Week 7, Assignment 1: Fluency and Word Study

What texts and materials do teachers have in their classrooms that support students' development of fluent reading?

Starting this school year, the school district has implemented the use of a comprehensive English language arts reading program called Journeys Common Core for all elementary grades.  The Assistant Superintendent of Instruction notes that there is more content in this program than teachers can fit in a school year. This leaves teachers with the challenge of identifying which material to teach.  It is particularly difficult as the content of the program is brand new so even experienced teachers are on a steep learning curve.  Positively, the abundance of materials each teacher can utilize includes differentiated levels of text of the same subject or story so there is some consistency in the entire class.  The available stories and nonfiction text all seem very interesting to young students and will encourage them to read to develop fluency.  Additionally, teachers are given posters for each unit that displays the essential question, key vocabulary words and target skills.  These colorful Focus Wall posters serve as a guide not only for the teacher but for the students as well.   The program has valuable online content that includes interactive whiteboard lessons as well as interactive content for students to complete at the school’s computer lab or at home. Students can also develop fluency by accessing each unit’s text passages online which includes audio narration to help struggling readers or those who prefer learning auditorily.

  

How do they select vocabulary to teach in all areas of your curriculum?

While the Journeys materials guide educators through a sequential approach with units and lessons, it is up to the individual teacher to choose which to introduce to students based on the essential question, content or subject of the anchor text, and target vocabulary words and comprehension skills. Those decisions will determine most of the new vocabulary that that classroom’s students will learn in the school year.

How much time do they allocate to word study?

Teachers in this district have been instructed to teach vocabulary within the context of a fictional story or nonfiction text to deepen understand instead of rote memorization.  While the teacher understands the strategy, her experience says that students need a broad range of word study activities beyond learning from context of a given text.  The students create and share original sentences and stories using new vocabulary and get quizzed regularly on definitions of vocabulary in the classroom.

  

What word study routines do they teach and encourage their students to use?

The teacher employs several word study routines with her students to reinforce phonics, spelling and vocabulary knowledge.  Students will start with new vocabulary words and study each word’s phonemes before identifying and sorting other words that share the same phonics.  For spelling, the teacher writes each word on the classroom SMART Board and guides the students in identifying patterns, strategies and tips.  Proper spelling is reinforced throughout the week in classwork and homework where students write sentences using the new words.  Lastly, but arguably most importantly, the teacher spends significant time on the students’ comprehension of the new words. They are first introduced in context as the teacher guides students reading the unit’s text.  She will point out new words and help the students understand the meaning and find strategies to find the definition.  The students’ knowledge is reinforced and assessed through classwork and homework that requires students to apply their understanding.

How do they differentiate instruction and tasks based on their students' needs?

The Journeys program features an anchor text for each unit along with related texts that are geared to students of varying reading skill.  This provides a consistency among all students as they are each reading about the same subject even if it’s at different levels of text complexity.  The Journeys program also provides different graphic organizers that teachers can use to differentiate instruction. It also includes numerous worksheets and interactive whiteboard activities that teachers can use to scaffold the instruction so that every student the opportunity to develop and deepen their knowledge and understanding.

Assignment 6: Lesson Plan - Phonics

Lesson Plan – Phonics:  Adding an ‘e’ to create long vowel words

Objective:  Students will understand that a silent ‘e’ added to the end of a word will change the existing vowel of a word from a short to a long sound.

Grade level:  Grade 1

Time Frame:  Two 30-minute periods

Subject:   English Language Arts

Standards:  

·         New York State Common Core State Standards

·         Reading Foundational Skills

·         Phonics and Word Recognition

·         Know final -e and common vowel team conventions for representing long vowel sounds.

Understandings/Competencies: 

·         Students will know that a silent ‘e’ at the end of a simple word will create a new long vowel word.

·         Students will recognize new words including their long vowel pronunciation.

·         Students will be able to write new, simple words with the silent ‘e’.

Assessment:

• ·         Assessment will include participation in class discussion, brainstorm and Bingo game. 
• ·         Further assessment will be determined through completion of individual classwork.

  

Sequence of Activities

• ·         Review short vowel sounds of high frequency words like apple, bed, pig, mop, and sun.
• ·         Review long vowel sounds and connect the sound with the name of the letter.
• ·         Share words with long vowel sounds like cane, bike, hope, and plane.
• ·         Introduce the silent or magic ‘e’ that can make the vowel say its name.
• ·         Brainstorm some words where the vowel is long (or says its name).
• ·         Watch these two videos:
• o   Electric Company – Add a Silent ‘e’:   
•       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gHPaVxkdPA
• o   Super ‘e’: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHO1aJyxWIE

• ·         Utilizing the classroom SMART Board, display simple words with short vowels and lead the class through placing an ‘e’ at the end of each word and pronouncing the new word together.
• ·         Students will complete classwork.
• ·         Play Bingo with words with long vowel sound.

