “what” students should read, and how teachers can make it understood and even enjoyable. As previously identified it is easy to read and not filled with theory or pedagogical talk. Future chapters will have very specific pre-, during and post- reading activities that teachers can possibly modify and incorporate.
There will always be texts that are not yours or your students’ first choice to read. However, if they are carefully chosen, and meaningful practices and tasks are aligned with the text, students can read with intent, understand and learn, and they just might enjoy themselves along the way.
Like too many of our students I strategized how to most quickly read the required text in the time allowed. In that vein, I read the chapter titles and flipped through the pages to peruse the subtitles. Because I was not certain I could read ALL the chapters in time, I started with the one that was most unfamiliar to me (I have to admit here that I had previously been assigned to read parts of this text in a previous class). At that point I began reading.
The text is an easy read, and the examples very applicable and congruent. The anecdotal student and adult reading behaviors are accurate and easy to relate to; therefore, being so business minded about my task was hard to do. Periodically I had to remind myself what my task was: to find words, phrases, sentences and passages that I found to be thought provoking for the purpose of sharing with the group. In my mind I kept telling myself, “Stay on task.” Sound familiar?
Other reading strategies that I used (and always use) are marking my text (A LOT), making connections, posing questions (one of my “markings”) and rereading for the purpose of completing my task. I asked myself, is that the word, phrase, sentence or passage I want to use? After rereading and giving it some thought, I either marked the page (again) or moved on.
As for the protocol, I was a bit familiar with it and had used it as a student in previous classes; however, I have never used it with students. Why? Precisely why I am in this class….to get more familiar with and build an arsenal of tools to use with literature in my classes. This one is relatively easy to follow and can just as easily be altered to meet students’ and my needs. As a group we did surprisingly well following the protocol and sustaining a meaningful dialog about the chapters we decided on.
As for the text, Daniels and Zemelman get to the “what” students should read, and how teachers can make it understood and even enjoyable. As previously identified it is easy to read and not filled with theory or pedagogical talk. Future chapters will have very specific pre-, during and post- reading activities that teachers can possibly modify and incorporate.
There will always be texts that are not yours or your students’ first choice to read. However, if they are carefully chosen, and meaningful practices and tasks are aligned with the text, students can read with intent, understand and learn, and they just might enjoy themselves along the way.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Dunnington - Reflection #1
Deb Dunnington
Multimodal Learning for the 21st Century Adolescent – Thomas Bean
Chapter 1 - (pages 1-29)
Today our professional book study group read the first chapter in our book. Chapter 1 in Multimodal Learning focuses on defining the terms multiple literacies and new literacies. These terms refer to how the idea of literacy is changing to incorporate other forms of media besides print, such as the Internet and the social networking trends of today.
We are in a time where the resources available to educators and students are changing and growing. Where before educators might use an online article as a supplemental resource, now “we can expect electronic forms of text to overtake older, print-based forms” (17). We are approaching a time where we may be forced to use those “older, print-based forms” as our supplement. This was a new concept to me because I was taught that visual aids such as technology or media should be used to further or deepen a student’s knowledge and learning, not replace the print medium. Technology is not an area I am totally comfortable in, but today, technology is a large interest of our teenagers and, as a teacher, I need to think about that and try to incorporate it into my lessons.
Another large focus in chapter one is on creativity. Bean appears to believe that “the more students practice functioning in creative, integrated, collaborative learning domains across all the content areas, the better” (18). By creative, integrated, and collaborative learning domains, I believe the author is referring to those social networks like Facebook, YouTube, Blogs, etc. that allow for people to socialize and discuss topics with others, even those in other locations. These are creative forums, but when reading this, I found myself questioning the text and wondering why we cannot still use print mediums in creative ways because, to me, creativity is not only found online. Bean states, “the possibilities for student creativity and production have never been better” (27). I totally agree with that because by using the technological resources we are giving students another tool to add to their toolbox and another way to build knowledge, I just don’t think it should be at the expense of those older resources we know work too.
Since none of our group had read the book prior to coming to class today, we chose to spend some time reading and then participated in the Last Word discussion protocol. One of the statements we discussed was “books, novels, magazines, and newspapers – artifacts of past generations – still remain on our radar. But, these hard copy paper-based forms of communication are quickly being outpaced by online forms of text, often augmented with appealing and engaging visuals and media clips” (16). Our group discussed that we have to be cognizant that not all of our students may have access to some of the technology and that not only do they need to know how to use the technology, but they still need to know how to use print sources, as well, because our big assessments are still in the “old” format. To me, the word multi says it all – we should use multiple mediums in our lessons.
I had never used the Last Word discussion protocol so in completing this activity I now have another strategy I can use in my classroom. I thought that it was a great way to discuss material and it forces the person who found the statement to listen to the other group members’ opinions and responses before commenting themselves. I thought this was great because I’ve noticed when using discussion in my class that a lot of times kids want to interrupt or dominate but they cannot do that when using this protocol unless they are totally not following the rules.
One reading strategy I used today was rereading. We only gave ourselves about half hour to read and prepare for our discussion and while that was enough for me to skim and find important statements, I didn’t feel as if it was enough time for me to read closely enough to be able to reflect on the reading. Before I could reflect, I reread the passages or parts of the chapter I felt were most relevant to what we discussed and to understanding the rest of the book.
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