Final Project Article Review

The article I chose to review has to do with, as the title implies, teaching children about learning disabilities through children’s literature. According to the article there are so many books available that portray characters with disabilities, and it is our duty as educators to make these texts available for students in the classroom. The article primarily focuses on first selecting quality literature and then promoting the understanding and acceptance that these texts bring into the classroom. In order to select quality literature the author of the article outlines key points to consider when approaching any text. These points include the features of literature, which are theme, characterization, setting, plot, point of view, and literary style. She also points out that quality literature is not only defined by text, but also illustrations. Most importantly she outlines, “How children’s literature that portrays learning disabilities can be used to promote awareness, understanding, and acceptance of individuals with learning disabilities” (Parter, Dyches, Johnstun 15). Not only does she outline how to select these texts, but how we can use them to promote the overall understanding of disabilities for young students everywhere.

Final Project Book Review 4

Book Review 4: The Peanut-Free Café by Gloria Koster

Koster, Gloria. The Peanut-Free Cafe. Morton Grove, Illinois: Albert
Whitman & Company, 2006. Print.


About one in twenty children suffer from a food allergy, and eggs, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, fish, shellfish, wheat, and soy cause most food allergies. In The Peanut-Free Café by Gloria Koster she illustrates how important it is that children with food allergies be understood, “everyone must understand that children with a food allergy can do everything that other children can do, except eat the food to which they are allergic”. In the story Grant, who is allergic to peanuts, is a new student to Nutley Elementary where peanut butter is a coveted food item. Simon, his newly found friend, is peanut butters’ biggest fan, but when he realizes the gravity of Grant’s allergy he must decide what to do when a Peanut-Free Café is established at his school. Simon struggles with giving up peanut butter and eating with his friend Grant. The illustrations in this story are humorous and time-telling fun for any young reader. Koster educates more than just children about food allergies, but also educators on what roles they must play in the understanding and preparation that coincides with providing a safe and happy environment for all students.

Final Project Book Review 3

Book Review 3: Sometimes My Mommy Gets Angry by Bebe Moore Campbell

Campbell, Bebe Moore. Sometimes My Mommy Gets Angry. New York:
Puffin Books, 2003. Print.

Mental illness doesn’t just affect the individual; it affects everyone connected with that individual including his or her family. In Bebe Moore Campbell’s Sometimes My Mommy Gets Angry, we as the reader get an inside look at how mental illness affects those we love. The story goes through one day in the life of Annie, a child whose mother suffers from depression. From the moment Annie wakes up and her mother asks, “who wants hot, golden circles?” (Campbell 1) to the moment she returns home from school and her mother says, “STOP ALL THAT SCREAMING…GET IN THIS HOUSE NOW” the reader is given a taste of how depression feels for everyone involved (Campbell 13). The book gives an amazing portrayal of families suffering from depression and how they battle it as one unit. On days like the one mentioned above, Annie knows what she must do; call her grandmother, eat a treat from her special snacks, and most importantly think happy thoughts. The reader is given an inside look at how individuals deal with depression and most importantly how they understand it. The message throughout the story is not just that people suffer from depression, but that those who do never stop loving their family whether some days are good or some days are bad.

Final Project Book Review 2

Book Review 2: Thank you, Mr Falker by Patricia Polacco

Polacco, Patricia. Thank you, Mr. Falker. New York: Philomel Books, 1998.
Print.

Reading is a profound concentration in education, especially in the early grades. Many books students read do not touch on the struggle of reading that many students can relate to, except Patricia Polacco’s Thank you Mr. Falker. Trisha is a new and struggling learner to her California school ready to hand in the towel. She has struggled reading in her past school, battled the ranting and bullying of her classmates, and is plain sick and tired of being different. Trisha cannot help but struggle with what many children her age face, not only reading, but also the blurred line between what is said and what is done. Coming from loving grandparents telling her “to be different is the miracle of life” and then being bullied for being different, Trisha begins to hate school (Polacco 8). It is not until Trisha meets Mr. Falker and he works one-on-one with her that she begins to realize she is not dumb, and can and will learn to read. This story of a child with dyslexia isn’t just about a girl who can’t see letters or numbers the way others do, it is about a child who sees the world differently and invites the reader into it. As the reader we get to see what it’s like to have dyslexia, how people with dyslexia learn to read, and how dyslexic kids might need extra help.

Final Project Book Review 1

Book Review 1: Kathy’s Hats: A Story of Hope by Trudy Krisher

Krisher, Trudy. Kathy's Hats: A Story of Hope. Morton Grove, Illinois:
Albert Whitman & Company, Print.

Trudy Krisher tips her hats to young cancer patients everywhere in her heartwarming story of a child battling the daily struggles of a cancer patient; the pain from chemotherapy, losing hair, missing school, being different from her peers. Kathy’s Hats: A Story of Hope gives an interesting portrayal of cancer and the young character that has it. Kathy’s story begins with the first hat she receives, a ribbon her mother placed atop her head after she was born to the first hat she wears after losing her hair due to chemotherapy treatments. Kathy not only battles with how much cancer has changed her physically, but also emotionally. She begins to reevaluate what she likes most, hats. It isn’t until her mother introduces the most important hat of all, a thinking cap. “My mother says that the most important thing about a person is the way she thinks about things” (Krisher 19). This book is a beautiful portrayal of adolescence and the many challenges youngsters must face and ultimately overcome.

Final Project Introduction

Introduction

As I write this paper, I think to myself “I’ve got one left in me” as a graduating senior of MSU. More importantly I consider the true depth of knowledge I’ve gained from this class and this assignment as I embark on my career as an educator.

