Chapter 3 Reading

Three important things from this chapter are: Explanation, modeling, and bridging, but the most important thing is moving toward independence. ". . . we must persevere until the strategies for reading and writing have become automatic and a blank piece of paper has taken the place of the answer frame with its scaffolded sentence starters."

Voice Thread 1

https://voicethread.com/new/share/6587075/

Course Activity 5

The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein

Shel Silverstein is an outstanding children’s author. Silverstein’s first book was Lafcadio, the Lion Who Shot Back, written in 1963. One year later he wrote The Giving Tree, which he had a difficult time publishing. Publishers agreed that it was too sad. Silverstein remarked that life “has pretty sad endings.” Shel was born in Chicago in 1930. He not only wrote books, but also songs for famous singers such as “A Boy Named Sue” for Johnny Cash. In 1984, he won a Grammy for Where the Sidewalk Ends. He was also a playwright and in 1981 wrote The Lady or the Tiger. In 1988 he co-wrote a film with David Mamet, Things Change. Silverstein died in 1999, leaving behind quite a legacy of writing to remember him by. In 2011 a new collection of his poetry was published as Everything On it and left us with even more text and drawings by the awe-inspiring author. (www.shelsilverstein.com)

The Giving Tree is the book I have chosen to focus on with my reading student, Judah. I asked Judah if she had read this book before and she has not. Next week, (weather permitting) I will give Judah this book to explore. I chose this book because of the amazing life lesson within its pages. Silverstein’s amazing ability to relate adult themes in children’s literature is an inspiration. In The Giving Tree, Shel portrays the self-serving nature of a little boy who takes advantage of his supposed-best-friend, the tree. The tree’s unconditional love for the boy is apparent from the beginning of the book until the end. I am hoping that this theme will be easy for Judah to pick up on and that she will be able to express her thoughts to me for the comprehension assignment that I hope is coming next.

This book is a picture and text book. I believe that the pictures go great with the text. They help to further enforce the ideas behind the words. The characters are multi-dimensional. The language is very rhythmic with varied sentence structure. I believe the reading level is probably appropriate, in that Judah will be able to understand what she is reading and be able to read the book in one session. I hope that the text is simple and brief enough that she can easily pick up on the themes which I certainly believe reflect real-life emotions and make connections to the world. The book varies its text by sometimes putting only half a sentence on a page to putting entire paragraphs on other pages.

As for multicultural literature, I am not sure that this book shows diversity between different cultures, but I undoubtedly believe that it is a book that could be easily adaptable to any culture. Love is universal. The Tree is a female character and the boy, obviously male, but their parts are not equal. This book shows that the male character is the taker and the female character, the giver. The book does not really portray multiple cultures realistically either.  So, I would have to say that as far as the criteria in the multicultural rubric go this book does not really hit high marks. Maybe my opinion is too narrow. I would love to hear the thoughts of my classmates who may have read this text.

READING 5

Although I do not have experience yet in being a reading teacher, I do have some experience in being a reading and writing tutor. I have never had to choose a text for a struggling reader, but I have created tutorials on how to use certain web applications for struggling adult readers for the Tri-State Literacy Council in Huntington, WV. Although I was not able to see how the tutorials were implemented, after some minor revisions, the Director expressed that she was very happy with the work and all of the effort. The only other experience I can share is making an instruction training manual for an advertising company I worked for in Hilton head, SC. Within its pages were instructions on how to identify each type of ad, how they were coded, how to proofread an ad, how to copyedit an ad, and the procedure of resubmitting ads to the graphic design team. Although exhaustive, the manual came in as a handy reference guide for all the new proofreaders that I had to train. I am not sure these examples quite fit the assignment criteria, but it is all of the experience I have thus far. 

Portrait of a Reader

Three goals I believe that Judah and I should set are:

1.       Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.

2.       Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and explain how specific word choices shape meaning and tone.

3.       Read complex texts independently, proficiently, and fluently, sustaining concentration, monitoring comprehension, and when useful, re-reading.

I also believe, from what I have read in That’s a Great Answer, that a good book choice for her might be Dear Mother, Dear Daughter by Jane Yolen and Heidi Stemple. This book is listed as one choice for readers grades three and older (p. 290). I also like the questions the questions that the Bibliography of Objectives has to offer at the end of That’s a Great Answer (p. 330). Some example questions listed are:  “Using information in the story, write a brief description of how_____felt when_____. “ and “Can this part of the story be described as:  a definition, a description, an explanation a conversation, an opinion, an argument, or a comparison? How do you know?”

