Blog #7

I choose to do a running record on two students; Rain and Juan.  I have only used running records a few times, so this was a good learning process for me. 

The first student I worked with is a 5^th grade student, who has been in the US for 6 years, but speaks Arabic at home with his family fluently.  His family is also fluent in English, but they “try” not to use anything but Arabic when at home talking to one another.  Rain read “The Champion,” which is a grade 5 leveled D reader.  While Rain read, I counted 21 errors.  Rain is not a fluent reader and missed many sight words such as “what,” “from,” and “where.” Rain did use visual cues frequently.  He had phonemic awareness.   Rain would look at the beginning sounds of words, but then guess on the word and move on without worrying about whether the sentence made sense.  Also, he did not display any use of picture clues. The last thing I noticed was a few times he left out the articles “the” and “a.”   Some strategies to use with Rain could be teacher modeling of how to self-monitor when reading to see if the words make sense.  After modeling, Rain needs practice reading aloud and continuing to learn how to self-monitor. Some other strategies would be previewing text, front loading vocabulary, using visuals with written words, taking a picture walk, and focusing on high frequency words such as what, from, and where. This can be done with flash cards.  Rain really needs to read familiar text daily to help with fluency.  An idea would be to have Rain read a lower level text for a week.  Each day, Rain should increase his words per minute and be exposed to the same sigh words throughout the week with the book. 

The second student is a Spanish Speaker, but has been in the United States for 2 years.  He is also a 5^th grader, and like Rain, only speaks Spanish at home.  Juan read “The Magnifying Glass,” which is a Level H book. As Juan read, I counted 11 errors.  I noted Juan had a little more fluency than Rain, and he did not miss common sight words.  He did stumble over words such as pickup (puckup), heavy (have), everything (everyting) and so on.  He had trouble with the longer words and seemed to also guess the words without looking at the entire word or trying to sound it out.  Juan had several visual errors as he substituted other words for what was written (wouldn’t-would, walking-walk-n.).  However, I find students substitute words in my class often.  Juan also frequently substituted the /h/ sound for the /j/ in the word joking and jewelry.  Knowing that this is the pronunciation in his first language is important to help him identify the differences between languages and become more aware of his pronunciations. I would make sure and use visuals to introduce such words as pickup truck, magnifying glass, etc.  A picture walk is also a good idea.  I would also suggest using repeated readings with the same story at an independent level.   I would also continue to work on practicing the English pronunciations for /j/ while reading.

Both of these students would benefit from daily oral language with the teacher and their peers.  Since they are not speaking English at home, this is the only time they are hearing themselves and others speaking English.  Also, students need to read in small groups, independently, and with the teacher daily.  Sight words should also be used each day through fun activities.  Explicit instruction and think-alouds are also a great way to help comprehension.  These skills will help all students in the classroom.   

Blog #6

 Copy and complete the activity at the end of chapter two of:

• Freeman, D., and Y. Freeman. Essential linguistics: What you need to know to teach: reading, ESL, spelling, phonics, grammar. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
• Determine Learning (L) vs. Acquisition (A) and explain your answers on your blog.

 As I was reading, Written and Second Language Acquisition, I had many thoughts and feelings about the two styles of learning.  When teaching reading, I see both components (learning and acquisition) being done in the classroom daily.  In the primary grades, teachers really focus on the phonics and word recognition part of reading.  Students have to learn how to decode a word or recognize it as a sight word, in order to increase fluency and overall acquire comprehension.  They also, however, read big books with illustrations or have students read familiar songs and engage them in poetry in order for students to acquire their own meaning  to make connections between oral reading and the print.  With this in mind, I think students need both learning and acquisition to become successful learners.  Sociopsycholinguistic learning for reading is a bit higher level, because students are learning how to read and comprehend by making meaning from the text and using background knowledge.  Word recognition is taught by the teacher in a set curriculum or daily routine and allows students to learn strategies.  When dealing with these two views,  I feel  Sociopsycholinguistic learning  can only happen for those students who have solid background knowledge and a good vocabulary bank from their home life.  I feel sociopsycholinguistic makes learning for Sped students and some ELL students hard.  They need more of a word recognition and direct instruction to help them learn decoding , vocabulary, and phonics.   

When teaching, I feel I do a pretty good job at balancing the two views.  As I was looking at this list, I can see that some of these activities can fall under both views as well.  However, some of the activities students are learning though direct teacher guidance.  Other activities are focused on helping the student understand what they read or hear. 