For my TE448 project, I decided to focus on individuals with disabilities in quality literature. As a future educator, whether teaching all students or teaching students with disabilities, I want to have an open voice for all children in my classroom. I want a diverse range of literature in my classroom for a diverse population of students. Above all, I want inclusion for all students present in my classroom. In doing so my students will be able to learn about individuals like them self and not like themselves in the same sense. As this course has taught me throughout the semester it is important for children to learn from literature and to be given that opportunity to learn. Students need rich, quality literature from an insider or outsider point of view in order to be able to relate to characters in the text or learn from them.

Basal Reading

I think BASAL reading lessons are a bad idea, I know we worked a lot with them in class and that Tompkins outlines several ways we can implement them positively, but I still do not like agree with them. I think that they cause a teacher to become too dependent on pre-planned lesson plans and only allow a teacher to teach one way. I think students need differentiated literacy instruction and that not every child can learn through Basal reading. I think it is easy for many teachers to rely on this method of teaching, but that planning your own lesson with multiple ways to approach a text is the answer. Not only that, but the Basal readers I have witnessed in my CTs classroom only offer sections or excerpts of texts. How are the students supposed to be motivated to read and comprehend text when they aren't getting the whole story? My CT doesn't use Basal readers in his classroom, he has created his own methods to teach literacy, which I feel are more effective. He includes literacy in every aspect of his classroom and every lesson he teaches. Whether he is teaching literacy through prompts like
"What would you do if you woke up after sleeping for ten years?" or through Read Aloud and DEAR time, the students are motivated and comprehend more because of it.

The dreaded Basal reader talk! I think the Tompkins book does a good job of trying to show the positive and the negatives of basal readers. Basal readers are so improved from what they were when I was young. The programs are much more inclusive and attempt to explore a greater variety of subject matter. These are used very infrequently in my placement. Most of the reading that I have observed is free reading and chosen by the students. There are some unintended consequences to his. Often a student can spend weeks "reading" the same book which will consist of them looking at pictures (for example the Guinness book of world records) Students can also pick books that are two hard for them to read and become frustrated or pick up books that are too easy and provide no challenge. This chapter does end with a really helpful review list: How effective teachers use basal reading textbooks.

This week’s reading addresses my biggest worry which is assessment. Chapter 9 in Tompkins shows some great examples of different kinds of assessments and their practical uses. The thing that I gained from this chapter is that your assessments should have a purpose and not just be for grades. If your assessment has a proper purpose it can illustrate the goal or purpose for the assignment. I do wonder if time restraints will be a problem in an actual classroom. There is an example they have with a teacher using a checklist and writing down al the student miscues and then analyzing them. I wonder how long an activity like this takes and how often would you be able to do this. You would have to have good classroom management otherwise you wouldn’t be able keep the class under control while you’re working with the individuals.

Chapter 8 in Tompkins really made me think of the children’s literature class that we had to take. I really enjoy getting the chance to see books from each kind of genre and to be able to make the comparisons. Truthfully I felt like that was one of the things that felt missing from this class. I wanted to know more about the literature that is being used in my classmate’s classrooms.
I noticed a pattern in this chapter. In almost every chapter there is a pink box that is labeled Nurturing English Learners. It then asks a question regarding the chapter topic and English learners, What I have noticed is the commonalities in the answers. Almost all the questions are answered by the most basic point which is to teach English learners lie the rest of your class with more support. They might require more help but the concepts that are important to the rest of the class are also important to the English Learners.
The chapter showed the features of text. My CT was teaching text features to the class and he gave each student a checklist that contained the common features of non-fiction text. It included things like headings, bold print, photos, diagrams, maps, and captions. The kids then had to go though a non-fiction book and make tally marks on their sheet for the items they found. They really enjoyed showing us all the tally marks they were able to make

In Tompkins Chapter 2, the beginning example talks about the class reading the book ,The Giver. (that book is a personal favorite of mine) I wish that I had read such an elaborate, thought provoking book when I was a seventh grader. It is strange but I cannot remember any of the trade books we used in school. They were usually dry and uninspiring. It is not until high school that I remember having any deep discussions about trade books.( I remember reading Catch 22 and Beloved in a modern US novel class in 9th grade) If as a younger student I had gotten the chance to have "grand conversations" about different text I think it would make a smooth transition into the analytical style of writing that is expected of students later in life. In the chapter they also talked about how in stage 2 one of the activities you can introduce is buddy reading. This is used in my classroom on a daily basis. The students can choose to buddy read during their free reading. I have seen great results when you have the right combination of kids. One of the kids ,James, has a tendency to not stay on task however when he does buddy reading he treats it like a chance to show off. The problem becomes that he often gets a little boisterous and has to be reminded that we do buddy reading quiet so others can read around him. I wonder if students would be more reluctant to read with a buddy in older grades.

