Rule - Literacy Reflection 2 - 11/16/13

This reflection is based on my Three Little Pigs lesson that I used with groups 2 and 3 this past week.

What students learned and which students struggled with the lesson?
Groups 2 and 3 spent two days with this lesson. Our word work focused on the sound /ow/ which makes two different sounds. Ow as in ripping off a bandaid "ow", and then ow as in "oh". I wrote down all these words on notecards: grow, slow, blow, mow, row, snow, throw, town, frown, owl, now, how, brown, and flower. I then distributed the cards out to the students and they were to group the cards together based on the /ow/ sound. Within any group, there are always those that like to be the leaders, or those that know what to do. Therefore, two students had no problem sorting the cards, and the students that did pretty much followed along and waited for the cards to be sorted for them.

What are alternate interpretations of your students' performance or products?
As students read, I listened to each individual read. The more times they read the book, they recognized the repetition of words and sentences in the book. I found this to be a good and bad thing. Its great that my kids recognized the repetition and followed along in such way. But then I realized that as they kept reading, it was almost like they memorized the words and were actually reading... if that makes sense. I didn't want them rushing through, so I emphasized slowing down and taking their time when they read.

What did you learn about your students' literacy practices that extend beyond your objective?
This lesson I was pleased to see my students using background knowledge to help them read. The word  Mama and Baby were written throughout the text. These words were at first difficult for my students. They attempted to sound out the words, but I told them the letters were "not cooperating" and that they should use background knowledge and illustrations cues to help them. And for the majority of students, the words clicked. So beyond my objective, students are recalling the reading strategies: lips the fish (says the first letter sound), stretchy the snake (stretches out all sounds in the word), and eagle eye (looks at the pictures for help).

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?
With the /ow/ sound, next lesson I plan to pull aside those students who struggled one at a time and go back over the note cards. It is important they recognize the different sounds and that the letters and context can help them indicate which sound they need to be saying.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students' learning?
The comprehension discussion for this book was short and lacked depth. Our group time was already cut short due to a morning assembly, so I decided to cut out the anchor chart. However, if I were to teach this same lesson again, I would use an anchor chart. The anchor chart helps students organize their thoughts, and allows them to document their ideas. I wanted students to be able to recall "The Three Little Pigs" and make predictions on "The Three Pigs". Also, I asked after students read, what problem did the pigs have? How did they solve their problem? I was hoping students would give me answers and use the illustrations to give support. I didn't get so much. So after students were done talking, I ended up showing them that if they look back through and pay close attention to the illustrations that they may be able to conclude some different understandings.

What did you learn so far about implementing your 'core practice' and what do you need to do to continue your professional learning? 
I need to continue keeping our group meetings organized! If students become familiar with the schedule of our meeting (word study, predictions, reading, comprehension), I firmly believe my students will have a better chance learning and recognizing the skills I am introducing to them.

Rule-Literacy Reflection 1-11/3/13

Guided reading has finally become a re-occurring routine in our classroom in the mornings. Students this week were more familiar with the centers and are beginning to move about the room to the correct stations without teachers instruction. I see three different groups for 20 minutes each.

What students learned and which students struggled with the lesson.
My first group consists of students who struggle the most in reading and writing. They are considered to be below level A readers. These students have not started reading books yet with me. During our time together we work on the alphabet, letter identification, letter sounds, point and read, find and circle, and instructed writing worksheets. Basically we are working on the foundation and starting from the beginning. Within this group, I saw 3/4 students learning and making progress. I saw that they began to memorize some of the worksheets we had been working on, and their writing was more clear and level appropriate. But the one student still can't seem to grasp on like the others. She has trouble concentrating and staying on task, and simply giving effort to any activity. She has trouble identifying letters and sounds without the help of others. Her writing is poor, it is hard for her to copy worksheets without being reminded simple instructions like, stay on the lines, or say the letter as you write it.

My second and third group consists of students that are all level D readers. All of them are closely similar in ability except two students. Those two are actually a bit stronger than the rest of the group. We keep them in this group so all 6 groups get an appropriate amount of time in guided reading. I noticed that before, during, and after reading the book, students were able to make connections. They pointed out familiar words, words that ended in -ing, and they asked related questions. For the most part, everyones behavior was great. They were intrigued and stayed involved. One student struggled to read on his own. I know for sure he is capable of way more than he shows. I've worked with him one on one when he is behaving and showing his potential. But unfortunately, more often than not, his behavior gets in the way.