The students:

L              look up words in the dictionary to write definitions

A             make a Venn diagram to compare two stories

L              practice sounding out words

L/A         read in round robin fashion

L              correct peers when they make a mistake

L/A         identify words on a big book page that start with the same sound

L/A         group cards with classmates’ names by a criterion on such as first or last letter

A             write rhyming poetry and then discuss different spellings for the same sound

L              ask teacher how to spell any word they don’t know

A             read a language experience story they have created with the teacher

A             work in pairs to arrange words from a familiar chant into sentences

L              divides words into syllables

L              on a worksheet, draw a line from each word to the picture that starts with the same sound

A             make alphabet books on different topics

The teacher:

L              preteaches vocabulary

A             does a shared reading with a big book

L              make sure that students read only books that fit their level

L              has students’ segment words into phonemes

A             write words the students dictate for a story and has students help with the spelling of difficult words

A             asks students to look around the room and find words starting with a certain letter

L              uses decodable text

A             set aside time for SSR (sustained silent reading) each day

L              teaches Latin and Greek roots

A             has students meet in literature circles

L              conducts phonics drills

L/A         chooses predictable texts

A             teaches students different comprehension strategies

A             does a picture walk of a new book

L              uses a variety of worksheets to teach different skills

Blog #5

Review 2 children’s books and determine what components in the book might affect comprehension because of cultural aspects. List 4 per book and tell how this schema could be taught or introduced to an ELL learner.



  The first book I chose was A Weed is a Flower by ALIKI.  This book is about the life of George Washington Carver.  It walks the students through the humble beginnings that George Washington Carver went through to become one of the greatest scientists in the United States. It depicts his dedication to helping his people, which led him to find over three hundred uses for the peanut and over one hundred uses for the sweet potato.
1) The main issue for my ELL students, but also for most of my other students, would be background knowledge of how peanuts grow.  I would present this information as a PowerPoint with many visuals. 

2) Vocabulary will also play an important part in the understanding the book.   I might start the class off with a think-pair-share discussion of the following words and concepts pairing ELL students with students who might have some understanding of the following words:

  Slave, farm, insects, garden, plant doctor, chore, peanut, crop, sweet potato, menu, soap

Most of the words are accessible through context clues and the support of the illustrations, however, ELL students may not have any or enough background knowledge to truly understand the meaning of the specific vocabulary. 

3) The book starts out by talking about George Washington Carver as being a son of a slave.  It portrays his life as a young small weak child belonging to a slave.  The idea of slavery and the conditions of people as slaves will have to be described to ELL students.  This can be done in many ways, but the best way would be though visual elements. 

4) The story describes the many different ways Mr. Carver used the peanut to help people.  Students will need to have an idea of what a peanut is and how it grows in order to understand the significance.  Planting a seed would be a great way for students to understand the different processes he went through when growing the peanut and doing his experiments.  This would allow the students to understand the growth process it talks about in the book.


  The second book I chose was Tikki Tikki Tembo by Arlene Mosel.  “Tikki Tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari ruchi-pip peri pembo is the full name of the firstborn son in the Chinese family of this story.  As the firstborn’s, his name must be spoken completely and reverently.  It is an old folktale of what happens when the boy falls into a well and his younger brother attempts to get help.  I use this book in my class every year as an example of the importance of family and also the uniqueness of certain names that are often passed from generation to generation.

1) Because this is the story of a young boy in China, there is lots of background related to the Chinese culture.  I believe the story is one that children can relate to as most have heard stories from their parents and grandparents about their unique family names.  Introducing the Chinese culture will be very important for students.  This can be done by making paper dragons, wearing Chinese clothing, and looking at bamboo.   Photographs will help reinforce these items and their use for students.

 2) Again, I would introduce vocabulary to the students.  I might use photos to explain these vocabulary words. Here is a sampling of some possible words to discover together:
 China, Village, Well, Ladder, Moon, Stone

 3)   The main idea of the story is a boy falling into a well.  The students will have to have background knowledge of what a well is and what would happen if one fell into it.  This can be done by modeling through activity.  Students could work in groups to make a well out of playdoh.  Water can then be placed into the well.  A ladder can also be made of Popsicle sticks to show how it might or might not work.

4)Tikki Tikki Tembo will be seen over and over again throughout the story.  Echo reading will help reinforce the pronunciation of the name for the students.  Hearing and saying the name over and over will help pronunciation for all students.

