Electronic Portfolio: December 2010

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Parental Involvement

Parental Involvement research: http://www.michigan.gov/documents/Final_Parent_Involvement_Fact_Sheet_14732_7.pdf

I plan on implementing parental involvement by sending home a daily folder that may have homework that needs to be signed or something that requires parent assistance. I will send home a letter at the beginning of school asking for their student's help in learning this year along with the article that's linked above. I will stress its importance and ask for 5-10 minutes a night with their child. Reading logs including the parent, guardian, or sibling reading to the student every so often. I will implement rewarding for students that have exceptional parent involvement.

Independent Reading

Independent Reading needs to take place on a daily basis in the classroom. This is a quiet time for students to jump into their books. I will at times issue homework in which students tell me about the book they are reading and their opinions on it. I want it to be enjoyable and not something they associate with boring schoolwork. I want my class to take their books home with them so they know that books have the ability to be read anywhere they want, and can be enjoyed wherever a student goes. Having students set goals for themselves will motivate them to read too.

Its benefits are ever increasing. Students' fluency and vocabulary will increase over time. In my class, I would like to implement a literature journal. It's a literature circle without the circle. I want students to give opinions on chapters, characters, and have them think critically about about their books. I will give adequate time for daily independent reading in my classroom.

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Using Reading Programs Effectively

Reading programs can be a great educational guide if they are used as intended. Programs aren't meant to be followed exactly step by step and can be adjusted to fit your needs and your student's needs. Teachers should not feel trapped because it's more of a guide but can also be really helpful when planning for strategies to work on with students. Reading programs also do more than just help with reading. They provide writing and language arts aspects as well. It entails whole group, small group, extension activities, and focuses on specific skills each week for students to acquire. Examples are cause and effect, drawing conclusions, and comprehension. The lesson I taught was from the Reading Program, Reading Street.

Accelerated reader helps promote enjoyment from reading books at their own pace and their own reading level. It is based on a reward system and is used to motivate students to read. The one thing the teacher needs to stress is "just right" books. This will assist in their fluency and vocabulary development. In my class, I hope to implement Accelerated Reader as a tool for student growth by encouraging them to read not only during independent reading, but also at home on a rainy day when there is nothing else to do. I plan on requiring updates on their books in the form of journals or writing circles. This will assist them when they take their A.R. test.

Reading Block Planning Sheet
Name Brian Stevens School Castlen Elementary Grade 5th
Reading Street – Unit _3__, Week _1__, Day __2_
Objectives: List objectives for the entire reading block.
TSW:
• Recognize the use and effect of literary elements and devices, including setting, character traits, stated purpose, metaphors and simple symbolism to gain information from various text formats; identifying implied purpose
• Use a wide range of strategies and skills, including using text features to gain meaning, summarizing passages, and drawing conclusions to comprehend 5th grade reading materials: determining sequence of events
• Demonstrate reading vocabulary knowledge, including recognition of multiple meaning words

Evaluation: Tell how you will evaluate each objective.
• The teacher will evaluate during small groups as we read the play together. The teacher will ask higher order questions on author purpose and story structure to check for understanding.
• The teacher will use the smartboard vocabulary notebook lesson to enhance vocabulary knowledge, including multiple meaning words.

Materials: List all materials that will be used during the reading block.
• Reading street, smartboard, vocabulary sheet, computer(s), smartboard notebook lesson on author’s purpose, vocabulary smartboard lesson
For the next 2 sections, explain your teaching procedures and/or explain what the students will be doing. Please make sure that you are covering all of the objectives. **Add in at least one additional resource or activity to supplement Reading Street. Please mark the additional resource/activity in bold print.
Whole Group Instruction: The teacher will begin the reading block by using the smartboard to increase vocabulary skills. It is oral discussion of each of the words of the week, with the students participating by using the words in a sentence. Once that is finished, the teacher will direct the class into their small groups as the teacher calls one group to her table for small group instruction.
Independent Activities:
• Technology Center- Students may work on the Ticket to Read program, accelerated reader testing, or accelerated reading
• Skill center- Students read their Accelerated Reading book
• Reading Center- Students complete the 10 Important Sentences handout, which involves sequencing the Reading Street story, Wings for the King, using the 10 sentences provided. Use your book to help you place the sentence strips into logical order. The students must show evidence from the story as they sort the sentences. There will be one sentence that is irrelevant and does not belong. They will explain reasons why it’s been chosen.
• Smartboard Center- The students will follow the instructions on the smartboard lesson. There are matching games for vocabulary words, short stories with questions at the end for author purpose and story structure

Small Group Instruction: Use the attached form for planning for small groups

After you teach the entire reading block, complete your reflection. In your reflection please explain what went well, what you would do differently if teaching this same lesson again, AND tell at least one thing you would do differently in your own classroom.