What are alternate interpretations of your students' performance or products?
For both groups, there was a sense of rushing and urgency to get done. There was a lack of focus and no one took their time, except one or two students out of the 13. In the first group, they rush to copy the words, and rush when they are reading. They end up making up completely different words. Some of the students in the second group would shout out "I'm done!" when they finished reading. So I wanted for both groups to realize that it wasn't about who finished first. I wanted their reading to slow down and take your time.

What did you learn about your students' literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?
For the first group, I noticed one of my students has an interesting habit. He is catching on to the activities but he seems to have potential negative tendencies. During reading, he gets angry when its too loud or when he thinks his neighbor is reading to loud and "telling him what to say." Repeatedly you will see him write and then erase, write and then erase. He uses a lot of force on the pencil and will draw one line over and over again too. Another student likes when I do the worksheets with them, and compare my work with their own.

For the second and third group, I recognized my students using the reading strategies we had talked about in previous lessons. The eagle eye strategy reminds students to look at the pictures for help, lips the fish reminds them to sound out the first letter in the word, and stretchy the snake says to stretch out each and every sound in a word. I noticed that the first time they read "The Very Busy Hen" they momentarily forgot about these strategies. But once reminded, I saw them using the strategies and reading successfully. I also noticed some of the students using inflection while they read, or at least trying to.

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?
For the first group, I will continue the same work with my student this next week, and continue to do so until I see that she is ready to move forward. I will modify/ differentiate instruction throughout the group based on what I see. I may have students complete different tasks to keep them engaged and progressing.

For the second and third group, in the beginning of the next lesson I will revisit the -ing ending, and what words you can add it to. I will remind students to double check the sound of the word and how they are using it. Does it make sense? And quickly remind them while going through the previous book. Those students who seem real behind, I will have them continue to work on that book before moving on the the next book.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students' learning?
For the first group, instead of having students do what I do, I should have them tell me what to do. Have them tell me how to spell words, make them think more and give more reasoning. I would also try and trick them to implement another way of showing them how to do something.

For the second and third group, I would give each of them a dry erase board and marker so they can practice writing the words planting, watering, cutting, mixing, and baking. I think this will help them remember the word to say it and write each letter.

What did you learn so far about implementing your 'core practice' and what do you need to do to continue your professional learning? 
For the second and third group, I learned so far about implementing my core practice that my students need more structure. When we do anchor charts it's hard for them to generate their own sentences. I need to continue to use anchor charts, but also give my students sentence starters that will help them narrow down their thoughts and fill in the blank. Therefore, I can get a better sense of their background knowledge and comprehension.

Metzger-Book Club Blog Reflection

Day 1

Today the students were introduced to their two new vocabulary words or “Hoot Words” as we call them in my classroom. Their new vocabulary words are enormous and admire. I introduced these words to my students by first reading the story The Biggest Pumpkin Ever by Steven Kroll. I did not stop to tell the students in the middle of the story that we had just read one of our new Hoot Words instead I waited until the story was over to let them know which two words they would be working with this week. Once the story and our discussion about the story were completed I introduced the words to the students. I did this by saying “One of our new Hoot Words this week is enormous. Can you all say enormous?” Once they had repeated the word back to me I did not hear anyone saying it incorrectly so I moved on. I have a very limited amount of time with the students to work on vocabulary so instead of asking them to give me their guess as to what the word enormous meant I just gave them the kid friendly definition I found. I said, “Enormous means it is really really big in size or number. It is bigger than huge! Here a few example sentences for you: An elephant is enormous! The crowd at the fair was enormous! So what does enormous mean?” I raised my hand to show that I wanted the students to do the same. I called on one student and he responded with “It means that something is super big like huge but bigger.” I then said, “Thank you Tom. Alright class thumbs up if you agree with what Tom just said and thumbs down if you thing what he said was wrong.” Every student had his or her thumb up so I moved onto admire. I asked the whole class to say admire. There was some difficulty with this one so I repeated it for them and listened carefully until I heard them all pronouncing it correct. Then I said, “Admire means to respect and like someone because they have done something that you think is good. Admire could also mean to look at something and think that it is beautiful. Here are a few example sentences for you: I admire your behavior today because you are listening so well! I admire your outfit today. So who can repeat back to me what admire means?” I again raised my hand to let the students know I would like them to do the same and then I called on Kate. She said, “Admire is when you like something of someone else’s so you tell them.” I said, “Great, that’s one definition who can give me the other?” I then called on Andy, “Like if someone was doing something that is good then you tell them that you admire what they are doing.” I ended my lesson by saying, “Great work boys and girls I am very impressed!”

