Week 2: Write Your Reflection on Reading (Moore and Hinchman ch. 4-7)
Reflection; To reflect; think about; contemplate connections;
a calm lengthy intent consideration
╚cognition; knowledge; noesis
╚process; cognitive_process; mental_process; operation; cognitive_operation
╚higher_cognitive_process
╚thinking; thought; cerebration; intellection; mentation
╚consideration
╚contemplation, reflection, reflexion, rumination, musing, thoughtfulness
╚retrospect
╚omphaloskepsis
╚introspection; self-contemplation; self-examination
╚╚meditation; speculation
╚cogitation; study
a remark expressing careful consideration
abstraction
╚relation
╚social_relation
╚communication
╚message; content; subject_matter; substance
╚statement
╚remark; comment
╚observation, reflection, reflexion
╚
***Note the critical thinking implied within this definition of reflection. Note the words "careful" consideration and self-examination.
I want to see and feel that you are critically thinking about how this all connects to you as teachers. How all this informs your thinking about teaching reading in your content area.
a calm lengthy intent consideration
╚cognition; knowledge; noesis
╚process; cognitive_process; mental_process; operation; cognitive_operation
╚higher_cognitive_process
╚thinking; thought; cerebration; intellection; mentation
╚consideration
╚contemplation, reflection, reflexion, rumination, musing, thoughtfulness
╚retrospect
╚omphaloskepsis
╚introspection; self-contemplation; self-examination
╚╚meditation; speculation
╚cogitation; study
a remark expressing careful consideration
abstraction
╚relation
╚social_relation
╚communication
╚message; content; subject_matter; substance
╚statement
╚remark; comment
╚observation, reflection, reflexion
╚
***Note the critical thinking implied within this definition of reflection. Note the words "careful" consideration and self-examination.
I want to see and feel that you are critically thinking about how this all connects to you as teachers. How all this informs your thinking about teaching reading in your content area.
posted by Susan A. Garr at 10:04 PM
11 Comments:
Reading these chapters left me hanging by a thread. As I read chapter 4 I realized that all the techniques for teaching reading, such as reciprocal teaching, were attached to very specific types of readers. The text did not offer a plan to use the techniques differentially, and did not address the issue, that classrooms are more likely to be heterogenous than homogenous in its' readers. The question in my mind was, "How would the techniques work if you had all 5 types in the classroom?"
As I continued to read through the rest of the chapters I expected to see the answer, but did not.
Chapter 5 read like propaganda for the four P's. I am not sure why the author had it in the book, unless it was to show classroom management.
The remaining chapters were more realistic in their content. I felt more positive about these two because, chapter 6 addressed the need to adjust the reading curriculum to the students' ability. It provided good techniques to help with the process. Chapter 7 suggested reading strategies that I know work. My favorite is the cross-age partnership. My own children benefit from this technique and find it mentally challenging, and fun.
I foresee using chapter 4 quite a bit as a reference tool in my lesson plans. By structuring the strategies by reading role, we can see which works best in each situation. That way, we can incorporate varied strategies in our lessons. As using varied instructional strategies is necessary in order to reach all our students, this is going to be very helpful.
The central question for chapter five, "How do I reach individual readers and writers when my classes are so diverse?" has been a central question for me over the past couple of years. While this chapter gives some suggestions, I still wonder how, realistically, this is going to work in a classroom. How can we motivate students to have input in their own education when they are already disaffected? How can we ensure that students don't always choose a book at an easy level for them?
Chapter 6 is great for special ed or reading specialist teachers, but in a classroom of 30 kids, how can we give that kind of personalized attention to the students who need it? Some of the strategies can be used in the classroom once you hit the meaning maker stage, but at the code breaker stage, I don't see it working in a regular classroom.
Chapter 7 has some great suggestions, but it seems idealistic to expect family book talks to happen in a lot of homes. Also, for a student already disaffected by school, getting them to an after-school program just isn't going to happen.
I had one problem with the AVID program discussed on page 140. While it seems like a great way to build dual cultural identities, it also smacks of "separate but equal" education which sets off my alarms. Also, caucasian students could benefit by learning about other cultures and understanding the discrimination that still exists today.
