Module 6 Assessment

Leading a Balanced Literacy Assessment System: Conducting a Literacy

Assessment Review

We have new supervisors (within the last 2 years) for every content area. We do have a District Curriculum Coordinator- who has 2 meetings per year for teachers from all of our schools to meet and collaborate. This is where we can discuss what we have used so far or what we would like to implement.

We do have required benchmark assessments in every content area. These are created by content area supervisors as well as a committee they have. These are now done on an online testing system that provides quick and accurate data. This data can then be compared between individual classes, individual schools, and even on a district level. It even compares state assessment scores that are uploaded to it as well. We do use this data for curriculum decisions and individual student decisions. The administrators as well as all teachers have access to all data.

At the end of last school year a Google Forms survey was sent to every teacher district wide. It then asked various questions about the grading system we have and assessments. It was nice to know that feedback was considered. It even asked how our 4 main grade types (classwork, homework, class participation, tests/quizzes) should be weighted in each grade level.

In regards to assessment results being communicated with students and families, it depends on whether it is a formal assessment or not. Our benchmark assessments are posted on teachers’ Realtime Portals in which Parents have access to daily and can see all student grades. We do give scholastic guided reading level assessments, which do not count as a grade, but for diagnostic of levels. This is up to the school/teacher on how to share that information. One year we did not send up notices with reports on it. This year we did send home letters when we did initial assessments to tell parents what level their child was on and what this meant.

This video really made me want to take part in an assessment review! There were some questions such as ones discussed above that I knew answers to, but others that I genuinely didn’t know, but am interested to find out.  

As Reading Specialists…

We need to be aware of all of the types of assessments going on in all content areas. We need to know what content area gives what assessment and when. It is our job to make sure that every student is getting worthwhile assessments. We need to make sure teachers and other professionals are using the data from these assessments to drive instruction.

Wisconsin DPI. (2015, January 16). Leading a   balanced literacy assessment system:    Conducting a literacy assessment review. Retrieved April 13, 2016, from                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v-uruFu6f-kg0

Module 4 Writing

As content area teachers, there are a few things we can do to help motivate and engage students to write.

            In “A Range of Writing Across the Content Areas,” Fisher and Frey (2013) stated that the most important things to keep in mind is for teachers was to build stamina, discussions and knowledge. As long as a teacher keeps that in mind, then the activities will follow. It is also important to start establishing writing routines in content areas. Fisher and Frey (2013) give three instructional routines that any teacher can follow and adjust according to their own classroom and subject. The first one they introduced and resonated to me the most was what they call Power Writing. Power Writing is a method for improving writing fluency through brief, timed events (Fishery & Frey, 2013, p. 97). The teacher simply gives the class a word or phrase, the students are then as to write as much and as well as they can on that topic. The teacher can do this for a minute and this routine is repeated two more times. As they finish each section, students will reread what they wrote, circling errors they made, and then they count the number of words they wrote, keeping track of this in a designated area. The goal is to have their number of words increase the more they practice this. This activity builds their writing fluency, activates knowledge, and provides teachers with information about student error patterns (Fisher & Frey, 2013, p. 97).

            I believe that this is an activity that you can make a routine in your Mathematics, Social Studies, or Science class. It also allows students to then engage in discussion about it, sharing students’ thoughts and building on other students’ ideas. The activity is flexible for any secondary classroom content area and will work on various topics. Another positive thing about this activity is that it doesn’t take up too much time, so teachers can still focus on the main part of their lessons, while working on writing as well.

            Another strategy teachers can use to engage and motivate students is annotating texts. Fisher and Frey (2013) explained that you should use this to help students write from sources to inform and explain. This is most beneficial to science and social studies, due to the fact that it is a CCSS writing anchor standard- “Conduct short as well as more sustained research projects based on focused questions, demonstrating understanding of the subject under investigation” (Fisher & Frey, 2013, p. 99). Students are given texts that they must collect evidence from and turn it into an informative/explanatory prompt. When students learn how to annotate texts, they build on their critical thinking skills and learn how to carefully read texts. This will help collect their evidence that is needed. Fisher and Frey (2013) mention a teacher, Mr. Martin, who before letting students annotate texts, give them text-dependent questions to guide their annotations.

Scenario:

Subject: United States History II course

Before teacher starts Chapter 29 Unit 1 on the Civil Rights, teacher can start with Power Writing activity (Fisher & Frey, 2013). Teacher will write these words/phrases on board the board. Timing each one for 60 seconds.

·         Segregation

·         Martin Luther King Jr.

