Sarah Uglum, target area

1.      Describe your target area for guided lead teaching.

·         ·         My target area for this unit is Practices to facilitate comprehension. The students will read the book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr. Students will be reading the book and are expected to think and write critically about the book. In this unit students will be learning about and implementing the reading and writing processes. For reading the book students will participate in whole class instruction with teacher guided literature circles, read alouds, shared reading, modified guided reading, modeled lessons, focused skill and strategy lessons, and genre study. For small group instruction there will be guided reading, independent reading, genre study, and focused strategy and skill instruction. In writing the students will be working in whole class modeled lessons, shared/ interactive writing, focused strategy and skill instruction and author sharing. In small groups conferencing will be added to the list. Then during their daily independent writing students will be writing in notebooks and journals. During this unit I need to clearly teach comprehension strategies, such as: making connections, asking questions, determining importance, inferring, synthesizing, visualizing, and repairing comprehension. Fluent oral reading will be important because I will walk around to students and ask them to read aloud therefore I can hear how they are doing with the book.

2.      Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?

·         About 60  minutes a day is allotted for my instruction. But, this is something that is in the curriculum the time frame for this unit can be flexible if need be.

3.      Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?

·         RL.4.1-4, RL.4.10, SL.4.1.a-d, SL.4.2, L.4.4a, c, L.4.5a-c, L.4.6, RI.4.1-4, RI.4.8, RI.4.10, RL.4.9, L.4.4a-c, RL.4.5, SL.4.1a-d, SL.4.6, SL.3.3, RL.4.1-3, W.4.2a-e, W.4.4, W.4.10, W.4.2a-d, W.4.9a, W.4.3a-e, W.4.10, RI.4.7, RI.4.5, RI.4.9, RI.4.6, W.4.9b,

4.      How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives?  In what ways does this learning include learning literacy: learning content, vocab, genres and other literary terms. learning about literacy: about the reading and writing process  and/or learning through literacy: will learn about topics by reading about them using reading as a tool

·         By having the students work in small groups and in whole class discussions they will become familiarized in working with others. Students as they get older will have to work more and more with others and it is a skill they need to learn now to be successful in the future. In my opinion this book is about hope and love, a girl diagnosed with leukemia attempts to make one thousand cranes because it is a myth that anyone who does will be granted a wish, and hers is to survive. Love because even after the girl dies before she accomplishes her goal others finish it for her and bury the cranes with her. There are good meanings and themes that the students can take away from this book and see/ experience in their own lives.

·         By reading this book students will learn literacy by being exposed to more vocabulary. Through reading this book students will learn about different genres by reading them and see what requirements a book needs to be considered a certain genre, in this case it is non-fiction. Students will learn about literacy by being active participants in the reading and writing process. Students will learn the different steps of each process by doing the activities in the unit. Students will learn through literacy because they will learn about topics by reading and writing about them. For this literacy becomes a tool that the students will then use to learn about the different themes in the book and learn about what life was like for the people in Japan in the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing.

5.      What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?

·         There is a good mix of teacher ked talk and student led talks in this unit. There will be think- pair- share, which the students have learned a little about this and have practiced it as well. Read alouds, retelling/ summarizing oral presentations, and collaborative discussion. For most of these I will simply provide a prompt or question and students will then in charge of working together to complete a task.

·         The classroom talks that will take place are teacher talks, where it is the teacher that instructs and the students listen and answer questions. There will also be student discussions, the teacher gives the students a prompt to talk about and in their groups they talk amongst themselves. The talks will be higher- level thinking when the discussion is student based because questions will not be answered with a yes or no and the students will have more opportunity to talk when working in small groups. There will also be whole class discussions when the groups all come together to talk about what was discussed in their small groups.  One of the norms that I want to students to work on is really listening to each other and coming up with genuine comments and questions about what someone just said. A second norm my students need to work on is not interrupting other students and to wait for their turn to speak.

6.      Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?

