Minilessons

Link to both minilessons:

https://docs.google.com/a/msu.edu/document/d/1846NnmDS4g4M5CiT7JCmSYwXJONSV143C6fYhBLxeDk/edit

The student I chose to do the high-frequency lesson with did much better than I had originally anticipated. Out of the list of 84 sight words that my MT gave me to work with, she quickly and correctly identified 82 of them. The students do a lot of work with their sight/word wall words throughout the year and it seems like this is really paying off. By using them in the their journals and playing games that require the kids to physically point out words on the wall, the first graders have become very familiar with how to identify them. The only two words she stumbled on were "hear" (which she pronounced as "hair") and "went" (identified as "wait"). She was also able to write sentences that used the preselected sight words accurately and appropriately.

For the fluency minilesson dealing with chunking, I worked with a different student who has had some problems with fluency in the past. He doesn't have any issues with identifying or sounding out words, but his reading is often choppy and doesn't flow as well as my MT would like it to. We used a book titled "Hospital Party" to do the lesson- one that was introduced to him and put in his book box about a week earlier. He had only read it in a guided setting one time and it was considered to be at his independent level. I read through the book before I pulled him out in the hallway and chose the pages we would be focusing on. After making copies of the selected pages, I marked the papers with the spots that I thought sentences could successfully be "chunked" into. He seemed a little confused when I first introduced the concept of chunking, but after going through the first few sentences, he caught on quickly. Overall I would consider the minilesson to be successful- when I handed him a physical copy of the book and asked him to read me the same sentences one more time, he read a noticeably quicker pace and did a better job of having the entire sentence flow together.

Mini Lessons

Link to both mini lessons: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ppYxkGvFP_49JHdxVMd8ImHQSj2sB4BjuMTVJJ1S11A/edit

Reflection:
I completely underestimated the first student.  I knew he was passed the kindergarten reading level but I was hoping he would struggle with a few words on the first grade sight words list.  However, he breezed through the sight words without ANY problems.  So instead I decided to scrap my lesson altogether since he really did not need any help segmenting.  Instead I had him read me a chapter from a chapter book he was currently reading (probably at least around the 5th grade level) and then retell it to me using his own words.  I thought a little comprehension practice would benefit him more than segmenting parts of words. 
The second lesson went a little more smoothly.  She knew some of the kindergarten sight words easily because they have been working with them a lot.  But she still struggled with more than half.  This gave me a good opportunity to review the sounds letters make and then take a few of the sight words and show her how to break them down into sounds so they are easier to read/sound out.  Once we worked together on a few words I had her try to read some of the words she struggled with on her own and she really seemed to pick up on how to segment.  It was good to see that a simple thing like segementing the hard words into sounds she knew really helped her and now she has this strategy to use in the future when she comes across difficult or longer words.

Struggling Reader- Comprehension

After conducting my mini lessons and reading chapter 11 of the Tompkins text I started thinking about comprehension.  Some kindergarteners are surpassing the class in terms of reading.  They are fluent and have no trouble with decoding and vocabulary.  However, I think that some of the them made be focusing too much on the words and are missing out on the comprehension aspects of readings.  For my letter I would write to the parents of a student who struggles with understanding and comprehending books and stories that are both read to the class and that they read themselves.  It would look something like this:
Dear ________,
While "James" has exceeded all of my expectations of where a kindergarten student should be at in terms of reading, I feel like he is missing out on the key themes and morals of what we read as a class and what he reads to himself.  It seems like he is focusing too much on reading the words as he flys through the pages at a very fast pace but when asked to retell a story or answer questions about what he read he struggles quite a bit.  In class I plan on spending some time teaching comprehension strategies with ALL students.  It is important for every student to understand that comprehension and understanding what they have read is just as important as learning how to read.  I plan on teaching students how to build background knowledge about something before reading, how to retell a story, using sequence boards to help retell a story and setting a purpose for reading.  I think these will benefit James a lot because it will focus his thinking and my goal is for him to learn good comprehension strategies to use when reading so that he will be able to understand the stories more.
It would be very helpful if you would work on these comprehension strategies at home with James so he will get more experience with them.  I will send home some retelling and sequence board worksheets along with some books so that he can practice with them. Thank you for your time and please let me know if you have any quesitons or concerns.

Sincerely,
Chelsey Pearson

Mini Lessons

Link to Reading Lesson #1 Lesson Plan:
https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1qSp_dpvVxgc-v4gsANaFrZWimQQ8qLhdSzfbySvkTpk

Link to Reading Lesson #2 Lesson Plan:
https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=12Ui1lRi6Js25oFZsK-re_k3JseuXhcg6ERIUmtO3Vv8

Reflection(s):
I conducted both of my lessons with two students. Overall, it went well. The idea of treating the identification of sight words (and in the second lesson, phonemes) as a type of "scavenger hunt" was a great motivator. The students seemed eager to locate the words or sounds I prompted or asked for. The texts that were used were appropriate in the sense that students knew most of the words but also were able to expand their word recognition as well as vocabulary (the word "ill" was foreign to them as meaning "sick") with a few select words. Upon the completion of the lesson, both students were able to successfully identify all of the sight words present in the stories as well locate or produce the prompted sounds at the end of the second lesson. Prior to the reading, students mixed up the words "in" and "on"- but were successful in using these words upon completion of the lesson.  As expected, there were minor instances in which the students got off track- as one student complimented the other's "Justin Beiber earrings" and wished to proceed talking about said earrings. As discussed in my lesson plan, I reminded the students of the task at hand and they quickly returned to our reading. In regards to applying their knowledge to the future, the students were eager and said they could use the word "on" in their writing and even new words they didn't know how to read such as hill, and even eager to use a new word for "sick" in the form of "ill." Overall, the lessons were both successful and beneficial to the students!