            Some other interpretations of this material could be that I did not look at all of my student’s performances. Some people may argue that the students can just chime in with what the other students are saying and not really be working with or learning the words. They may think that the students who are shouting things out the loudest really just understand the procedure of what we are doing and not the information. Some other sources may say that the students can fake that they are saying something which would mean that they are not be interacting with the words. This could be by moving their mouth to say what the other students have already said. They could also be moving their mouths just when they notice that I am about to look at them. To these sources I would say that you are right, I did not check in with all of my students about their knowledge of the words but I also know my students. I know which ones never raise their hands because they are not listening and which students are shy. Throughout the whole week we will be interacting with the words and if they do not pick up the definitions it will be apparent when I ask them to write a full sentence using the vocabulary words and to illustrate it. Beyond my objectives I have learned that my students enjoy learning new Hoot Words. This became apparent when the students kept excitedly trying to work them into their own conversations or when we were talking together. I got many more compliments on my outfit than usual. Once one student started to try and use the words in sentences others followed suit. It was very fun to see the students push themselves to use new words and become excited when they realize they used it correctly.  

            With the students that I know are struggling with the Hoot Words I plan on using the words in sentences throughout the week while speaking with them so that they become more comfortable and familiar with them. There are two students that I plan on writing the sentences they dictate to me on the final day because they struggle greatly with writing so if I can at least get them to tell me a sentence and I write it I will be thrilled. If I were to re-teach this lesson I think the only thing that I would do differently would be to ask the students what they first thought the words meant given the sentence it was in for context. This would allow me to see how my students are developing not only in their reading but also in their ability to decode a word based on what else is in a sentence. I think this would improve students learning because it would have them start to think about what they are reading in sentences and how they can figure out a word based on the rest of the sentence and the picture.

            So far in implementing my core practice I have learned that when students are learning new words they need to have repetitive activities to go along with their learning. Having many examples helps the students to get comfortable with the vocabulary. My Core Practice was strategic selection of words to study and by picking words that students can use frequently I am pushing them to take their learning of these words to the next level. We encourage the students to come in and tell my MT and myself when they have heard a Hoot Word out of school because we want them to get use to hearing these words and using these words. Each day throughout the week we are working with these new Hoot Words to get the students use to them and I think that is very important because these are words that can allow students to feel comfortable in future reading levels.  To continue my professional learning I need to make sure I am having the students interact with the words in a correct format. Some activities will work easier for some words then others. As the teacher I need to make sure I am looking at these things and keeping in mind my students abilities. I want to push my students as much as possible but I also want the work to be achievable and have them succeed. An easy way for me to do this will be to play out the activities before I give them to the students.

Book Club Posts for Reflection on Lessons

Reflection 1:

            During my lesson the students were eager to come to group time. In my A group there are 3 students that are all reading at an A level. My lesson was centered on phonics/word study and how learning the first sound of the word can be very helpful in solving a tricky word. The students have been working on this for many weeks. All the students were easily able too place the picture cards and word cards under the letter they went with and were able to also tell me the sound of the letter.  Based on the students ability to be able to sort the pictures and word with also being able to come up with words that had the same beginning sound as a word given I believe the students grasped a majority of the strategy. One of the three students took a little longer to come up with a word, but I believe it more had to do with her being shy and that sometimes she feels uncomfortable around the other students who loud and outgoing. I have tried not to single her out to respond, but I do need to know what she is thinking. I am trying to make her feel comfortable and I am seeing her respond more and more by herself, showing me she as well as a understanding of these sounds. I believe therefore that all the students have an understanding of the beginning consonant sounds in words. However I believe the students are still struggling with using this strategy all the time in their reading. When the students are reading I see them guessing words for the words they are not sure of. The students look at the picture for clues, but not always do they begin with the same letter as the tricky word. The students that are guessing words that do not begin with the same letter as the actual are normally the loud and outgoing two students. They are more so rushing through the text. Therefore I am trying to slow them down and have them point to each word. I want them to not be reading at a snail pace when they know the words, but because they are at a very low Tier 3 level it is important for them to take in each word slowly and use the strategies as well.  Sometimes however when they are guessing the word it does begin with the same letter as the word given, but if you look at the word they said and the word on the page it does not make sense. The students need to continue at combining all the tricky word strategies, including this one while slowing down while reading. When the students slow down they are able to grasp the strategy and use it. The student who is shy never guesses and therefore will take the time to really think about it. I see this as a student who takes her time and also I see her using the strategy. She looks at the picture and she also always guesses a word with the same beginning sound. Normally she gets the correct word, but sometimes when it’s not right the beginning letter is right. Therefore I believe she has a strong understanding of the beginning sounds.

