Reading Practise Intensive - Day 9 Sharing

The 9th, and final day, of the Reading Practise Intensive was just as informative as the others. My big takeaway and challenge was around feedback and feedforward. 

More specifically, am I providing my students with effective feedback and feedforward. Currently most of my feedback is done verbally, however this isn't rewindable for the students. One of the barriers to giving written feedback is the time it takes to access the students work to then leave a comment. My next step is to set up a system where this can be done in a way that is systematic yet sustainable. 

Another point of interest was getting students to share what they are reading and working on with their whanau. I like the idea of getting the students to talk with a family member about their reading as part of a follow up task, for example,  

"Responding to a discussion point from the week’s text(s) Talk to a family member about a time when…  Record your response on this slide". 

I suspect (hope) having it included in the follow up task will increase the likelihood of it happening. It's also reasonably simple and easy to do but nevertheless includes whanau. 

Over the next few weeks I will give my student's the same reader survey I gave them at the start of the year. It will be interesting to see the results and how they compare. Watch this space. 

Reading Practise Intensive - Day 8 Reflection

CREATE, CREATE, CREATE was the focus of today's Reading Practise Intensive session. 

If I'm honest, recently I have not been using create tasks as frequently or effectively as I used to. Today was a great reminder of the way a well planned create task, can engage and empower children and help embed the learning for them. 

One barrier to create tasks is the amount of time they take, however today we were introduced to some short create tasks that could be completed in 1 or 2 sessions. I am intrigued by these and look forward to using them, and others like them, in the coming weeks.

Another aspect that caught my attention was the idea of children working collaboratively and placing themselves inside the create task, e.g their image or voice. I have done this in the past with children, writing and recoding raps/songs together, however this took a while. I am keen to explore shorter create tasks where children work together and have themselves inside it - much like the image below.  

All in all this session gave me a lot to think about and has given me the shake up I needed to plan some amazing create tasks for my kids - my goal is make this sustainable.

 

Teaching Inquiry update

 This year my inquiry focus question is: 

How can I develop the dialogic discourse ability of my children so they can freely engage in discussions about a text and what effect will this have on their vocabulary and comprehension?

Check out this post to see my in initial problem and wonderings.

From conversations with my students I learned that their hesitancy to participate in open discussions about text came down to this:

They're not used to it so therefore don't know how

What they are used to is talking to the teacher then waiting for the teachers response to validate what they said before moving on. I found this really fascinating. As teachers, we say we want a class that can have robust discussions about text yet, very early on, a child learns that they can only speak at the appropriate time, often needing to raise a hand first then being called upon by the teacher. I wonder if in an attempt to create an environment that is controlled and calm I have somehow stifled my students ability to speak freely and share their opinion? 

Moreover, the children are more accustomed to speak mainly to answer the teacher's questions. They speak to have their response validated from the teacher. Therefore they speak to the teacher. The idea of speaking to a group of their peers, actively listening, asking questions of others is novel to them and therefore needs to be explicitly taught.

With this learning I set out to explicitly teach my children how to have robust discussions. Initially the discussion were minimal and awkward but having used the ground rules for talk (see image below) to focus and direct our discussion we have slowly improved and are now at the stage where the children are engaging more willingly and freely. 

Gamification

To encourage the children in engage in discussion I turned our discussions into a game. Collectively the children were given 3 lives. If the conversation stalled for more than 10 seconds, and I had to intervene, they lost a life. This was a fun way to encourage the children to talk and it worked wonderfully. We are now at the stage where we no longer need the game although every now and then we still do it because the kids enjoy it. 

Authentic conversation

One of the challenges, which is ongoing, is keeping the conversation authentic. While the children talk sometimes they aren't really listening to each other or asking questions of each other genuinely. Rather, they ask questions, invite others to speak, to put pressure on them or to be silly. To combat this we have ongoing conversations and reminders at the start of the discussions. As the children have got more used to discussions the silly questions are reducing but it's a work in progress.

