Final Reflection

Between going to class and reading When Kids Can't Read, I have picked up a lot about how to diagnose problems in dependent readers and strategies to help them.  I have learned many classroom activities that all kinds of students can do, like the worksheets we created on vista.  In tutoring I helped a student to better grasp making inferences using one of Beers's activities in the text.  I especially like Chapter 14 which gives sources for teachers to review and choose books for students to read and ways to get them involved in reading on their own (see below entry).  I combined my experience with tutoring, in classroom discussions and reading the text to feel more confident in how to teach when I get into my field.

Selecting Books for Classroom Assignments

Obviously when assigning books to read for assignments teachers cannot please every student, except for with a choice project.  I definitely want to have a choice reading project as part of my English class curriculum.  I can compile a list of books through surveying the students to find out what kinds of books they like, then have them choose a book off the list, or have me approve one of their own selections.  Part of the survey could be asking students what their reasons for reading are--entertainment? For information? For learning something new? The reasons the students give will reflect in the books I put on the book list.

After giving the assignment and handing students the book list I compiled, I can spend a day in class having a talk about all the books so the students have a better idea of which one they want to read,  A good idea from When Kids Can't Read is doing book teases, where the teacher reads just a short but climactic excerpt from a book so students want to read it to find out what comes next.  This can be done separate from the choice project book talk, just perhaps in the first few minutes of a class here and there to motivate students to read on their own time,

Another good idea Beers presents in the text is taking the class to the library once in awhile (maybe once a month) and helping students check out books.  She makes a good point that some students will read if someone shows them a good book, but will not wander in alone to search for a book in a library.  All of these ideas are easy ways to try to interest students in reading more.

(Chapter 14)

Scaffolding

Previous to reading Chapter 13 of When Kids Can't Read, I assumed that high school students of lower reading levels should read novels more at their level, rather than what the advanced English students read.  Because of the case study in the book, I realized that, for example, all tenth graders can read Huck Finn.  The difference is that some students need help comprehending the text, while others are more independent.  Perhaps English Teachers could recommend each student to a general level class, moderate or advanced for the next grade, so the students are better grouped with similar learners.  Each of the classes would read the same text, only the lowest level would have more scaffolding and more comprehension exercises in the class, while the upper level class could work on higher levels of thinking.  In this way, all students read the grade level novel, but work with the text in a way that is most helpful to them. 
  As it is right now, most students are enrolled in middle level English classes, yet not all of them are able to succeed in them.  If the teacher assigns an activity to enhance making inference and comprehension skills, the students who have mastered these skills would be bored, which would be unfair to them.  If the teacher only focuses on higher level thinking, many lower level students would tap out and not succeed, which is unfair to them.  If students could be better broken up based on their skill levels it would be easier for the teachers to focus on certain areas and more students would succeed.

(Chapter 13)

Fluency and Competent Readers

     This chapter made me realize that just because a student does not have fluency in their reading does not mean they are not comprehending a text.  From my own experience, it seems that usually comprehension comes to readers who read fluently and acknowledge punctuation.  Early in the chapter, the author (Kylene Beers) includes a transcript of a one-on-one lesson she has with a first grade boy.  She provides him with a few sentences and asks him to read aloud.  It is clear from the breaks in the transcript that his reading is choppy and without inflection, yet, when Beers asks him to summarize the story, he does so flawlessly.
     Examples like these make it more evident how many different types of reading and/or comprehension problems there are and they exist in all different types of students.  This makes me more aware of how important both formal and informal assessments are because it is not always easy to diagnose exactly what is wrong.

(Chapter 10)

Vocabulary

 I remember my middle school days of receiving a vocabulary list every week to memorize for a test that Friday.  One or two of the words always stood out in my mind, actually learned, but the rest of those words were always forgotten.  I would always do well on the tests, and even I forgot most of the words, so looking back I wonder if some of the other kids who didn't do as well even retained one word.  When Kids Can't Read touches on this issue and I agree that learning only a list of 5-8 words a week would help students retain them better and they would be more willing to learn such a few amount of words. 
Chapter nine also touched on vocabulary graphic organizers and ways to chart or draw words. This approach seems very juvenile, and every time I was asked to do something like this in school I would get it done in about a minute, not having retained anything.  I think the quizzes at the end of the week, and speaking the words in class is enough, and perhaps having a Jeopardy style game every month to cover the words again.  I love learning and teaching new words, but the classroom approach must be age appropriate and not in a large quantity.


(Chapter 9)

Post Reading Strategies for the Classroom

Often times in my high school or middle school English class, my teacher would assign reading for homework then want to discuss it as a class the next day.  Few students seemed to participate in the discussions because the questions were so broad, only the confident students would answer most of the time, while the rest of the class sat there and tuned out. An idea to get all students involved would be to ask smaller, less broad questions and in different forums, like small groups on occasion.  When Kids Can't Read  explores a strategy called SWBT, or Somebody Wanted But So.  This strategy can be used in many ways, one is making a chart on the board in front of the room and completing it as a class.
Example:
Somebody                  Wanted                       But                 So
(List a character)       List motivations       List conflicts       List themes and resolutions

By modeling this approach, teachers can later ask students to break off into pairs and make their own charts and focus on parts of the text, like, specifically the main character, any abstract idea a character wanted, etc.  This strategy can help students who struggle with finding main ideas, students who need help summarizing, or help students structure or outline their ideas before writing a paper. This strategy would work for all learners because advanced students may dig deeper to come up with themes while a struggling student can use this chart to simply form his thoughts.