            I believe that some other interpretations of this material could be that the students understand that “t” makes a certain sound, but are unable to apply it. I think some sources may argue that the students who are loud cannot apply it since they can’t apply it outside of a structured activity of just working on the sounds, such as reading. They may say the students understand the procedural aspect of the strategy, but can’t conceptually think about the strategy in their reading. However someone may also say that they are in the beginning stages of this conceptual knowledge because of the fact that they do in some cases apply it and also that they are looking at strategies to use when they get to these parts in their texts. I could see sources also agreeing with me that the students understand and they simply need to slow down. I think an argument of this could be that if the students are reading to fast then they aren’t really reading. However the students are able to comprehend and retell the story. The books they are reading are heavily repetitive and simply just changing one word per page, which could make a difference as well. The students want to read it fast because it is so repetitive. I am hoping to see the students using these strategies more as the text complexity increases.  As far as the student who is shy and does appear to be using the strategy I could see sources arguing that the process of knowing the letter sound and looking at the picture for a clue would result in a much quicker response. Is the student really using the strategy or are they doing something else? However I believe the counterargument is that because she is at a beginning level that just might be how her brain is functioning. I think most sources would agree that as long as it’s not a heavily lengthy amount of time she is grasping the strategy.

            Beyond my objectives I have learned that the one student really wants to learn. She is dedicated to trying to learn these strategies, but she can get off task and rushes through the material. She believes that since she grasped the topic once she will automatically know it again. However this is not the case because when she rushes through the material she misses words and mistakes words for others. She is then not using the strategies. I have realized the first strategy she uses is looking at the picture. I have also learned that she enjoy writing and writing about her reading. She has a strong understanding of onset and rime as well. Beyond my objectives the second outgoing and loud student also needs to slow down when reading. He reads faster than anyone in the group. I believe because it is so repetitive he is simply turning the page and reading the prior sentence because he is assuming it will be the same. However many times the sentence may change on the last page and then he stumbles. He needs to slow down and point to each word. I think a lot of what he is reading is going into memory and not conceptual knowledge of the word and why it is pronounced that way. I have also learned that he is unmotivated about school when around others and works much better one on one with a teacher. Even in a small group he likes to act like he doesn’t care, which has impacted me as a teacher trying to motivate him. Regarding the third student I have learned that she needs wait time. She takes a little longer to answer and I need to sit back and let her think without keep asking or restating my question. She takes a minute to comprehend what I have said. She also uses the picture when she is unsure as the first strategy she uses while reading. All the students in general automatically want to tell you the sound of the letter when I ask for the letter name. This shows me that the students have an automatic response to answer with the sound about the letter, which shows letter sound knowledge. All the students also need to work on self-correction; they make one guess and do not go back to make sure it makes sense.

            Some of the students may need continued practice with this to make sure they are making accurate guesses and also going back to make sure the word makes sense based on using the first sound by looking at the rest of the word. This concept is continuously enforced throughout the next couple lessons phonics aspect. I will also be continuously supporting them and reminding them during their reading in the lessons and also in the independent reading. During independent reading time the students are reading by themselves and the teachers conference with the students. This could be a time I could help reinforce this strategy with the students and continue to have them practice it. I also could reinforce it when the students ask what a word is or how to write a word during writing. Sounding out the word starting with the first sound is a great way to start writing a word if you are unsure of how to spell it. A lot of the LLI (Leveled Literacy Intervention) program is working on the strategies then reading to use them. I am hoping to see them use the letter sounds we worked on this week in their reading for next week in one of the words that’s tricky with that letter. However not all the words that are in the next weeks book are tricky for that student with the letters from the previous weeks. If I could change something about my lesson and the program that I am following I would insert words with these beginning letters that should be tricky for the students in the next weeks book so it was a more accurate form of assessment. That’s a change I would suggest to the program or if I could incorporate another book with the lesson I would that had tricky words with these letters. However since it is such a scripted program I am unable to add elements to teach. If I could suggest another element to the program I would have the students write a “t” word on the t page instead of just saying the letter, sound, and the t word of the picture. I like the repetition, but I think for students that are 2^nd graders working on a low first grade program they need something more to do that doesn’t seem boring. I would also use more games and interactive activities, such as jumping jacks for onset and rime. I believe that just because it is an intervention program doesn’t mean it can’t be more fun and interactive for the students.

