What would you ask this author over a cup of coffee? What did you find confusing/interesting/surprising? Elaborate. There are two matters that I would like to discuss from this week's reading. The first one addresses the idea of content-area teachers finally fostering literacy in their classrooms. This issue is briefly discussed in Chapter 4. Many content-area teachers were making detrimental misjudgments when assigning content-area reading material; they were assuming that all students would comprehend the text and consequently be on track to meet the unit goals.Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey state that progress has been made and content teachers are understanding the correlation between students' reading comprehension and mastery of content standards. It seems as though educators have finally had the light bulb turn on! The Rand Reading Study Group (as cited in Keenan, Betjemann, & Olson, 2008) noted that "comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading and because comprehension failures can lead to school failures, there has been an increased interest in trying to assess and understand comprehension" (p. 282). The chapter goes on the highlight that more secondary teachers are partaking in read alouds and shared readings. The idea of read alouds at the secondary level always perplexes me. I think this has occurred because there is very little literature addressing the upper grades. I ponder whether secondary students would find this practice to be too childish. If they perceive the activity as below them, they will certainly disrupt and lose interest. The reading alleviated some of my concerns by citing the study conducted by Herrold, Stanchfield, and Serabian (1989), which outlined the positive reactions secondary students had to read alouds. Another part of the reading that enlightened my thinking about read alouds was the point that was made about students with reading difficulties accessing complex text by listening to the teacher. I always wondered if it was helpful for students to simply listen to text. Are they really improving their reading skills this way? The case made in this week's reading started to change my view about "reading with your ears". Since I am a very visual person, I wanted to view a read-aloud. I love this one! I know it is for younger children, but I love how it is interactive. Many of the ideas and strategies can be adapted for secondary classrooms. fw.to/K5E88YC
Amanda, I decided to do a month-long read aloud for a devotional period we have at the beginning of each day. I, too, wondered if the students (eighth grade) would consider it to be babyish. However, what is interesting is that some of my lower students were not as into the story as the higher performing students. Those higher students were raising their hands to make predictions, ask questions, and to clarify information. I wonder if a student's interest in text is related to their ability and experience in the use of these comprehension strategies. Even at this age, they are enjoying the read aloud! It is a time to kick back together. I also verbalize some of my thoughts throughout the reading to model for them. I can understand the delay in getting secondary content area teachers to focus on comprehension. After all, most of their training is in their content area such as learning mathematical and scientific principles and not much is in literacy. I'm sure they would have agreed that comprehension was essential, but they did not know how to improve it. I appreciate my background in elementary education which gave me an understanding of literacy in all content areas! (But I still need to learn more to apply it to this level.)
I have to be honest, I absolutely despised having things read aloud to me in school. Shared reading was always a struggle for me to sit through (as a student) because the teacher or other student reading never read as fast as I would like them to, and it was a true test of patience for me to suffer through it. I am still the same today, preferring to read whatever is being read aloud myself, and I feel like I cannot comprehend it as well if I didn't personally read it. That being said, having read this chapter, and after reading Amanda and Linda's comments, I too have a new found appreciation for shared reading and read alouds in the middle school classroom. I am going to do a planned, shared reading with students in a sixth grade science classroom tomorrow. We are beginning a discussion on anatomy and physiology of the eye, and there are a lot of new vocabulary words that they are going to be seeing for the first time. I am hoping that by reading a complicated part of the text to them, and then following up with a hands on activity using the same vocabulary, they will be a bit more comfortable with it going forward. I find that many of the students have problems with science terminology and/or textbooks, whether it be pronunciation of terminology or comprehension, and after reading this chapter I am anxious to try it. I especially liked the suggestions for costumes and props, and I can envision students getting a kick out of this. Once you start collecting costumes and props for this type of activity you could also use them for "visual displays through virtual interviews" as is discussed in chapter two of our Fisher and Frey textbook. They are both creative ways to teach students while (hopefully) holding their interest. I found an interesting article online while looking into suggestions for middle school science read alouds. It is: http://searkscience.pbworks.com/f/Taking+Time+to+Read+Aloud+inScience+NSTA.pdf This article by Patricia Braun is very supportive of reading aloud in a middle school classroom and specifically suggests books or a science teacher which I found helpful.
