Lists

I heard one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard today on NPR's This American Life. It was the episode from December 31, 2010 and is called "Say Anything." In Act 2 of this episode an actor reads an except from a book, which is just a list of the author's fears. I don't know what it was about the reading, but it was beautiful.

So here's my idea:

Spend a week or two on lists. The lists don't have to grammatical. They can be short, long, skinny, wide. They can be about anything. Reasons why you love Provo, fears, joys, friends, favorite colors. Whatever.

Practice writing lists by giving students a few example topics with time limits. For example, 30 seconds to make a list of their favorite vacation spots. Share these with their partners. 1 minute to make a list of their least favorite school assignments. Share these with their partners. 45 seconds to make a list of their favorite dates. Share. Possibly a few more. Have them expand their lists or make new ones. Share. Now change their list, make it shorter, make it longer, switch up the grammar, whatever. Make their final list.

Now tech savvy students can record their lists focusing on their performance--voice, intonation, rhythme, timing--all those things that make people interesting to listen to. Perhaps a students may want to add sound or music, but this is an entirely oral assignment. For the rest of us, perform like the beatniks--just a stool. Encourage these students to also bring music or sound to supplement their readings.

Self-Evaluating

Students learn more when they practice metacognition--that is when they are more aware of their thinking and learning. One way to do that, as suggested by my friend Pat, is to have a section of students' notebooks set aside for self-evaluation. In this section students will rank their understanding of a subject on a scale of 1 to 5 and then explain what they do know and what they would like to understand better.

For example, when teaching on subject-verb agreement, stop at any point in the lesson (most likely when you start to get the glazed-over look) and have students rank their understanding on a 1 to 5 scale and write questions. Give students 2-3 minutes to do this. Have students hold their fists in front of their chests and hold up their understanding fingers. This gives you a formative assessment to know how students are doing.

At this point, you have several options depending on the number of fingers you see--lots of fingers, move on. Not so many fingers, go back. Reteach, or give students a chance to ask their partners the questions they just wrote down. Or have students ask you, but I think it's better to have students tutor each other.

At the end of the lesson, have students re-rank themselves and example the difference or lack of difference and why.

Or after several days, have students go back to their list of self-evaluations and have them put a star next to the item best shows their learning. Maybe they write a reflection on their amount of learning or they answer the questions they asked originally.

This form of ranking and explaining not only makes students be more cognizant of their learning, but it also gives students time to reflect on their learning and ask questions; shows students how much they've learned; shows students what they need to study; allows for peer-tutoring; mixes things up a bit. I like it. Thanks Pat.

Skinny Books

The importance of activating prior knowledge to reading comprehension can hardly be overstated and last night I read about an interesting (though teacher time intensive, but thank goodness for the Internet) activity called Skinny Books.

Skinny Books are a collection of related pictures, magazine articles, newspaper clippings, trade books and other sources.

Here's how I might use this: When teaching on the Cold War, I would start the unit with a skinny book of pictures of the destruction around Europe, propaganda posters, newspaper clippings, song lyrics, political cartoons, etc. Students would look through and study these skinny books to give them a better idea of the state the world was in at the end of World War II. We would then make a list of predictions about the relationship between the US and Europe; the relationship between the US and USSR; the state of Germany; the future of the atomic bomb; the role of the US in the world; the state of the American economy. Students may then be write a journal entry as if they were 8th graders in 1945.

And the next day, get the textbook out and get some reading done. Reading every day is class vital.

Primary Sources

1. Lecturing is boring and passive.

2. Real historians don't listen to lectures.

3. To create more authentic learning environments, we must involve students in activities that professionals participate in.

And so,

4. Read more primary sources.

Real historians use a combination of primary sources and other historians' books to triangulate new knowledge or a new view on old knowledge. This requires critical reading, thinking, writing, and talking skills. We should do this in our classrooms.

But primary sources are hard to read and are more likely to have bias than a textbook, so students must be taught how to read primary sources.

Day 1: Introduce the idea of primary sources

*To do this, you will need 3 short primary sources related to the same topic such as three accounts of the Kent State shooting or 2 opinions on and a selection from the Constitution--whatever you are learning about in history. Remember literature, like poems and short stories, is also a primary source.

