Module 3: Activity 2

I do think that some phonological awareness mentioned in the video is needed for children to learn how to read. I don’t however think that it is the most important strategy though. The nonsense word test I feel is completely absurd and meaningless. I do not understand the point of reading words that have no meaning at all. Understanding text is the purpose of reading. Reading nonsense words is completely defeating the purpose.

A reader needs many other strategies in order to become a proficient reader. A proficient reader is defined as being effective and efficient. He or she needs to be able to also understand the words that are read. A proficient reader uses graphic cues, schema, syntax, semantics, and context to gain meaning from what he or she is reading. The readings in the book have shown me that a student can sound out many words and pronounce them correctly, but if he or she does not understand the meaning of the word, then the child is not truly reading.

Module 3: Mock Memo from a Reading Specialist.

Erica, a fifth grader, reads grade level passages at a rate of 177 words correct per minute, or 30% faster than grade level norms. When asked to retell what she has read, Erica struggles and is able to give little to no information from about the text. Many other children in Erica's class also read well above grade level expectations for fluency rate (or automaticity), but the teacher laments that they struggle with comprehension and using appropriate expression and intonation while they read. What is going on here? What advice can you offer the teacher? Write a memo to the teacher from the viewpoint of the school's Reading Specialist. Give the teacher and explanation for the phenomenon and offer her advice on dealing with the situation. Please keep the memo to no more than 400 words. Post it to your blog and name the posting "Module 3: Mock Memo from a Reading Specialist."

            It seems that the students in your class are focusing on getting the words correct. They are not focusing on gaining meaning from the text that they are reading. Your students’ do not understand that the purpose of reading is to understand the text.

            The “Think-Aloud” Strategy could be used to help your class to begin to understand what they are reading. This strategy is a way of discussing what is being read. For example, if you are reading a text, you can model the “Think-Aloud” Strategy by stopping at a point and thinking aloud of what is currently going on in the story, such as the very hungry caterpillar is eating a lot of food. The students can contribute with their thoughts as well. Once you have modeled how this strategy works, students can be broken up into groups, in which they can implement the “Think-Aloud” Strategy on their own. Doing this will enable children to process what they are reading and truly understand the text.

            Let me know how this strategy works for you and if I can provide any further assistance.

Thank you,

Kimberly Wood

Reading Specialist

Module 3: Reading Reflection

I do not agree with Marilyn Adams in her statement regarding how readers look at the individual letters when reading. Good readers read based on context, schemas, semantics, syntax, and graphic cues. They use all of these factors together to gain meaning from the text. Relying on reading by looking at the individual letters not only is an incorrect idea, but it would require a significant amount of time. According to the reading, reading “means that various features within words—not necessarily letters—are picked up  by the eyes before the words or chunks of letters are perceived and before words (must less the individual letters) are identified by the brain” (Weaver, 2002, p. 109). Often times, readers are predicting what word comes next or looking ahead when reading. When I am reading, I notice how I may read ahead or reread a word if it does not make sense. I never am focusing on the individual letters. In the end, Marilyn Adams statement does not represent the true idea of how readers read.

References: 

Weaver, C. (2002). Reading Process & Practice (3rd ed.). Portsmouth, NH:  Heinemann.

Prominent Theorist or Researcher Assignment

Here is the link to my Researcher Assignment. I chose to research Vivian Vasquez.
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BymP-jX0jKBhMjcyX0NIamh6Z0U/edit?usp=sharing

Module 2: Activities 1 & 2

Activity 1:

Complete Exercise #3c on page 58 in the text: first write a definition of each word listed. Did you notice yourself using any fairly consistent principle for determining what the words might mean? Discuss. Then read the first chapter of A Clockwork Orange to find the meanings of at least six of the words: http://www.ebooktrove.com/top_ten/AClockworkOrange.pdf. In each case, how do you finally determine what the word means? Combine this assignment with Activity 2 in this module. Create a blog post.

Definitions:  Before reading, I tried to determine the definitions of these words standing alone. I tried to look at the endings of the words to determine what part of speech the word may be. I also thought about words that sounded liked the words and hoped that these words would mean something related.