SMART Board Activity

Classwork Sheet One

Classwork Sheet Two

Class Bingo Game

Week 6: Assignment 2: Reading Fluency

Reading fluency is a key part in the ultimate goal of teaching students to be proficient in reading comprehension.  Defined as the ability to read text correctly and quickly, fluency certainly has a critical role in a person’s ability to read and understand.  Research supports that a student who can read with fluency will spend less time decoding words and meanings and pay more attention to comprehending the sentence, passage or story.  Conversely, a reader struggling with fluency will need to devote more attention to unfamiliar words or phrases and will therefore have less concentration on the meaning and context of the story.

While debate continues about how to best increase the reading fluency of students, there appears to be agreement that it is indeed an important link to comprehension.  Academic research and anecdotal experience connects the ability to read text accurately and efficiently with appropriate phrasing and meaningful expression to an effective reading experience that is both educational but enjoyable.

One thing that I learned for the first time is the term prosody which can simply defined as expression and phrasing in reading.  While objective assessment of prosody can be tricky, I can see the importance of prosody in helping a reader understand what is being read.  Scales and checklists provide tools to assess students in prosody but the subjectivity can remain high.  Other, more measurable, assessments focus on reading speed and accuracy through a words correct per minute (WCPM) score.  This can be done throughout a school year to identify early baselines and measure progression towards increasing each student’s WCPM.

While assessment can also take place when students read aloud, the real value can be realized when such activities take place.  The teacher should provide a model of well-paced, expressive reading and provide students timely feedback on their reading performance.  Teachers should also encourage parents to do the same at home.  Noting the need to improve on my son’s reading comprehension, I have begun reading with him to improve his fluency.  By reading grade-level text aloud with appropriate pacing with prosody, I am providing my fourth grade son a model for him to replicate.  I’m also able to check his understanding of phrases, clarify definitions of unfamiliar metaphors and assess his comprehension.

In addition to student read alouds modeled with good pacing and phrasing, teachers can utilize other techniques to increase fluency.  I would incorporate choral reading where students read aloud with the teacher.  For students who struggle more than others, they can follow along silently until they build the confidence to participate through small group or even individual instruction.

For more advanced text or perhaps a relatively mature subject, I would utilize cloze reading where the teacher takes the lead in reading aloud to the class.  On a more regular basis, partnered reading can be effective for both stronger readers and those who are less skilled.  I would also have students read silently while I provide individual help for students who need it.  These activities and others are essential to building the reading skills students need to develop crucial reading comprehension proficiency.

Week 6: Assignment 1: Mini Lesson Plan

Assignment#1 On you blog, create a mini-lesson (10-15 minutes) based on the assessment results

Since many of the errors made by the student who read the Whales and Fish passage were structural or visual, the focus of a mini-lesson would work on increasing her exposure to words like and including those she missed.

Objective: Students will be able to properly decode grade level words that are visually similar.

Activity:

1. Teacher will read aloud sentences that are also presented to students on paper on and displayed on a SMART Board or projected on a whiteboard. Each sentence will include pairs of visually similar words like “most” and “must”, “live” and “lived”, and “baby” and “babies”.

2. Students will be asked to circle words on their paper which appear to be similar in each sentence. Students will also be asked to do the same on the SMART Board or whiteboard.

3. Teacher will verify or correct answers of each sentence.

4. Students will then use each pair of visually-similar words to create a new simple sentence.

Assessment: Teacher will assess individual student knowledge during class discussion and classwork.

Week 5: Building Oral Language video + Running Record

In a diverse classroom of students with varying levels of language ability, Ms. Wilson was effective in providing grade appropriate literacy instruction while respecting the skills each student brings to the classroom.  In the video, despite having a bilingual aide, the teacher did not rely heavily on the resource to connect with students who are learning English as second language.  Instead, she differentiates instruction and keeps each child engaged.  For example, some children show the ability to read independently while she works with others who need more guidance. 

While the classroom is surprisingly large, Ms. Wilson maximizes the space with separated learning centers so her students can have varied experiences during their kindergarten day working in smaller groups.  This keeps the children engaged, helps them build social and language skills through small group interaction, and offers numerous opportunities for the teacher to observe, guide and instruct her students individually.  A challenge for other educators would be how to emulate this room set up when classrooms are typically smaller than the one shown in the video.

