Tuesday, October 7, 2014
Tutoring Reflection
I just completed my fourth and final tutoring session with my student. All of the sessions have been conducted in the classroom during specials or recess, so other students have not been present so as to minimize distractions. The lessons have focused on reading comprehension strategies that the student can use to remember more of what she has read. The first two sessions addressed before, during and after reading strategies and the use of anticipation guide to activate background knowledge. I was not able to complete as much of these sessions as I would have liked given the time available and the student's tendency to bring up unrelated stories and pieces of information. Because of this, I shortened my final two sessions and had them focus on the same book. The first session included a read aloud to the student and then the student read the story to me. We stopped at various points in the story to discuss visualization techniques she could use to help better understand the story. The final session then focused on author's message. The student was able to retell a fair amount of the plot and elements of the story, which indicated to me that she made more of a connection with the text and related more to fiction, given the first two sessions used informational text. We then reviewed all of the strategies we had discussed over the four sessions, summarizing how the student could use those strategies when we re-test. Interestingly, the student mentioned that she was going to read fast because that is what the DIBELS test was assessing. This answered one of my questions in my journal that questioned if she read at such a fast rate because that was what she thought she needed to do to be successful. This presented a great opportunity for me to remind her that we are reading to learn in third grade (and on the re-test she will take), so it is most important for her to remember what she has read and not read it as fast as she can. Today was a big breakthrough when she actually admitted (without probing) that she read so fast because of her past experiences with reading tests. While I don't expect drastic improvement from my four short sessions, I do believe the student is beginning to understand that the purpose of reading is to comprehend and not just recognize words and she will begin to modify her reading rate to meet this need.
Sunday, October 5, 2014
Critique of Reading Instructional Strategies/Materials
Michael Miller
Fall 2014
Practicum III
Wilmington University
Critique of Reading Instructional Materials/Strategies
The ability to read is by far the single most important factor in predicting future academic success. Increasingly, children are entering school with minimal exposure to a print and language rich environment, making a teacher’s role in reading instruction all the more critical and challenging. In order to facilitate the implementation of reading instruction, teachers can consider a wide array of supplemental resources; however, careful attention must be given to the reputability of the source of the materials and the intended instructional outcomes of using these tools. The most beneficial and effective resources are those that have been carefully selected based on evidence based research. Five instructional materials and strategies teachers can consider in reading instruction include graphic and semantic organizers, leveled readers from Reading A-Z, Elkonin Boxes, anticipation guides, and vocabulary building bookmarks.
Graphic and semantic organizers are likely one of the most widely used and effective materials in reading instruction. These resources can go by a variety of names, including maps, webs, graphs, charts, frames, or clusters and be modified for use at all grade levels. Through the use of these tools, students are able to turn the abstract into a concrete visual by illustrating concepts and identifying relationships between these concepts. Graphic organizers can help students understand text structure, plot line, and character traits in addition to writing well-organized summaries of the text. Some examples of specific graphic organizers and their intended purpose include venn-diagrams to compare and contrast, storyboard/chain of events to sequence, story maps to better understand characters, setting, plot, problem and resolution, and cause/effect to aid in establishing connections between events in the story. Graphic organizers can be made or found online at no charge and can serve a number of purposes beyond those mentioned here. Graphic and semantic organizers present no significant disadvantages to instruction or student learning and should be used as widely as possible across the curriculum.
The effective reading teacher must go beyond the basal reader to truly meet the needs of all students and align instruction with Common Core Standards. Printable leveled readers from Reading A-Z (www.readinga-z.com) are an amazing resource to supplement basal reading instruction in the primary grades that is aligned with Common Core State Standards and available in a variety of languages, effectively meeting the needs of a diverse classroom population. The leveled readers are divided into 27 levels of difficulty to aid in differentiating instruction and are often accompanied by lessons, reader’s theater scripts, worksheets, and assessments. The Reading A-Z site offers an abundance of additional resources, including fluency passages, phonics lessons and flashcards, vocabulary books, and graphic organizers. With an increased emphasis on assessment, teachers can surely benefit from the benchmark books and running records. Furthermore, teachers can rest assured that the strategies and materials are evidenced based as Reading A-Z developed the resources based on the National Reading Panel’s recommendations which correspond to the findings of the Put Reading First federal initiative. While Reading A-Z presents no significant instructional disadvantages, the license does come at a cost of $99.95 per individual educator with 1-36 students. Bulk discounts may be available if an entire grade or school wanted to implement the program. Overall, even considering the cost, Reading A-Z seems to be an extremely beneficial tool in any Reading teacher’s instructional toolbox.