      In both books, I would make sure I included on my vocabulary wall any and all words that are crucial to the understanding of the text.  Having them where the students can see them will be beneficial as a reference.  I would also try and find multiple opportunities for these students to hear, say, read, and write any frequently used words from both texts in different activities using photos or illustrations to support the words.  A great way to practice fluency would be to have the students chose a couple of pages that were the easiest for them to read and have them practice their fluency using those pages.   A small group activity would be to use the picture books with all the artwork that purposefully supports the text, to model and reinforce the use of pictures to deepen understanding in texts.

Blog #4

Choose a text in a language that you are not familiar with, at a level at which you should be proficient (an adult publication). Read it. Find a way to make meaning. Do whatever you have to do to make this text comprehensible. Now scale back the difficulty of the text. How far back do you have to go until you understand what you are reading? What did you do to make meaning? What are the implications to teacher?

I went to the local library and asked the librarian to refer me to a good novel in Spanish.  The librarian suggested I read the book titled" La Sombra Del Viento," by Carlos Ruiz Zafon.  I took Spanish for four years in high school, so I thought I would be able to understand the jist of the book with little trouble.  The truth was I was able to comprehend very little from this book. I was able to pick up words here and there, which allowed me to make some sense of the story.  The easiest words to pick up were the ones that were very similar to English words or English words themselves that I suggest were not able to be translated. The next words were those Spanish words I could remember.  This helped me get an idea of what the sentences were trying to say.   I think I was able to get the whole idea of the book, but I definitely could not understand the details. 

Some of the strategies I used included making connections between words I knew and words that were similar.  I would try and find connections with words I understood to those that had the same suffix or prefixes; ella, la, le, mos, etc.  I would also ask myself: “Does it make sense? Or “What would make sense?” based on the words I could understand.  I would try and comprehend based on what I knew and what would make sense in that sentence.  I found I could only read sentence to sentence to try and making meaning.  My fluency was low, and I am not sure my pronunciation was correct either. 

This book should have been at my ability level, but it was very frustrating to read, and my comprehension was very low.  So, I decided to try a children’s book in Spanish. 

I then moved on to the children's books. I read the story "Eres Mi Mama?," by PD Eastman. Because of the very many, detailed pictures, and the familiar words such as perro,I was able to make sense of this book. I could understand that the dog was lost and could not find his mother. I established this with and without the pictures.  I did not have a complete comprehension of the book, but I was able to comprehend most.  There were words that I was able to pick up on, but the text as a whole was still very difficult for me to comprehend.

With this book, I relied on the strategy of checking the picture.  I found I went back to my first grade reading tricks list I give my students.  I was trying to reread the sentences for comprehension and pick out words I understood and tried to make sense without the ones that didn’t. 

This exercise was very eye opening.  It was a challenge of frustration and uneasiness.  I felt very uncomfortable and wanted to give up a few words into the text.  Reading was not enjoyable but a job.  As teacher, we don't want our students to feel this way about reading.  We want to make sure we are using successful ELL Strategies to help students.  As a teacher, I want to do everything I can to make sure students are receiving the support they need, so they don't feel the way about reading as I did with my unfamiliar text.  It was a great way to be put in their shoes.

Blog #3

Entry #3: Comment on the relationship between oral language and the reading process.

Oral language has long been regarded as the foundation for beginning reading as children draw on the meaning, syntax and the phonology of spoken language as a bridge to emergent literacy (Clay, 2002).  Students cannot read and comprehend material if there isn’t a relationship between oral language and reading. Students need the benefit of a comprehensive and balanced ESL program as well as the added opportunity to practice both listening and speaking skills to become proficient at a second language. Classroom talk is essential to a successful second language acquisition.  The process of decoding would fall apart if students couldn't break a word down into the morphemes and word parts that make up language. Just as students need practice reading, they also need practice in developing their oral language stills.  It is very important for teachers to allow students to speak in the class each day.  In many classrooms today, teachers ask many questions and allow for student responses.  However, these questions usually ask for simple, few word responses.  Students are not given the opportunity to talk and explain in detail, which plays a very large role in student’s oral language development.   Students need to work in small groups and whole group situations where each student has the time and the ability to interact with other students.  Second language learners, especially, need to have this oral language and need to always be given time and encouraged to speak and interact with their peers to provide them with the practice they need to have conversations with one another. I also believe in the importance of students hearing text read to them while reading. This teaching strategy helps students see for themselves the relationship between oral language and the reading process and why they are so important. While students obviously learn from interacting with one another and using their own voice, they also need to hear and know the words and the sounds before they can decode meaning from the word.  

References

Clay, Marie, M. 2002. An observation survey of early literacy achievement, 2nd edn.

Auckland: Heinemann Education.