            In implementing my core practice I realized that word study and the learning of words and their parts needs to be repetitive. The students need many examples and activities that are the same so that they can make connections. I have learned that students may seem to have grasped the topic, but it’s not till you put them in a place to use it will you really see if they are grasping it. In general I think I have learned the power of not rushing. I think that as teachers we tend to think about all the things we need to accomplish and it gets overwhelming. I think we all need to take a step back and understand the importance of teaching till they get it. I think that’s highly important in word study and reading strategies in general because if not they will not continue to increase their reading level. To continue my professional learning I think I need to work with other levels of students, for example some students at or closer to grade level to see what they are doing to solve a tricky word or how they approach phonics work. That would give me a benchmark of where the students need to be and what it looks like. I am a visual learner therefore it is hard for me to read about where a student needs to be without seeing it. That way I can structure a path in my head that students need to reach with checkpoints along the way. I think in order to continue my professional learning I need to learn how to keep data and how to organize that so it is more clear a student’s progress as well and how would you keep data for this type of phonics work.

Refection 2: 
The students came into the lesson excited. They enjoy getting to move to a different room and work in a group. Upon entering our lesson I saw the students truly be able to grasp the idea for the phonics that day, but not have a full conceptual understanding of how to use it. The major big idea or concept that students were to grasp was recognizing and using simple phonograms with a VC pattern. For example the two phonograms that we looked at in this lesson were –at and –an. The students grasped that both –at and –an were words that we know and that they make the same sound as the individual words when they are in a word such as bat or man. We still hear the small word within the word with an added sound. One student was able to grasp that even all the words under that category rhymed because they had the same ending. All of the students were able to easily pronounce the words written under each category and able to tell me the part or pattern in the word. They picked up on that there’s a sound and a part in the word. When I told the students that this relates to our reading workshop lesson of looking for little words in our larger words the students were all able to give an example of a time when they used the strategy of finding a small word in a big word to sound it out. They weren’t able to tell me the exact little word (2 out of 3 students couldn’t) but they recalled a time using this strategy. This told me that the students understand that little words are in words and sometimes those words are phonograms as well. It will be interesting to see if the students can have the same understanding when we discuss phonograms that aren’t little words. I made sure to stress that these are little parts despite them looking like little words. The students were able to easily highlight the pattern in the word they wrote it easily. The students said the first sound of the word they were going to spell and then added the part with no help. I believe this shows understanding of the part and how you can use onset and rime, writing the first sound and then the part. The students struggled when I asked them what type of “a” was in the words. They paused and then one student said it’s short after I followed up with the question is it a short or long “a” sound in these parts? I do not know exactly if the students picked up on the type of “a” it was that was being used or if they were guessing or possibly even assuming based on our prior work with short vowels. In prior lessons the students worked on short vowel sounds and now doing patterns with short vowels. Once I had the students say some of the words and asked what sound the  “a” makes in them all of the students said the short “a” sound. I then reiterated the fact that is it’s short sound and the long sound is when a vowel says it name. This shows the students have struggled to make connections between the previous units and this one. This is something that the students all struggled with and therefore as a teacher I will need to keep reiterating that difference of the two “a” sounds and the sound of the vowel within the part. Therefore if I was to teach this lesson over again I would make sure I was discussing with the students more about the short “a” and how we can hear it in –at (just the part) and also in the words. Also experiment if we can find any –at words that don’t have a short “a” sound. The LLI program however is structured therefore it would be something that I would change about the program because I believe that despite us just talking about the short a I believe the students need explicit instruction on the connections between them because some students may not see them if not. All of the word strategies go together and I believe as a whole the students are struggling with fitting these connections and strategies together. I also believe that the students struggled with the fact that this can be used in their reading as a strategy. They were unable to give me a direct answer at the end of a lesson as to how to use it. They said the part is in the word and another student stated we could sound it out. However they did not grasp that since we know the part it’s easy. Quick onset and rime blended to pronounce the word. Look for the parts we can solve tricky words that have these parts. I think students are caught up on looking for little words, which at and an are little words, but they may struggle when we get to patterns such as –et and –en that are not little words.