6. How might this article influence your teaching?
Chapter 4 went into great lengths about how to engage classrooms with reading, a discussed a lot about read aloudsand shared readings. First of all I like how the authors detail the benefits of read alouds. They make it clear that "read alouds alone cannot compensate for reading gaps," Being in many different middle school classrooms I have the opportunity to do read alouds with a variety of kids. When introducing a new unit for any core class I feel that both read alouds and shared readings are crucial to student advancement in new units. Even the best readers may not always comprehend what the reading entails and talking about the text as it is being read aloud may diffuse any confusion. To make read alouds successful, you, the reader, have the responsibility to make the content engaging for students. Props, movies or video clips, costumes and other manipulative activate listeners engagement and can bring difficult texts to life. In my own teaching, ways I plan to make read and think alouds more beneficial for my students is to use more props. I also plan on explaining to students how read alouds and shared readings benefit them. Keeping the students in the loop about what you are teaching them and why lets the students know why they are doing these activities in class.
I completely agree with what Biancha is saying about holding engaging read alouds. However, I disagree that they will be crucial to student advancement in new units. It may be my bias as a math teacher, or my inexperience as a math teacher, but as I stated in my response lower down the blog I can see using the shared reading more as a review of concepts, not to start new concepts. Because of the focus on the importance of terminology and vocabulary in math, you come into the chicken and egg concept that was discussed in the previous chapter. Can the students read to learn the terminology, or do they need to be practicing the concepts that the terminology connects with? I think that no matter how engaging I make a math read aloud, the emphasis in the math class needs to more on practicing using the terms than reading about them.
Alyssa, I hear where you are coming from, and I agree with you that reading with students is not 100% crucial to student success (i.e. if you do not read the textbook chapter with your students while teaching a concept, they will never master that concept. Of course that is not true, especially with math, because examples and text features can teach the concept as well as, if not better than, the text itself). However, I do not believe that Biancha chose that word to mean “end-all-be-all.” As we all know, no teacher can choose the same approach for every single lesson, or students (and teachers) will be bored to tears. I believe that Biancha meant that reading aloud with students (and not just a text, but secondary sources, chapter books, news articles, etc.) is important, and of course, I agree with her. Teachers should not assume that students will independently understand a text because it is written at grade level, as Amanda stated earlier. Even in high school, I remember social studies teachers reading current events from newspapers to support a concept. My Spanish teachers always read different lyrics, poems and stories aloud to my classes. Biancha's statement is true, and although I believe I am choosing to look at this through my Spanish lens, and not your math one, I understand that it is crucial that I read with/to my students with great frequency because I am their primary source for hearing the Spanish language pronounced correctly. I overhear my students try to help each other read new Spanish words, and it makes me giggle (quietly and to myself, as I am a professional) because they often use very monotone, choppy prose, and their interpretation often dulls a language that I believe to be quite lively and melodic.
Also, it is important to expose the children to the vocabulary as much as possible, whether in isolation or in the context of the chapter. With new words, it is all about exposure and laying the foundation for a student. The more frequently they hear the words will never harm a student, only plant a seed in their brain that will grow through future exposure to those words. I could not help but think of the graphic organizer chapter after reading your post, Alyssa. Perhaps organizing the content is a missing link that will take an excess of information from new chapters in your math textbook and help the students to make connections and construct meaning when learning different concepts.
Corinne, I mostly understand where you are coming from. Just to give you more background on my statement, and to explain my math lens a little, I don't have a math textbook for the students to be reading from, or using graphic organizers to disseminate, or learn about new concepts from. Our objectives are usually so specific (yesterday it was solving one step equations by using addition) that there isn't a lot of reading that we can find for each objective. All of the vocabulary that we expose the scholars to is defined by either myself, my co-teacher, or my academic director, as well as all of the rest of the information that makes it to the students. I believe that read alouds could be effective and a change of pace, but for all contents it may either not be feasible, or the most practical way of achieving the intent. Again, the texts that the book mentioned can be a fun way to change the pace of the class, but I believe that as we continue to read the text and do further research that we will be able to find what works best for each content, and I don't believe that read alouds make the best fit with math.
Alyssa, I just ordered one of the read alouds that our text book mentioned for math. I thought it might be a fun way to review terms and concepts and to determine if students picked up the humor. When I taught first grade, I loved doing some read alouds for math and have been looking for something similar at the middle school level. With the focus on authentic learning, a short story could provide an interesting set up for a particular type of math problem. I would like to research this a bit more. Don't you think it would be interesting to read a story in which a character had to figure something out that would best be solved by a one-step equation? This may also lead to some interesting questions and discussions. I will have to see if there are any such stories out there!