·          Civil Rights

Between each power writing students will circle errors and count correct words. This topic has not been covered since students were in primary grades, therefore this activity will help activate prior knowledge on the subject. Fisher and Frey said they had more than one student tell them that “I didn’t know what I thought until I wrote it down” (p.97).

After the three writing activities, teacher can then start a discussion on civil rights. Students can then share ideas that came to mind. This incorporates the discussion and oral fluency needed that Fisher and Frey recommend.

Teacher will then introduce Chapter 29 Civil Rights. Before they begin to read, teacher will give students their opinion writing prompt for Unit 1: “Do you think the nonviolence used by civil rights activist was a good tactic? Explain. Keep in mind the Montgomery bus boycott, television coverage of events, and sit-ins.” “Writing from sources in an important aspect of content area learning” (Fisher & Frey, 2013, p. 99).

Now students can annotate copied pages of Unit 1, keeping this question in mind. This gives students a purpose to the reading and will help keep them engaged in the lesson. Teacher will review key annotations that Fisher and Frey (2013) recommended such as underlining, asterisks, circling key words/phrases, highlighting, writing in margins or at the top and bottom of pages.

After reading the lesson, students will then be able to formulate their own opinion and find the necessary textual evidence to support their opinion.

References

Fisher, D., & Frey, N. (2013). A range of writing across the content areas. The Reading Teacher, 67, 96-101.

Module 2: Comprehension

“Many content-area teachers believe that reading instruction is not their responsibility. They did not receive the relevant training and generally feel it is someone else’s role to teach reading skills. Although reading specialists and special educators might in fact provide instruction for students who struggle with basic reading skills such as decoding words and reading fluently, it is nevertheless important for content-area teachers to integrate literacy instruction into their classes” (iris.peabody.vanderbuilt.edu, 2016)

Page 2: Components of Effective vocabulary

            This section talked about how content area teachers assign new vocabulary, and just ask for students to define and memorize it. I did learn more-effective vocabulary instruction such as selecting essential words, explicitly defining and contextualizing those words, helping students to actively process the information, and providing multiple exposures to the words.

Page 7: Building Vocabulary and Conceptual Knowledge Using the Frayer Model:

I have never seen the Frayer Model before. It was a great resource to use, especially in my fourth grade classroom. There are also examples of completed Frayer Models for every content area. The two videos on page 7 were also extremely helpful.

“The Frayer Model is not intended to be used as a worksheet for homework, something that would be no more effective than asking students to simply look up the definitions for a list of assigned words.”  

Pages 8-13 had components of effective comprehension instruction: activating prior knowledge, monitoring comprehension, using graphic organizers, answering questions, and generating questions. I did save the table on page 10 that had Examples of Fix-Up strategies:

• Re-read the paragraph (silently or aloud)
• Look up unfamiliar terms
• Find more information (e.g., seek out electronic or print references, ask someone for help with an unfamiliar topic)
• Reference an adjacent graph, chart, or picture
• Reconstruct information in an equation, chart, image, concept map, etc.
• Search for upcoming headings that will provide clarification

I use a plethora of graphic organizers in my classroom. Page 11 gave a couple of website links for me to explore, I especially liked http://www.nsta.org/publications/news/story.aspx?id=49933#content. It gave Science graphic organizers, explained them, and even had a rubric.

Lastly I was intrigued by page 12 that was the topic of the article I read- Question Answer Relationship (QAR).

I chose to read Fenty, McDuffie-Mandrum & Fisher’s (2012) article “Using Collaboration, Co-Teaching, and Question Answer Relationships to Enhance Content Area Literacy.” I mentioned the Question Answer Relationships (QAR) theory in my discussion board without naming it. We use QAR in my school district and I was interested in learning more about it. “QAR  is a literacy strategy that provides students with a framework to guide their processing of comprehension questions frequently encountered after reading a piece of text” (Fenty, N. McDuffie-Landrum, K., Fisher, G., 2012, p. 29).

QAR teaches students that there are two ways to locate answers: in the book or in my head. In the book means the answer is directly in the book. In my head means the answer is beyond the text. These two types of questions are then further broken down. In the book is broken down into an either right there or think and search question. Right there means the answer is directly in one portion of the text. Think and search means the answer can be found by assembling information read throughout the text. In my head is broken up into author and me and on my own. Author and me means that readers must use their background knowledge and schema with information provided in the text. On my own is when readers strictly use background knowledge to answer a question.