·          The core practice for this unit will be explicit instruction with an emphasis in Thinking aloud, reading aloud, interactive reading aloud, and guided interactive discussions. Focusing on explicit instruction will help me learn the ways that I want to implement these practices. During these two weeks I will be able to see what strategies work in what situations and which ones do not. By using think alouds I will see what kind of thinking the students relate and respond to and that is the type of wording that I will try and use. Using explicit instruction will allow me to practice directly teaching students the techniques and procedures to use when they are reading.

7.      What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?

·     The school has on record the reading level of all the students and that will be helpful because then I can group students by reading level for in class activities. The school provides the books for the class, so that all the students have their own copy. Paper to make cranes will also be needed for an in class activity.

8.      What additional resources do you need to obtain?

·         

9.      How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?

·         I will give them a writing prompt about the bombings at Hiroshima to see what the students know. I am not sure if I will structure each part by giving them the topics I want them to write about or leave it open ended. The structuring of the pre-assessment would look like this: Who bombed Hiroshima? What were the affects of the bombing? What country and year did the bombing take place? Under each question would be room for the students to write their answers.

10.  What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?

• I need to see how well the students work in groups and make a product for an assignment. I also need to know where the students are in their comprehension level, that way I can make the different groups based on this so that I can use differentiated instruction effectively.

11.  What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?

·         I need to learn when using each of the explicit types of instruction in appropriate based on the material, so that I can make it as effective as possible.

12.  What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?

•       I am concerned that my students will have a  difficult time getting their work done in groups. I am extremely concerned that teaching these lessons will be overshadowed by classroom management.
• 
  

Target Area and Core Practice, Emily Laurent

Inquiry Two, Part A:

Discuss Your Target Area and ‘Core Practice’ for Guided Lead Teaching

Talk with your MT about your idea, and use the information you gained from Inquiry One to respond to the following guiding questions listed below.  Upload to Angel and blog before our Week 4 class (Oct. 2) AND post them on your book club blog:

1.     Describe your target area for guided lead teaching.

My focus for guided lead teaching will be comprehension strategy instruction and assessment. I will discuss with my students strategies for questioning, making connections, making predictions and summarizing.

2.     Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?

Approximately 60 minutes is allotted for reader’s workshop each day.

3.     Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?

RI. 4.2: Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize the text.

RL. 4.2:Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text; summarize the text.

RF. 4.4: Read with accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.

4.     How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives?  In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning through literacy?

Students will need strong reading skills from here on out in their education journey. They will use comprehension strategies to help support their reading every day in a meaningful way. Their learning will be determining what is important to do while reading. Students will learn ways to manipulate literature for information and how to focus their thoughts on the main idea or important aspects to a story. Students will be learning these strategies through literature itself.

5.     What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?

So far this year, talk about comprehension strategies has been in the form of mini-lessons in a reader’s workshop. I will continue that trend. When in reader’s workshop, we discuss as a class: What are strategies to use to aid comprehension? What are important things to do while reading? The teacher leading the mini-lesson will ask questions and encourage discussion amongst the students. Student lead themselves in partner talk, such as turn-and-talk discussion with a neighbor and my students love to share! They will be happy to tell you about their text-to-self connections and experiences. We foster higher-level thinking in that we ask students to think beyond the book we were reading during the lesson and to think about a book they are reading for IDR or at home; how would the skill from the mini-lesson transfer? I will plan on making it clear I would like students to have enough time to have meaningful conversations about the book we are reading, not talking over other students, I expect all students to participate in any way they can, modeling how to use sticky notes while I read to note my questions or connections, encouraging inner dialogue while reading and having students read-write-think; not to just sit and absorb a lesson, but to apply it and reflect on what it means for them to use it.

6.     Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?

My chosen core practice is monitoring comprehension. I will ask myself: How are my students comprehending now? What works for them? Is it different from student to student? How do I account for this? I’ve had a lot of experience with read-alouds and now I want to delve into making reading meaningful. I want to know how to help my students get the most out of their reading experience and see how that helps them with their literacy learning.

7.     What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?

I have several outlets for mentor texts: classroom library, school library, Walled Lake or Novi Public Library. My mentor teacher is the Language Arts guru for fourth grade and she has given me numerous resources from lists of picture books to activity ideas to templates for mini-lesson instruction. I also have the CCSS to reference when determining what fourth graders should be learning.