I have to jump in on the discussion of using read alouds in math. I have a large collection of math story books. I have used the Sir Cumference series by Cindy Neuschwander and Wayne Geehan in the past. I have always used it as an introduction to a unit. They grab the students attention and even if they are not familiar with all the vocabulary they become engaged with the story. As we progress through the unit, students start to make connections with the math in the book. Another resource that I love is The Adventures of Penrose the Mathematical Cat by Theoni Pappis. These are short articles from the perspective of the cat as he learns about new math concepts. I have used these articles as a read aloud then discussion and also enrichment for my stronger math students. I'm thinking I might try something different to integrate some of my LA strategies into math. One of the articles is about types of numbers and we recently did lessons on this topic. Some students still are confused about the difference between rational and irrational numbers. I am going to assign the reading to students as a homework assignment. My students are familiar with a close reading process in which first read the text independently annotating for ?'s, vocabulary, important ideas. I would follow the next day with a shared reading where we could review any questions or unkown vocab, then respond in writing about their understanding of rational vs. irrational based on the text and their math work. I'll let you know how it goes! While researching math read alouds I came across this link on GoodReads which has a number of great math books for kids. http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/639383-math-books
After reading the chapter and in response to Biancha's ideas about read alouds, I decided to try one with my 7th-grade class today. I like how Biancha quoted the part of the text that cautioned that "read alouds alone cannot compensate for reading gaps", but the kids did enjoy using the strategy as an introductory activity. I am beginning a unit of the subject of failure. They were very engaged as I read and used props and costuming. I tackled a complex-informational article that was slightly above my students' reading levels. The text lobbied for people to view the idea of failure as positive because it means you tried something and, if you keep trying, that failure can ultimately lead to success. There were stories within the article about men climbing Mount Everest and going to the North Pole in a hot air balloon - all of which I conducted the read aloud for. The article articulated how the men failed at first, but kept trying and finally succeeded in their goals. It was a wonderful experience that helped break down some of my negative thoughts that I wrote about read alouds in my previous post.
9. Would this author find corroborating evidence for his or her perspective in your teaching setting?
The author would not find corroborating evidence in my classroom of either shared readings or read alouds. This is not something that I have prioritized in my classroom before, but something that I have interest in looking into in the future. I don't have any math textbooks in my district, and all of my materials are created to fit into our rather specific lesson planning template of do now, notes, example problems, independent problems, and then exit ticket. I can see the value in veering from this pattern (and often do anyway to allow for partner work and group time), but had never considered reading aloud an important facet of a math class.
What most interested me in this chapter, and what I could see myself using in the future, is the idea of reader's theatre. Immediately after finishing the chapter I went online to see if I could find any of the books that were talked about in the section to find concepts related to my 6th grade math class. Reading, rereading, and then acting out could be a great jigsaw activity that my classes take part in, or a fun way to start our review of the unit.
I also think that I need to change my perspective a little on the importance of reading. Often in my highest group I will print out a math explanation, or write a paragraph like you would see on math.com, and have the students "teach themselves" the new basic concept. I only let this happen in my highest cohort, (erroneously) thinking that my lower cohorts won't get as much out of reading and teaching themselves. Fundamentally, I know that activating their own knowledge is crucial, but I can't seem to let them go into this material on their own, predicting where they will lose focus or just stop reading. This chapter gave me some good strategies to try to implement in the future, but certainly was not anything that I do now.
I LOVE reading aloud to my students. As ELA teachers, we are actually required to read texts aloud to the students - especially for our SLOs. However, they always have a copy of whatever I am reading and they are expected to be following along. Now, I have to admit, I have a background in communications, public relations, public speaking, drama, singing, etc. So, seriously, doing a read-aloud is truly a passion for me. I make different voices for characters; I interject questioning; I do think-alouds; you name it! And, of course, I stop to check for understanding periodically and encourage students to make connections, etc. With the predominant nature of our non-fiction texts right now, it is imperative that we do, in fact, point out text features and condition the students to pay attention to them. However, my students always love when I read them some highly regarded literature. Like Skippy Jon Jones. Just kidding - but seriously, the kids love it. I use it as a treat, periodically, and make all the different goofy voices.
