Informational Text Feature Walk

Hello Everyone!  It's Colleen and Stacy from The Rungs of Reading.  Today we are going to share a nonfiction strategy that Stacy loves to use in the Reading Room called the Text Feature Walk! 

 

Most primary-aged students learn how to do a "Picture Walk" before reading a story.  While previewing text, students activate prior knowledge, make predictions, and set a purpose for reading the book.  Effective reading instruction includes this important strategy yet this supportive practice is not as common when using informational text. 

When entering intermediate grades, students may experience difficulty reading textbooks and informational text due to high-level vocabulary and unfamiliar concepts.  In addition to these complexities, students encounter numerous text features throughout the text that often get overlooked even though they have been taught their importance.  The Text Feature Walk is a technique that explicitly teaches the purpose and importance of text features which enables students to navigate any informational text more effectively. 

First, students learn how text features support informational text.  Familiarizing your students with the purpose of each text feature is key to the lesson's success.  Additionally, it is important to model an interactive discussion about text so that students will be prepared to do it on their own.

Once students are familiar with text features and are able to hold a focused discussion about text, you can easily introduce the steps of a Text Feature Walk.  Through explicit modeling and thinking aloud, demonstrate the steps to follow while taking a Text Feature Walk using a short nonfiction article.  The steps outlined on our Student Cue Cards include identifying the text feature, making a prediction, making a connection, asking questions, and predicting the main idea.

Part 2 of the lesson focuses on guided practice with the teacher providing support as needed.  Within small groups, students use the cue cards to preview and discuss each text feature in order to activate prior knowledge, make connections, and set a purpose prior to reading the information text.

Once groups are finished, have students come back together as a whole group to discuss what went well and what they learned from their discussions.  They are now ready to read and more fully comprehend the text!

We hope you enjoyed learning more about using the Text Feature Walk!  To get you started using this important cooperative learning technique, please download our LIMITED freebie that includes all of the cue cards you will need.  This freebie will be available until May 2nd at 9:00 EST.  

Sharing Ideas For Preventing Summer Slide

Summer? Are we talking about that already?! Believe it or not, many schools have just a few short weeks left of this school year. I am already getting questions from fans on my own page, The Literacy Nest, for names of programs to use with struggling readers over the summer. Today, I'll share a few ideas and programs, but I want to open this post to you, the readers, in hopes that you'll share some of your own strategies. First, let's talk about summer slide.

We as teachers and parents are all too familiar with the effects of summer slide on our students. Having two months or longer off from school can be rejuvenating in many ways, but for struggling readers, it may cause regression.
An article from Study Clerk: "Experts agree that children who read during the summer gain reading skills, while those who do not often slide backward. According to the authors of a report from the National Summer Learning Association: "A conservative estimate of lost instructional time is approximately two months or roughly 22 percent of the school year.... It's common for teachers to spend at least a month re-teaching material that students have forgotten over the summer. That month of re-teaching eliminates a month that could have been spent on teaching new information and skills."

Source: http://www.firstbook.org/

Consider that loss of learning time for the struggling reader and you have some catching up to do when a new school year begins. It's a common cry for many educators out there. When the Fall returns, there's a great deal of reteaching going on in many classrooms.
There are several solutions to this problem, but some may be costly. Throughout my teaching career, I've taught in two very different socioeconomic backgrounds. I've worked with the students whose parents can afford a private tutor for the summer, and others who've been mandated to attended summer school. Certainly a private tutor is a wonderful way to help a child overcome summer slide, but it isn't always accessible or affordable.

We as educators can start looking now to see which children are going to need that little extra help and motivation to keep the learning going all summer long, but in a fun and engaging way.

Here are some ideas:

1. Most local libraries will host a summer reading challenge for city or town residents. Invite the local librarian into your classroom to do a special talk about summer reading and any special incentives going on for those participants. This worked well with my own students each year.