8.     What additional resources do you need to obtain?

I will need to create either classroom anchor charts or individual, student manipulatives to help my students remember, recall and practice the strategies we will go over. I do not necessarily want worksheets, so resources to developing a different outlet would be helpful.

9.     How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?

I will ask my students before each mini-lesson about the target strategy/ skill for that day. Can they identify the strategy? Have they used it before? Why is it helpful? I will also ask my students how they think about a story while reading it. I want to see what they are already doing without prompt from a teacher.

10.    What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?

I want to take into account my student’s likes and dislikes; this will help me chose books to use as mentor texts. I need to know the special needs of all of my students. I have a few ESL students; what can I do to make my instruction make sense? I have several students who have trouble focusing for extended periods of time; what are ways I can let them shake off energy to aid in hindering distractions? I want to make sure I reach all learners visually and verbally.

11.    What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?

Assessment: Would more formative assessment be appropriate for monitoring comprehension? I’m in the process of determining how comprehension is individualized. I therefore do not see a universal way to assess comprehension. Is there a particular sequence I should be teaching these comprehension strategies? How do they build off of each other?

12.    What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?

I’m concerned about showing my students the difference between “fake reading” and meaningful reading. I worry they are already stuck in the habit of reading without thinking and I want to make sure they come away from my instruction with go-to strategies that will eventually be second nature. Classroom management is something that always concerns me. How can I make this guided lead teaching transition as smooth as possible for my students? 

Inquiry 2 - Target Area

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During my guided lead teaching, I will be working within the fourth grade fantasy genre unit with the novel Poppy by Avi. Throughout my lesson, I will place a heavy emphasis on practices to facilitate comprehension instruction.  Students will be given to opportunity to brainstorm, draft, revise, proofread, and edit their work.  Additionally, a stress will be placed on Read Alouds, Shared Reading, Guided Reading, and Independent Reading.  During the school day, approximately 45 minutes to one hour is allotted per day for instruction in this area.

This unit lesson will cover a number of Common Core Standards. They include the following:

·       RL.4.1-4, RL.4.10, RL.4.5, RL.4.1-3

·       SL.4.1.a-d, SL.4.2, L.4.4a, c, SL.4.1a-d, SL.4.6, SL.3.3

·       L.4.5a-c, L.4.6, L.4.4a-c

·       RI.4.1-4, RI.4.8, RI.4.10, RL.4.9, RI.4.7, RI.4.5, RI.4.9, RI.4.6

·       W.4.2a-e, W.4.4, W.4.10, W.4.2a-d, W.4.9a, W.4.3a-e, W.4.10, W.4.9b

Teaching in this target area will provide students opportunities to learn different skills that relate to their lives.  Students will become accustomed to reading and comprehending text independently, a skill that is vital for real life.  Students will also learn how to vocalize what they infer from a text as well as listen to others’ opinions and conclusions.  Taking others’ views and deductions into consideration and learning from one another is definitely a skill that will stay with these students and will relate to their lives outside of the classroom.  Students will be learning literacy through the new vocabulary words and techniques that the author incorporates in the story.  Students will be learning about literacy when they think deeper about the author’s purpose and why the author chose to include certain things and techniques in the story.  Finally, students will learn through literacy by using reading as a tool to gain information.  For example, in Poppy, students will be exposed to certain themes such as social hierarchy, deception, and blinding following authority and perhaps not believing everything you hear.

My goal for this target area is to place an emphasis on student-led discussions.  While reading Berne and Clark’s article, “Focusing Literature Discussion Groups on Comprehension Strategies,” I really took an interest to what the article had to say.  So for in my classroom, students have only participated in teacher-led discussions while I have taught Making Meaning.  We have utilized the “turn to your partner” strategy where students are given the opportunity to have brief discussions with a partner and to report back to the group what their partner had to say.  Opening such discussion to a large group setting in which the students take the lead is something that I am very interested in.  In order to implement this, I think that we would need to cover topics such as talk stems and appropriate questions that encourage higher-level thinking.  While teacher-led discussion is important and will be used for this target area, I would really like to make an effort to teach students the techniques for successful student-led discussions.