Week 9 post

I believe that the basal method does not allow teachers to fully teach their students. No two students learn alike, so how could teaching the "book way" to every student, every year the same exact way possibly work? I am pretty sure that my CT would be all for this way because it causes little preparation by the teacher and, it seems to me, little student-teacher interaction. I do not think that I would like this teaching method because I like to teach creatively. Don't get me wrong, I am all for recycling lesson plans and borrowing from other people, but I do not feel as though every lesson plan should be recycled. I believe that teachers should cater lessons to their students because differentiated instruction is, in my opinion, the only way to teach effectively.

new literacies thoughts

While doing our new Literacies project, I have learned some great Yiddish phrases that I am excited to teach and I have also learned that I really do know a lot about my religion. Here are some of the common Yiddish words and their definitions:
bubbeOr bobe. It means Grandmother, and bobeshi is the more affectionate form.
chutzpahOr khutspe. Nerve, extreme arrogance, brazen presumption. In English, chutzpah often connotes courage or confidence, but among Yiddish speakers, it is not a compliment.
feh!An expression of disgust or disapproval, representative of the sound of spitting.
goyA non-Jew, a Gentile. As in Hebrew, one Gentile is a goy, many Gentiles are goyim, the non-Jewish world in general is “the goyim.” Goyish is the adjective form. Putting mayonnaise on a pastrami sandwich is goyish. Putting mayonnaise on a pastrami sandwich on white bread is even more goyish.
kibbitzIn Yiddish, it’s spelled kibets, and it’s related to the Hebrew “kibbutz” or “collective.” But it can also mean verbal joking, which after all is a collective activity. It didn’t originally mean giving unwanted advice about someone else’s game - that’s an American innovation.
klutzOr better yet, klots. Literally means “a block of wood,” so it’s often used for a dense, clumsy or awkward person. See schlemiel.
kosherSomething that’s acceptable to Orthodox Jews, especially food. Other Jews may also “eat kosher” on some level but are not required to. Food that Orthodox Jews don’t eat - pork, shellfish, etc. - is called traif. An observant Jew might add, “Both pork and shellfish are doubtlessly very tasty. I simply am restricted from eating it.” In English, when you hear something that seems suspicious or shady, you might say, “That doesn’t sound kosher.”
kvetshIn popular English, kvetch means “complain, whine or fret,” but in Yiddish, kvetsh literally means “to press or squeeze,” like a wrong-sized shoe. Reminds you of certain chronic complainers, doesn’t it?
Mazel TovOr mazltof. Literally “good luck,” (well, literally, “good constellation”) but it’s a congratulation for what just happened, not a hopeful wish for what might happen in the future. When someone gets married or has a child or graduates from college, this is what you say to them. It can also be used sarcastically to mean “it’s about time,” as in “It’s about time you finished school and stopped sponging off your parents.”
mentshAn honorable, decent person, an authentic person, a person who helps you when you need help. Can be a man, woman or child.
mishegasInsanity or craziness. A meshugener is a crazy man. If you want to insult someone, you can ask them, ”Does it hurt to be crazy?”
mishpochehOr mishpokhe or mishpucha. It means “family,” as in “Relax, you’re mishpocheh. I’ll sell it to you at wholesale.”
http://www.dailywritingtips.com/the-yiddish-handbook-40-words-you-should-know/

Week 9 Post - Basal Reading

The Tompkins chapter seemed to support the Basal reading program.  In one part of the chapter, they say that some teachers feel that they are limited with the textbooks, while others feel it's a great resource.  I feel that the Basal reading program is an easy way out for teachers.  Students should be reading tradebooks from second grade on.  The Basal reading program does not provide students with the full version of a book, they shorten the stories so the students are not getting the full effect.  I think the Basal reading program is great for first year teachers, but after your first or second year when you become more familiar with the curriculum and your atmosphere, you should step away from this reading program and be creative!  My CT strongly disagrees with the Basal reading program.  The third graders in my field placement read tradebooks and my CT has actually created packets full of comprehension, vocabulary, and prediction exercises for the students to complete as they read through the book.  By reading an entire book, students are able to see the full plot of the story, and learn more about the characters in the story.  The Basal reading program seems choppy, jumping from book to book.  I feel that you can learn the same content, such as spelling, grammar, vocabulary etc... by completing worksheets after each chapter of a book, instead of multiple shorter versions of books.

Vocabulary Lesson: "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry"

If I were to create a Vocabulary lesson based off of "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry" I would focus on word choice. I would have students pair up into groups of two and pick out at least thirty words they liked from the chapter they had read. These words could be words they found interesting, words they don't know, words they have always liked, tasty words, etc. Next, I would have students record these words on paper. Then, I would have the students, in pairs, narrow their lists down to ten words, their personal favorites. After this, I would ask students to work independently and do the same lesson over again. Students will create their own list of personal favorite words, this time not only relating to "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry", but to any words they know at all. I will have students record this list in a notebook in which they can refer back to easily for their writing in the future. Students will be asked to update their lists frequently, but every time the add a word one must be eliminated from the list. Students will only exchange words in this process in order to keep them from using the same old "blah" words in writing. Through this process, of collecting words, students will learn to be more in tune to the language spoken and written around them in everyday life. They will learn to use more flavorful and enticing words in their writing and become more familiar with words they may have not known. Also, they will come to recognize more words in books they read and learn how to go about defining them and actually implementing them in their own writing later on. To make this lesson even more vocabulary related, I can have students define each word they add to their list and use them in a sentence, but the key part of my lesson is to get students to broaden their vocabulary use. Also, to get students to start using more enticing and interesting natural language that will authenticate their writing in the future.

Roll of Thunder Vocab Task

If I did a vocabulary lesson on this first chapter, I would break students up into small groups and have them pick out ten words throughout the chapter that they did not know. I would then have the students look up in a dictionary the meaning of those words. After that, I would have them write ten new sentences using each of the ten new words that they found. Then, we would popcorn around the room until we learned every word from every group and what it meant. After that, I would collect all of the student’s papers and type up a list of the new words that they did not know and hand them out to the students. If I felt it necessary, I would have the students learn the words for a vocabulary test that we would take and keep adding to throughout the book. This would only be necessary if they were choosing common words that they should know or would need to know later in life. Vocabulary is always good to learn!

