Week 12: Metacognitive Assessments and Comprehension Video

This video was extremely informative. It offered vital information and strategies that should be taught to students in order to help build their reading comprehension. In the video, Professor Duke explains why teaching comprehension strategies becomes very important in elementary grades 3-5, because it is at these grade levels that students are exposed to expository text, and when a student is reading an expository text the teacher can not assume that the student has prior knowledge or prior understanding of the topic that is being discusse, so that is why comprehension of the text is important.
I really like the idea of having a poster in the classroom listing a variety of strategies (such as thinking aloud, creating inferences, building predictions, rereading, looking for context clues, breaking down unknown words) that students could use to guide their thinking about text. I also liked how the teacher consistently modeled and guided students through these strategies and how to use them; this is definitely an instructional practice that I will implement in my future classroom.

I would definitely use many ideas in this video in my future classroom to help students build their comprehension. I would help my future students learn how to build on their comprehension skills by through discussion, writing along with explicitly teaching comprehension strategies, teacher modeling of these strategies, as well as guided use of these strategies. Comprehension strategies are basically sets of steps that good readers use to make sense of text. Comprehension strategy instruction helps students become purposeful, active readers who are in control of their own reading comprehension.

QRI-5 vs. DIBELS

The Qualitative Reading Inventory-5 can be used to provide appropriate information in

three areas:

1. To identify a student’s instructional level

2. To determine areas of reading in which the student is having difficulty

3. To document growth based on a type of instructional program or intervention

When used to determine a student’s reading levels, the QRI-5 can help find the levels

at which a student can read independently, read with instructional guidance, and read

with frustration. The QRI-5 can also be used to determine if a student’s reading levels are

below his or her chronological grade level, and this goes from K-12.

The Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) are a set of procedures and measures for assessing the acquisition of early literacy skills from kindergarten through sixth grade. They are designed to be short (60 seconds) fluency measures used to regularly monitor the development of early literacy and early reading skills. These assessments are performed using a computerized handheld device such as a palm or IPod touch.

DIBELS are comprised of seven measures to function as indicators of phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, accuracy and fluency with connected text, reading comprehension, and vocabulary. The measures that encompass Dibels are Initial Sounds Fluency (ISF), Letter Naming Fluency (LNF), Phoneme Segmentation Fluency (PSF), Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF), Oral Reading Fluency (ORF), Retell Fluency (RTF), and Word Use Fluency (WUF).  DIBELS were designed for use in identifying children experiencing difficulty in acquisition of basic early literacy skills in order to provide support early and prevent the occurrence of later reading difficulties.

QRI-5 vs. Dibels: The first difference between the two is the grade levels in which each assessments aim towards. The QRI-5 offers assessment materials for students in grades K-12, while Dibels is from only K-6. Dibels also has a time limit for each assessment, which 60 seconds. The QRI-5 also has timed assessments but it is not used on all grade levels.

Both the QRI-5 and Dibels be used to identify reading levels and match students to suitable text, verify a suspected reading problem, determine strength and needs of a student, and recommend paths for interventions. The QRI-5 and Dibels are designed to identify students having difficulty in achieving basic literacy skills, however, Dibels is more specific; it assesses issues such as phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, accuracy and fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. The QRI-5 is a little different; it has word lists, concept questions (accessing prior knowledge), miscue analysis, retelling, and comprehension questions.

I really enjoyed using the QRI-5. So far I only had the opportunity to practice on my friend’s kid, but I think it is a great assessment tool, and is overall student friendly. However, I feel that the Dibels can be quite challenging for the student and the teacher. I did find some difficultly on the palm with pressing the buttons, so that was a little upsetting; hopefully, when it comes out on the IPod touch that will not be a problem. Also, I can see how it can be frustrating to the student because of the time allowance. Students may feel pressured knowing they only have 60 seconds. In conclusion, I really enjoyed learning how to use and administer both assessments and will certainly use them in the future when I teach.

Observation Update

During my second observation this week, I had the opportunity to speak and interview the ESL teacher. My interview transcript is below. I also had the opportunity to sit with my student Socrates. Socrates is in fifth grade. He is an ELL student and also has special needs; he has ADHD. His parents were born in Greece, and Socrates was born here. However, he told me that his parents speak only Greek at home so that is how he communicates with them. Also his grandmother was his baby sitter since he was born and also only speaks Greek. So he learned English when he was in kindergarten however, due to his ADHD he is having trouble with English. His teacher told me that he does read and write on 4th grade instructional level.