In order to work with this target area, I will mainly be utilizing resources from my classroom.  These resources include the classroom set of Poppy by Avi, sticky notes provided by my MT that she has accumulated over time, technology in the classroom including the Promethean Board, the Elmo, and our classroom set of Expressions, and most importantly, my MT.  I feel as though my MT will be the most helpful resource while planning and teaching my unit lesson.  She has many years of experience and I believe that I truly do learn from her everyday.  She has already offered me guidance, suggestions, and advice and has assured me that she will support me in any that I may need.

Throughout this unit lesson, I will focus on responding to reading. I will do this by incorporating the use of sticky notes in order to allow students an opportunity to respond to their reading as well as to practice facilitation comprehension instruction.  By focusing on this core practice, I will contribute to my own professional learning in many ways.  First, it will allow me to see students’ thoughts and reactions to certain parts of the story.  I will be able to see which parts stood out to them and may have connected with.  While during a discussion lesson smaller details may go un-discussed, sticky notes will allow me to see what my students find to be important or interesting.  In addition, sticky notes will allow me to also leave messages for my students.  Instead of only responding to lengthier pieces of writing, responding to the students’ sticky notes will allow for quick pieces of advice, questioning to get students thinking deeper, or words of encouragement.

There are a few things that I would need to know, and that I will most likely learn from experience, about the use of sticky notes to support my planning and teaching.  To start with, I wonder if students will see the sticky notes as a distraction.  Having being able to get to know my students for the past month, I have seen that they do in fact become easily distracted.  Whether it is a visitor in the room, a phone call from the office or another teacher, or a change-up in our daily schedule, my students have a tendency to get off task and need to be pulled back in.  For this reason, I wonder if students will be able to use the sticky notes appropriately or if they will become an issue.  Next, I wonder how many sticky notes will be enough for students to use to be effective.  I predict that some students will ask, “Miss Buscemi, how many sticky notes should we use?”  I want to tell them however many are enough for you personally, but I wonder if I will have students that use a multitude of sticky notes while others just a couple.  I am interested to see how things play out the first few times that we use our sticky notes.

Pre-assessing my students in regards to my target area has already begun.  For the past few weeks, practice for the upcoming MEAP test has been our number one priority in our classroom.  While prepping for the MEAP test, we have been practicing skills that will be necessary for my unit plan.  These skills include reading fluently, grammar, silent sustained reading and silent sustained writing to build stamina, and discussions.  I am able to observe which students are more advanced in a given area and which students may need more practice.  This will be helpful when it comes to creating groups for group work or guided reading groups.

One thing that does concern me about planning and teaching my unit is the timing in which it falls.  It just so happens that the dates of the guided lead teaching falls within the genre unit that we are going to be covering.  Because it is so easy to become slightly behind schedule, I am a little concerned that this will happen and my unit lesson will be pushed back.  I do not mind if it needs to be pushed back a couple of days in the lesson, I just hope that it is not pushed back so much that it will change the topic of what I plan on teaching.

Literacy Instruction and Teacher 'Finesse'

One piece of advice Routam offers in Chapter 7 is to introduce the writing process as a whole, rather than step-by-step. This may seem odd as several of our other Language Arts instructional strategies involve mini-lessons focusing on one concept then banking these concepts which build off one another. She justifies this by noting there is not research out there supporting the use of drills or worksheets. Rather, having the whole presented to the student at once allows them to learn more easily with more meaning. For this example, it is key for the teacher to know each part of the writing process fully and be able to model using each part rather than telling the students about each part. I have found that this idea of showing rather than telling is successful, but sometimes hard for me to carry out. When my students are not understanding a concept and I have run out of ways to show them or have them notice something that I want them to notice, I turn right to direct teaching; I will tell them. While I believe that student discovery is more authentic than me just lecturing to them, it requires a special set of teacher-skills that develop with practice and restraint. I am trying everyday to focus on providing opportunities for my students to be discoverers. What are some strategies that allow students to learn authentically without me telling them what to learn? Is there anything in particular that works for you and your students?