Week 8 Post - Vocabulary Development Lesson

If I were to teach a vocabulary lesson using "Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry," I would first teach a mini-lesson on vocabulary.  I would put up a paragraph from "Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry" with a word the students are not familiar with in it, and I would read the text aloud to the students.  I would show the students how they can use context clues to help them find the meaning of a word and demonstrate this using a few paragraphs that contain more difficult words.  I would also show the students how to use a lexical resource, such as a dictionary, but they would see that there are usually multiple meanings to words so it is difficult to figure out which definition we are looking for.  After we had practiced this task as a whole class, I would have the students work in small groups to find meanings of words in "Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry."  Every student would have their own copy of the book, and they would receive a worksheet with the word they are trying to define, a page number, and a blank space for the students to write the definition.  I would take this a little further and have the students determine if the word is a noun, adjective, adverb etc... and then re-write the word in their own sentence.  Having the students use the defined word in their own sentence would act as a post-assessment to the lesson because I would see if the students really understood the meaning of the word or not.  After the lesson, I would post these words up on a word wall in the class so the students would remember them and use them again in their own writing.

Week 7 Post

After reading the Tompkins chapter on fluency, I have learned how important it is for students to be fluent readers and writers.  In order for students to understand and comprehend the text, they need to be reading fluently, otherwise they will be focusing on how to read particular words, and not the meaning of the text.  As future teachers, it is important for us to include activities that promote fluency in both reading and writing.  In one of the first days of class, we did choral readings with our small groups.  As Tompkins mentions in the chapter, students become increasingly fluent readers as they read and reread text aloud.  The chapter also talks about high-frequency words, which are the most common words used in reading and writing.  Some of these words are difficult to sound out, like could for example, so it's important for students to memorize these words to help their fluency.  Many teachers use word walls to display these high-frequency words so the students become familiar with them.  My CT has a word wall on top of the chalkboard and he changes it every few weeks.  As you all know, I'm in a third grade classroom, so the word wall does not contain high-frequency words, it has "better" words for the students to use.  For example, my CT has big being the "boring" word, and has humongous, colossal, enormous, etc... next to big so the students can choose a more interesting word to use in their stories.

To become a more fluent reader, students can do repeated readings where they practice rereading a book or chapter of a book a few times while trying to improve their reading speed.  Students also need to practice reading books to improve their fluency.  If students read every night as part of a homework assignment, this will help their reading fluency.  It's important for students to read outside of school so they have practice finding the meanings of words on their own, since a teacher will not always be there to help, and to improve their reading skills.

One of the key approaches mentioned in Tompkins, chapter 5, is that explicit instruction is crucial for non mainstream students who may not have the same literacy background as the middle class students have. The book gives several examples of the things that would differentiate these learners. They might not have been read to as preschoolers. In addition they may not have recited nursery rhymes which can help develop phonemic awareness. I can remember when my mom was teaching in Chicago she was surprised at the students unfamiliarity with nursery rhymes. She began finding ways to incorporate these rhymes and poems into her students reading opportunities. Another example that was listed was the students might not have experience with writing letters to family members. I think this is an unfortunate generational loss. I imagine if we were to ask our class when the last time someone received a letter that was not email we would find it is infrequent. Things that we as teachers can do to increase word identification and fluency are:
Post high frequency words on word walls. This cold include adding words from the book club book that will be important to the story. In my placement the students have a personal journal that they keep in their desk that is their personal word wall. In theory it seems like a great idea except I have been their for how many weeks and I have never seen any of the kids actually use it. I have also not seen them add any words to it. ( my intention is to ask my CT during field this week if they put their weekly spelling words in their personal word walls)
Practice reading and writing high frequency words throughout literacy activities
Introduce key words before, during and after reading
Model word strategies with the students during read aloud and shared readings
Practice! Present more reading opportunities. Have students reread passages. The best books for reading practice are ones that a student is interested in and that are written at a level just below their instructional level. In my field placement each student has a bag that they keep the books they are currently reading inside, there are usually between 5 to 7 books in the bag. They get to choose the books by getting them out of the classroom library during their daily choice time. The CT just went through and had the kids bring up their bags and he went through the bags with them. It gave him a chance to see what they are interested in and what type of book they are choosing. He then had them read from one of the books. He would either tell them what a good choice they had made or tell them if they were having trouble. If they missed more than 5 words he considered the book a little to challenging and encourage them to add some easier books to their bags. He explained it to them as the only way that you can get to be a better reader is to read more.
For a mini lesson on Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. I would do a quick write to develop writing fluency. The idea that I would like the group to explore is: If you were Stacey and TJ came to you for help what would you do and why? (keep in mind what would be appropriate in this time period )

Week 7

When dealing with students who have trouble with comprehension, it is very important to teach students the skills in order to question themselves throughout his or her reading. It is important for students to learn that it is acceptable to go back and re-read what they just read if they do not understand it or to look up words in the dictionary. I also think that it is important to teach students how to take their own notes while reading because note-taking is not something that comes naturally. In the third grade GLCEs, in fact, there is a section on metacognition that states that:
Metacognition
Students will…
R.MT.03.01 self-monitor comprehension when reading or listening to texts by
automatically applying strategies used by mature readers to increase comprehension
including: predicting, constructing mental images, visually representing ideas in text,
questioning, rereading or listening again if uncertain about meaning, inferring, and
summarizing.
R.MT.03.02 plan, monitor, regulate, evaluate skills, strategies, and processes to construct
and convey meaning, (e.g., decoding unknown words), and use graphic organizers to
deepen understanding of problem/solution and organizational patterns.
and that is all about learning to self question and become a more comprehensive reader.