Fenty, McDuffie-Landrum, and Fisher (2012) gave guidelines also to help plan QAR instruction, specifically in special education classrooms. They state that QAR will best work if taught through collaboration and co-teaching. They broke it down into five steps for educators to follow: anticipatory set, modeling, guided practice, independent practice, and closure. There are also great sources for fiction and nonfiction texts on page 33 in Table 2.  Table 3 on page 35 has sample questions for teachers to preview and connections to Bloom’s Taxonomy.

“The QAR strategy can enhance comprehension across a variety of content areas and can encourage the use of a common language for strategy use throughout the school day” (Fenty, N. McDuffie-Landrum, K., Fisher, G., 2012, p. 37).

References

Fenty, N., McDuffie-Landrum, K. and Fisher, G. (2012). Using collaboration, co-teaching, and question answer relationships to enhance content area literacy. Teaching Exceptional Children, 44(6), pp.28-37. 

Iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu, (2016). IRIS | Seconday Reading Instruction (Part 1): Teaching Vocabulary and Comprehension in the Content Areas. [online] Available at: http://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/sec-rdng/cresource/#content [Accessed 15 Feb. 2016].

Literacy Autobiography

Personal Influences

Growing up with two older sisters made me want to accomplish many things that I would not be able to until a later age. I do not remember the exact moment I began to read, but I do have vivid memories of my two older sisters reading to me and with me. I always aspired to be more like them. I was a cheerleader just as they were, I dressed similar to them, I ate what they ate, so I know why I did my best to begin reading; it was to become more like them. They would play school with me and I was always the student. Through playing school with them, I began to pretend to read in order to appear as cool and as smart as my sisters.

I was raised in a home of readers. Typically my mom was carrying an easy read, a newspaper or business book for my dad, and of course the highly-rated children’s books were clutched in the hands of my sisters. We were members at my town pool and oftentimes, my mother, sisters, and I would sit their consumed by the books in our laps. Vacations also earned a designated Barnes and Noble night prior to leaving. Whenever I asked for a new book it was always a yes. Mostly it would be as a reward, which I worked for, other times just because. Reading was not only encouraged in my household, but expected. There was never talk about reading, it just was what it was. 

Elementary School

I was that one student who would wait for DEAR time in school. I looked forward to our Library class weekly and even went to our public library for more books. As I said, I don’t remember the book I first read or how I learned, but I do know that I didn’t have a struggle with reading. I assume this is why I enjoyed reading and grew a profound interest in reading.

Throughout my elementary school years, I rushed to the bookstore the day I received my Summer Reading list. I valued this list even more than my own Christmas Wish List. Depending on the grade I was in, I was only required to pick 2 or 3 books from the list. This decision was not an easy task for me. As soon as my mother would take me to Barnes and Noble in Edgewater, I would gather all the books I was interested in. I would sit there for what seemed like hours and read all the summaries on the back of the books, look at the covers, and even begin to read the first chapter of many of the books. I would split the books up into three piles: very interested in, somewhat interested, and this needs to go back on the shelf. Some of these books included James and the Giant Peach, Island of the Blue Dolphins, Number the Stars, Shiloh and Lord of the Flies. Even as a young child I was captivated by characters and their stories. I would immerse myself into the story so that I, too, was a part of the book.

High School

            I know I still read throughout my high school years, but I want to say it wasn’t as often. I was busy with more school work and sports. I do know that I had a terrible time reading A Tale of Two Cities. I was distraught when I had to buy the SparkNotes version of it in order to write about it and prepare for the comprehension assessment I would be getting my first class back. That I will never forget. Looking back I don’t know if it was the language, lack of interest, or what that made me not like or understand that book.

Professionally

As a teacher, I have found it my mission to make my students that do not like to read, find enjoyment in it. It saddens me to see students not want to read. I have initiated “Book Talk Fridays” for the first time in my classroom. This is when students can volunteer to sign up and present a book they love to the class. They are expected to state facts about the book, give a brief summary, and explain why they recommend the book to fellow classmates. I hope this method affects more students than I could on my own. I expect that a recommendation coming from one of their peers will have more of an influence on them than I would have.

I also have been doing a lot of research on mentor texts to use for writer’s workshop. I have found highly rated children’s picture books to work on 4^th grade leveled skills. I was shocked to see the enjoyment my students found when I read them a picture book that used numerous examples of onomatopoeia. I want to read as many great books as I can to my students in hopes that it will encourage them to become productive readers and writers.

In conclusion, it is safe to say that I have had a love for reading since the day I pretended I could read. I believe I am lucky to have such an exhilarating hobby and interest in reading after many years. I find that reading builds character. Everyone can learn from a book, and many learn different lessons from one book.