I tried to administer the QRI-5. Unfortunately, Socrates did not want to do it. He kept getting up and walking around the room. So the teacher and I decided not to push the issue and try it another day. I was not able to set up another day to observe this week due to the school schedule and the fact that the schools will be closed next week for spring vacation, I will be hopefully going back on Tuesday April 26th. I will keep you all posted!

Interview with an ESL Teacher

Interview Questions with ESL Teacher

Q: Please describe your ELL teaching experience.

I have been a ESL teacher in this school district for 10 years now. I got this job straight out of school so I was very lucky.

Q: What is your perception on ELLs in terms of their learning motivation and performance (especially in reading and writing)? What learning difficulties do ELLs usually encounter in schools? What is the role of the family and community in helping ELL's learning?

I feel that an ELL student learns better and is motivated when learning is engaging, fun and they feel like they can contribute to the classroom. That is a hard question to answer because each student is different. Some students have trouble with pronunciations. It is extremely important that the family becomes involved in the student's learning. I feel that students whose families are involved do better in the classroom. It is also important to have community support.

Q: In your opinion, how do classroom teachers resolve ELL's learning difficulties? What strategies do you adopt? Are they effective or not? Do you participate in on-going professional training for teaching ELLs? What if your experience in terms of working with students from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds? How do you make sure that your teaching is culturally responsive? How do you go about reaching out to the family and community?

Classroom teachers do try to resolve ELL student learning difficulties as best as they can. Some teachers learn some basic words of the ELL student's native language, and are able to communicate with them in difficult situations. Some teachers use pictures to help students understand words. However, it is often hard for them to spend too much time when they have 22-25 students to teach; that is where the ESL teachers come in. I make sure that my teaching is culturally resonsive by doing my research on it. I also frequently attend seminars and workshops.

Q: If you have an ELL in your class whose culture you are not familiar with at all, how do you go about teaching the child?

If I have a an ELL student whose culture I am not familiar with, I do research on it.

Week 8: What contributes to an effective writing program?

1. Discuss the components of an effective writing program and why they are important.

The main components of an effective writing program are personal connections, writing conventions, and inventions.  For one, I feel that personal connections are extremely important for students when writing; students can become more engaged to write more apt to write when they can relate to a topic through a personal experience.  I believe that if students are encouraged to write about a topic using their own experiences, then their will be more creative with their writing. I feel that these components are important to have in an effective writing program because they keep students interested and they also greatly help them with their writing.

2. How might you rearrange your schedule to create more time for students to write in general and, in particular, for students to write about their personal experiences?

  

I would rearrange my class schedule and set aside 10-15 of class time each day for writing. During this time students would write in their write in their journal or scrapbook. The topic can be either something related to the lesson or free writing where students just write creatively about anything they find interesting. I would then set aside one or two days a month where students who choose, get to share their writing in class and read aloud to the class.

3. How can you create ways for students to make personal connections in different subject areas through writing?

 Depending on the subjects, I would ask students if they can relate to the topic through something they experienced, heard or saw, and write about it.

4. How can student work help you decide which conventions to teach?

Through the observations of student writing the teacher will be able to figure out the strengths and weaknesses of the class. So for example, if the teacher finds that a bulk of the class is having problems with certain verb tenses, then the teacher will know to focus more on making sure that the students are familiar with that.

5. When can you promote student inventions and experimentation with different formats in writing?

A teacher can promote students to use invention and experimentation with different formats in writing creative writing during writing time, language arts, and basically throughout the day when she/he feels it to be necessary

Interview with ESL teacher

I will be interviewing the ESL teacher from the Harbor Hill Elementary School next Monday April 11th, I will keep you all posted.

QRI-5 Assessment

For the word list he did fabulous! He got all of the words right on his level, and on the level below. However, when he was reading the level above, I noticed that he was hesitating a lot. He knew all the words, but I think because I told him that these words are a level above his he started to get nervous and lose his confidence. I had to re-assure him that he was doing a good job, and then he really did, read all the words. For the narrative text I had him read "The trip to the Zoo." I started with the pre-knowledge questions and he did very well, he knew all the questions100%.  On that reading passage he only had 6 miscues which made him an independent reader on that level. On the retelling he recalled 40/ 55ideas.  On the questions he got all but one correct without look-backs, and only looked back for one question.

For the expository he read"Cats, lions and tigers in your house." For the concept questions he scored 9/12. On the reading passage he had 7 miscues, so once again he is an independent reader for that level.  He did pretty well on the retelling knew 38/47 ideas. On the questions he got all but one correct without look-backs, and only looked back for one question, same as the narrative text.  So my guess on how he reads was right, he is an independent reader for his level.