The Writing Process

In Chapter 2 of Thompson, the Writing Process was heavily focused upon and I was pleasantly surprised to realize how much my kindergarten students engage in the writing process at such a young age. Most prevalently, as I have discussed in relation to other topics throughout TE 402, the students in my placement engage in the writing process through their daily “Reflections” activity. During Reflections, the students first engage in the Prewriting stage by taking a moment to individually think of potential ideas to write about. Some students take this very seriously and actually “rub their brains” to “help stir thoughts.” They proceed to gather and organize ideas; which is also mentioned in the reading, as they ultimately decide upon one topic to write several sentences on. Drafting takes part as the most detailed aspect of the process, as students take turns suggesting various sentences that could be used on the topic at hand, with collaboration in rewording and finding the right “fit” for the actual sentence to be used. Once the sentences are written, the students read the entire Reflection piece aloud, which typically leads to step 3 of the writing process, revision. It is important to note that in the beginning of the year, the process stopped at drafting. However, I have noticed the students beginning to ask the teacher to add more details or suggest changes to the sentences. My MT is not only encouraging of this process, but proceeds to show students how it’s ok to “have a messy paper” with drawing various “arrows” to designate the new detail being added to the sentence etc. The only step missing during the “Reflections” activity is “editing” as the students typically do not focus on misspellings, grammar, or mechanics at this point; especially because my MT writes the sentences for the students at the front of the class. Instead, they move straight to the fifth step outlined by Thompson, publishing. My MT types up their “Reflection” and one student each day gets to draw a picture of the day’s events, to be added to their “Reflection binder.”

While the students are engaging with many steps of the writing process as a whole group, it is important to mention that in the students’ independent writing, less of the writing process has been established. Students spend time writing in their journals frequently, at which time they do engage in both the prewriting (brainstorming) and drafting stages of the writing process. Sometimes they are encouraged to “go back and add details” which would fall into the revision stage, but this is rare as it takes most of the students’ full engagement to reach the drafting point as they are still learning to formulate words and sentences.

My own involvement in working with students and the writing process is significant. Nearly every time I am present in the classroom the students engage in literacy centers, during which time I have worked with students at various points of the writing process, mostly focusing on developing literacy based skills that will help students grow in their writing. 

3 Tiers of Vocabulary

The book that I'm reading for book club is Maniac Magee. The chapters are relatively short (mostly between 2-4 pages), so I looked through a few different chapters to come up with the following examples for each tier of vocabulary words:

Tier 1 (Basic): Simply, jumped, unused, confused, rolling, scrubbing

Tier 2 (Academic): Practically, plunked, unthinkable, sneered, crumpled, loaned, hemisphere

Tier 3 (Specialized): Fishbelly, cast-iron, gingersnap

The words I chose to put in the Tier 1 category are words that are used frequently in everyday conversation. Students who are fluent in English will most likely have heard these words several times before and will know their meaning. The words I listed for tier 2 will probably look familiar to students but they may not know the exact meanings.  As the Tompkins chapter described, these are words that students could possibly pronounce and use in a general sense.  However, diving deeper into the definitions and uses of the word will be beneficial throughout their academic careers. For example, the word 'unthinkable' may be familiar to children but can also be somewhat confusing.  At first glance students might think it is referring to not being able to think about something.  However, when it is used in Manic Magee, it's actually describing something that is controversial.  The specialized tier 3 words I selected are pretty specific to the book itself and may not have much meaning in other contexts.  The word "fishbelly" is used several times throughout the novel as a nickname for the main character. As a Caucasian boy spending much of his time in an African American area, his peers refer to him as "Fishbelly" because his skin is white like the belly of a fish. Explaining this to students would be helpful in understanding the storyline of the book but would probably not be useful in other aspects of learning.

Effective Fluency Assessments

Fluency is a major component of literacy and I think it can be assessed easily as well.  As for the Tompkins reading, I think the running record scoring sheet is effective because it assess's accuracy as well as reading speed if the assesser records the speed.  While it seems like a lot of work for the teacher or assesser I think it is very effective in assessing fluency.  I also really like the "Words I Know" test on page 73.  I've never seen an assessment like this before but I like its simplicity.  While it might be the most effective way of assessing fluency, I think it will give the assesser a better idea of what words the student already knows well (sight words) and what the students might need to work on more.  I also think that reading books with students is also an effective informal assessment.  It is a good way to assess students prosody.

As for my placement, since I am in a kindergarten classroom and it is getting closer to the end of the year, fluency is something they are focusing on right now.  My mentor teacher focuses on literacy with the students so I get the opportunity to see how she assess students as well as get a chance to see the students grow and improve.  The students have really grown as far as sight words.  At the beginning of the year they would need my help to read or write just about every word but now I am so impressed at how much they can do on their own.  Also, not only do they have more sight words but they have also learned how to sound words out which has helped them a lot as far as fluency is concerned.