Extracting vs. TransactingChapter one brings up an important discussion: the idea of extracting versus transacting. Currently, the majority of reading instruction focuses on extracting information from a text. In the world of standardized testing we often hear, find the evidence to support your answer. What we are not hearing are questions that come from the students that require themselves to think critically about their own thinking. What makes that the best evidence? How does that piece of evidence affect me as the reader? Beers and Probst make a very important point on page 22 of this chapter, "We need students who can do more then answer questions; today's complex world requires that our next generation of leaders be able to raise questions...we must teach students to read with curiosity." Turn and Talk Reflection "How often do you ask your students, 'How did this reading change who you are?' If not often, explore with colleagues why this is. Do you believe that reading can change who you are? If you do, then why not discuss that with your students?
Each week I ask my students, "What did you learn about yourself as a reader?" This school year, I want to improve how this question should be answered. I have always wanted them to reflect on their change and progress but now I am realizing that I have not articulated this goal with them. I have modeled saying, "This week I improved my fluency." or "This week, my book taught me the importance of being a great friend." However, students need the explicit instruction direction of relating the book to themselves, which my reflection question does not directly do. "We've heard some teachers say that in the future, reading may not be as important as it is now, since we will have more audio books and will be able to turn to the Internet to watch/listen to someone explain almost anything. Do you agree? Do you think in the future we'll read less? Is reading still necessary even now? " I would l like to politely disagree with anyone that argues that reading is not important. Yes, audiobooks are becoming more popular; however, students today still love reading a book too, even an ebook. I allow my students to read books on Epic (getepic.com) which offers book titles that contain a text to speech "Read to Me" option. Many of the students ask how to turn the option off because "it takes the fun out of making the voices for the characters" (fourth grade reader). It is certainly possible that we will read less in the future; however, for the foreseeable future, reading will be necessary to complete every day tasks, such as grocery shop and read the road signs as you drive. Even more so, someone people are no auditory learners and will never be able to learn through someone explaining vocally. They need to personally read the content. We can never be a society fully reliant on audio. "What will be lost if reading is less valued? How do you share the value of reading with students in your school?" If we do not keep a value for reading in the education system, I imagine what will happen will be similar to what we are seeing happen with the science and social studies content. When I was in fourth grade, I have a robust knowledge about my state's history, culture, and geography because we spent a full year developing that content. When some of my students come to me, they are unsure what state is west of New Jersey and what ocean they go to when they go down the shore. If we devalue reading, our students will not be able to succeed in life because they will not have the fundamental skills that allow them to go off and learn what we are unable to teach during the school day. They will have undeveloped phonics skills, as well as comprehension skills. During my reading time, I also develop listening comprehension; therefore, I suspect that listening comprehension would also decline. If we cannot accurately listen to another person and respond, we will not be able to communicate effectively. We are a society built on communication, digitally and in person. "In this country we kept slaves from learning to read. Additionally, for a while in our history, you were adequately literate if you could simply sign you name-or even just make an X. In developing countries today, girls are still educated less than boys. What do these situations suggest about the potential power of reading." Reading education has always been used as a an oppressive tool. It is a way to show power over another person because once you learn how to read you can find a book about anything and learn about that topic. Reading is a universal key to education.
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While scrolling through the countless otter photos on my Facebook feed today, I came across a new post from one of my favorite teaching blogs, Life in Fifth Grade.
If you are interested in learning alongside me, visit the Amazon page for more information about the book! "If this reader, this student who must be able to handle the toughest of texts, has a chance to emerge in our classrooms...it will be because you somehow shut out the loud voices that proclaim our schools are failing and keep true to the voices that you know matter most: you students' voices."Week One: Introduction Part 1I have never opened a professional text and laughed while reading the very first page. Last year, I met a child similarly to the one described in the book who had similar feelings about bathing suits. She came to a summer camp with 2 full coverage rash guard bathing suits. When another camper inquired about her bathing suits, she simply replied "Well I am going to be in the sun. I don't want to get sunburnt. Why would you take off more clothes if you are going to spend the day baking under the sun?" Similar to Beers and Probst's sock child, my camper had a way of thinking different than my own and it was a way to make her life easier. By selecting a more practical bathing suit, she prevented the terrible sun burn that other campers suffered, despite their efforts to reapply sun screen. This young 6 year old embraces the heart of Beers and Probst's philosophy.