I believe some alternative reads on my students could be that the students just saw a pattern and ran with it, just like rhyming words. Despite these being patterns the students did not grasp the real idea of them in words because the students were unable to pick up that it was a short a (showing not clear understanding of the parts of the pattern) and that they do not see it as a strategy, which is the point of learning it. I could also see others saying the students do not understand because of their prior knowledge of the word “at” and “an” that they do not grasp that it is a part (see it as a little word) and therefore do not have understanding of parts and patterns in words. They more so understand little words within big words. I could also see others saying that they did fully grasp it because they were able to say all the words, picked up on the endings were the same that’s why they rhymed, and understand that you can make more words from the fact that they understand the onset and rime in spelling the words. However in general I think the consensus would be that the students could grasp the topic of a part in a word they know and that to pronounce a word it is blending the sounds. The conceptual understanding may not be they’re of using it while reading or writing, but they have an idea. This lack of conceptual knowledge may be more difficult as the students move into words with letters on both sides of the pattern. In the upcoming weeks the students will review old patterns and build on new ones. These ideas will need to be stressed to the students so that they can move into the conceptual knowledge. However the LLI program is for the students to grasp the topic so stating these ideas to the students are something I would add in this lesson and in upcoming so they aren’t just gaining an idea of a topic.
The literacy practices that I learned about my students that go beyond my objectives are highly based on their ability to not make connections. I was somewhat surprised that not any of the three students were able to truly grasp a large understanding of the fact that the vowel sound in the word was a short a. This has led me to think about their literacy practices in general and that the students may not be making connections therefore not progressing in their reading. I believe a strong focus of mine will be to make these ideas more explicit and them in the next lesson see if they can make the connections because I can’t always be telling them. They need to uncover these ideas as well. I noticed in the one student that they really do not listen to modeling or instruction and then are somehow thinking they can just figure it out and do it. I believe this is truly hurting his literacy advancement. During mini- lessons and instruction that’s when you get the ideas and concepts you need in order to do the work. This has led me to think that this student is being held back because of his attention to the instruction. I also learned that this student has a strong understanding of rhyming words, and how rhyming words have the same ending. The second student that I learned about was that this student has a strong sense of reading strategy knowledge because when I did mention that this is a strategy we can use she went off on a large list of other strategies. I was confused why she did not pick up on this one as a strategy and it made me think she has simply just memorized them and not truly thought about how they are used or could be used. The third student I learned about his knowledge of onset and rime, all the students had a strong knowledge of it but I truly saw how he in particular said the beginning sound, the part, wrote both, and then said the word. He was almost modeling the strategy in blending word parts. I also learned that he picks up on a pattern and can keep going. He listed off multiple words as I was trying to fill in the chart with the words the program wanted me to with each part. He also is able to come up with words and know that the word can have two different meanings, for example bat. This told me he has knowledge of word meanings and that the same word can have two depending on the context of it.
Since I believe that the students do not completely conceptually understand parts in words I am going to make sure to stress these in lessons I teach outside of the LLI groups if I notice them, I will point them out in their reading during independent reading time conferences, and also stress them in our upcoming LLI lessons with new patterns. We keep going over parts in the next couple lessons therefore the ideas about vowels and how they are more than little words are ideas I am going to stress as we continue to work through parts in words. The LLI program is structured therefore I can not change major aspects of it to re-teach, but sliding words in with these parts that have consonants on both sides so that the students can see is something I am gong to do so that they have a more conceptual understanding and it’s not just an ending in a word.
I have learned that my core practice is difficult. The English language is difficult and there are many components of it that all fit together. Just like my A group I think I have learned the importance of connections and that students see all of these aspects of parts to learning about words. They aren’t just things that they are learning, but all fit together so we can understand literacy as a whole. I think that’s something that students need to know. I want to tell my students this in the upcoming lessons and stress adding it to our knowledge of literacy. I have learned that word parts can be confusing because you learn them and learn to look for them, but then you go from looking for them to knowing them and just reading without noticing them. I realize that this will not be for a while, but it’s the goal I need students to work too. That all these strategies are important, they will work at them, but then they will just know it cause they have used strategies in the past. In order to continue my professional learning I think I need to learn about all the parts in words that the students need to know in order to understand how they build and what I need to do to help students make the needed connections between them (despite similarities and differences).

Week of 10/7 Post

In reading this week's readings I was very interested in the questioning. As a teacher I believe that sometimes question after question sometimes make us a little crazy. However I believe the big take away that I got out of the readings are that questions are important. Questions are just like mistakes. We need to make or ask them in order to learn.

In reading the narrative piece for 2nd grade in the Writing Essentials book I have some questions on Narrative writing:

In the case of Owen (a student that complains of his head hurting while writing, so the teacher gives him less work to accomplish) how will that affect this long term performance in the classroom? Will it impact his success and motivation to try to do as much work as other kids?