Ms. Wilson’s calm, patient and positive manner with her kindergarten students reaffirmed the effectiveness of the approach of another kindergarten teacher I observed in the past.  Her routine, organization, leadership, and pace appeared to keep her young students in a respectful order even when the children were excited over their classmate’s drawing at the end of the video.  Her expert instructional practice and frequent encouragement provides her students with confidence in their abilities as shown by this shy student who was able to develop and demonstrate his ability to tell the class a story through illustration and words.  The culture and environment she sets in the classroom are effective to help the students develop academically, socially and emotionally.  There is a lot in this video that an aspiring educator like me can incorporate into future practice. 

In future classroom observations of lower grade classes, I will pay closer attention to the different learning centers and how the classroom is organized.  For an experienced educator like Ms. Wilson, these nuances have been developed over her teaching years and much can be learned from her practice.  In upper elementary grades, I will observe how the teacher creates small groups so they can learn through interaction like the young students did in the video.

Running Record Practice

Errors

1. Mispronounced “Kobe” as “Koby”

2. Mispronounced “can’t” as “can”

3. Tried to twice to correctly pronounce “Vishnu Chatterjee”

4. Mispronounced “Kobe” as “Koby”

5. Mispronounced ”reached” as “reaches”

351 total words, 5 errors

Error rate = 1:70

Accuracy rate = 99%

Self-correction rate = n/a

While the student was able to read the two pages with relative ease, the errors he made appeared to be careless ones.  Twice, he mispronounced the name of the main character because the nickname used twice in this passage varied by just one letter from the person’s real name.  “Koby” and “Kobe” can be easily confused but also identified as different with more careful reading,  Another character’s name was indeed tricky and the reader had to take some more time to phonetically sound it out.   The fifth error can be attributed to a tricky change in tense in the story.  The previous paragraph begins with a character musing, “Looks like I could see my name in print tomorrow.”  The next paragraph continues the story in past tense and the reader misread “reached” as “reaches”.

I would work with the student to read with more attention paid to detail.  With this learning objective as the focus, I would select my favorite Dr. Seuss book, “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!”   The student will read selected passages of the book aloud with care as frequent repetition, poetic-like phrases, occasional rhyming, and alliterations can easily cause a careless reader to make errors.  After calculating the reader’s error, accuracy and self-correction rates (pre-assessment) and elapsed time to read the passage, I would guide the student to re-read the same passage at a slightly slower rate with more pauses and breathing.  The student’s performance will serve as the post-assessment and hopefully satisfies the learning objective of reading with more attention to detail.  The difference in elapsed time should be small which should give the student confidence that increased care in reading does not have to cost much more time.  I think this is an important detail to share with the student who may be reading too quickly just to get through a passage.

Week 4: Whales and Fish

Here is the running record of the young student reading Whales and Fish.

The thirteen errors that I marked were:

1. mispronunciation of "animals" - student said "animal" (am I being too strict?)
2. mispronunciation of "live" - student made it past tense and said "lived"
3. mispronunciation of "thought" - student said "thot"
4. mispronunciation of "live" - student made it past tense and said "lived"
5. mispronunciation of "must" - student said "most"
6. teacher pronounced "through" for the student
7. teacher had to encourage student to continue with "they must come..."
8. mispronunciation of "live" - student "lived"
9. mispronunciation of "whale" - student made it plural and said "whales"
10. mispronunciation of "must" - student said "most"
11. mispronunciation of "babies" - student said "baby"
12. mispronunciation of "must" - student said "most"
13. teacher pronounced "tails" for the student

Error rate is 15.  This means that for every error, the student reads approximately 15 words correctly.

Accuracy rate is 93%.  The passage is at an instructional level that can be used in leveled reading session for this student.

Self correction rate is 1:3.  This ratio indicates the student is self-monitoring her reading.

This student was able to read the passage well with a good knowledge of vocabulary and demonstration of self-monitoring strategies. She read at a steady pace with appropriate pausing at many commas and periods.  She also shows good reading comprehension during her retelling with the teacher.  She was able to recall the main idea in her own words including the relationship between whales and fish.  The student also recalled many facts and details of the passage with some aided recall.

While I marked thirteen errors on the running recoed, six were made on just two words and three others were made with incorrect use of the plural and singular forms of a few nouns.  With some corrective drills and more reading experience, such minor errors can be reduced in frequency. Two other errors came on the student's inability to pronounce words that start with the consonant blend "th".  These two links provide fun ways to reinforce common words with the "th" consonant blend to meet the needs of this student.

http://www.bingocardcreator.com/bingo-cards/speech-and-language/words-that-begin-with-th
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/consonantblends/blends/th/

Week Three Assignments

Shared Reading

How does this shared reading activity engage students who are at different levels of literacy development?