Small Group Plans for Unit 3, Week 1, Day 2

Group: Green
Title of Text: Wings for the King__________________________________
Author: Anne Sroda______________________________ Level:_________________
Strategy/Skill Focus: Author Purpose, Story Structure, Cause and Effect (reviewed), Vocabulary Development

Vocabulary(Word Work Focus): Admiringly, permit, scoundrel, subject, worthless. These words are in the story, and the teacher will stop to ask for recognition and meaning.

Extension Activity: Assigning parts of the play Wings for the King for the group and having students read aloud together along with the teacher.

Group: Yellow
Title of Text: Wings for the King__________________________________
Author: Anne Sroda______________________________ Level:_________________
Strategy/Skill Focus: Author Purpose, Story Structure, Cause and Effect (reviewed), Vocabulary Development

Vocabulary(Word Work Focus): Admiringly, permit, scoundrel, subject, worthless. These words are in the story, and the teacher will stop to ask for recognition and meaning.

Extension Activity: Assigning parts of the play Wings for the King for the group and having students read aloud together along with the teacher.

Group: Blue
Title of Text: Wings for the King__________________________________
Author: Anne Sroda______________________________ Level:_________________
Strategy/Skill Focus: Author Purpose, Story Structure, Cause and Effect (reviewed), Vocabulary Development

Vocabulary(Word Work Focus): Admiringly, permit, scoundrel, subject, worthless. These words are in the story, and the teacher will stop to ask for recognition and meaning.

Extension Activity: Assigning parts of the play Wings for the King for the group and having students read aloud together along with the teacher.

Guided Reading/Small Groups

Maybe one of the most important parts of the day, small groups allow the teacher to roll his/her sleeves up, and work with children 4-7 at a time. Small group work is one way of ensuring active participation of students. It also enables students to move more readily from receiving knowledge to generating knowledge. Through discussion students are able to personalize this knowledge and build their thinking processes and understandings.

In my small groups, we read leveled readers together one day, and read a story from reading street the next day. Because the story was a play, I assigned parts and had the students read as if acting out the part using their voice.

Shared Reading

Shared reading is a great way to develop fluency and sentence structure. Teachers can use echo reading, buddy reading, choral reading as ways to develop those skills. In my lesson, I chose to echo read using a Halloween poem. However, being in a 5th grade classroom, I had some students racing to finish the echo. So be aware of the level of children you are reading to. Afterwards, we went over vocabulary words from the poem, and had students infer what the poem was about.

I. Subject/Content Area
• Reading/Language Arts/Holiday
II. Course of Study
• Use a range of strategies, including drawing conclusions such as opinions about characters based on their actions and summarizing passages, to comprehend fifth-grade recreational reading materials in a variety of genres.
• Use a wide range of strategies and skills, including using text features to gain meaning, summarizing passages, and drawing conclusions, to comprehend fifth-grade informational and functional reading materials.
III. Concepts
• Fluency, recognizing words automatically, reading with expression
IV. Behavioral Objectives
• TSW demonstrate fluency, focusing on reading with expression
• TSW use high-frequency words correctly in oral language
• TSW identify sequence of events
V. Evaluation
• Teacher observation of students participating in shared reading lesson by reading fluently, with expression, and using high-frequency words in oral language.
• Class discussion identifying sequencing of events in the poem

VI. Materials
• Meeting Myself, a Halloween Poem for all students, highlighters, SMARTboard
VII. Teaching/Learning Procedures
A. Motivation
• The teacher will announce the title of the poem, and have students make predictions about the poem. The teacher will ask students what they like best about Halloween.
B. Instructional Procedures
• The teacher will distribute copies of the poem to each student. Teacher will explain that they are going to practice reading the poem fluently today. They will listen to the teacher model the poem fluently and with expression.
• The teacher will read the poem, two lines at a time, with the class echoing those exact two lines as they follow along with their poem.
• The students will read the poem together, without echoing. The teacher will step in if needed, in case the class gets off track.
• The teacher and students will discuss any challenging words and highlight them on the poem.
• The teacher will then write on the smartboard a line from the poem, and a student will come to the board and write something that happened either before or after that line. We will do this until we get majority of the poem in sequence order.
C. Closure
• The teacher and students will reread the poem together. Expression, fluency, and comprehension are key points that students will focus on. They will keep the poem and reread during independent reading.