Can you tell me more about your thinking of spending a whole day of writing on celebrating writing, I understand the importance in praising children, however that is a long time to take away from working on lessons? The students are learning, but can you say that they are learning enough for that day in observing others writing and if they are really paying attention?

In reading the visualizing section I also have a couple questions:

Is making an assumption about what you think will happen based on an inference between the text a type of inferring or is a prediction what would be the difference between these too?

How do you judge someones visualizations because it is a basis of what they are personally seeing?

Inquiry Two: Part A Blog Post

1. My target area for guided lead teaching is Vocabulary Acquisition, Use and Assessment. My school has recently implemented a program that they are trying to get the teachers to use called Robust Vocabulary. This program allows the students to learn words that they would not normally see or hear that are considered to be in a higher-level vocabulary.

2. Around 20 to 30 minutes

3. I will be working my first graders toward R.F. 1.4, SL. 1.2, SL. 1.4 and SL 1.5.

4. A statistic was found by the educators at my school, I am unsure of the exact percent but the majority of students at my schools parents have a lower vocabulary then we did as students. To try and keep the gap from growing they are trying to add some higher level vocabulary words each week. So this lesson directly affects their lives. The words come from books that we read aloud to them, this is an example of learning through literacy. This learning also includes learning literacy because they are learning new vocabulary and attempting to use it within their conversations. An example of how this lesson will include learning about literacy is as follows. When a student learns the word stupendous they will learn that this word means that they are great, amazing, and wonderful all in one. Well they need to know what they words great and amazing and wonderful mean first to really understand what the word stupendous means.

5. The students read a book each week that has their robust vocabulary in it and throughout the rest of the week they go back to that book and do activities that push them to interact with the word so that they become comfortable with it. This classroom talk always starts off teacher-led due to the read aloud and then introduction of the words. I would like to build up a Teacher-Involved type of discussion because I feel that the students would feel more comfortable with the words if they were able to talk about it together and I was just there to help them if they got a bit confused.

6. The Core Practice that I choose to study is strategic selection of words to study. I want to work on improving this practice because I feel that it is important for students to expand their vocabulary. Plus this practice goes right along with the route I am taking with Webster's Robust Vocabulary program. I believe that this will contribute to my own professional learning because it will push me to become more aware of the words that I use around the students. I will start to try to use some different words to introduce them to new language. 

7. I have the teachers within my school community to use as resources. I can also use the school library as a resource to look for the two books that I will be reading for this target area.

8. My principle gave me the book Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction by Isabel L. Beck, Margaret G, McKeown, and Linda Kucan to help with writing my unit plan so I will be using that as my additional resource. 

9. Honestly, this is something that I am unsure of because I am not sure how to pre-assess someone's vocabulary. I had the idea of having a discussion where I ask them to tell me the biggest or hardest word that they know the meaning of but I feel that this would be a bit intimidating and that I may only get a few kids raising their hands. So I guess the honest answer to this question is that I do not know but I plan on doing some reading to see if there is a way to answer this question.

10. I will need to find out who is comfortable with language and who is not. I do have an ELL student in my classroom so I also want to figure out a way to help him to understand the vocabulary that I am choosing because he is already struggling to understand, I do not want to overwhelm him and make him feel inadequate. 

11. I need to learn that this is the correct core practice to be using for my unit plan. Having the wrong core practice will cause me to have trouble planning out my teaching strategy. I also want to know if I am utilizing enough core practices or if there are more that I could be using and am not seeing. If this is the case please let me know what other core practices you could see me using within my unit, I will gladly take any input given!

12. My concern is that I am not teaching a big enough unit. While I feel that this is important I am aware that this unit is not about reading or writing. My teacher was very upfront with me and said that she was not comfortable giving me writing because she was on the writing committee for Webster and they are trying something new and she wants to make sure it is being done correctly. I totally understand and am fine with that but I am just worried that I may not be taking over something that is considered big enough to MSU. 