Week 6 Post

I felt that Chapter 5 in the Gibbons text was really helpful for lesson planning.  Pages 84-97 go over various activities that can be incorporated before the reading, during the reading, and after the reading.  I wish I read the chapter before completing the rough draft for the lesson plan because I was not sure what types of activities to have the students do before reading.  All of the activities listed in the chapter are ways to help the students understand the book they are reading, and to develop better reading strategies.  I thought it was interesting how on page 83, it says "part of learning a language involves learning about the culture in which it is used, and if we restrict what children read to the blandness of the basal reader, we do them a disservice by presenting a reductionist and limiting curriculum."  My collaborating teacher is VERY against the basal reading curriculum.  He has his students read trade books, and created packets of worksheets for each trade book the students read.  It was difficult for him to have this approved by the principal because it is not in the curriculum, but he was able to convince her to allow him to use these books.  He said that the basal books only have portions of stories in them, so the students are not experiencing the beginning, middle, and end of a book.

Chapter 8 of the Tompkins text seemed like a summary of TE 348.  It was helpful to re-learn the different genres, since I took TE 348 my sophmore year, and also to review the elements of a story.  Third grade seems to really focus on the basic elements of the book!  The worksheets that the students complete while reading books throughout the year seem to be about character traits, summaries, predictions, etc... and the basic elements of a book are incorporated into these worksheets.  It was also helpful to read about the different types of poetry since I have honestly not written a poem since grade school.  I vaguely remember learning about limericks, and haikus, so it was helpful to view student examples of these poems.

week 5

In the Gibbons, Chapter 4 they talked about writing in a second language across curriculum. I liked how in the chapter it gave a lot of ideas of how to incorporate writing. This includes lots of modeling. I know I talked about this before but I still lament the lack of writing that I see in my placement. I do see their writer’s workshop twice a week, however that is usually a “ free writing” scenario. The class sees a lot of the finished product of writing but there is not a lot of seeing the CT write. I have only seen the CT write down the students ideas once in my visit to the classroom. There are so many great examples in the book that I think these students could be successful at. I have seen them work on narratives and recount stories for writer’s workshop. I would like to see them do some writing that dealt with reporting. I think this would go over extremely well because so many of the kids are really interested in science related non-fiction books. I would like to see where they would take it with some guidance

Week 4

I wanted to talk a little about the article about Marcus. It is the one I have most related to and that I have found the most profound personal connection. It really hammers home the message about being flexible. It made me rethink some of the ideas that I had of what my ideal classroom would be. As I was reading , all I could think of was how frustrating it must be to have all these great ideas and not be able to get them across to someone else. I imagine that this is the same sort of frustration that is felt by ELL students. It also reminded me of an students I observe a couple years ago. I was volunteering at a summer school writing class for 5th and 6th graders. One student in particular had his parents come in and talk about how stubborn he was and he was unwilling to work on his writing. After watching him for a few days the CT had a specialist come in and take a look, she suspected that he had dysgraphia and just had a problem with the physical act of writing. Once they realized his problem they were able to arrange for him to use a laptop in class and he was able to keep up with the rest of the class. He became more involved and actually enjoyed coming to class. It makes me think of the quote from the article, “Don’t be so afraid of differences in kids, it isn’t necessary for everything to be completely the same for everybody all the time.” That is the advice I am going to take with me.

Tompkins Comprehension Skills

I really found Tompkins' chapter on Facilitating Student's Comprehension very interesting and understandable. I loved how Tompkins discussed how important it is for students to understand the different factors of texts in order to develop better comprehension. These text factors included reading, phonics, strategies, vocabulary, writing, and spelling. For example, by having a good vocabulary and content knowledge students will be able to understand and better comprehend what they are in fact reading. When I work with my focal student, Sarah, in field she understands what she reads because she has acquired a strong vocabulary through extensive reading and writing. In the past I have worked with students who did not read often or write on their own, when they would read they would come to a lot of words they did not understand. They would omit these words and then over time as they read, they would omit so many they could not comprehend what was being said or told. I think by having students develop these skills they will have better overall comprehension. In my field classroom the students read and write everyday. They peer edit stories, read aloud to their peers, are read to, and are constantly practicing these skills.

Week 5 Post

The Tompkins reading, like Michelle mentioned below, was very similar to TE 301 and what I have been witnessing in the classroom. The main issue I have had is that I see all of these levels of literacy comprehension present in the classroom, but I have not seen how my CT has built up to it. I think the only answer here is that he uses a series of literacy activities in order to familiarize his students more and more until they have mastered certain aspect of literacy comprehension. The students master fluency by reading aloud and independently within the classroom, they read with a purpose when they are prompted with specific questions to take into account while reading, they are motivated to read by being able to explore literacy by exploring their imaginations in creating their own stories to share with the class, and they make inferences by being prompted with questions to encourage them to take their thought process one step further. The only thing I wasn't familiar with or even impressed by was they little mention of English Learners in this chapter. I felt as though EL students were only mentioned a few times and that the chapter did not mention much advice on how to differentiate learning for these students. I feel as though my CT does a great job of encouraging his EL to succeed by giving them a lot of one on one instruction. Even if they don't know the background of a topic he will strengthen other core areas related to comprehension like fluency and motivation.

Week 4 Post

I think I covered the wrong reading in my last Week 4 Post so I am posting once again.