·         Deng—a loud sound

·         Tolchock—a vechile

·         Veck—a v-neck shirt

·         Viddy—funny

Definitions from reading:  After reading, I tried to see how the word was used in the sentence. I determined if the word was a noun, adjective, verb, or adverb. I then used the context in the sentences before, the sentences after, the words before, and the words after to help determine the definition.

·         Deng—money

·         Tolchock—to steal from

·         Veck—man

·         Viddy—allow

·         Creech—Screeching

·         Droogs--dogs

Activity 2:

Read Exercise 7 on p. 85 and rather than showing it to an audience, complete the exercise yourself. Answer the questions, including the two at the top of p. 86. Combine this assignment with Activity 1 in this module. Create a blog post. Name this blog posting "Module 2: Activities 1 & 2."

1.     Who tried to read the words letter-by-letter?  Why not?

I did not read the words letter-by-letter. I didn’t do this, because I found if I did this, I was not able to blend the word together.

2.     Who tried to read the words mostly by chunking them into syllables?

 I tried to break the words down into syllables into read the words.

3.     Who tried to read the words by sampling the letters more or less all at one?

To read the word, I read each syllable all at once to determine how to say the word.

4.     What words do you know the meaning of, or think you know the meaning of?

The word “extravasate” sounds like a verb providing something in addition to. The word “dissepiment” sounds like a noun that is in a negative state.

5.     Did pronouncing the words give you insights into their meanings?

Yes, pronouncing the words gave me the ability to look at word endings to determine the part of speech. I also used prefixes that I recognized in other words to determine the meaning. For example, I know that “dis” typically is a prefix that is negative. So for the word “dissepiment.” I assume the word means something in a negative sense.

6.     How do you handle unknown words when you encounter them in normal reading?

When I am reading, I mainly use context to help determine the meaning of a word. I will look to see what words or sentences before or after can help give me clues as to what the unknown word means.  From this, I can usually determine the meaning of the word.

7.     What do you think are the implications of this experiment and discussion for how we should help students deal with unfamiliar print words?

I think this experiment was to show us that students can use their schemas to determine what an unknown word is by looking at prefixes and suffixes. In text, students can use the context around the word to help define an unknown word. 

Module 2: Instructional Challenge

OR: It my little monkey here.	ER: Is my little monkey here?
OR: We got to tell.	ER: We've got to tell.
OR: Frog look at Toad calendar.	ER: Frog looked at Toad's calendar.
OR: A word what sounded good.	ER: A word that sounded good.
OR: hisself	ER: himself
OR: I can come to your party?	ER: Can I come to your party?

Are these children proficient or non-proficient readers? I think these children are proficient readers. It seems that their dialect is factoring into their reading. According to Weaver, "Proficient readers make miscues that reflect their predictions, their prior knowledge, and even their preferred language structures" (2002, p.74). It is natural to pull one's own language into reading a text. Weaver provided a good example when she gave the rural mountain speech passage and discussed how she found herself making miscues by translating the text into her own proper way of reading and writing.

I feel that these children are doing the same thing. I do not feel that their miscues are affecting the overall meaning of the text. The children are comprehending what they are reading even with such miscues. Weaver explains this as the readers changing the surface structure, but the deep structure is still understood (2002. p.76).

If I were teaching a student that was making miscues based on his or her dialect, I would not correct the child. The most important thing would be to ensure that this student is comprehending the text. If the student is not comprehending the text, I would correct the child and decide why the child is making miscues.

 I do wonder if dialect related miscues would reflect in their writing. If so, at what point would dialect miscues need to be corrected? 

References:

Weaver, C. (2002). Reading process & practice. (3rd ed.). Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Module 2: Reading Reflection

The major folklore of reading instruction relates to the “theory” that reading is considered an exact process. In other words, the reader is expected to read everything exactly as printed on the page in order to understand the message of the author. In general the consuming public, legislatures, courts, and too many educators hold to this theory. It is like the theory of the world being flat during the time of Columbus.

                                    --Robert Harper and Gary Kilarr

In the quote above, Robert Harper and Gary Kilarr respond to society’s reading perception. They disagree that reading is a process in which all words are read correctly in order to comprehend the text. I without a doubt agree with Harper and Kilarr. Reading is more than reading words correctly. Reading is using context, syntax, semantics, schemas, and graphic cues in order to gain meaning from the text.