We are currently reading the book Number the Stars. I bought the audio version as well and (thanks to my coughing fits), I tried it out on my class. They all begged me to read the next chapter. Apparently, the narrator wasn't as animated as I was with using different voices, etc. I also found myself wanting to keep hitting the pause button and add vital information to what was being read, but I felt like I would ruin the flow a bit. It's just not the same, but it certainly helped my voice a bit.
I did a quick bit of research on the topic and found this interesting tidbit: http://www.greatschools.org/students/7104-read-aloud-to-children.gs?page=all
It's not all relevant, but I focused on the aspects of reading aloud to older kids. My own children are in high school and they still enjoy being read to. So do I. :-)
I realized I chopped off the question at the top of the entry above. It should have read that it was a response to #4 - How does the central idea of this chapter intersect with other voices in the field? The link above was about other voices in the field and I found it compelling that the author supported reading aloud to students of all ages.
Lisa, I am so jealous that you have found the time to do a read aloud of a novel with your students! One of my favorite times of the day when I was a 4/5 teacher was our 15 minute snack break where I would do a read aloud. I would often read texts that were challenging for many of the students, so it exposed them to higher text complexity and we would have great discussions about the books. I am teaching Language Arts this year and have not found how to integrate read alouds into our class. Most of my reading with the students is shared reading of shorter texts, lots of non-fiction and excerpts or short-stories for fiction. Fisher and Frey explain that there is evidence to show that read alouds in the middle school motivate students, change attitudes about reading, and expose them to more challenging text. I do not disagree, but wonder how to fit it in. We have 40 minute class periods,and most of my instruction is focused on close reading of complex texts. Students read the text, annotate text, we re-read together to clarify, students then re-read on their own, and finally respond in writing to text dependent questions. These are important skills for readers and I have noticed an improvement in the students ability to read, analyze, and write about complex text. I just wish I had the time for read alouds because I strongly believe that the greatest benefit of reading aloud is that it fosters a love of reading. When I taught fifth grade most of my students read for enjoyment; two years later I find that most of my seventh graders do not read for pleasure. Why such a significant change? How do I shift my own instruction to motivate my readers?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWhat would you ask this author over a cup of coffee? What did you find confusing/interesting/surprising? Elaborate.
ReplyDeleteThere are two matters that I would like to discuss from this week's reading. The first one addresses the idea of content-area teachers finally fostering literacy in their classrooms. This issue is briefly discussed in Chapter 4. Many content-area teachers were making detrimental misjudgments when assigning content-area reading material; they were assuming that all students would comprehend the text and consequently be on track to meet the unit goals.Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey state that progress has been made and content teachers are understanding the correlation between students' reading comprehension and mastery of content standards. It seems as though educators have finally had the light bulb turn on! The Rand Reading Study Group (as cited in Keenan, Betjemann, & Olson, 2008) noted that "comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading and because comprehension failures can lead to school failures, there has been an increased interest in trying to assess and understand comprehension" (p. 282). The chapter goes on the highlight that more secondary teachers are partaking in read alouds and shared readings.
The idea of read alouds at the secondary level always perplexes me. I think this has occurred because there is very little literature addressing the upper grades. I ponder whether secondary students would find this practice to be too childish. If they perceive the activity as below them, they will certainly disrupt and lose interest. The reading alleviated some of my concerns by citing the study conducted by Herrold, Stanchfield, and Serabian (1989), which outlined the positive reactions secondary students had to read alouds.
Another part of the reading that enlightened my thinking about read alouds was the point that was made about students with reading difficulties accessing complex text by listening to the teacher. I always wondered if it was helpful for students to simply listen to text. Are they really improving their reading skills this way? The case made in this week's reading started to change my view about "reading with your ears".
Since I am a very visual person, I wanted to view a read-aloud. I love this one! I know it is for younger children, but I love how it is interactive. Many of the ideas and strategies can be adapted for secondary classrooms.
fw.to/K5E88YC
*You can view by coping and pasting. For some reason, it is not working as an inserted hyperlink.
DeleteAmanda, I decided to do a month-long read aloud for a devotional period we have at the beginning of each day. I, too, wondered if the students (eighth grade) would consider it to be babyish. However, what is interesting is that some of my lower students were not as into the story as the higher performing students. Those higher students were raising their hands to make predictions, ask questions, and to clarify information. I wonder if a student's interest in text is related to their ability and experience in the use of these comprehension strategies. Even at this age, they are enjoying the read aloud! It is a time to kick back together. I also verbalize some of my thoughts throughout the reading to model for them. I can understand the delay in getting secondary content area teachers to focus on comprehension. After all, most of their training is in their content area such as learning mathematical and scientific principles and not much is in literacy. I'm sure they would have agreed that comprehension was essential, but they did not know how to improve it. I appreciate my background in elementary education which gave me an understanding of literacy in all content areas! (But I still need to learn more to apply it to this level.)
