Emma Newton Inquiry 2 Part A

Emma Newton Inquiry 2 Part A

1.     Describe your target area for guided lead teaching.
            After observing and informally (and formally on occasion) assessing my first grade students through out the past 3 weeks my mentor teacher and I have realized that the students need to work on their comprehension skills a lot.  I plan on teaching, primarily through modeling and book discussions, various strategies my students can use in order to help them comprehend.  I hope to teach them about a “First Grade 5 Finger Retell,”  (a retell including the characters, setting, beginning, middle and end of a story) text-to-self connections, and visualization.  Additionally (because this is first grade and there is A LOT of time set aside for literacy, I hope to continue working with my students on writing sentences and details that make a sentence a sentence.

2.     Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?
            We do Daily 5 almost everyday.  During time (Daily 5) two hours is set aside for Reading/Literacy time.  However, only one of the two hours is instruction time and the other hour the students are working independently.  Therefore, I have roughly one hour (four 15 minute mini lessons) of instruction time.

3.     Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?
-CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2 Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson.
-CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.3 Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story, using key details.
-CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.7 Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.9 Compare and contrast the adventures and experiences of characters in stories.

4.     How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives?  In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning through literacy?
            As we have learned in our class readings, comprehension is KEY to reading.  Therefore, by teaching/modeling ways to work on comprehension I will be teaching my students one of the most important aspects of literacy learning and without this skill learning through literacy is impossible.

5.     What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?
            In first grade (especially at this point in the year) I am learning that it is difficult to have a lot of student-led talks.  A lot of the students make a connection to a question or a story, (which is good) but it often leads to an off topic comment /story that does not contribute to the lesson or topic we are attempting to teach about.  However, I have not lost hope, I am thinking that it would be beneficial to teach my students “Do you agree, disagree or have something to add on to what_______ said?”  This I think would help keep students on task and teach them to build off of each other and have more of a students-lead conversation.

6.     Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?
            Reading comprehension/strategy instruction.  I hope to learn more about teaching strategies through modeling.  There is a lot of strategies to teach students that will help them comprehend information, and I think it is crucial that students learn these skills.    

7.     What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?
            I plan to use the Elmo and Promethean board if possible, and if I feel (after looking into it more) that it would be beneficial for the students.  Additionally, I have a “5 Finger Retell” glove that has all the elements (and little related pictures) of the “5 Finger Retell” that I hope to teach them about.  This I hope will help them remember all five elements that they should be looking for when reading/including while retelling a story.

8.     What additional resources do you need to obtain?
            As of right now I am not sure what additional resources I will need to obtain.  Depending on if the Promethean board is working, I am considering showing a virtually book/story and using it to model a 5 Finger Retell/ use it to lead into a book discussion.  I am hoping that perhaps the visually pleasing elements/”fun” technology elements that a visual book brings to the table will captivate/interest the students more so that they will pay close attention.  Also, I need to decide what books I want to read aloud- I want students to like/be interested in them!

9.     How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?
            I hope to do some type of informal assessment (mainly because the students are only in 1^st grade.)  This I am thinking will include having the students retell a story as I pay close attention to the elements they include (prior to my unit.)  Additionally I would like to have a book discussion at the beginning of my teaching unit and at the end to see if growth has occurred.  I am hoping they will learn to build off of teach others ideas (still with some teacher guidance) and learn through literacy.

10.   What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?
            I want to find out more about what my students are interested in outside of school, and what types of stories they like.  This I think will help me make the lessons more interesting and engaging for my students.  Additionally I believe I need to do more research about how I can help them work toward have a class discussion with each other as opposed to always teacher lead discussions.    

11.   What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?
            I would like to learn more about what I should be keeping consistent (practicing with the students everyday) in order for them to accomplish the goals of my unit plan.  Additionally, I want to know more about where students should be (according to grade level) with respect to the core practice I am attempting to teach.
           