*Ask students where they think historians get their information fromRefer to (or maybe even show short clips of movies) such as National Treasure (not my favorite, but it works) or others (I'm drawing a blank) where people/historians/investigators are shown in dark rooms shifting through piles of information. This is what historians do. They don't just go to a textbook and get the information; they must search it out.

*Ask students to list places or things historians could get information. Divide the list into 2 parts--primary and secondary sources and write them on the board. Include items like journals, diaries, newspapers, pictures, bank statements, government forms and documents, other books. Anything that a person leaves behind is a primary sources, so even a ticket stub from a movie.

*Explain/discuss why primary sources are good sources of information and why they are not completely credible--people only get one side of the story, etc.

*Explain that when reading primary sources we can get a lot of information but we need to be careful to watch for bias.

*Pass out a short newspaper clipping or journal article or other primary source. Read it out loud to the class. Think aloud as you answer the following questions about the primary source

1. Who wrote the document?

2. When was the document written?

3. What is the main idea or a short summary of the document?

4. What things does the author assume you know?

5. What things does the author leave out?

6. What sort of bias might the author have?

7. Why did the author write this document?

8. What did the author want you to learn from reading this?

*Now give the students a chance to try. Pass out a second primary source and read it as a class. Answer the following questions as a class and have students think aloud as they answer questions.

*I'm thinking that about here you'll be running out of time, but if not, read one more primary source, but this time have students read it in partners or in groups of 3 or 4 and answer the questions. Bring the whole class back together and review the answers to the questions.

*If you still have time, discuss what you've learned about the event that all 3 primary sources were about. Write down a few key facts. Discuss the similarities and differences between the 3 sources. Why were they different? What made them different? How did the similarities and differences help you to create a picture of what happened at Kent State (or the March on Washington or the Battle of Gettysburg)? How does reading and using primary sources differ from reading a textbook?

*And bell. This will only be the first of many days dealing with primary sources, because for the rest of the year, you'll supplement textbook readings with primary sources.

The Take-Five Model

I just recently read that students should be reading in class every day. Reading in class every day. When I was teaching, I liked to use reading for homework, but the more I think about, the more it makes sense to have students reading in class. This allows you, as the teacher, to better monitor comprehension; to guide the reading; to work with struggling readers; reduces homework load for students; motivates students to continue reading at home; and by using the jigsaw method, allows students to read few things in greater depth. So read in class every day.

Here's a strategy from Jeanne R. Paratone and Rachel L. McCormack's "Grouping in Middle and Secondary Grades: Advancing Content and Literacy Knowledge" in Literacy Instruction for Adolescents: Research-Based Practice ed. Karen D. Wood and William E. Blanton, Guilford Press, New York, 2009.

The Take-Five Model has five daily components: get ready, read, reread, respond, and react.

Getting Ready includes doing any of the following

*review previous work

*activate/build background knowledge

*develop vocabulary

*make predictions

*question

* mini lesson

*introduce/implement graphic organizer

*comprehension monitoring

Reading can be done in various groups such as pairs, teams, individual, or whole class and includes

*read with a focus

*main idea

Rereading can also be done in any of the various groups mentioned above and includes

*reading with a different focus

*for detail

*to identity areas of confusion

*verbalize/think aloud

*talk/discuss

*skim

*complete graphic organizers

*KWL

*answer questions in text orally

Responding is also done in various groupings and includes

*response journals

* dialog journals

*arts

*learning logs

*convert graphic organizer to connected text

Reacting is genearlly the whole class but can be done in various groupings and includes

*sharing journal entries

*teacher-led or peer-led discussions

*sharing responses or graphic organizers

I like this model because it is formed around groups and discussions and can be used in any content area. It prevents reading from becoming an isolated activity of students reading on their own and then doing nothing with the reading. It forces students to read, do something with the reading and then read it again. Reading then is an active, involved process where the reading is important now and is use in authentic conversation and not just to answer right there questions.

Children's Books

My new favorite children's books:

The Pigeon books by Mo Willems

I love the interaction of the pigeon with the audience and the text with the pictures and the use of text to to convey tone.

Great books.