Week 2 Book Club

When reading Regie Routman's Writing Essentials chapters for this week I could not help but feel that there are many things I need to improve my expertise on to help teach my students how to become better writers. One of the things I noticed within my classroom, that I did not think about, was that a student does not need to spell the word perfectly the first time. This seems like something that I should have already known but I have never taught in a first grade classroom and I am still learning from my mentor teacher. The goal right now for my class is to just have them writing the sounds they hear within the word. In chapter 7 Routman talks about how teachers should not focus on the correctness of students writing because it will reduce the quality of their writing by making them feel discouraged. When my teacher asks the students to write and they struggle with a word she has them pull the word out and asks them to tell her the sounds that they hear. With each sound they write down the letter and that is how they make up the spelling of the word. Even though most of the time the word is spelled wrong the students feel excited and good about themselves because they have completed writing. Another thing that I would like to develop some more expertise in is learning how to conference with my students about their writing. I know, from my own experiences, that having conferences about our writing is one of the easiest ways to benefit in writing. After reading Chapter 9 I do feel that I have some better ideas for ways that I can tie conferencing into my own classroom. I really enjoyed the idea of having a whole class conference for a couple reasons. First, the teacher is still able to maintain control of the class. Second, the student who is reading their writing can learn from their peers as well as show them their own strength in writing. While I really love the idea of peer conferencing I do not feel that it is appropriate for a First grade level because my students would not be able to focus on talking about their writing with their peers. That class time would just turn into talk time.

I feel that I also need to develop some expertise in how to organize daily writing after reading these chapters from Writing Essentials. I feel this may at first be a professional dilemma for me as well because there is so much that goes into the writing process that I fear I would get lost. There are so many facets of the writing process that students need to partake in that I would not get through them all in the proper amount of time or in the correct manner. However, I really like the idea of doing a Writer's Workshop for a couple reasons. First, I like that it sets aside a part of the day where the teacher and the students know they will be working on their writing. Second, it gives me as the teacher time to map out which part of the writing process I would be working on with the students that day. In chapter 8 Routman talks about how the layout of writer's workshop starts out with the teacher giving demonstrations on how students should be writing and then gradually releasing the responsibility of writing to the students. I think that this layout is perfect for a first grade class because they are just beginning to learn how to write and they need a lot of modeling still.

An idea I have to hybridize my literacy instruction is by tying in the Social Studies lesson my students are learning about right now. They are learning about rules and why they are important. We, as a class, have been talking a lot about who has power, authority and why certain people deserve power and authority. I believe an excellent way to tie in writing to this lesson would be to ask the students a time in their lives when they utilized their own power and authority. This is a place where they can tell a story of their own, which Routman said pushes the students want to actually write while also having them work on their writing skills. The bonus of tying in the writing assignment to the social studies lesson would be that while it was enriching the social studies lesson the teacher could also take the students through the process of prewriting, drafting, revising, editing and the publishing.

NEW: Blog - week of 9/12

Margaret Rule-Blog 1: Week of 9/12

This internship year is critical in terms of developing my professional identity as a teacher. The internship is an important opportunity to get as close as I can to being a teacher without holding complete responsibility, but I am still anticipating needing to manage school, classroom, and student dilemmas on my own throughout the year. In relation to developing my professional identity, I am concerned about not fully committing my personal goals as a person and teacher in defense to my school's expectations and my mentor teacher's expectations. I understand that sometimes I will have to hold back on instructional strategies and techniques because it is not my classroom, and my ways may not match up with my mentor teacher. I want to avoid discrepancies with students and their parents regarding my actions in the classroom. Therefore, communication with my mentor is important and we should discuss what is expected of us as the teachers and what is expected of the students. This way, we can prevent dilemmas with instruction and student comprehension. 

In relation to constructing relevant curriculum, I anticipate composing common assessments for social studies and science with higher level thinking. What happens if a lesson simply goes all wrong? Either my instruction wasn't clear for the students, the lesson was too difficult, or I loose the attention of my group and the students don't learn the objective of the lesson. And lastly, in relation to assessing students in meaningful and productive ways, I anticipate finding time to do the assessments within the day. I also anticipate lessons that simply go wrong. Either my instruction wasn't clear for the students, the lesson is too difficult, or I loose the attention of my group and the students don't learn the objective of the lesson.  Lastly, completing all the units of study before the end of the year. 

I feel confident in planning and assessing. Although I have not spent a great amount of time inside the classroom, I already know of the resources within the school to properly create unit lesson plans. And before the school year started, the interns and new teachers attended a professional development opportunity about a new reading assessment. We are using the Fountas and Pinnel Assessment System. It is a great program that allows teachers to construct accurate assessments of our students' reading levels and comprehension. I do hope to learn more about teaching. I am nervous about classroom management and behavior, especially working with first graders. It is a challenge to keep students interacted and keep them from talking aloud when ever they want to.

Given what I know so far about my classroom context, there are opportunities for me that will help me learn more. My classroom has great diversity within the students, speaking in culture terms and in their independent levels of learning. So using the new assessment, we will be able to see where all students stand. Depending on those scores, my mentor teacher and I will discuss the idea to 'finesse' or 'hybridize' our literacy practices.