Pioneered by Russian psychologist D.B. Elkonin, Elkonin boxes have been used for many years as an instructional method to build phonological awareness by aiding in the process of segmenting words into individual sounds. Furthermore, Elkonin boxes teach students how to count the number of phonemes in a word as opposed to the number of letters and brings further clarity to the alphabetic principle in decoding and spelling. This resource is best used individually or in small groups and can accompany books like Go Dog Go by P.D. Eastman, Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss, and Mom and Dad are Palindromes by Mark Shulman. To use Elkonin boxes, students pronounce a word slowly, stretching it out by sound. The teacher either draws the Elkonin boxes or uses an existing template, drawing one box for each syllable or phoneme. The student will then use manipulative letters or write the letters associated with each sound in the appropriate boxes. Elkonin boxes are also a great tool for second language learners and students of varying reading skill, where teachers can use words with pictures and only two boxes, words with pictures and three boxes, or words with no pictures and up to four boxes. The use of Elkonin boxes, most applicable at the K-3 level, presents no significant disadvantages to reading instruction and it’s effectiveness is supported by evidence based research from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
An excellent resource to aid in reading comprehension, an anticipation guide is a strategy that forecasts the major ideas contained in a passage through the use of statements that activate students’ thoughts and opinions. Prior to reading, students respond to a set of statements that relate to the key ideas and major concepts in the selection, which is very effective at cueing into the major ideas of the text prior to reading. The most effective statements are those that relate to the students‘ interests and beliefs that will be supported or challenged in the learning activity. Given the abundance of evidence that supports activating background knowledge, this is an invaluable tool to arouse interest in a text, set a purpose for reading, and encourage higher level thinking. Critical to the successful use of this tool is a teacher’s knowledge of his/her students and the prior knowledge they bring to the discussion, given the most effective anticipation guide statements are those which the students have some knowledge but do not necessarily have a complete understanding. Following the reading, students should return to the anticipation guide and locate the text evidence that supports or rejects each statement, which openly addresses and changes students’ misconceptions. Beyond the advantages listed above, the use of anticipation guides also encourages collaborative group discussions, can be used at all grade levels, and comes at no cost as teachers can create this resource themselves or identify one from an abundance of free websites. There are no significant disadvantages to using anticipation guides to improve reading comprehension.
Finally, a very effective and easy to use tool for vocabulary instruction is the vocabulary building bookmark. Research has shown that the most effective manner to learn and retain vocabulary knowledge is by learning the words in context. The vocabulary building bookmark is a tool students can use to keep track of vocabulary words they encounter while reading that they do not understand. A variety of formats for this resource exist and are available free of charge from a variety of websites or can be made from existing classroom materials. Most versions include an entry for the word, source, and page in addition to space to define the word in context and from an external resource like a dictionary. By tracking the location of the word in context, students can then return to that word to check if there understanding of the selection changes after learning the meaning of the vocabulary word. Through this process of creating word meaning, students are also effectively improving their reading comprehension. Furthermore, if students find themselves listing too many words on their vocabulary bookmark, it is likely that the text selection is above their ideal reading level and a new text should be identified. This resource can be used with students at all grade levels and it’s use produces no significant disadvantages.
This summary of resources only addresses the tip of the iceberg with regard to the abundance of tools and materials teachers can use to assist their reading instruction. Teachers must first carefully consider the reading level and instructional needs of their students and implement strategies that are most appropriate at the whole class and individual level. The most effective resources are those that are designed and implemented based on evidence based research and can be easily modified to differentiate instruction for a diverse student population. Through the use of these tools and resources, reading instruction can be a more pleasurable experience for teacher and student while producing significant gains in reading ability.
References
Adler, C.R. (Ed). 2001. Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read, pp 49-54. National Institute for Literacy. Retrieved from: www.nifl.gov/partnershipforreading/publications/reading_first1text.html.
Buehl, Doug. (2001). Classroom Strategies for Interactive Learning, 2nd Edition. International Reading Association.
Elkonin Boxes. Reading Rockets. Retrieved from: www.readingrockets.org/strategies/elkonin_boxes.
Reading A-Z. (2014). Retrieved from: www.readinga-z.com
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