Grade Level/Subject Taught: 6-8 Talented & Gifted, 8 Critical Concepts (21st Century Skills)
Phonemic Awareness
Activity #1: Using Hip-Hop Music
Description: This activity takes hip-hop music and looks at rhyme and near rhyme. It allows students to play with language by using music they love. After analyzing the lyrics of several different songs, focusing on rhyme and near rhyme, students would compose two poems or raps of their own, one using rhyme and one using near rhyme.
Rationale: I wanted to find an activity for phonemic awareness that didn't seem babyish. Middle school students want to blend in, and nothing ties them together better than their music. I think readers of all levels would find this activity engaging, and for students who lack phonemic awareness, I think they would perceive this activity as inclusive.
Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/education/1254304/improving_phonological_awareness_and_decoding_skills_of_high_school_students/
Phonics
Activity #2: Using Phonics as Part of Word Study
Description: This activity is basically a word study where roots and affixes would be learned, but the change comes in the focus of phonics instruction as part of the activity... not just focusing on the meaning of each, but how the letters and sounds go together and how they can change the meaning of a word.
Rationale: I have found that good readers don't always understand words and how they're put together. By breaking words apart and focusing on roots and affixes, readers of all levels can improve. Focusing on one affix or root at a time would give struggling readers repetition with those sounds, and they could see how those sounds together change words. Our 7th grade spelling book touches on these ideas in a few places, but I've never taken it more in depth. I think this activity could
Source: http://www.centeroninstruction.org/files/Practice%20Brief-Struggling%20Readers.pdf
Fluency
Activity #3: Comics and Graphic Novels
Description: This activity gets students to consider the characters in comics, cartoons, and graphic novels... how their voices would sound, how they would differ compared to other characters' voices, etc. Then, it moves on to actually having students read what the characters are saying.
Rationale: There's a whole section in this post called "How To Teach Fluency Without It Feeling Childish." That really caught my attention. I'm going to have a Iranian boy in class next year who has good written English, but he speaks very little English. I want him to make gains with fluency, but I don't want to attract a lot of attention to this. I already have built a unit on comics, cartoons, and graphic novels, so this is a natural fit. I have never incorporated oral interpretation to the unit, but it's a great way to build fluency.
Source: http://expateducator.com/2012/07/04/
Activity #4: Choral Reading
Description: This article briefly mentions choral reading, and it mentions it in a very basic way, but it was my inspiration to connect what I know about choral reading to use with middle schoolers as a way to improve reading fluency.
Rationale: I have several poetry activities that I do with my students to get them to step inside characters' shoes. They came from Jeff Wilhelm when I heard him speak at a conference many years ago. As I read the page from this website, I somehow connected to those activities and some of the things Wilhelm talked about at this conference. I take those poems one step further and turn them into choral readings. This would improve fluency and also give the students a chance to present their work to others. The majority of the activities I'm thinking of end with a poem created by the class. I could also have them arrange that poem into solo, small group, and large group choral patterns. This would force them to look at force and impact, and in the end, it would improve fluency as well.
Source: http://www.k12reader.com/reading-fluency-and-instruction/
Activity #5: SSR (Sustained Silent Reading) programs to improve reading
Description: This article talks about how to build a good SSR program. It highlights 8 steps from Pilgreen's book about SSR (see citation below): access, appeal, conducive, environment, encouragement, staff training, nonaccountability, follow-up activities, and distributed time to read. (Lee, 211)
Rationale: I was drawn to this article because my school already has an SSR program in place. Unfortunately, it is not done with fidelity, and it is not effective. I have already started talking to administration about this article and how to improve our SSR program. Research cited in this article shows that SSR works, but there are steps to take to use the program correctly. I think starting with staff training about SSR would be the first step in my building.
Source: The article I read was called "Becoming the Reading Mentors Our Adolescents Deserve: Developing a Successful Sustained Silent Reading Program." It refers several times to a book called The SSR Handbook: How to Organize and Manage a Sustained Silent Reading Program.
Lee, V. (2011). Becoming the reading mentors our adolescents
deserve: Developing a successful Sustained Silent Reading program. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy,
55(3), 209-218.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/JAAL.00026
Pilgreen, J. L. (2000). The
SSR handbook: How to organize and manage a sustained silent reading program.
Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.
Vocabulary
Activity #6: Outside In Vocabulary Strategy
Description: This strategy happens during reading of text, and it involves a 3-step process:
- Look outside the unknown word for context clues.
- Look inside the word at root and affixes.
- Reread the passage and make inferences.
Source: Kira Van Winkle's contribution to the vocabulary wiki, based on an article called "A Root Awakening: Vocabulary Instruction for Older Students with Reading Difficulties"
Ebbers, S. & Denton, C. (2008). A root awakening: Vocabulary instruction for older students with reading difficulties. Learning Disabilities Research & Practice, 23(2), 90-102.
Comprehension
Activity #7: Think-Alouds
Description: This video highlights six think-aloud strategies that can be modeled in the classroom: rereading, prediction & inference, asking & answering questions, visualization, summarizing, and making connections.
Rationale: About 5 years ago, my district focused on literacy strategies. Think-alouds were taught and practiced as part of our staff development. Then, we started focusing on other things. Our reading scores still aren't where they should be, and I think getting our staff all on the same page with literacy strategies would be helpful. This video is short, and it uses books that are actually taught in our building. I think it gives a great overview of think-alouds and how they can be used to improve reading comprehension. I look forward to sharing this video with my staff.
Source: http://bit.ly/JsVR2l
Activity #8: Using Literature to Teach Inference
Description: This article talks about how to teach inference in a variety of curricular areas. It also comes with a list of book titles at the end of the article to use for this purpose.
Rationale: We just analyzed our Iowa Test results, and as usual, inference is an area where my building struggles. I liked this article because it gave tips to use in many classes, not just in reading. I think an effort across all disciplines is going to be necessary for our students to improve their inferential skills. I'm looking forward to sharing this article with my staff.
Source: http://www.ncte.org/library/nctefiles/resources/journals/vm/0201-sep2012/vm0201using.pdf
William, B. P., Moran, P. P., Berndt, R., Ritz, E., Skilton, J. A., & Bircher,
L. S. (2012). Using literature to teach inference across the curriculum.
Voices from the Middle, 20(1), 16-24.
No comments:
Post a Comment