2. Some school hands out summer reading lists. Here's my twist:  If you were a student in my class, I sent you off with a list of book recommendations that we created together in class. Every child shared their recommendations. Then, I typed up a list of nearly 50 books and gave everyone a copy. The class summer reading list was always a big hit in my room because it came from peer suggested books, not adults. But I was sure to add in my own book suggestions too. :)

3. Another item I sent home with my kiddos on the last day was an envelope or blank postcard with the school address on it and a stamp for them to write to me over the summer. I would receive quite a few back and was always so pleased to receive them. If I couldn't be there with each child and see them keeping a summer journal, I was sure going to encourage it!

4. Send a special class newsletter to parents with educational websites and apps for children to use. Instead of just focusing on technology, include places for kids to read and enjoy a good book outside (on a front porch, in a beach chair, on a hammock, a park bench, in a tree house, resting against a tree.) Maybe create a class photo collage of kids posing in their favorite reading spots.

5. Summer reading incentives work for many families. I encourage offering constructive and reasonable ones. Several years ago, I actually found a summer reading list I had created at the age of seven . Don't ask me why I still have it! Anyway, when I finished reading a certain amount of books agreed upon, I was rewarded with a Barbie doll I had eyed in the toy store. So during the summer, it may be just the thing to offer a child a trip to the movies or local ice cream parlor for creating a summer reading goal and sticking with it.

~Programs~

 If you do have the funds to purchase a program to use with students or your own children this summer, and are looking for something more structured, here are four suggestions:

1. Raz Kids If you're familiar with Reading A-Z, you may have heard of Raz Kids. This interactive version has great mobile features and reading incentives. Teachers can track progress while students practice fluency and reading comprehension skills. This is suitable for students K-5.
2. Lexia Core 5 is a comprehensive program for the struggling reader. Addressing 6 areas of reading instruction, it encourages student led-learning by letting children work at their own pace.
3. Snap! Learning has a new online program that I reviewed and used with several students several months ago. The stories we read on my mobile device were high interest, had an audio feature, a fluency check-up and comprehension questions.  There are leveled readers and passages and lessons for close reading.
4. Headsprout This is a program that's new to me, but looks like another great online reading resource. There are fluency, phonics and reading comprehension programs for K-2 and 3-5

Now it's time to join the conversation! Please comment with your best tips, links and ideas for preventing summer slide. Let's keep the conversation going among our fellow educators and teacher bloggers too. You're invited to stop by my blog where I'll share more resources this summer. Good luck with the rest of your school year. I'm looking forward to hearing from you!

photo source: www.morguefile.com

Poet-Tree with Words, Wit, and Wonder

April is the perfect time to celebrate one of my favorite topics, poetry. I had the opportunity to observe my intervention students in their regular classroom this week.  In both reading and writing they are studying poetry.

Poetry Mentor Text

Miss Reisinger launched the unit with the book, Words, Wit, and Wonder: Writing Your Own Poem. 

Author, Nancy Loewen

Words, Wit, and Wonder is recommended as a poetry mentor text by Lucy Calkins and The Reading and Writing Project.

• In the first part of the book, rhythm, rhyme, alliteration, similes, metaphors, and onomatopoeia are explained in kid-friendly terms.
• In the second half of the book, six poetry forms - acrostic, cinquain, concrete, free verse, haiku, and limericks - are introduced.
• Each of the twelve tools presented is accompanied by an example poem.  

Writer's Workshop

As the unit progressed, students began writing their own poetry.  They referred to the mentor text during writer's workshop.

Words, Wit, and Wonder

Pictured here is Tool 7 - Acrostic Poems from the mentor text.  The explanation of an acrostic poem is given in the purple box on the left-hand side of the page; to the right is an example poem, "Spelling Test".

The student above is drafting his own acrostic poem, "Hobbits," while referring to the example from the text.

Words, Wit, and Wonder

Pictured here is Tool 9 - Concrete Poems.  