I was really impressed by the Gifted and Talented article on Marcus. I did not expect the outcome of the story to be that Marcus would have so much trouble in school from what his mom spoke of in the beginning. It really shows how much an environment and a teacher have on influencing a child. Marcus began to hate school with teachers that did not fully understand him, and this caused him to completely fall behind in certain areas of writing at first. It was interesting to see how well an effective teacher had on Marcus' attitude and eventual success. Mrs. Jenson really encourages me to think about how you really must differentiate the learning of all your students in order to benefit them fully as an educator. Simple things like giving him a heads up before asking him to respond/act or giving a schedule chart with rewards can make all the difference.

Week 5 Post

The Tompkins reading seemed like a huge review of TE 301!  It was helpful to see how to teach comprehension in the classroom.  My CT does a great job of this, instead of using traditional elementary language arts books (I can't remember the series that the rest of the Okemos teachers use.. I think it's Beacon or something), he has his students read trade books and he forms a huge packet of worksheets for each book for the students to complete as they are reading the books.  The worksheets in the book consist of prediction worksheets, text-text/text-self/text-world connections, alternative endings, summarizing etc...  This is a great way to assess the students comprehension because they wouldn't be able to complete these worksheets if they weren't understanding what was going on in the book.  My CT will also monitor the students' comprehension by pausing after important scenes of the book, and asking the students questions about it.  If he comes across a word that may not be in the students' vocabulary, he will stop and ask the students if they know what the word means, and then he'll put the word in a sentence to better help the students understand the word.  By pausing to monitor the students' comprehension, he is also modeling how students can monitor their own comprehension while reading silently.

Week 4 Post

I thought that the "Marcus:  Gifted and Challenging" and Breitfleder readings were very helpful.  The first reading was interesting because the little boy Marcus was placed in a gifted program, but was diagnosed with ADHD.  It was helpful to see how Marcus performed in both classes and it showed how much of an effect us teachers have on students abilities to learn.  The teacher allowing Marcus to hold onto a squeezy ball during group reading time was interesting, this is something I never would have thought of having a student do.  It just shows that you really need to know all of your students and make modifications to each students' learning environment so they are better able to learn.

The Breitfleder article was helpful because it discusses ways to meet specific students with special needs in the classroom.  I liked how they provided pictures and directions on how to make inexpensive visuals for the classroom.  I really enjoyed the circle time board on page 6 with the weather bear.  Students are more likely to pay attention during various lessons throughout the day if they have manipulatives to keep them attentive.  For one of the visuals, the Breitfleder suggested having individual "mini" versions of the visual so the students can all participate with their mini one, and one student will come up to do a manipulative on the bigger, teacher version.  I thought this was a great idea this way everyone is participating in the activity, and therefore getting more out of the lesson.

Week 4 Post

I really enjoyed how Tomkins refered to effective spelling practices in the classroom. She mentions that some teachers find spelling tests effective, while others feel they should be learned through reading and writing. In the third grade classroom I work in, my students do not have spelling tests. My CT is not big on testing children’s knowledge, he is even against times table test too. He would rather have his students demonstrate their knowledge through math games and math work than a test, and he feels the same way about spelling. My CT has his students working towards their spelling in much of their language arts work daily. The students have reading time where they read out loud to the class, are being read to, or are reading silently. Also, he has students writing their own books and sharing them to the class. The other day in class my CT had the students use their thesaurus’ when he eliminated certain words to be used in their writing. He told the students they couldn’t use words like “said, little, big, etc” because he wanted more descriptive words like “declared, shouted, enormous, miniscule, etc. I really enjoy his method of teaching and so do the students of his classroom. Although, I find spelling tests helpful and encouraging to some students, I think there should be more ways to encourage a child to learn besides the competitive nature of tests.

After taking the Digital Native quiz, I felt less confident about my digital skills. I would say, overall, I am digitally native rather than a digital immigrant, but I still am not aware of all the digital possibilities out there. For example, before this class I had never really blogged before. I knew of friends’ blogs that I would read and check up on, but I never had one of my own. The more I read on the site about how our generation is always multi-tasking I knew I was digitally native because I am always multi-tasking. As of right now, I am typing while listening to music with a friend talking to me. I am always doing multiple things at once and I find it impossible not to at my current point in life. I am always so busy, it seems pointless not to multi-task. I found the site interesting how it said that certain people do not find disabilities like ADHD legit, because with the current generation it may not be that a child needs medications, but simply more of a challenge. For example, I can compare two classes where I cannot focus in one, but am fully alert in the other. I think a lot of it has to do with how effectively a class utilizes its time and class to yield participation and attention.

Week 3 Post

I really felt that Gibbons had a lot of good stuff to say about reading that related to my field classroom. The Scaffolding book spoke a lot about having students fluent in reading by grade three, and the majority of my classroom is fluent in reading. My CT has them reading silently, aloud, and as a class. They are constantly editing and producing books, which they read aloud to their classmates and have in their classroom libraries. Also, the chapter spoke of how ESL students should read aloud rather than write to effectively develop their literacy skills. I have three ESL students in my field classroom, one ESL student in particular is struggling because he just moved here from Korea. He works one on one a lot with my CT and practices reading and editing his book before he shares it with the class. I think reading to the class really encourages him to work on his reading and overall improves his reading. Overall, I really enjoy how well my CT goes about teaching literacy effectively in the classroom. He makes sure it is everywhere in the classroom, which I think is great to do because literacy is so integrative. I don’t like when students simply work off to themselves, because I think literacy should be apart of the whole class more than an individual activity.

Week 3 Post

It was difficult to relate the concepts discussed in the Tompkins chapter to my field placement because I feel that my students are well beyond the basics of spelling. I have seen students blend sounds together while trying to "sound out" a word, but they don't really sing songs and chants or participate in any of the activities listed in the chapter.