12.   What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?
            I want the students to like/be interested in the lessons.  At times I feel that they easily tune out and do not gain any information from a lesson, but if they are interested/engaged they actively participate and clearly take something away from the lesson.  Additionally I am concerned that time will not go smoothly.  Daily 5 is a tight/strict schedule and I want to be able to keep the students routine the same so that it is not too much change for them taking place all at once. 

Hong Inquiry 2 Part A Target Area

1.      Describe your target area for guided lead teaching

I will be working on Reading Comprehension/ Strategy Instruction and Writing Instruction for this unit. The topic of the unit would be “how to…” and I will read books on “how to…” and have writing lessons. I do not have clear ideas about how to make the 10lessons, however, I have talked to my mentor teacher and we decided to work on “how to…” lessons. We will read books that have “how to do things” and we will connect the lessons to the readings. Since our school uses both CCSS and GLCE, I will be using both CCSS and GLCE.

2.      Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?

We did not discuss exactly how much time we are going to spend for each lesson, but, I am assuming that each lesson will be 30-40 minutes per day. Most of our lessons in our class consist of 30minutes lessons, such as whole group worksheets and writing worksheets. Therefore, I am trying to follow our routines in order to minimize the conflicts among our lessons and the routines.

3.      Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.1.7 Participate in shared research and writing projects (e.g., explore a number of “how-to” books on a given topic and use them to write a sequence of instructions).

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.1.2 Write informative/explanatory texts in which they name a topic, supply some facts about the topic, and provide some sense of closure

4.      How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives? In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning through literacy?

Students start to learn how to follow patterns, routines and directions. As an example, if they learn how to write letters on lines, they will be able to learn how to write letters and use them in their lives such as class lessons and homework. Also, students can learn “how to” do things and behave in certain situations and routines. Since we will be focusing on writing such as letters, words and sentences, they will learn how to read, listen and write; we will read books to support my lessons.

5.      What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?

We will use whole group talk and individual quiet thinking time. They will first be working at the carpet area for reading and instructions from me and then, they will be seated at their seats. They will work individually at their seats quietly. I will lead the class at first until they get all the instructions, then, they will lead the discussion as they write their works on their worksheets. They might have small conversation where they can share their thoughts about the readings or worksheets as they work on their lessons, however, there will be no specific time for them to discuss about the lessons. They will start from lower-level thinking and as lessons go, I will develop the thinking to higher-level thinking.

6.      Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?

We will work on reading aloud and responding to reading as we work on the unit. I will be reading books aloud at first to show different kinds of “how to” books and they will respond to the readings at the carpet area. I will look at their progress; we will collect all the worksheets and results, then, we will see how they improved or did not improve. As an example, we may see one student developed her/his penmanship or spelling.

7.      What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?

My mentor teacher provides resources about “how to…” lessons and books which I can develop previous knowledge about the area; I can improve my lesson as I go over all the resources. Also, we will see what they are interested in and what they do outside of school so that I would know which lessons to make. I will go to school library to see if there are any books that are related to our target area; we may check out and read them aloud.

8.      What additional resources do you need to obtain?

I would like to gather more information about first graders’ lessons about “how to….” I think I lack some information about the lessons yet, therefore, I need to check if there are more information about “how to…” from online/ offline resources.

9.      How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?

We will read several “how to…” books before we assess my students. We will briefly discuss about each book during pre-assessment and we will read them aloud again during our assessments, if necessary. I will keep reading the books in order to develop higher-level thinking and let them know how the lessons will be done. My mentor teacher and I decided that reading books several times would help them have deeper knowledge about the topics/ stories.

10.  What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?

I need to check if there are any students with special needs and what I can do for them; I already have some ideas/ thoughts about my students, but, I need to work on it with more details. Also, I have to think extra works for students who are in advanced level or who are behind as well. I need to make sure that everyone is following the lessons and instructions.

11.  What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?

I would like to find more information about core practice and similar lessons that other teachers already did in order to collect more information.