The student pictured above is drafting a concrete poem in his writer's notebook.

Publishing:  The Poet-Tree 

As students complete a published piece of poetry, it is added to a class book and hung on the Poet-Tree. 

A close-up view of the "concrete" branch of the tree.

A close-up view of the "couplet" branch of the tree.

Students are working on other types of poetry that will be added to the interactive bulletin board as they are published.  What a great way to celebrate National Poetry Month!

Today is Poem in Your Pocket Day.  If you would like to learn more about it, Lauren wrote a great post about it {here}.

Would you like to read more about poetry across the grade levels? Andrea has an awesome post {here}, freebies included!

Do you have a favorite book or activity you use when teaching poetry? Our readers would love to know.  Please share your ideas in the comments.  :)

Notice & Note: Strategies for Close Reading

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter weekend!  I spent part of the long weekend reading Notice & Note: Strategies for Close Reading by Kylene Beers and Robert E. Probst. I have a ton of thoughts running through my head now that I am finished.  I thought I would share two of them with you today to help me better understand what I have read.

Common Core Standards require students to closely read a variety of texts.  What does that mean exactly?  I have seen the posters everywhere on Pinterest and in the blogisphere that breaks close reading down to what you do each time you read the text (reading the text two to four times).  Many of those say that students should be annotating as they read.  My question has always been:  How are students supposed to know what they should be writing in the margins that is actually helpful in deeply understanding a text?  It seems too simple to just have them write a question mark next to a part where they have a question or an exclamation point next to something that was surprising.  If they are closely reading, there should be a transaction between the reader and the text.  Students should be thinking deeper about the questions they are having or why he or she finds the part surprising.  Beers and Probst give you six signposts that you can teach your students to help them dig deeper into the text and create meaning by transacting with the text at a deeper level.  What do you do to help your students dig deeper into a text without leading them to the meaning you derived from the text?

Another term that has risen to the top of discussion since the implementation of Common Core is 'text dependent questions."  In Notice & Note, the authors write, "We worry that a focus on text-dependent questions may create a nation of teacher-dependent kids...Text dependent questions usually suggest that a teacher has crafted the questions and the order of them to lead students to a predetermined meaning of a particular passage" (p. 43).   The authors suggest that teachers work with students to create their own text dependent questions.  They even provide a structure to help teachers do this with their students. (Clicking on the picture will bring you to Google Docs so you can download your own copy.)

I don't want my students to become dependent on me.  I want them to be independent readers.  Questions they create on their own are more engaging and authentic than any question I could ever write.  Students are trained that there is 'a right answer' when the teacher asks a question.  If I am the only one creating the questions, they will never fully engage in the text.

One sentence really stood out to me and I came back to it over and over again.

I would love to know:  What book has changed you?

Tally it up for Main Idea

Hi everyone! It's Melissa from Don't Let the Teacher Stay Up Late here to share with you again! I don't know about you, but we just got back from Spring Break yesterday and are in full gear preparing for our state tests. This is where our upper grade teachers really start to panic, and the kids can unfortunately become overloaded with test prep and stress from all sides.

Well, I am sharing a "test prep" tip, but it's one that I think is very simple and can really help your kids a ton! Virginia actually did an analysis of the most missed questions on our state tests, and, no big surprise, Main Idea and Supporting Details appeared a lot.

Many of our teachers have taught the students to "Stop and Jot" or make "Headlines" for each paragraph, which can be effective but also frustrating. I've been working with the students to keep it short and simple if they do it so they don't burn out from writing these long sentences every time. Plus I also teach them to chunk smaller paragraphs. Still, that's not the strategy I'm here to share.

When students reach a main idea question, have them use tally marks to see which choice is discussed most often.

I pulled a passage from ReadWorks, which is a great free site that I highly recommend if you're looking for engaging passages. Have the student read through it once on their own. Then when they reach any question that asks for the main idea or says the words "most", "mostly", or "main"...