DeleteI have to be honest, I absolutely despised having things read aloud to me in school. Shared reading was always a struggle for me to sit through (as a student) because the teacher or other student reading never read as fast as I would like them to, and it was a true test of patience for me to suffer through it. I am still the same today, preferring to read whatever is being read aloud myself, and I feel like I cannot comprehend it as well if I didn't personally read it. That being said, having read this chapter, and after reading Amanda and Linda's comments, I too have a new found appreciation for shared reading and read alouds in the middle school classroom. I am going to do a planned, shared reading with students in a sixth grade science classroom tomorrow. We are beginning a discussion on anatomy and physiology of the eye, and there are a lot of new vocabulary words that they are going to be seeing for the first time. I am hoping that by reading a complicated part of the text to them, and then following up with a hands on activity using the same vocabulary, they will be a bit more comfortable with it going forward. I find that many of the students have problems with science terminology and/or textbooks, whether it be pronunciation of terminology or comprehension, and after reading this chapter I am anxious to try it. I especially liked the suggestions for costumes and props, and I can envision students getting a kick out of this. Once you start collecting costumes and props for this type of activity you could also use them for "visual displays through virtual interviews" as is discussed in chapter two of our Fisher and Frey textbook. They are both creative ways to teach students while (hopefully) holding their interest. I found an interesting article online while looking into suggestions for middle school science read alouds.
DeleteIt is: http://searkscience.pbworks.com/f/Taking+Time+to+Read+Aloud+inScience+NSTA.pdf
This article by Patricia Braun is very supportive of reading aloud in a middle school classroom and specifically suggests books or a science teacher which I found helpful.
6. How might this article influence your teaching?
ReplyDeleteChapter 4 went into great lengths about how to engage classrooms with reading, a discussed a lot about read aloudsand shared readings. First of all I like how the authors detail the benefits of read alouds. They make it clear that "read alouds alone cannot compensate for reading gaps,"
Being in many different middle school classrooms I have the opportunity to do read alouds with a variety of kids. When introducing a new unit for any core class I feel that both read alouds and shared readings are crucial to student advancement in new units. Even the best readers may not always comprehend what the reading entails and talking about the text as it is being read aloud may diffuse any confusion.
To make read alouds successful, you, the reader, have the responsibility to make the content engaging for students. Props, movies or video clips, costumes and other manipulative activate listeners engagement and can bring difficult texts to life.
In my own teaching, ways I plan to make read and think alouds more beneficial for my students is to use more props. I also plan on explaining to students how read alouds and shared readings benefit them. Keeping the students in the loop about what you are teaching them and why lets the students know why they are doing these activities in class.
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI completely agree with what Biancha is saying about holding engaging read alouds. However, I disagree that they will be crucial to student advancement in new units. It may be my bias as a math teacher, or my inexperience as a math teacher, but as I stated in my response lower down the blog I can see using the shared reading more as a review of concepts, not to start new concepts. Because of the focus on the importance of terminology and vocabulary in math, you come into the chicken and egg concept that was discussed in the previous chapter. Can the students read to learn the terminology, or do they need to be practicing the concepts that the terminology connects with? I think that no matter how engaging I make a math read aloud, the emphasis in the math class needs to more on practicing using the terms than reading about them.
DeleteAlyssa, I hear where you are coming from, and I agree with you that reading with students is not 100% crucial to student success (i.e. if you do not read the textbook chapter with your students while teaching a concept, they will never master that concept. Of course that is not true, especially with math, because examples and text features can teach the concept as well as, if not better than, the text itself). However, I do not believe that Biancha chose that word to mean “end-all-be-all.” As we all know, no teacher can choose the same approach for every single lesson, or students (and teachers) will be bored to tears. I believe that Biancha meant that reading aloud with students (and not just a text, but secondary sources, chapter books, news articles, etc.) is important, and of course, I agree with her. Teachers should not assume that students will independently understand a text because it is written at grade level, as Amanda stated earlier. Even in high school, I remember social studies teachers reading current events from newspapers to support a concept. My Spanish teachers always read different lyrics, poems and stories aloud to my classes. Biancha's statement is true, and although I believe I am choosing to look at this through my Spanish lens, and not your math one, I understand that it is crucial that I read with/to my students with great frequency because I am their primary source for hearing the Spanish language pronounced correctly. I overhear my students try to help each other read new Spanish words, and it makes me giggle (quietly and to myself, as I am a professional) because they often use very monotone, choppy prose, and their interpretation often dulls a language that I believe to be quite lively and melodic.