Another key piece of advice Routman suggests is to make writing meaningful to the students. While not a hard concept to grasp, or even disagree with, finding ways to do this take practice and thought. How can you help students chose meaningful, but also worthwhile topics to write about? My mentor teacher helped scaffold this very idea in my student’s writer’s notebooks. She took a page, divided in into 4 sections and had them write down some things that 1) they liked, 2) they didn’t like, 3) scared them, and 4) were some of their hobbies. This allows students to have a reference for when they need to write about something and can’t think of a topic. Routman suggests in Chapter 8 to allow time for students to share their writing with peers. As a teacher, we need to discuss with students how to listen to their peers and respond with constructive comments and how to ask questions. What are some ways to facilitate this in a productive way? My students have a hard time with constructive peer interaction when it comes to writing or any other content area. They have a difficult time knowing what to say to their peers. Usually they take turns reading their writing piece and sit to talk about irrelevant topics.  Are you seeing your mentor teacher provide opportunities for your students to compose authentic writing? If so, what and why do you think it works?

There are several opportunities to ‘finesse’ the literacy instruction in my classroom as described in the Kersten/ Pardo article. I am seeing my mentor teacher do it every day. We have several curriculum programs for language arts: DWA, DRA, Making Meaning and Word Study. In each, my mentor teacher puts her own little twist on the instruction to make learning meaningful and personal for our students. How can a set curriculum fit each and every student? There are always little tweaks that need to be made and accommodations that need to be accounted for. I know for Word Study, the activities going along with each unit are do not take a lot of effort on the student’s part and do not challenge their thinking; sometimes, not even requiring the students to know the meaning of the word they are studying! In order to accomplish the missing goals from the Word Study curriculum, I could incorporate an activity that applies the learning in a new context. For example, asking the students to write a sentence or paragraph using several of the words. I would be looking for correct usage, as well as spelling accuracy. This way students are studying for a purpose and will be able to extend their learning after the spelling test at the end of the unit. What are some ways you see your mentor teacher deviating a tad from a set curriculum? I know my mentor teacher and her co-teacher have some strong feelings about some curriculum and have no problem ‘finessing’ their instruction. Do you feel comfortable as a beginning teacher to do the same or do you think being able to do that come with experience and reputation?

9/11

The biggest dilemma this year is going to be classroom management. The students like to talk a lot and do not stop even when I am talking. Using the attention grabbers does not work because they just continue to talk. I am concerned that this is going to take away from my learning how to teach because I am going to be so focused on getting the class's attention. I probably will not be able to implement many of the comprehension strategies that require students to work in pairs or groups because it will be too big a distraction for them. In Strategies That Work it states that teachers work with a small group while the rest of the class works on the same activity. But with my students they need the teacher to be constantly watching them and keeping everyone on track.

I am also nervous that since I have to constantly keep the students on track and tell them to be quiet I am going to build antagonistic relationship with some of the students. So I am going to have to work to stay positive and work one-on-one with students where I can work on making positive productive relationships with my students.

Even if my students were well behaved I am still new to teaching a class and balancing everything is a challenge. I have a hard time remembering to explain everything in detail because I am so  preoccupied with making sure I get everything done. In Strategies That Work one of the teachers mentioned that when something went wrong with the students work is was because she did explain the instructions in enough detail. This is something that I am going to learn with practice and time.

In my class there is something called Making Meaning, where the teacher reads to the students a specific story and there a predetermined questions during the reading. The students have practiced turn and talk where they turn to a partner and discuss their answers, the class then comes together and a few students volunteer their partner's answers to share with the class. I like doing this with the class because the students are right in front of you so they behave more and most students actually participate. Having these lessons go well gives me more confidence to work with my students.

Unlike last year I am much more confident talking in front of the class. Talking to the class comes much more naturally, so that is one less thing I need to think about while teaching. This allows me to have more of my attention on showing and telling what I want the students to do and learn. I am fairly confident writing lesson plans because of the practice from last year. I am familiar with writing out each part and the reasoning behind each section.