According to the reading, being able to say every word in a passage is not required in order for comprehension to be achieved. Proficient readers, “focus primarily upon the construction of meaning from text, not upon identification of all the words” (Weaver, 2002, p. 80). When looking at the running record samples in the book, often times, students’ miscues do not affect the meaning of the text. These miscues are made, because students are predicting what word comes next, or they use prior knowledge in order to read the word. For example, in one of the running records, Billy substituted the words “of the clock” for “o’clock” (Weaver, 2002. p. 65). He kept the meaning as both phrases relate to the time of the clock, but he used words that better fit in his schema. In this example, precise word identification had no effect on the meaning.

Students sometimes make miscues in the reading due to their dialects, but these miscues do not affect how the reader is able to understand what he or she is reading. Many times, a reader will translate a passage into their own language structure. For example, the author discusses when reading a passage with rural mountain speech, she read the sentence containing the phrase “I ever” to “ever I” (Weaver, 2002, p. 75). This preserved the meaning and kept the deep structure of the text, which is truly what is important.

In the end, society’s idea that reading is simply word comprehension is completely false. Reading is using context, schema, syntax, semantics, and graphic cues. These strategies are all needed in conjunction with each other, in order to fully comprehend a text.

References: 

Weaver, C. (2002). Reading Process & Practice (3rd ed.). Portsmouth, NH:  Heinemann.

Module 1: Activity 2

 a.      What is corandic?  Corandic is an emurient grof with many fribs.

b.     What does corandic grank from?  Corandic grans from corite.

c.      How do garpers excarp the tarances from the corite? Garpers excap the corite by glarking the corite and starping it in tranker-clarped storbs.

d.     What does the slorp finally frast? The slorp finally frast a pragety, blickant crankle:  coranda

e.      What is coranda? Coranda is a cargurt, grinkling corandic and borigen.

f.        How is the corandic nacerated from the borigen? The corandic is nacerated from the borigen by means of loracity.

g.      What do the garkers finally thrap? The garkers finally thrap a glick, bracht, glupous grapant, corandic. Which granks in many starps.

I was able to answer such questions based upon the word order and the syntactic clues. The questions were only recall questions that were identical to the sentences in the passage. The assessment questions only required me to look for the words in the questions that matched the words in the text. I was then able to provide an answer, and get the answer correct without even comprehending what the passage was about.

Unfortunately, many questions that children are given are like the questions above. I had no idea what I was reading, but I was able to get every question correct simply based upon syntactic clues. Assessing the children on simple recall facts that specifically match the text is showing the students that it is not a necessity to comprehend what you are reading. It is important for students to use syntactic strategies when reading, but it is also important for the students to grasp the meaning of the text. We as teachers need to be sure that the assessments we are able to create truly assess the students on comprehension using a sociopsycholinguistic method. Many standardized tests and curriculum based workbook and activities unfortunately use questions such as the ones above. These questions require only one part of the sociopsycholinguistic view of reading, but as seen through this activity, there are many more parts to reading that play a role in a reader fully grasping the meaning of a text. 

Module 1: Activity 1

Module 1: Instructional Challenge

Read the following passage:

Hocked gems financing him, our hero defied the scornful laughter. Think of it as an egg, not a table, he said. Then three sturdy sisters sought proof, forging over vast calmness, and sometimes over turbulent peaks and valleys, until at last welcome winged creatures appeared, signifying monumental success.

Answer these questions about the passage:

1.     What are the hocked gems?

The hocked gems are something that is of value that was taken from the main character.

2.     What should we think of as an egg and not a table?

We should think of valuable things as fragile like an egg, and that these things may not always be around.

3.     Who are the three sturdy sisters?

The three sturdy sisters signifies a metaphor over problems with money. People can become very stressed in certain financial situations. In life, there will be calm times as well as turbulent, tough times.

4.     What kind of winged creatures appeared?

I think the winged creatures are birds flying overhead. These birds represent hope. There may be stressful times in life, like financial problems, but in the end, everything will be okay.

If I were to use this passage in my first grade classroom, I would first have to introduce the pronunciation of these words as many of these words would be too advanced for them. From there, I would pull from their schemas what they know already about these words. I also would have them look at the context, and I would have them view how these words are used in the sentences to determine meaning from the text.