DeleteAlso, it is important to expose the children to the vocabulary as much as possible, whether in isolation or in the context of the chapter. With new words, it is all about exposure and laying the foundation for a student. The more frequently they hear the words will never harm a student, only plant a seed in their brain that will grow through future exposure to those words. I could not help but think of the graphic organizer chapter after reading your post, Alyssa. Perhaps organizing the content is a missing link that will take an excess of information from new chapters in your math textbook and help the students to make connections and construct meaning when learning different concepts.
Corinne, I mostly understand where you are coming from. Just to give you more background on my statement, and to explain my math lens a little, I don't have a math textbook for the students to be reading from, or using graphic organizers to disseminate, or learn about new concepts from. Our objectives are usually so specific (yesterday it was solving one step equations by using addition) that there isn't a lot of reading that we can find for each objective. All of the vocabulary that we expose the scholars to is defined by either myself, my co-teacher, or my academic director, as well as all of the rest of the information that makes it to the students. I believe that read alouds could be effective and a change of pace, but for all contents it may either not be feasible, or the most practical way of achieving the intent. Again, the texts that the book mentioned can be a fun way to change the pace of the class, but I believe that as we continue to read the text and do further research that we will be able to find what works best for each content, and I don't believe that read alouds make the best fit with math.
DeleteAlyssa, I just ordered one of the read alouds that our text book mentioned for math. I thought it might be a fun way to review terms and concepts and to determine if students picked up the humor. When I taught first grade, I loved doing some read alouds for math and have been looking for something similar at the middle school level. With the focus on authentic learning, a short story could provide an interesting set up for a particular type of math problem. I would like to research this a bit more. Don't you think it would be interesting to read a story in which a character had to figure something out that would best be solved by a one-step equation? This may also lead to some interesting questions and discussions. I will have to see if there are any such stories out there!
DeleteI have to jump in on the discussion of using read alouds in math. I have a large collection of math story books. I have used the Sir Cumference series by Cindy Neuschwander and Wayne Geehan in the past. I have always used it as an introduction to a unit. They grab the students attention and even if they are not familiar with all the vocabulary they become engaged with the story. As we progress through the unit, students start to make connections with the math in the book. Another resource that I love is The Adventures of Penrose the Mathematical Cat by Theoni Pappis. These are short articles from the perspective of the cat as he learns about new math concepts. I have used these articles as a read aloud then discussion and also enrichment for my stronger math students. I'm thinking I might try something different to integrate some of my LA strategies into math. One of the articles is about types of numbers and we recently did lessons on this topic. Some students still are confused about the difference between rational and irrational numbers. I am going to assign the reading to students as a homework assignment. My students are familiar with a close reading process in which first read the text independently annotating for ?'s, vocabulary, important ideas. I would follow the next day with a shared reading where we could review any questions or unkown vocab, then respond in writing about their understanding of rational vs. irrational based on the text and their math work. I'll let you know how it goes! While researching math read alouds I came across this link on GoodReads which has a number of great math books for kids.
Deletehttp://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/639383-math-books
After reading the chapter and in response to Biancha's ideas about read alouds, I decided to try one with my 7th-grade class today. I like how Biancha quoted the part of the text that cautioned that "read alouds alone cannot compensate for reading gaps", but the kids did enjoy using the strategy as an introductory activity. I am beginning a unit of the subject of failure. They were very engaged as I read and used props and costuming. I tackled a complex-informational article that was slightly above my students' reading levels. The text lobbied for people to view the idea of failure as positive because it means you tried something and, if you keep trying, that failure can ultimately lead to success. There were stories within the article about men climbing Mount Everest and going to the North Pole in a hot air balloon - all of which I conducted the read aloud for. The article articulated how the men failed at first, but kept trying and finally succeeded in their goals. It was a wonderful experience that helped break down some of my negative thoughts that I wrote about read alouds in my previous post.