VIII. Supplemental Activities (Early Finishers, Enrichment, Remediation)
• No early finishers
• Students can illustrate the poem, or the highlighted words. Buddy groups can be formed to encourage reading together
• For students who have trouble reading fluently, the teacher will work with them in a small group
IX. Professional Reflection
• The shared reading lesson worked well. My main problem was that I split the lesson into two groups. Because I was using a poem to do echo reading, the other half of the class not involved with the poem could hear everything we were doing. They knew what to expect when it was their turn to participate. I initially wanted to have it done in four small groups. My cooperating teacher told me I didn’t have enough time for that. That’s why I decided to do two groups. If I had to do the lesson over, I would make the lesson as whole class. The actual lesson went well. We echoed the poem and then put the poem in sequential order on the smartboard. The poem related to their lives, so it was fun to discuss that as well.

Meeting Myself, a Halloween Poem
By KSarver

While scouring the aisles for a costume that would fright,
I came across a horror and squealed with delight.

Something so magical it called out my name,
I knew I had to have it, so fast did I claim.

While putting it on I felt such a glee,
I ran out the house screaming like a banshee.

Knocking on doors and gathering my treats,
nothing moved faster that the soles of my feet.

Knocking at the last home something didn't feel right,
the door flung itself open and showed its white light.

The woman was old and covered with warts,
the dog was bearing his teeth and boy did he snort.

It felt like i was looking in a mirror, my reflection I did see,
I turned to run away, but I could not flee.

It was myself I was glaring at, wrinkled and old.
My future shown to me, so alone and so cold.

She told me that she was once like me, young and full of vigor,
but unkindness had changed her, my eyes grew ever so bigger.

I turned and ran home as fast as I could,
knowing I had to change, and I knew that I would.

So if you get your jollies from causing a fright,
just remember it may be you at the next door,
on a foggy Halloween night.

Read Aloud

Read Alouds are a great way to model fluency and for students to hear books that are above their reading level. They are a great way to integrate math, science, social studies into reading as well. It also can develop vocabulary and comprehension strategies. Below is a read aloud lesson plan.

I. Subject/Content Area
• Reading/Language Arts/Art
II. Course of Study
• 2.) Use a range of strategies, including drawing conclusions such as opinions about characters based on their actions and summarizing passages, to comprehend fifth-grade recreational reading materials in a variety of genres
• 3.) Recognize the use and effect of literary elements and devices, including setting, character traits, stated purpose, metaphors, and simple symbolism to gain information from various text formats, including tables and charts.
III. Concepts
• Drawing conclusions, making predictions, recall/retell, synonyms and antonyms based on vocabulary words I use from the story.
IV. Behavioral Objectives
• TSW participate in the read aloud by making predictions of the text
• TSW identify elements to the story such as setting, plot, conclusion
• TSW identify synonyms and antonyms from the story’s vocabulary words
• TSW draw a picture of the main character based on their imagination
V. Evaluation
• On the assessment, I will have students identify synonyms and antonyms. There will also be a section where the student is asked to give the setting, the plot, and the conclusion of the story.
• During the read aloud, I will pause to ask students orally to make predictions about the text.
• At the end of the assessment, students must draw Tailypo from their own imagination. I will not show pictures until after drawing time is over. I want them to use their imagination and creativity.
.
VI. Materials
• The read aloud book, Tailypo, paper, pencil, crayons/markers, plain white paper
VII. Teaching/Learning Procedures
A. Motivation
• The teacher will begin by having the class join in on the carpet. The teacher will ask the students about Halloween and what they like best about it. The teacher will then ask what makes them scared, if anything, about Halloween. The teacher will then introduce the book, Tailypo. The teacher will inform the students that the objective is to make predictions about the story, and use their imagination to draw the main character at the end of the story.
B. Instructional Procedures
• The teacher will begin by reviewing with the class what a synonym and antonym is. The teacher will also recap what the setting, plot, and conclusion means in a story. She will inform them to think about these things throughout the story, along with what Tailypo might look like.
• The teacher begins reading Tailypo, stopping at points in the story to ask for student participation in the story, and to also highlight vocabulary words that they will see again on the assessment.
• The teacher will not show pictures of the story, emphasizing student imagination and creativity.
• Once the book is finished, the teacher will ask for student participation on recalling and retelling main events.
• Following the students returning to their desks, the teacher will pass out an assessment of the story which asks for synonyms and antonyms of the vocabulary words, a setting, the main event in the story, the conclusion, and something they learned from the story.
• The students must turn this in before beginning their drawing of Tailypo. They may use any writing/coloring utensils in their drawing.
C. Closure
• Once time is up for drawing, the teacher will ask the class orally the same questions that were on the assessment page for clarity of the lesson.
• The teacher will allow for a few students to share their drawings of Tailypo, and then reveal what Tailypo really looks like in the story.
VIII. Supplemental Activities (Early Finishers, Enrichment, Remediation)
• There will be no early finishers. Once they are finished with the assessment, students will begin their drawings.
• For enrichment, the teacher will have students create their own ghost story!
• During reading centers, the teacher will pull the students needing remediation into a group and figure out where they are confused in the lesson.
IX. Professional Reflection
• The read aloud lesson plan went very well. I believe this lesson plan went much better than others, because the book kept the students engaged throughout the entire lesson. Having a ghost type story for the read aloud allowed me to be animated with the scary voices which the class enjoyed. Things I would have done different would be pausing for more questions for inference. The assessment could be altered to provide easier words used for the synonyms/antonyms portion.