12.  What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?

My mentor teacher and I recently decided which topics we are going to do for my unit, therefore, I still need to think more about my plans and lessons

Abbie Sliger Inquiry 2 Part A

Your Name: _Abbie Sliger__________________

Inquiry Two, Part A:

Discuss Your Target Area and ‘Core Practice’ for Guided Lead Teaching NOTE: YOU MAY INSERT YOUR ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS POSED BELOW IN A DIFFERENT COLOR FONT.  Please name your file with your last name and email as an attachment to your instructor (example: SmithPartATargetArea.docx) Talk with your MT about your idea, and use the information you gained from Inquiry One to respond to the following guiding questions listed below.  Email your responses to your instructor before our Week 4class (September 26) AND post them on your book club blog:

1. Describe your target area for guided lead teaching.

My target area for guided lead teaching is sequencing. I will be working with students to develop their abilities to retell a story in the order that it occurred. This is an important part of the first grade literacy curriculum at Cornell and therefore I want to be able to give my students the tools they need to master this target area.

2. Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?

There is approximately 1 hour a day devoted to this area. I will be focusing on my target area during the time that the students are taught from the Reading Street curriculum. We focus on whole group instruction for about half an hour and then break in to small groups for the second half hour.

3. Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.1 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2 Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.3 Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story, using key details.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.1.3 Write narratives in which they recount two or more appropriately sequenced events, include some details regarding what happened, use temporal words to signal event order, and provide some sense of closure.

4. How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives?  In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning through literacy?

Teaching in this target area will give students the ability to retell and discuss what they are reading in a sequential order. This skill will also translate over to their writing abilities. This relates to their lives as they are constantly wanting to share something about themselves or some event and often do not know where to begin. Having the skill of sequencing gives the students a foundation for communication. The students are learning literacy as they will be applying this skill to both reading and writing. They will be learning about literacy by understanding that sequencing is an important part of literacy and they are already using and hearing sequencing often in their daily lives. They will also be learning through literacy by using different texts and writing activities to help them become aware of and practice using sequencing.

5. What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?

I would really like to build student led discussions within my classroom norms. The students often have a lot to share and I think that giving them the opportunity to share their ideas will help them gain a deeper level of understanding and give their peers a new perspective. I do not want my unit to be all teacher led. I know that some students learn better through doing activities instead of talking about them. I would really like to make the focus of my lesson to help the students develop their ability to share what they are thinking and ask questions about what they do not understand to their peers.

6. Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?

The core practice that I want to work on developing is mini-lessons. Being placed in first grade it is very apparent that the students do not have the best attention span or the patience for un-needed information. I think using mini lessons will not only help those students who are struggling to focus, but will give all of the students the tools they need to be successful. I think using mini lessons will contribute to my own professional learning by having my lessons more focused and clear. This will give the students a chance to gain the most information from the lessons I am teaching.

7. What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?

I have many resources within Okemos. My mentor teacher is a great resource for this target area as she has taught this skill to first graders before. The other first grade teachers at Cornell are also great resources, as they will be teaching the same topic at some point. There are many specialists that exist within Cornell and the Okemos district that will be able to provide me with any materials that I may need for my lesson.

8. What additional resources do you need to obtain?

I need to obtain some visual aids for my lesson. I have observed that the students in my classroom really respond to having a visual so I will need to include some in my lesson.

9. How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?

I will assess my students by having them read a story and then retell the story in a sequential order. I will also have my students complete a writing task that has them ordering tasks.

10. What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?

I will need to be up to date on the reading and writing abilities of all of my students. As they are learning their abilities are changing and therefore some students need to be more challenged than they were a few weeks ago. The last thing I want is for my students to be frustrated with the lesson so I really want to do some research on their abilities to make sure the whole group activities are on level tasks.

11. What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?

I do not see many mini lessons taking place in my placement so I need to do some personal research as to what mini lessons consist of and what makes them successful.

12. What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?

I currently do not have any concerns. I am sure that will change as the weeks progress. 