Where are we at now

Discussion around text are now common place in my reading program and my kids are now used to it. They engage with the provocation and are speaking more willingly and freely. At the start of a session the children pick one of the rules to focus on and try to implement that. The hardest rule to initiate is 'asking others questions' but they are making progress. I often remind my children that this is a hard one to do and even a lot of adults are poor at this :).

After our discussion the children quickly reflect on how they did in their discussion and how well their group did. This does not take long but has been useful in helping children progress.

Where to next

My children's next steps involve having the discussion and reflecting independently. Currently I'm still overseeing the discussion and jumping in when needed however this is getting less and less and i'm confident the children will be doing this independently soon. 

learning Focus

Reading Practise Intensive - Day 7 reflection

Day 7 was all about THINKING. In particular 'higher order thinking' (HOT) and how we can get our students thinking more critically.

I found the image below helpful in understanding the various levels of thinking. 

My goal is to push my students beyond literal through to the interpretive and evaluative levels - Reading between and beyond the lines. While this already happens to some degree I was challenged to be more intentional in planning opportunities for higher order thinking

To do this I am endeavouring to use gritty texts that include critical literacy themes such as gender roles, social stereotypes etc and come up with HOT response to text follow up activities. These gritty texts will also provide great opportunities for robust extended discussion. 

To support the outworking of this I want to use a digital modelling book (see screenshot below). I haven't used one before but I can see it's usefulness in recording children's thinking and responses in our guided reading sessions. 

Reading Practise Intensive - Day 6 Reflections

Day 6 of the Manaiakalani Reading Practise Intensive was all about vocabulary. 

As the day went on quickly I realised how much more intentional I need to be about including specific and direct vocabulary teaching into my literacy program. It's not that it doesn't happen rather, it happens somewhat haphazardly. This is because, at the year 7 &  8 level, the notable gaps have had to do with comprehension so I have focussed on this and vocabulary has taken a back seat. It's time to put it into the front seat :).

I am particularly interested in doing morphology work with my kids, breaking words into their prefixes, suffixes, and root words and studying them. I think my kids would really enjoy it, and my hope is that this would instil the love of words and language in them.

Moreover, I would like to start using a word wall effectively. I have used them in the past, but they have tended to fall over for one reason or another. I am wondering how I can create and use one where the kids are engaging with it themselves. 

Lots to think about and I'm looking forward to getting into it!

Reading Practise Intensive - Day 5 Reflection

As per usual, after another day of the Reading Practise Intensive I have much to think about. 

A highlight was the idea of Read like Writers: Write like Readers. Where we get our students to imitate the writing style/tone etc of an author they have read. Much like an emerging artists would study and imitate a master artists. I suspect my students will really enjoy it am interested to see how my students will go with it. 

Another take-away is adjusting my timetable to include conferencing with my students. This happens somewhat organically, however can often fall by the wayside. My hope is that by intentionally including it it will happen more frequently. The challenge is working out where to slot it in.

Inquiry Focus 2023

Inquiry Focus Question

This year my inquiry focus question is: 

How can I develop the dialogic discourse ability of my children so they can freely engage in discussions about a text and what effect will this have on their vocabulary and comprehension?

It is widely acknowledged that there is a reciprocal relationship between oral language influencing reading development, and reading influencing oral language development. The National Reading Panel’s (2000; p.230) historic report points out: “Vocabulary occupies an important position in learning to read. As a learner begins to read, reading vocabulary encountered in texts is mapped onto the oral vocabulary the learner brings to the task….The reader learns to translate the (relatively) unfamiliar words in print into speech, with the expectation that the speech forms will be easier to comprehend. … When the word is not in the learner’s oral vocabulary, it will not be understood when it occurs in print.” Therefore oral language and vocabulary development is crucial to improving reading comprehension. 