For my camper, the rash guard did prevent a terrible sun burn and the way she presented herself and her new style, invited others to help her make it efficient. "And so, Disrupting Thinking is, at its heart, an exploration of how we help students become the reader who does so much more than decode, recall, or choose the correct answer from a multiple-choice list. This reader is responsive, aware of her feelings and thoughts is the text bring some fourth. She is responsible, reflecting honestly about what the writer has offered and how she has reacted, willing either to holdfast or too change,As a reason and evidence dictate. And she is compassionate,Willing to imagine, possibly two feel, always to think about what others-author, characters, and other readers- are experiencing and saying so that she may better understand."Disruptive Thinking starts with two questions:
If disruptive thinking that will help my students begins with being uncomfortable than I am well on my way there because Part I of this book made me uncomfortable. The contrast between the attitude toward reading in first grade and fourth grade absolutely terrifies me. As a fourth grade teacher, to read a child say that reading is only about "Can you find the evidence?" and "[Personal choice reading] is only on Friday when no one has a red mark by their name on the behavior chart" breaks my heart. Personal choice reading or self-selected independent is not a reward. It is an integral part of the balanced literacy framework. I know how it feels to lose a love of reading because you are not allowed to select your own texts. I was that child in middle school and high school. I do not want my students to be that way. The leveling and labeling of students is worrying. To have a third grade child express "I LOVE Bunnicula. But it's a home book. First my mom read it to me every night. I can't read it at school because I'm not that level. I have to read Frog and Toad at school because that's my level" worries me even more because this is were it starts. I fully believe in Benchmark testing; I am partial to Fountas and Pinnell's benchmarking system because of the comprehension insight it provides you. However, I believe that benchmark testing is meant to inform instruction not restrict a love of reading. Books should not be labeled as "home books" or "school books." I teach my students how to select a just-right book and when they find a book that may be too challenging but they want to read it, we give it a chance, together. I find time for an extra reading conference with them to model fluency and support comprehension strategies. I inform the parents of their child's endeavors with the difficult text and encourage them to support their reading at home. The world is not filled with pre-leveled texts. Students cannot go to Barnes and Noble or Amazon and search for a level T book. Furthermore, different texts require different schema. Not every level T book is appropriate for a level T reader. I remember my first attempt at reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I was in 8th grade. I was not a confident reader. I had, what I later learned to be, decoding problems that lead to comprehension problems because I was reading too fast. I read the the work Portkey and Porky. I did not read the previous 3 books. I did not have the schema to back up my reading of the wizarding world. So, I assumed that they were carrying a magic pig around. I abandoned the book on Chapter 6 and didn't return to the book until after I graduated college. As soon as I arrived at page 65 of the book, I realized my mistakes and why this book was so challenging. If only my teacher had checked in with me to see how the book was going. Instead of simply providing our school wide unsupported DEAR (Drop Everything And Read) time. I dreaded DEAR time. Instead of reading, I spent 40 minutes every day, wondering if what I was reading was actually happening in the book. It usually wasn't. With every book chosen for me, I began to notice that I wasn't understanding the book the way the other students were. I began to resent reading and did not want to select my own books. I went through the motions. Selecting a book, opening it and staring at the pages daydreaming, reading only enough that I could write a summary, and then double checking to make sure the summary matched what was actually happening. Each time I received the same star for completion. I do not want this for my students. Since learning the basic phonemes and graphemes in college and obtaining a pair of glasses, I have renewed the love of reading that I had in first grade. I do not want my students to lose their love of reading because it is not their independent reading level or they don't have a chance to read their own self-selected books. I am ready to begin my disruptive thinking journey. My questions: 1. What do I want to change? I want to foster a love of reading in my students by encouraging self selected reading and providing mini-lesson instructions that allow students to practice reading in a practical scenario. 2. What assumptions make that change hard? The biggest assumption standing in my way is the leveling of students and books in school. I must find a way for leveling to be purposeful and authentic. The other assumption that will make this change hard is the students' mindsets. By fourth grade, my students do not take every lesson and automatically believe it is useful. I must prove to them the use for each mini-lesson and show that it is not simply an arbitrary selection. Well if you are still reading this, thank you. If you want to continue following along with my disrupting thinking journey, check back next week for another post. One of the challenges that I am facing this year is effectively encouraging my students to reflect on the quality of their work. It is not a grade that we are aiming to achieve. It is not a number of words on a page or sentences in a paragraph. Instead, we are attempting to apply the every day mini-lessons into a larger more meaningful creation that we can take pride in. My students are focused on "achieving an A" but I want them to focus on this is where I am currently performing and this is what I have to do to get where I want to be.