Chelsea Gose- Inquiry Two, Part A

Inquiry Two, Part A:

Discuss Your Target Area and ‘Core Practice’ for Guided Lead Teaching

Talk with your MT about your idea, and use the information you gained from Inquiry One to respond to the following guiding questions listed below.  Email your responses to your instructor before our Week 4 class (September 26) AND post them on your book club blog:

1.     Describe your target area for guided lead teaching.

My target area for guided lead teaching will be about details during reading and writing. I will specifically focus on writing instruction as my target area. During reading, I will focus on the details of the story, including: characters, setting, central message, etc. During writing, I will focus on “small moments” where they students learn to add details to their writing and write about one specific moment in time instead of just one big event that happened.

2.     Approximately how much time per day is allotted for your instruction in this area?

I will have about 40-45 minutes per day to teach each lesson.

3.     Which Common Core State Standard(s) will you work toward?

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.1 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2 Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.3 Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story, using key details.

• CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.1.5 With guidance and support from adults, focus on a topic, respond to questions and suggestions from peers, and add details to strengthen writing as needed.

4.     How will teaching in this target area provide opportunities for students to learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives?  In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning through literacy?

This unit will be important for my students because details are an important part of life. If they use more details in their writing and conversation, others will be able to visualize the story they are telling. It will help them convey their ideas in a clearer and informative way. The students are learning literacy because they are developing their writing and reading skills. They are learning about literacy because they will use different types of genres to guide them in their own writing. They will be able to point out the different aspects of details in a story. They are learning through literacy because they will be able to notice the details in their own writing and in the writing of their peers.

5.     What types of classroom talk take place within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led, or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?

At the beginning of my unit, I will start with teacher-led conversations to introduce each new idea about detail. By the end of the unit, I hope to have more of a student-led atmosphere in the classroom. This goes hand in hand with the gradual release of responsibility. Eventually, my students will be independent writers and will need little to no assistance from the teacher to get their writing done, using the specific details I will be teaching them. I think it will be helpful for the students to share with a partner before doing their writing so they can talk about what they will be doing and brainstorm some ideas before they write their story. We would review how partners work together based on our anchor chart from Writing Workshop.

6.     Which ‘core practice’ do you want to work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this core practice contribute to your own professional learning?

I will work on developing/improving minilessons focused on learning needs. Focusing on this will help my own professional learning because I will need to get to know my students really well to see which details of writing I need to focus on for my unit. As a teacher, it is very important to know your students so you can plan lessons that are engaging and meaningful. It will also force me to narrow down my ideas to the most important things students need to learn in order to be better writers. I will do my best to make sure I don’t teach any lessons that will not improve their writing skills.

7.     What resources within the community, neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in this target area?

My mentor teacher, teachers in my school, and my classmates will be resources because I can bounce ideas off of them and have them look over my unit to make sure it makes sense and to offer me any suggestions. I pretty much have all of the supplies I will need to teach my lesson. My MT has lots of books on literacy that I will be able to use to help come up with more ideas for my lessons. The school curriculum has a literacy book called Treasure that I can also use. I will also use the school library to find books that I want to use during my lesson.

8.     What additional resources do you need to obtain?

I need to find books that we can do read alouds for that will demonstrate the different aspects of details in a story. I will also need to print out writing workshop paper for my students to use. I will also need large pieces of paper so I can make anchor charts for my students to reference when doing their writing.

9.     How will you pre-assess your students in your target area?

I will have my students do a piece of work about anything they want and just mention that they need to include details. From this, I will determine which details my students are familiar with and what “details” mean to them. I hope that their writing after my unit will include the details that we will be learning about.

10.  What else will you need to find out about all students in your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?

I would like to sit down and talk with my students individually to see how they feel about writing. I did this for 801 and it was really helpful to hear how they students feel and the specific things they enjoy about that subject. If there is a specific aspect of literacy learning that they don’t enjoy, I will try and modify my lesson to make it more meaningful and enjoyable for my students.

11.  What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core practice’ to support your planning and teaching?

I would like to research it a little more and figure out what I will teach for my 10 lessons. I will try and find out what would be the most effective lessons so my students can improve their writing over the course of my unit.