The Problem

Generally speaking, many of literacy student's struggle to engage in discourse about a text. I suspect this is due to a potential number of reasons such as:

• Feeling shy, anxious or worried about sharing. Sharing in a group is a vulnerable thing to do even for adults. The unknown responses from others in the group can cause a reluctance to share. 
• Having a 'can't be bothered' attitude. 
• They don't know how to have a discussion. 

Proposed Solution/Hunches

I suspect the process to developing the dialogic discourse ability of my children will require a number of actions:

• Creating a safe classroom culture where every contribution is valued and respected. 
• Getting buy-in from the kids. Demonstrating the importance of being able to share your thinking and opinions.
• Explicitly teaching/modelling how to have a discussion. This includes outlining Rules for Talk.

• Using texts that are engaging and provocations that evoke discussion. 

Next steps

Attain some baseline data such as:

• Easttle reading  results
• PAT vocabulary result
• Observe children having a discussion about a text recording what takes place

Reading Practice Intensive Day 3 - Reflection

Day 3 of the Reading Practice Intensive gave me a lot to think about. Here are some of my leanrings and take aways. 

Summarising

In his work on teaching summarising, Timothy Shanahan's suggest an important part step is for teachers to model deleting the information that isn't necessary from a text. This was new to me when it comes to summarising and makes a lot of sense. Usually my focus has highlighting important pieces of information however this isn't any easy thing to do and deleting the information that isn't necessary may a more effective strategy. I look forward to using this with my kids. 

Mixed Groups

Historically I have used levelled groups when it comes to my reading program i.e students with similar reading ages are grouped together. After today, I am interested in incorporating mixed and flexible grouping into my reading program. There are many to consider in doing this however I think providing flexible grouping will be beneficial for my kids. 

 

T Shaped Literacy

I found the discussion around text sets interesting, in particular T-Shaped Literacy

The T-Shape Literacy Model (Wilson & Jesson, 2019) proposes that learners’ literacy learning can be enhanced when they read a range of texts (represented by the horizontal bar of the “T”) to explore a unifying concept in a deep way (as represented by the vertical bar).  - From RPI Day 3 content

Over the coming term I will be endeavouring to incorporate the T-Shape Literacy Model into my text selection process. 

Reading Practice Intensive Day 2 - Reflection

Toaday was day 2 of the Manaiakalani Reading Practise Intensive. The focus of toad was around knowing your leaners as readers. 

One of the biggest learnings for me was around tracking our kids progress. In teaching, there are so many pieces of relevant information that needs to be used to assess children's learning needs and design their learning. The challenge can be storing this information so that it is easily accessible. Today we were introduced to a comprehensive digital Teacher's Workbook that can be used to not only hold the information but plan for leanring as well - a one stop shop as such! Though initially the Teacher Workbook look overwhelming due to the number of tabs it's easy to see that in the long run a tracking and planning document like this will be of great value to my teaching practise.

I was also reminded how much useful and valuable information there is through analysing the PAT data of my children. I can use it to see common gaps in my students reading comprehension and then design specific leanring tasks to tend to them.  I'm interested as to what I'll find out.

 

Reading Practise Intensive

Today was the first day of the Manaiakalani Reading Practise Intensive. A course aimed developing our knowledge and ability of teaching reading effectively.  There is much to take away and digest but below are my initial wonderings

Reading for enjoyment

I'm not someone who naturally enjoys reading.  I wouldn't sit down and read a book for pleasure. For whatever reason I never got that bug.  While this is the case, I do still read but when there is a reason to, like when I want to learn something specific. Today, one of the readings mentioned that for people who enjoy reading "reading was about finding pleasure, wellbeing, connection, relationship, meaning, and a sense of identity in the world". It struck me that the benefits of enjoying to read went far beyond having fun with the inclusion of better wellbeing, connections and relationships etc. This has got me wondering how can develop not only my own desire, but the desire of the kids in my class to want to read. How can I instil in them a love of reading?

Student choice 

My other wondering has been how can I incorporate greater student choice within my reading program. Greater choice in texts and activities. We were shown some examples which will be a great starting point. 

Watch this space.