When I worked with Kelly* last semester, I noticed that the words on her spelling lists all rhymed. I feel that this is a good approach to teaching students new words because they are able to compare the rime part of the words even though the words have different onsets.

Towards the end of the chapter, Tompkins begins to talk about spelling tests and how some teachers feel they are beneficial in the classroom, while other teachers feel that spelling should be learned through reading and writing. In my field placement, instead of my CT giving his students a basic spelling test where he says the words and the students write it down, he gives them a list of 5 words and the students circle the word that is misspelled or they circle none of them if all of the words are spelled correctly. I feel this is a great way to test students on their spelling because this will connect to the students learning how to edit their own work in the future.

After taking the Digital Natives Quiz, I was surprised that I only received a 4/6. I wasn't sure what "modding" was or "smart mobs." I am not at the "emergent stage" of digital literacy because I knew what more than half the terms were, but I'm definitely not a digital native! It seems that someone at the emergent stage of digital literacy would not be familiar with any of the terms from the Digital Natives Quiz, and they would not know how to use a blog, wiki, IM, etc... They would be exploring through the programs but would need assistance from someone who is digitally literate. This is similar to the emergent reading/writing stage from the Tompkin's chapter (chapter 3) since students are just beginning to learn their alphabet and write scribbles that will eventually form into letters.

I was thinking about writing in the placement that I am currently in, and I feel that I don’t see enough of it. I go in the afternoon on Monday and the morning on Thursday. The morning has a structured schedule similar to Ms. McClosky’s schedule in the Tompkins book. They start the morning with a class meeting. They do the lunch choices, calendars, a couple of math related morning routines and then they go to their seats and work on their morning sentences. They have two sentences that they need to correct and rewrite on the line below. The CT puts it on the ELMO and projects it onto the white board and they correct it ass a class. When they are finished they can read . Then they have a free choice time where they can read, write or practice words on the white boards. There are many other reading opportunities throughout the day. There are many of the things discussed in Chapter 3 of the Tompkins book. There are signs, printed rules, and labeled class items to name a few. I guess my concern with the writing is this: during their writing time I see many people in the class focusing on the pictures to go with the stories instead of the story itself. I am waiting to see how much writing they do for other subjects but unfortunately there are a lot of obstacles to seeing the other subjects. There are speakers coming in, or switched gym periods, or an extra music class . Plus there was a substitute one of the days which meant worksheets. I wish I could be there more often to see what goes on.

Week 3 Post

This week in my placement, we were not in the classroom but on a field trip to Waldumar, which is an outdoor education center. It is focused on science and map skills. This was my second time this semester spending such a lovely day there. The first time I went, I was so bored out of my mind that I was counting down the seconds until I was allowed to leave the freezing cold barn that has not yet been introduced to a heating system. Today, I was in charge of leading a group of students out into the woods with a gps system that I had no idea how to use and did not end up working! It was a frustrating day, especially because I could witness the students learning language arts.

Week 2 Post

Most of the third graders in my field placement are at the fluent stage of the "Three Stages of Reading and Writing." They make text-to-text and text-to-self connections during reading time. The students in my class are becoming familiar with the writing process as well. They have written creative stories every month and they will start with a rough draft, then conference with my CT, Katie, or I and then we will go through their story with them and correct spelling and grammar.

As Katie was saying in her post, our CT tries to get his students to use more interesting words by prohibiting them to write the words "big," "small," and "said." He has a list of words on top of the white board that the students can use instead of big, small, and said. When he stops allowing students to use a particular word, he will have them take out their thesaurus and look up "more interesting" words for the students to use instead, and then he will put them up above the white board.

There are a few students in the class, like my focus student Kelly, who are unable to create their own stories, or even sentences without assistance. Kelly is at the Emergent Stage of the Three Stages of Reading and Writing. She knows her alphabet and how to write her name and letters, but when she writes, she does not put a space between her words, and she uses invented spelling. If you ask her to read what she wrote back to you, she will be able to. She understands the concept of print and directionality concepts such as reading from left to right and from top to bottom on a page.

Kelly has improved a great deal from when I first started working with her last semester during TE 301. She is able to follow along during shared reading with one-on-one correspondence, she just has a difficult time writing sentences on her own.

Comment on Ashika's post

Once again my computer won't let me comment on other posts, but this is what I was trying to comment on Ashika's post:

It sounds like your CT has established a great classroom community for his students! This reminds me of the 3rd chapter of the Tompkins text where Tompkins says that reading and writing should be demonstrated as integrated processes. Your CT is doing this by reading a book with the class and then writing out the students' questions. This will help them become more familiar with sentence structure and spelling of high frequency words. Is "Fly Away Home" a chapter book? I saw the movie but I never read the book. It's great if it's a chapter book and the students are able to comprehend what the teacher is reading and able to ask questions about the book.

To Amanda's comment on my first post

For some reason I can't reply to your comment on my post from last week about Kelly, but here's what I was trying to say:

Kelly has trouble with her sight words, for example she has a difficult time distinguishing "that," "they," and "there." None of her English spelling look similar to the Spanish language, but she does confuse her vowel sounds. She'll pronounce "set" like "sat" because she assumes every c-v-c word has an "a" sound in the middle. My CT said it's very difficult to keep in contact with her parents, it was easier in the beginning of the year because her sister went to college close to home so she would attend the parent-teacher conferences, but now her sister went out of state to college. He said that Kelly's parents brought their landlord to a conference once and she's going to try and help Kelly out.