The hardest part is getting the students to see relationships when it's not so specific. I would recommend modeling a LOT, then have them work with a partner or group before trying it independently unless you know the passage or question is a little more straightforward.

What other little "tricks" do you teach your kids to help prepare them for tests?

Five for Friday ~ Poetry Across the Grades

Hello, everyone!  Andrea from Reading Toward the Stars here today!  I have been on my Spring Break this week and am not ready to go back.  But, I am excited to share some fun poetry ideas for everyone, especially with Poem in Your Pocket Day next week!

This post is linked with Kacey at Doodle Bugs Teaching.

Poetry can be used with even the youngest of children.  Nursery rhymes and other simple rhymes are perfect to use with young children.  I use them with my own daughter and kindergarten students to help them with rhyming.  Just listening to the poems and rhyming together helps them out so much!

I also use simple poems with my kindergarteners to work on concept of word.  I use nursery rhymes and simple songs to help them know where words are in print.  We progress throughout the year as we read poems.  Here are some examples of things we do with the poems.

Using stickers to mark words

Finding words in the poems

Here is a freebie of Weather Poems that are perfect for Concept of Word from Carla at Comprehension Connection.  Click {here} or on the picture below to grab it from her TPT store.

Using poetry with beginning readers is always fun!  We use the poems as repeated readings to help with fluency.  I use one poem throughout the week with the students to help with fluency practice.  We also work through other activities as well, such as locating sight words or other words they need to know.  We continue to work with rhyming words as beginning readers too.

Em from Curious Firsties has a great post on using poems for repeated readings.  You can read her post by clicking {here}.

As children progress as readers, so do their needs as readers.  Poetry lends itself well for helping students with important reading skills.  Once students are more fluent as readers and have the basics for reading, they need to hone in on important skills.  At this stage, students really need more work on prosody, the rhythm of speech.  We really have fun with this as we highlight punctuation marks and other types of print to help them focus on HOW to read the words and phrases.  I posted about this in February, and you can read this post {here}.

Of course, once students become competent readers, they work with poetry in different ways.  Once students are familiar with the ins and outs of poetry, they can begin to work with comprehension.  Students in third grade and beyond can work on reading poetry and thinking about what happens in the poem.  Sometimes poems can be tricky, but if you start out with poems they know, like nursery rhymes {yes, nursery rhymes with older students}, they can understand comprehension skills easier.  Many nursery rhymes tell a story and have some type of cause and effect.  Think about "Jack and Jill".  Kids can learn so much from that one rhyme!

Problem:  They need water.  Solution:  They go up the hill to get it.

Cause:  Jack fell down.  Effect:  He broke his crown.

And as students go through the middle and high school grades, they can use that simple knowledge on more complex poems.

Even though many of these ideas seem to be specific for each stage of reading, readers in all stages can benefit from poetry.  The ideas in the various stages can be used for other stages as well.

All readers can find imagery in poetry and visualize what is happening.  Each week when we read poems in my groups, we spend some time drawing a picture of what is happening or what the students think about when they read the poem.  Here is an example of a student's drawing based on the poem we read.

Thank you to Lauren from Teacher Mom of 3 for this wonderful set of May poems,which is where I got the poem for the above picture!  You can grab them for free from her TPT store by clicking {here} or on the picture below.

Students of all ages can also write simple poetry.  Many start with the simple acrostic poem and work their way into some more complex types.  I like to use the Bio Poem with my students when they study famous people.  Here is a freebie template for planning a Bio Poem.

And in honor of Poem in Your Pocket Day, which Lauren wrote about on Wednesday in this post, here is a freebie you can use with your students for their poems in their pockets.

Bex from Reading and Writing Redhead also has a great freebie full of resources for helping to teach poetry in this blog post.

There are so many wonderful ways to use poetry in our classrooms!  What are some fun ways you have used poetry with your students?

 

**Thank you to Ashley Hughes for the cute kids in this post!