In order to meet this goal, my co-teacher and I started out by slowly implementing student reflection time into the lessons. At the end of our first STEM challenge of the year, we had students think about the effectiveness of their design and the real-world impact of the lesson. Then we moved to reflecting on our knowledge acquisition in math by attempting to apply vocabulary to a daily reflection question. By December, we believed we were ready to attempt our first rubric reflection by self assessing our opinion writing. It was not disastrous; the students were able to accurately identify their strengths and weaknesses in their writing. However, I would never attempt it this way again because the students did not feel confident in their reflections or their ability to read a rubric, despite my lesson on rubrics 30 seconds prior to their reflection time. After enjoying a few days of my Christmas Break, I started to think back to these reflections. Why had my rubric reflection been successful last year and not this year? Quickly I realized my mistake. I never explicitly taught my students how to read a rubric. Sure, we said, "See this column is one star. This is two stars. Look at how it moves from 'I did not write an introduction' to 'I attempted to get my reader ready." However, my students were busy thinking about where their introduction fell instead of making the connections between one star and two star and so on. It is important, especially at an elementary level, to meet students where they are and make the information relevant to them. My students do not care about stars on a paper. However, this group of students loves cooking and food. Whenever a topic is tricky, my co-teacher and I work with them to build a food comparison. With this particular group, story plot becomes a delicious meal at Outback Steakhouse and the layers of Earth become a Jelly Munchkin from Dunkin Donuts. So what would a four point rubric become? A pancake breakfast, of course! When we returned to school after break, we began our next unit in Writing. Before we continued on and learned a new set of expectations, I took a few minutes to establish the categories of expectations. As with our "Outback Steakhouse story plot", we set the scene with our setting. We entered the local diner. We were seated and we placed our order. "One plate of pancakes with butter and syrup, please!" Then I walked through each step of the rubric. I modeled bringing in an empty plate and handing it to a student. When he was clearly upset with his order, I responded "Well I followed some of the directions. I went to the kitchen and got a plate! You asked for a plate. Is that not good enough?" Clearly, it was not good enough. The students decided that I had followed some directions to create some kind of final product but my final product did not meet my expectations. I needed to try again. So after a long debate of how I failed as a waitress and what I could do to improve, I attempt the order again. This time I modeled bringing in a plate with a single pancake. The class applauded. I said, "Enjoy!" and walked away. He immediately called me back and complained that I did not bring the toppings he requested. The debate began again. While I was more successful this attempt, I clearly did not meet my student's expectations. I mostly followed his directions to create an edible final product, but still does not meet the expectations that were set for me. My students then told me exactly what I needed to do. "Go back to kitchen. Get a plate. Put the pancakes on the plate. Get some butter and syrup and bring it all back out." So, I did exactly what they told me. I modeled going to the kitchen, getting the pancake and putting it on the plate, grabbing the butter and syrup and taking it back to my student. I placed the pancake on the plate in front of him and told him to hold out his hands. I then handed him a pretend pat of butter and poured my pretend syrup right into hands. The class erupted in laughter. I looked around and said, "But I did what you told me. He ordered one plate of pancakes with butter and syrup. There's the plate. There's the the pancakes. Here's some butter and here is some syrup." My student looked up at me and said, "Well who wants a puddle of syrup their hand! We should not have to tell you to put the syrup on the pancakes! You have to do some thinking on your own if you want to cut it as a waitress!" The class nodded in agreement. So I tried again but this time created the most beautiful imaginary pancake meal I could dream of and brought it back to my student. The class applauded. I took my bows. Then we debriefed. Why is this fourth plate a successful meal? What makes it better than the others? The class concluded that the fourth meal is the best pancake meal because I not only met the expectations that were set but I put my personality and creative thinking into it. It is not a cookie cutter meal that any chef or waitress would bring you. I had my students