I enjoy the opportunity to read about and view classrooms that are rich in good discussion. It is such a different dynamic from a lot of the classroom I remember as a young learner. I know that this blog is for 3rd grade but it turns out my placement is a second grade classroom. (As a side note: I still overall want to teach third graders once I am out in the real world) My CT has done a great job establishing a classroom rich in dialogue between teacher and student and also between peers. The other day was a great example of that. The CT read the class the book Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting. He then told them that they would be revisiting this book the next day and asked if there were any questions that we can try to answer after reading it a second time. I was so impressed with how many hands shot up and how involved they became in the story. The CT wrote every question down on the whiteboard. As one question would be written down it would lead another student to think of a new question. After everyone had their questions recorded he reminded them that these are all questions that we are going to try to answer next reading period. I’m excited to see where the discussion is going to go during the answer section. It appears that he has a well established norm in his classroom regarding classroom discussion. He did not have to offer many reminders to stay on task and the kids seemed to know what their expected roles were.

I looked through the syllabus to try to get an idea about what my goals will be for this course and I admit I was a little overwhelmed. There is so much information about literacy to cover and so little time in the semester. The first thing that came to mind was I hope that I can gain the insight on how to create balance between various learning styles in a classroom. There is a constant worry for me that there will be learners that I will leave out. I also worry that because as a learner I was able to be successful in a "traditional" style of learning ,I will easily fall into uninspiring habits. I also want to become confident in my abilities to support ELLs and other diverse learners through my lesson plans and also with proper school and community resources. I read the course pack readings before posting this so there was another goal I wanted to add. I hope to have a better understanding of effective strategies dealing with codeswitching. I wonder what impact this will have on other subject areas. I also hope that we touch on some strategies for challenging gifted students as well.

Week 2 Post-Classroom Talk

I have been witnessing a lot of different 'classroom talk' within my third grade classroom. Last week in class our CT told the students they couldn't use certain words in their writings, because he considered them "dull" and knew the students could challenge their use of vocabulary. Every week he eliminates more and more words the students can't use, forcing them to pull out their thesaurus' and explore. He eliminates words like big, small, said, etc. This week when I went to field the students were reading their chapter books as a class related to their social studies lesson on the civil rights movement and when asked to describe a character from the book one child actually raised her hand and described the character as "obstinate". I could tell she was picking up a wider vocabulary and our CT praised her on this immediately!

By setting some ground rules in the classroom, our CT has developed a greater level of learning to take place within his classroom. Our CT has students writing books every two weeks that they spend much time creating, editing, illustrating, and then presenting to the class. He has students read chapter books allowed to one another as well as read to by himself every day. They students have come to accept reading time and writing as a privileged, something fun to do! This shared sense of passion for reading and writing leads to students learning a more varied and diverse 'classroom talk'. 

I think above all in order to scaffold students to encourage them to share, you need to show them that they can have fun in an accepting and self-expressive, care-free environment. They students of my third grade classroom have built a safe community together and enjoy sharing. Although there are some students more reluctant to share than others, this reluctance in combatted by an unwavering sense of acceptance and praise.

Week 1 Post-My Goals

My goals for this course are undetermined for now, I feel as though I have just dipped my feet in the water and I am not even sure where this course will take me. I think throughout more time spent in the class I will be able to develop goals for this course and the direction I want my learning to take place in. Most of all I think I am just excited to be back with such an amazing group of people, our class really worked well and challenged one another last semester so I am excited to be working together again. I hope above all, from this course, that I learn to integrate Language Arts effectively and learn to encourage students to enjoy Language Arts.

week 2 post

I am really excited to have this literacy course this semester because my third grade class that I am in this year is basically illiterate. They cannot read words such as, "is" and "her" (nor can they spell them), and they use words and phrases such as, "ain't" and "I don't got". I spoke to the teacher about her thoughts on her students' lack of spelling skills (but I did not put it that harshly) and she said that she does not really care about her students' spelling. I found this to be terrible. These kids are nine years old and they cannot even spell the word "is"! I am really excited to learn new ways to teach my students how to spell and how to sound out words (they were never taught how to do this until I came around), and I want to learn new ways about how to get them excited to learn how to spell and read. Another thing that scares me about these students is that, the way that their school works, is that they will only be in elementary school for one more year and then they go off to junior high. That means that, unless they have an awesome fourth grade teacher who really cares about their students spelling skills, they will go into junior high not knowing how to spell anything!

With a lot of the reading that I did about ELLs, it made me think about a lot of the information that I have learned about how to teach special education students. The main thing about teaching both of these groups of people, and technically, ELLs are considered special education students, the key is individulization and variation.

I did really like, though, how in one of the articles that the teacher had the parents write letters about their children and all that the children had to do for homework was to make sure that their parents did their homework. I think that I would like to do something like this with my students in the future.

After reading through the syllabus, my goal for this course is to become more familiar with the Language Arts curriculum in Michigan, and to gain practice assessing learners of various writing and reading levels. I am looking forward to learning about different teaching styles that can be used in language arts so that I can accommodate all of my students in the future. Throughout grade school in language arts classes, our curriculum would consist of reading a book and reflecting on it. I'm interested to learn how to teach a more engaging language arts class while covering the necessary standards.

Chapter 1 of the Gibbons text reminded me of one of the students in my field placement, Kelly*. She was born in the U.S. but her parents speak nothing but Spanish at home. Kelly* speaks fluent English and Spanish, but she has a difficult time with reading and writing. Her parents are illiterate in English so Kelly* doesn't have any support at home for reading and writing. I worked with her last semester because I took TE 301 and 401 concurrently, so I am going to continue working with her this semester to assess and scaffold her learning and progress.