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I agree with what many of you are saying about the reading of chapter five. I was disappointed with the way it represented differentiated instruction. I think differentiated instruction is just what good teachers do. But the difference from what I have studied is that these teachers know they are doing it and plan for it.
At one point, I wasn't sure what the main message was accept: once we get our kids and get to know them we will know how to meet their needs.
This is true. Teaching can be the most organic experience. You might teach the same prep four times in a day, but each class could be directing itself down a different path.
Getting to know your kids is the key to good teaching. You will be amazed at how much you hone in on the kids and who they are. Most of the students I had were very willing to share themselves, and because of this I was able to use it to my advantage. Because I got to know them I was able to pull something for them to read based on an interest, thus hooking them into our content. Asking about how their soccer practice went or even going to a game afterschool, impacts the way your students will see you. Kids appreciate being recognized as a complete, whole person. (as you probably can relate to)
I am enjoying reading people's reactions to the text. I Have often wondered how people were responding to the text. Are the science and math people able to synthesize what the text offers, or do they see it as too heavily language arts based? Having been teaching for so long, I find myself wondering how a person who has not been in the classroom would read this text.
I read the strategies they promote and I say, yes, they all work well. Choose one two or four to really teach the kids and use until they really are able to talk about their process.
I read about Moore and Hinchman's reader roles and think yeah that makes sense. And then I wonder are we providing reading experiences for students to partake in reading for a variety of purposes? Are we naming that purpose and showing students what people in that specific field might be reading and thinking about? (metacognition) Is covering the curriculum a priority over critical thinking?
I think we read about the intervention teacher so that we know if we have a kid who is working with an intervention teacher (sounds like a 12 step program) we can talk to him/her about what strategies to use. It is important that we are in dialogue about who and how are kids are being worked with.
We practice talking about our own beliefs in reading so that we are comfortable sharing our ideas with our colleagues and students.
My thoughts quickly move to the homework I never gave back last week. I loved reading your literacy stories. A common theme in almost all of them was high school reading was mostly forgetable and probably avoided at all costs. More than half of us said that we didn't read in high school...eventhough we might have been a good reader, we might have read what we wanted to read for pleasure, the majority of us opted not to read. In fact, someone said that as a high school kid, she spent more time figuring out how to not read rather than just reading.
I am not sure what point I am trying to make, but I am thinking isn't this fascinating? What does this say about high school? What does this say about the kids we will have? What does this say about the adolescent brain? What does this say about starting a class with the longest word in the english language?
I am not sure? The first story I had my kids read was one that had a swear word in it. I wanted to show them how cool reading could be. I bit different approach from the one in the book. It worked.
Thanks for your time.
See you all tonight.
susan
Jacqueline Aessa
Week 2- reflection
Text User:
I definitly agree with teachers who uses their book as a guideline for the topic they teaching to thier students. however, on the other hand I dont' agree with teacehrs who used the book as a teacher for their students. What I mean is when a teacher tells his student to read a chapter and because he didn't have time to go over it, he would expect his student s to understand it, and unfortunately test them on it.
In my math area, the books could be used as a termenology tool, and not a teacher. although math is very logical and goes from one step to another, it take a while whether short or long understand a concept.
From my personal expereince, I had a teacher who would come to class and would start reading the book with us and expect us to have read it already, and barely explain the topic and says I can't explain everything to you, you have to read the book before you come to class and after you leave. I know that I need to read the book but the teacher should explain the concepts as well, otherwise why do I even need to come to class!
Jacqueline Aessa
Week 2- Response
I definitly agree with Claudia Barlea about teachers caring about their student are more seccessful teachers and leave a longer impression on their students, however, sometimes, the teachers should put some limits as to howmuch they need to get involved in student's life and concerns. One simple reason is that the teachers themselves have their own life to deal with and having other studnet's problem might conflict with thier life. another reason would be that the teacher might be trying to do good to a student but just because he/she is not familiar with the student's family background whether ethnisity or just family problem, the teacher would unintentionally creat more problem to the student than solving them.