rate the meals on a four star scale and displayed the rubric on the board. We worked together to establish the language that we will later use to reflect on our work. Since establishing the pancake rubric rating scale, my students reflect on each assignment when they complete. They write their pancake rubric rating in the margin of the paper. When we check their work, we discuss with the students why they chose their rating and what they can do to move up on the scale. The students are very honest with themselves. Most often we are seeing threes and they say this is not my neatest work or I completed my work but I was distracted and rushed to complete it in the last minute. We are giving our students the power to assess themselves are create their grades. We are noticing that most often all of the reflections and justifications align with our assessment of their work. The students are now grading themselves in their classwork activities and setting expectations for themselves for the next time. After seeing their independent application of the pancake rubric to assess their behaviors, we decided to give them a chance to reflect on classroom behaviors that we use for our life skills indicators on our report card. We created a student evaluation that reflects our indicators. The students completed the reflection and set a goal for the third marking period. When inputting their second marking period life skills indicators, we took their reflections into consideration. Most students were very honest and did not give themselves all fours. In the upcoming weeks, their reflections will be added to their Seesaw journals are periodically we will revisit them and reflect on our progress toward our goal. My students are beginning to think more in terms of progress and less in terms of a quantity grade. This transition will be a long process but the first step towards our goal is looking positive. If you are interested in my pancake reflection rubrics or my student self evaluation, visit my Teachers Pay Teachers store. As I continue to discover more about the Design Thinking Process, I find myself reflecting on the lessons I designed last year and wondering if my efforts to develop new design thinking approaches to my old lessons are benefiting my students or am I just repackaging the same content under a shiny new bow.
My goal for the year is for my students to not only learn the material that I am presenting to them, but also understand why it was chosen. In order to help our students unpack these mystifying ideas, my co-teacher and I decided to close our Reader's and Writer's Workshop shares with a "why" discussion to gauge the progress toward this outcome. However, we felt that was not going to be enough for our next unit. "Change is an opportunity to do something amazing. #InnovatorsMindset"
- George Couros The Innovator's Mindset: Empower Learning, Unleash Talent, and Lead a Culture of Creativity When I first opened this book over the summer, I was intrigued by what I was reading. George Couros decided to start his book off with a strong quote from Albert Einstein, "Once you stop learning, you start dying." Before I had even immersed myself in this idea of an "innovator's mindset," I was already thinking deeply. I have never agreed with a statement more in my life. I love to take every opportunity to learn more. I embrace opportunities to ask questions and am often overly curious about the processes behind observations in my every day life. If I were to stop learning something new, I would lose a part of who I am. For this reason, my co-teacher and I have adopted a motto for our classroom this year. "Today is a great day to learn something new." I have decided to take part in #IMMOOC, a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) based on this book. If I am being 100% honest, I am nervous and a little overwhelmed by this opportunity, being that I only just joined Twitter a month ago. However, if I were to turn down this opportunity to learn something new, I know that I would come to regret it. The challenge I have been posed with this week is to reflect on why innovation in education is so crucial today and the first thing that comes to my mind is how much education has changed since I was in elementary school. When I was in elementary school, I remember going to the computer lab once a week. We learned about keyboarding with Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing for Kids. We played Snood. The most creative project I can remember was making a secret webpage about a topic that I liked in fifth grade. However, I do not remember the steps but I can promise you that it was not as easy as creating this blog. I remember there being desktop computers in my classroom, but I do not remember using them. The experiences with technology that I do remember were the ones I had at home, on my giant dinosaur Acer computer, loaded with Windows 95. I was not allowed to use the internet because my parent's needed the phone