As the teacher led the class in reading a poem aloud together for the first time, the participation of the students differed based on their confidence and ability to recognize words and letter sounds.  Those students who are more proficient as engaged as they verbally participate.  Even those students who did not use their voice to follow along were engaged as they enjoyed the poem read by their teacher and classmates.  These children may not know the words well enough to recite but they are learning by watching and listening.

During her explicit phonics lesson, how does Ms. Perez support students' problem-solving skills?

Ms. Perez supported students’ problem-solving skills by building upon what they already know.  For example, when a young boy struggled with pronouncing the word “spot”, she reminded him of the sound of the blended consonant.  After he was able recite the consonants, she had him add the sound of “ot” before combining his knowledge to allow him to successfully say the word.  Her encouragement helped motivate students and made them feel proud for their accomplishments.

Based on what you saw in the video, what are the different ways that shared reading can be used to promote literacy?

Shared reading can encourage each of the students to read better.  For those who can read along with the teacher, they feel proud of their ability.  For students who struggle with the content, they can stay interested while their teacher leads the group. Their motivation to read better comes from wanting to join those who can recite with the teacher.   Perhaps, the teacher can pair students of different abilities to help promote literacy as one student learns from a peer.

Guided Reading

Why does she think it's important for students to verbalize their strategies? What else do you notice about how she helps students build meaning in text?

This video segment showed how effective a teacher led small group instruction can help students develop fluency, build vocabulary and improve reading comprehension.  The teacher shows different strategies to help students make sense of they are reading and to make connections with the text. One method she used was asking her students to verbalize their reading strategies.  In doing so, she says the strategies get internalized so they can be relied upon in future, independent reading.  I also see how verbalization of a student’s strategy can help others in the small group as they may learn something new that can help them.

Additionally, Ms. Perez challenges the students to think about a word that makes sense in the context of the sentence or story.  She hid an adjective to allow the young children the chance to use their understanding of the text to figure out an appropriate word to complete the sentence.  By doing so, she is using a fun way to help students in a guided reading group build meaning in text.

Differentiated Instruction

How does Ms. Perez organize her classroom to support a wide range of learners?

The classroom appears to be relatively large leading to a layout of different learning centers where the teacher and student teacher can lead small group instruction.  This allows for a broad range of learners to develop knowledge and skill at their own level.  Ms. Perez has opportunities to watch the students at work during “center time” as she takes in information for informal assessments

How are reading and writing connected in classroom activities?

The video clip shows two advanced readers connecting their reading with writing.  The two young girls took notes of important points when reading a higher level informational text.  They then grouped the notes together in logical categories to write their own book.  Making such a connection deepens the comprehension level allowing the readers to demonstrate their understanding through restating key ideas and details.

Assessment

How does Ms. Perez use ongoing individual assessment to guide her instruction? How can the class profile be used to help group students and differentiate instruction? 

The periodic individual assessments on each student’s reading ability and comprehension provide valuable data for the teacher.  Charted on a graph, the class profile shows a visual representation of the proficiency of the students.  Ms. Perez is able to use this information to determine what she will teach and how she will instruct the class.  She can adjust the lesson plans to fit the progress of the students.  She can also group her students by reading ability and provide appropriate small group instruction to help develop their skills.  Such differentiated instruction will help students progress based on their current reading level.  

How can ongoing assessment be integrated into your own classroom practice?

There is tremendous value in classroom data collected through ongoing assessments over a period of time.  This could show the rate of progress of each student as well as the levels of proficiency.  A teacher could identify those students who have excelled and provide further challenge with more advance materials.  Students with lower achievement can be tracked easily and provided more small group support or individual instruction.  

The Importance of Informal Assessment 

While summative assessment provides valuable opportunities for teachers to evaluate and document student learning at the end of a unit or lesson, informal testing is equally important to measure the progress of students on an ongoing basis.  With periodic informal assessment throughout a school year, teachers will gain valuable information that can be utilized to create lessons, adjust instruction and structure class activities to address specific issues.  

One major advantage of such regular data is the ability to keep students engaged with appropriate levels of instruction.  If students are demonstrating a high level of proficiency through informal assessment, teachers can increase the rigor to maintain the challenge and interest in the classroom.  If informal assessments show that students are having difficulty mastering concepts, teachers can reinforce previous lessons with additional activities before moving on to other topics.  Such responsiveness and adjustment by teachers can help address deficiencies of individual students earlier.  With increased demands on classroom time, informal assessment is more critical than ever so teachers can make smarter and more timely decisions on their instruction to foster academic achievement of their students.