(Chapter 8)

Teaching a Class of Varying Skill Levels

One difficulty that was discussed in Teaching Reading Class today is the task of teaching a class containing students who are proficient, independent readers, along with students who need to learn comprehension strategies.  As a high school student I would have been frustrated if my English Teacher focused on comprehension strategies because I had no issues with it.As a reading specialist the strategies that I have previously written about and that When Kids Can't Read touch on would be spectacular ideas to teach to students one on one.  Additionally, as a new teacher I am assuming that I will have to teach more general English courses than advanced levels, so, more likely than not, the entire class may struggle with comprehension and require these strategies. 

When reading a more difficult text, even the most competent of readers would miss some details the first time because of the complexity.  It would be reasonable for a reader of any level to, for example, make one prediction (about what is to come in the story) and one connection (to their own personal experiences) a chapter. Another idea (from Teaching Reading) is to have in class reading of a short story and pair the students up.  First, they each read silently to themselves, then stop at teacher selected predetermined places in the text to discuss briefly with each other.  The conversations will last about two to three minutes, where the students will comment on parts they enjoyed or found profound, ask questions or make connections to each other.  Obviously the teacher will need to monitor these conversations to make sure the students do not veer off topic. Does anyone have any other suggestions for teaching to students of all reading skill levels?

(Chapter 7)

Making Inferences

Along with comprehension, making inferences is a very difficult strategy to teach.  Try to read a  text and make notes alongside it of exactly what you are thinking, so that you can explain your thought process to your students and show them the inferences you have made.  For example:

He handed her the green and she passed him a tall sundae through the window.
^He has no antecedent, so we are not meant to know his name yet

^"green" must be referring to money because its a clear exchange- he pays her and she gives him a sundae.

^She must be an employee of an ice cream stand because she is through a window and passed out ice cream after receiving payment.

^Many ice cream stands have windows in which the money and product is passed though, hence the assumption that this is an ice cream stand.

By explaining how you reached your conclusions, step by step, it will become easier for students to break down the process of making inferences and become better readers.

Anticipation Guide

As a teacher, when introducing a new piece of literature it is important to be creative with its introduction.  With constant repetition, students tend to become bored and uninterested.  One helpful example I have found in When Kids Can''t Read is making and Anticipation Guide (example shown below). Getting students thinking and discussing themes in the coming text will get them to better identify them and analyze them.

Romeo and Juliet

Before Reading:                         Situation:                                   After Reading:

                                       1. Would you date someone your family hates?

                                       2. Do you believe in arranged marriages? 

                                       3. Would you betray your family's trust  if you

                                        think they are being unreasonable?

                                     

                                      

Questions like those above underly the main themes in Shakespeare's play and get students thinking about what they would do if they were Romeo or Juliet before knowing the plot.

(Chapter 6)

                                       

Comprehension Strategies

In grade school I was never taught comprehension strategies, but was lucky enough to infer them myself.  Many junior high and high school students face difficulty writing papers about literature because they don't know where to start.  They complain that the material is boring or stupid as a cover for their inability to comprehend it.  In English classes, students are taught the meanings of texts, but teachers seldom explain how they got the meanings.  To teach comprehension, one must not assume that her students infer strategies by observing her behavior, but must explicitly and directly explain strategies.  When Kids Can't Read  brings up a point referring to the difficulty in this task: how do you teach someone how to predict something? Some of the strategies include, as When Kids Can't Read reads, "clarifying, comparing and contrasting, connecting to prior experiences, predicting, recognizing the author's purpose," and a few others.  Plan activities to teach students how to do these things, and use informal assessments like observing to determine at what point students can move on to actually using these skills.
(Chapter 6)

Defining a 'Good Reader'

  Until recently I have never considered how many types of problems readers could have, and how some of them may be difficult to identify.  When Kids Can't Read describes a girl, let's call her Katie, who always volunteers to read in class, speaks with confidence and clarity and has excellent fluency while reading.  As it happens, confident Katie had major problems with comprehension. Identifying a child or adolescent with a reading problem is much easier if the child has problems with word pronunciation or fluency, because she spends so much time and effort merely trying to read the words, it is assumed that comprehension is very little.  Katie's case emphasizes that teachers should not be so quick to make assumptions and stereotype the kind of learners their students are.
  The most difficult aspect of teaching reading is explaining comprehension.  When students know what makes a good reader they are better able to become one. A few examples of a 'good reader' to explain to students are:
1. Good readers realize that there is meaning behind the text, and review the text until the meaning is clear.
2. Making inferences and pulling themes and/or main ideas out of the text also makes a good reader.
3. Good readers are fluent and can hear the words in their minds as they read, and some are able to conjure images in their heads.

Teachers should be sure that students have proper diction but. most importantly, are able to comprehend what they read.  A student like Katie should not make it out of high school, still not able to understand what she reads.

(Chapter 3)

"I Don't Get it" and The Importance of Reading

"I don't get it." Who knew such a simple statement could carry so much weight?  As a teacher, one must consider all the possibilities that the statement could have. When Students Can't Read, What Teachers Can Do describes a situation in which an alliterate student consistently expresses that he does not understand the reading material.  In cases like these, the student does not know how to ask for help; his problem could be in sounding out words, comprehension, or he could just not understand why he needs to read the selected material in the first place! Decoding the meaning of "I don't get it" is most important in giving students the help they need to succeed.

In the upswing of technology with the stimulating television and video games, teens and older children seem less likely to curl up with a good book.  Often their time is spent on technology over reading because they are bored by what they read in school and don't know where to look for a good book.  Teachers of adolescents need to be aware of titles that are current and would appeal to young readers.  Creating incentives to read outside of class, like assigning extra credit opportunities, and recommending books for each student may interest more teens to get involved in books.  This past weekend I read a teen novel called Jumping off Swings that I would recommend to young adults, not to mention the ever popular Harry Potter and Twilight series'.  Reading books targeted for teens both sets an example for students and allows you to have conversations with them about books they enjoy.

(Chapter 2)