The Essential Components

Phonemic Awareness: Phonemic Awareness is the understanding that spoken words are made up of individual speech sounds. It is a critical factor in learning to read and spell (Put Reading First, p. 1). In my classroom, I will use activities that have children identify and categorize phonemes, and blending them into words. I will assess using small group instruction as well.

Phonics: Phonics is the understanding that there is a predictable relationship between phonemes and graphemes (Armbruster, B. B., Lehr, F., Osborn, J. 2003). Phonics instruction teaches children the relationships between letters of written language and individual sounds of spoken language to where they comprehend.

Reading Comprehension: The ability to aquire strategies to understand, remember, and communicate what is read. Making predictions, inferences, and the ability to know what cause and effect is are strategies that children must learn to be able to comprehend what is being read.

Reading Fluency: Fluency is the ability to read a text accurately and quickly (Armbruster, B. B, et al). Fluency is important because it provides a bridge between word recognition and comprehension. Fluent readers do not have to focus on decoding the words, which helps comprehension. In my classroom, I will provide a wide variety of texts at varied levels and genres.

Vocabulary: The knowledge of words, their definitions, and context in which the word is used. Word wall is a good way to increase vocabulary skills. I will have a word chart with vocabulary words from each story we read.

Assessment

Teachers must have the skills to determine where a student stands. Using formal and informal assessments can assist teachers in directing where a lesson needs to go, and the types of questions that need to be asked throughout the lesson.

Informal assessments are the most helpful mainly because it is a direct and instant assessment. Asking higher order questions during a lesson will help know what students are comprehending and what areas still need to be addressed. A running record with a student takes 5-10 minutes and is a great way to informally assess their reading fluency or comprehension. Having a classroom blog or daily journal is a great way to see what students are learning based on a teacher's lessons. Practicing the concepts as a whole group is a way to lighten a student's stress as opposed to giving them a worksheet and telling them it's for a grade. The most informative assessment is a one-on-one with the student because it becomes clear what a student knows and needs improvement on. Examples of assessment materials are the QRI or Dominie.

Formal assessments include tests, projects, posters, experiements etc. All of these are good tools to assess students on units or chapters. Tests are about a sure thing as taxes and are necessary in today's world. But hopefully the amount of them taken will decrease in the future.

In my classroom, I plan on including a variety of assessments because many students can't always show what they've learned through a test. And the classroom is a more enjoyable atmosphere with student projects and posters all over the room.

My Assessment Profile

Reading Philosophy/Goals

"Knowledge is Power". Children hear this quote all the time, but I doubt they take a moment to reflect on what it means. A person's potentials or abilities in life will undoubtedly increase the more knowledge that is gained. And the more one is reading, the more they will acquire knowledge. I want students to be able to understand that through reading, they are gaining knowledge and no one can ever take that away from them.

As an educator, I want to challenge them to read books that are anything but silly books. Sure there is a time and a place for those, but I want students to be challenged to read a variety of texts; Chapter books, novels, magazines, journal articles, newspapers, biographies, informative internet articles. With me providing the variety of texts and the many subjects, students will hopefully find things that engage them when it comes to reading.

I hope to be able to instill a passion for reading. Nobody likes doing chores, and I'd hate for students to view reading as a chore. Ways that I can do that start with my own attitude. I must be excited about reading for students to be excited. Having literature circles and other activities related to their reading materials gets them interested in what they are reading.

Last but not least, I want them to know and understand the difference between first-hand and second-hand knowledge. Instead of taking someone's word at face value, find out for yourself by researching the topic. Students need to question everything.

Mini Goals-To understand and know how to spell:

They're, There, Their
Your, You're
Than, Then
(more to come...)

Background Information

My name is Brian Stevens and I have been getting extra preparation for the real world for the past six years. In those six years, I have been in college. Four years is the route you want to take, but we can't all be winners.

This is my professional portfolio and I hope to use this (with edits for principals) as my way of showing people what my idea of teaching is all about. I plan on graduating in May 2011 with a bachelor's degree in elementary education. Where that takes me I am not sure. I hope to move away for awhile. That is for certain.

I am currently working with 5th grade teachers and students, and am having fun with it. I have also worked with Kindergarten, so I am well rounded in tying lots of shoes. I enjoy being that person that students look to for learning. I want to encourage them to succeed at everything, and to always question things around them.