line. So, my entertainment consisted of making PowerPoint presentations, that I saved on Floppy Disks. I would read a book, make a slideshow, and present it to my family. I would also use EA KIDS, the first CD-ROM I owned, to create sticker stories and then use the images to tell stories to my baby brother. My brother is eight years younger than me. By the time he was elementary school, our family had switched to DSL internet. He never had to listen to the squeal of the dial up tones. His entertainment consisted of disks. Disks that had movies that you didn't need to rewind. Disks that had songs that were not destroyed by a machine pulling out the tape inside. Disks that had video games that you did not need to blow the dust off of to make them work. It has not been that long of a time since I was in elementary school but technology has come such a long way. Innovation is crucial in education today because we are not teaching the mastery of the tools they have now. We are preparing these students for jobs that may not exist yet. They will be working with technologies that may not have been invented yet. They need to be able to identify a problem, ask questions, brainstorm solutions, and develop and test a prototype to solve their problems. Then on top of all of that, they need to know how to share their ideas in the world. I learned how to write a perfect letter to the editor when I was in middle school. We sent them to the newspaper and I never heard or saw anything from it. Last week, my students read a book and created hashtags to start a conversation. We then used our class twitter account to tweet the author of the book and we heard back from him that night. Change can be overwhelming. We need to teach our students that it is not something to be afraid of but something to embrace. They are going to face more changes than we can imagine. Teaching students how to have an innovator's mindset will help them to develop a skill set where they can use the wealth of information available at their fingertips to learn and create something new. If you are interested in learning more about #IMOOC you can visit George Couros's Week 1 Blog Post. Welcome to The Tiger's Tale. I am so glad you decided to stop by. On my blog I will be sharing stories of my second year of teaching along with anything I find on the internet that I think would be helpful for my fellow teachers to know.
A Little Bit About Me This is my second year as the general education teacher in a fourth grade inclusion room. Previously, I was a long term substitute Basic Skills Reading teacher at the same school. I have the privilege to work with an amazing co-teacher for the entire day. Together, we design interactive notebooks, anchor charts, activities, and more to meet the needs of our classified, general education, and enrichment students. I am a Class Dojo Mentor and have earned this title by being the most active Class Dojo user at my school. Previously, I have used Class Dojo as a means of providing feedback on targeted skills. This year, I am very excited to implement the NEW Class Dojo toolkit in my classroom. I am also an active user of SeeSaw. This year, I will continue to have my students publish their work to their portfolios and together we will create a Class Blog. I am looking forward to connecting parents to our class so that they can be involved in our daily activities. I grew up in South Jersey, in a suburb of Philadelphia. Outside of school, I love all things Disney! I also enjoy reading, camping, and trips down the shore. Every summer, I volunteer at a children's oncology camp. A Little Bit About My School I am a teacher in New Jersey, South Jersey to be exact, where we use a modified version of the Common Core Standards entitled the New Jersey Student Learning Standards. My school has an interesting mix of students. There are your typical middle class families; however, you also have your families that live on farms. It is always interesting to hear my students tell me about their pets- many of my students have pet chickens. My school is a Balanced Literacy School. To meet the wide variety of abilities in our room, my co-teacher and I utilize a Reader's Workshop and Writer's Workshop Model. This way, we are able provide daily support to our students that are struggling with a particular topic. For math, our school uses enVision Math Common Core. We have adopted a similar workshop approach to help meet the needs of our class. For Word Work, the fourth grade at our school utilized the Words Their Way Program to provide differentiate word study and spelling strategies. This year, we are also implementing the new New Jersey Student Learning Standards - Science, the Next Generation Science Standards. |
AuthorJust an elementary school teacher trying to navigate the crazy world of all things fourth grade, design thinking, inclusion classrooms, meaningful technology integration and more. Archives
January 2018
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