12.  What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and teaching your unit?

I can’t think of any concerns at this time. I just really want my students to be able to develop and improve their writing skills. I think they will have fun with my unit!

Brown Book Club: Initial Post 2- Chelsea Gose

In the readings for this week, I learned a lot about integrating basic skills, daily writing, and conferencing with students. In chapter 7, it talked a lot about making learning meaningful and engaging for the students. One of the things that stood out to me was when Routman talked about teaching students explicity and telling them why you are teaching them the subject. This helps students see the purpose of the lessons and help them see why they are important. At Averill Elementary, we have objectives charts that we hang up in our classrooms. The goal is for students to be able to refer to the objectives and understand their goals for the lesson. It also talked about the importance of word walls and how making the word walls flexible can help the students with their spelling and confidence in writing. 

Chapter 8 talked about how to make our students better writers. We need to teach our students how to choose worthwhile topics, so they are writing about something they care about, something they can tell a lot about, and something where they can include appropriate and interesting details. The chapter also focused a lot on teachers modeling the tasks for the students. This can be done at every grade level. If a teacher can effectively model the assignment for the class, her students will be more successful in completing the task. It also mentioned the optimal learning model which relates to the gradual release of responsibility. In this model, it starts with the teacher demonstrating and modeling for the students and eventually the students will be able to do their work independently. Another thing Routman talked about in this chapter was "Teach it first, label it later". If you were to teach your students about writing an "expository multiparagrah essay", it would be better to do the assignment together first, and then explain to the students that they just wrote an expository multiparagraph essay so the students don't get overwhelmed and confused. 

Chapter 9 discusses the different types of writing conferences, which include: whole-class shares, quickshares, on-the-run-conferences (while walking about the class-room as the kids write), one-on-one formal conferences, and peer conferences. During conferences, it is important to: listen to what the writer is trying to say, affirm what writer has done well, reinforcing the writer's strengths/attempts, assessing confusions/strengths/next steps, teaching, scaffolding, and setting goals with the student's input. 

All of the readings have help me think of ways to incorporate these ideas into my classroom. The book offers ideas of implementing these concepts into my classroom and I look forward to integrating the basic skills, organizing for daily writing, and talking with my students about their writing. 

Brown Book Club: Initial Post 1- Emma Newton

Brown Book Club: Initial Post 1
Emma Newton
   
     Generally speaking, I found the reading we did this week to be rather informative, and I enjoyed learning about all of the different ways that professionals in the education field today are thinking about reading and comprehension.  However, while reading the first chapter I found myself feeling rather frustrated.  I understand that being an "Active Reader" and making self to text connections is an extremely important part of reading and comprehension, but how can I be worried about that when more than half of my first grade students can not decode (read) the text.  At first I was thinking, Well this chapter is rather irrelevant to my experience at this point in time, but now I feel completely different.
     Although the majority of my students need to learn to decode text and read, we should still be teaching them (mostly through example, in my opinion) strategies to use while reading that will encourage them to be active readers that are making connections to the text that help them to comprehend.  As the reading pointed out through the "story" at the beginning of chapter two about a teacher, Steph, and her second grade student, Alverro, sometimes when students focus so much on decoding (and often teachers too) students fail to remember what they read making it impossible for them to comprehend and make connections in their mind that allow them to learn through reading.  I now understand we must take the time to encourage students to ask questions about the text and relate to it, even if we are concerned about their ability to decode text.
       Furthermore, In my mind I feel this weeks reading pushed the importance of constructing relevant curriculum that the students are interested in and have prior knowledge about so that it will encourage and allow them to easily make connections and relate to it.  Constructing a relevant curriculum I feel is extremely important in relation to the majority of the definitions of comprehension throughout the first four chapters of Strategies that Work.  However, I also feel that is easier said than done.  I hope to learn more about my students interests and prior knowledge so that they can relate and make text to self connections whether is be with a text they are reading or with something I am reading to them.  I would also love to learn more about strategies that my mentor teacher uses to build a relevant curriculum.