Reading from this book I don't take anyhting it says as the highway where it is do this or leave. I feel that each is a suggestion a tool I can put into my warchest. I think of Stephen Covey 7 habits book and can draw parallels between this book and the approaches in it. Is the nuts and bolts of the book right? maybe not. However the idea of the plan and tying everything together are important. The idea of the perspective of the student and the students view of the teacher view of him are important. Reading the chapters helped me think about things I could do in my classroom.
Chapter 6 was very helpful in showing me how to get over the more difficult learners.
These chapters finally moved into what I expected from the title of this book (specifically chapter 6). I have always been scared and unsure as to how to approach these types of difficulties in a classroom, as so much of our training is generalized, due to the amount of material we cover.
I found myself relating a lot of the suggested methods to the methods I learned in my TESL course. Unfortunately, the actual title of the method has slipped out of grasps from my long-term memory, but there was process of teaching reading to TESL students where the students themselves created their own text, usually through a demonstration (like making a cup of tea). They knew the context, the meaning, and they were creating their own narrative of what the words were that represented that process. The errors were left uncorrected, to reinforce the overall process and to eliminate intimidation, etc. The class moved from narrating it verbally for the person acting out the demonstration, to the teacher writing the steps out on the board, and so on... (After finding my notes on this, I will come back and fill in any missing pertinent info.)
Responding specifically to Susan's "what do people who have not been in a classroom think about the text?"... as much as my review before had a positive spin (possibly due to comparing these chapters to the first chunk! I kept thinking there... ok, when are we going to address strategies to teach reading to students who struggle?), I tended to read the text as, "Ok, more stuff that is a lot of common sense, but may be it will be of more use once I'm overwhelmed on the first day of class?" It reads like a lot of my texts... not that interesting, a lot of redundancy and wordiness (did we really need to be walked through the weaving metaphor at the opening of Chapter 4? I read this to my husband, and he cracked up, replying, "No wonder everyone thinks education majors are not intellectual!").
To be fair, I do think there are very good points in here and I am learning. There are specifics that hit base and make more than common sense. However, I want to read more about the intricacies of reading problems and be stimulated a little more.
On another note, I too reacted to "intervention" as a very negative, abuse-related term. Is the politically correct term for this process now? Is this what people use regularly? No wonder kids get a complex!
And yet another response-- to Andrea and getting real-world people into classrooms-- My sister is a consultant for middle school math programs in 7 states... and she and I did a "team-presentation" when I was in college at an educational conference about this. I was in school for fashion design, and it was titled, "The Geometry of Fashion, and the Fashion of Geometry." We had a blast, and the male teachers who chose our session commented that they didn't expect to be entertained but were. I had found that I was using so much geometry with patternmaking... we presented this aspect, then presented a very watered-down version, incorporating the same principles into a hands-on classroom activity that the teachers could take away with them.
test
Jenny Marano
Week 2-Reflection
Re: Chapter 7 (section entitled "Buddy Reading" p. 136-137 and "Literacy Across the Curriculum" p. 144)
In reading this text, I sometimes have some trouble relating the ideas to my plans to teach mathematics. However, in these particular sections, I recognize methods that I have experienced in my own classes that I feel I may use in the classes that I will teach.
The very first paragraph of the Buddy Reading section describes a reading method that involves the students pairing up and taking turns reading aloud and then analyzing what they have read together. One of my professors just last semester used this method with our class, and as much as I ABSOLUTELY prefer to work alone, I found that the method was extremely beneficial to our understanding of the material. We were presented with a worksheet that listed definitions of theorems, followed by applications of those theorems. I believe that the reason this method is so effective is that in just one session the student takes both roles (that of the teacher/lecturer and that of the student/listener), and is thereby engaged at all times.
The other section that I wish to mention, Literacy Across the Curriculum, brings up another extremely important idea for educators of mathematics or the sciences. So often, students cannot even remember the correct terminology for the very technical concepts that they are studying. A focus on just the vocabulary within a content area could be another way to expand the students' reading in all subject areas. In these subjects particularly, the code-breaking involved in learning the technical terms can be very beneficial in helping to make meaning out of unknown words in their other everyday reading.
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