ReplyDelete9. Would this author find corroborating evidence for his or her perspective in your teaching setting?
ReplyDeleteThe author would not find corroborating evidence in my classroom of either shared readings or read alouds. This is not something that I have prioritized in my classroom before, but something that I have interest in looking into in the future. I don't have any math textbooks in my district, and all of my materials are created to fit into our rather specific lesson planning template of do now, notes, example problems, independent problems, and then exit ticket. I can see the value in veering from this pattern (and often do anyway to allow for partner work and group time), but had never considered reading aloud an important facet of a math class.
What most interested me in this chapter, and what I could see myself using in the future, is the idea of reader's theatre. Immediately after finishing the chapter I went online to see if I could find any of the books that were talked about in the section to find concepts related to my 6th grade math class. Reading, rereading, and then acting out could be a great jigsaw activity that my classes take part in, or a fun way to start our review of the unit.
I also think that I need to change my perspective a little on the importance of reading. Often in my highest group I will print out a math explanation, or write a paragraph like you would see on math.com, and have the students "teach themselves" the new basic concept. I only let this happen in my highest cohort, (erroneously) thinking that my lower cohorts won't get as much out of reading and teaching themselves. Fundamentally, I know that activating their own knowledge is crucial, but I can't seem to let them go into this material on their own, predicting where they will lose focus or just stop reading. This chapter gave me some good strategies to try to implement in the future, but certainly was not anything that I do now.
I LOVE reading aloud to my students. As ELA teachers, we are actually required to read texts aloud to the students - especially for our SLOs. However, they always have a copy of whatever I am reading and they are expected to be following along. Now, I have to admit, I have a background in communications, public relations, public speaking, drama, singing, etc. So, seriously, doing a read-aloud is truly a passion for me. I make different voices for characters; I interject questioning; I do think-alouds; you name it! And, of course, I stop to check for understanding periodically and encourage students to make connections, etc. With the predominant nature of our non-fiction texts right now, it is imperative that we do, in fact, point out text features and condition the students to pay attention to them. However, my students always love when I read them some highly regarded literature. Like Skippy Jon Jones. Just kidding - but seriously, the kids love it. I use it as a treat, periodically, and make all the different goofy voices.
ReplyDeleteWe are currently reading the book Number the Stars. I bought the audio version as well and (thanks to my coughing fits), I tried it out on my class. They all begged me to read the next chapter. Apparently, the narrator wasn't as animated as I was with using different voices, etc. I also found myself wanting to keep hitting the pause button and add vital information to what was being read, but I felt like I would ruin the flow a bit. It's just not the same, but it certainly helped my voice a bit.
I did a quick bit of research on the topic and found this interesting tidbit:
http://www.greatschools.org/students/7104-read-aloud-to-children.gs?page=all
It's not all relevant, but I focused on the aspects of reading aloud to older kids.
My own children are in high school and they still enjoy being read to. So do I. :-)
I realized I chopped off the question at the top of the entry above. It should have read that it was a response to #4 - How does the central idea of this chapter intersect with other voices in the field? The link above was about other voices in the field and I found it compelling that the author supported reading aloud to students of all ages.
ReplyDeleteLisa, I am so jealous that you have found the time to do a read aloud of a novel with your students! One of my favorite times of the day when I was a 4/5 teacher was our 15 minute snack break where I would do a read aloud. I would often read texts that were challenging for many of the students, so it exposed them to higher text complexity and we would have great discussions about the books.
DeleteI am teaching Language Arts this year and have not found how to integrate read alouds into our class. Most of my reading with the students is shared reading of shorter texts, lots of non-fiction and excerpts or short-stories for fiction. Fisher and Frey explain that there is evidence to show that read alouds in the middle school motivate students, change attitudes about reading, and expose them to more challenging text. I do not disagree, but wonder how to fit it in. We have 40 minute class periods,and most of my instruction is focused on close reading of complex texts. Students read the text, annotate text, we re-read together to clarify, students then re-read on their own, and finally respond in writing to text dependent questions. These are important skills for readers and I have noticed an improvement in the students ability to read, analyze, and write about complex text. I just wish I had the time for read alouds because I strongly believe that the greatest benefit of reading aloud is that it fosters a love of reading. When I taught fifth grade most of my students read for enjoyment; two years later I find that most of my seventh graders do not read for pleasure. Why such a significant change? How do I shift my own instruction to motivate my readers?