I think these questions are good for comprehension, which is something Judah and I will soon be working on. When I did the other course activities, I just had Judah tell me about her reading habits and read a small section of text for me. We did not get into the comprehension of the text. So, I feel like we will need to go back to the Winnie the Pooh book, briefly, just to be sure she understands what she is reading. What we concentrated on for the purposes of the Running Record were individual words and groups of words that she may have struggled with, but we did not go over the meaning of the entire text.

 In reading the “9 Components of Effective Reading Instruction” I think what we need to concentrate on next is the “Fluent, automatic reading of text.” This step acknowledges that children who read with fluency, comprehend the text simultaneously. This step also deals with independent reading levels, which is one step I wish for Judah and I to focus on.  I would like us to also work on the text comprehension step, as we did not focus on that before, and I want to be sure Judah is aware of what the text means and can comprehend small details as well as overall themes. I think this will happen with some follow-up questions once we re-read the Winnie the Pooh excerpt. I also have That’s a Great Answer to refer back to for some other comprehension question ideas.

So, far, I believe Judah is a competent reader who struggles mostly with individual words, but is not afraid to ask for help. I think this characteristic of her reading is very important to her comprehension of the texts that will be given to her for future assignments. I was not able to get with Judah this week to re-read Winnie the Pooh, but will work on that in the next few days so that we can assess where she needs to grow in the comprehension realm. 

2015 Reading Three

 What do you like about the book?  I like her honesty about what she decided needed improvement in this 2^nd edition. I also like that she said that teachers liked the 1^st edition too much. At first, I was thinking, “haha, what?” but once I read her rationale about this text becoming the instruction instead of a helpful manual, I got what she was saying.  I also like that she had included a CD and bibliography full of resources.

What resources will be helpful? I think all of the information provided will be helpful: the CD, the text itself, and the bibliography. I think it’s extraordinary that she thought about using the CD in a tech-savvy course with an overheard or whiteboard.

Concerns about the book? I don’t have any concerns about the book, yet, but we are only through the introduction. I may voice concerns as our reading progresses, but I believe that this author has her bases covered so far. 

2015 Course Activity Three

For Miss Judah, I chose a passage from a children’s story book. She did very well while reading the passage. She stumbled on a few words, but ultimately did amazing. She surprised me by knowing some of the larger vocabulary that I initially thought would present an issue. The following is the passage and notations that we looked at this week.

From Winnie the Pooh’s Bedtime Stories:

“It was the time of year that the A V inhabitants of the Hundred-AV Acre Wood called fall because that was when the leaves on the trees decided to do just that. Transforming from green to all those bright autumn tints and T Vhues was obviously quite exhausting. So, before the cold of winter arrived to SCredden the ends of noses and SCtickle toes (no matter how warmly cradled in sensible boots, and stockings so woolly that Oa pastureful of them would make a SCshepherd look twice), the leaves would drift drowsily down to sleep away the season under the blankets of snow that would soon be arriving.

Making sure the leaves were arranged properly for their winter’s nap was a responsibility Winnie the Pooh and his neighbors took very seriously, or as seriously as a bear of very little brain could take anything that didn’t involve eating.”

Miss Judah only made two countable errors according to the chart provided through taskstream. Out of 104 words, Judah missed omitted one word and was told one word. According to the accuracy chart, Miss Judah garnered a 98% accuracy rate. Her self-correction ratio is 1:22. This means that the first text I chose was an “easy text” and the taskstream Running Record recommends that I “move the child to a higher text level.” I had a feeling this might be the issue as I am a novice to teaching and was unsure what a third-grader’s reading level should be (other than googling some ideas). We will attempt a longer portion of text next time as well, as I believe that may have been part of the issue as well. I was not sure how long of a passage I needed for this assignment. So, next time we are going to focus on Hamlet, that’s totally a joke.

As for Judah’s Reading Behaviors, she did great at sounding out the words she did not know and when she came to the word “acre” she pronounced it “Ack-ree” and immediately said, “that just doesn’t sound right.” Judah was very self-aware of the words she stumbled on and had a great rate of self-correction.

All in all, I was very pleased with Miss Judah’s results and feel that once I have selected appropriate texts, then we will really see what we need to strengthen and focus on. Miss Judah was accurate when she said, in the reading interview, that when she comes to a word that does not make sense or is difficult to pronounce, she asks for help. That’s great—she certainly did. I wish all people were so eager to ask for assistance when necessary.