If the children’s schemas do not match the content of the text, I would work to develop the students’ schemas. A student’s schema is built upon experiences and exposure to topics, so I would work to introduce a new text that may not match the schemas in my classroom. Introducing them to the words and the experiences that go with the words through discussion, pictures, and any physical movements that may coincide with the words will help develop the students’ backgrounds of the topics. 

          I think that some time should be used in texts that do not match a student’s schema. I feel that a schema can be developed through reading things that a student is not familiar with. I think this should be incorporated more into a small group time where discussion can take place if a student does not have the background to understand a certain part of the text. I feel that independent reading time, where a student is reading on his or her own should focus more on the student’s interest and schema, so that the student is fully comprehending what he or she is reading, as discussion of things the student does not know would more than likely not be taking place.

Module 1: Reading Reflection

What are some of the major differences between a skills approach to literacy and a comprehensive or sociopsycholinguistic approach?

There are many differences between a skills approach to literacy and a sociopsycholinguistic approach. According to the reading, skills approach involves teaching a student from the bottom up. A sociopsycholinguistic approach is the complete opposite. It involves a more in-depth and interconnected method for reading and comprehension.

 With a skills approach to literacy, students learn to recognize letters and letter sounds, and then move on to more complex reading strategies, such as learning word families and sounding out words. Comprehension and meaning are completely left out of the equation until students are able to verbally say the words. The skills to reading are taught more in isolation rather than pulled in together. Reading is viewed as first being able to pronounce words and meaning as something that will develop later.

On the contrary, sociopsycholinguistic fully entwines all concepts of reading from a skills approach, as well as including schemas, and context. These skills are taught together versus in isolation. When a student is reading, he or she will use background knowledge, phonics skills,  the context of how the word is used, the meaning of the word, and how the word looks in a sentence to full comprehend the text. The sociopsycholinguistic approach also understands that with each reader bringing his or her own skills and schemas, each reader may comprehend the text differently. Students transfer what they already know into the reading and develop their own meaning to the text.

In essence, skills approach to literacy focuses only on the basics of reading. Fundamental skills must be learned before comprehension can be factored into the learning, and skills are taught in isolation. Sociopsycholinguistic views reading as a whole. Students incorporate basic skills, such as letter names and sounds, but also use their schemas to determine meaning and context in order to create their own comprehension to the text.

Personal Model of the Theory of Reading

Personal Model of the Theory of Reading Assignment

Kimberly Wood

Kennesaw State University

How do you teach reading? This is a question that I have been asked by several friends who are not in the education field. After a couple years of teaching, I can explain how I teach reading, but the process of the students learning how to read from my teaching baffles me at times. I feel learning to read begins when children are young. Being around a print-filled environment with books, labels, words, and letters, exposes children to literacy and gives them great background knowledge to begin the process of learning to read. Though this is not always the case for all children, as some students are not exposed to literacy at a young age, so the prior knowledge they build occurs in the school environment

            At school, all children are learning how to read on a daily basis throughout the school day. Typically children are taught how to read through a mixture of phonological awareness, phonics, prior knowledge, and reading comprehension. I believe that all of these factors coincide together in the reading process. A student just beginning to learn how to read in school is initially exposed to letters and letter sounds—the basics of phonics. Students learn to recognize letters and the sound of the letters in different words. Upon mastery, students memorize sight words that they will easily and quickly recognize in text, move on to spelling words that focus on a phonological pattern, and work on blending sounds together to form words. These steps help to set children up with the basic skills of reading. Also, in the early elementary grades, teacher read-alouds are common to show students how to read fluently as well as exposing them to words. I feel that these all factor into a student learning how to read.

            In the classroom, the most effective way for a student who is learning how to read is a small group guided reading time. I feel that this is the time that a student truly is learning how to read. From my personal experience, I group my children based on their reading levels. Some students read at an advanced level and some read at a lower level. Prior to reading a book on the students’ level, I choose words that I feel the students may not know how to sound out or words they make not recognize. We go over these words as a group where I write the word on the board, and the students repeat it. Usually the students know the meaning of the word, but they cannot read it. For example, a student may not be able to read the word “fire truck,” but once we read the word, the student can explain the meaning of the word. He or she is then able to transfer learning what the word “fire truck” looks like to the actual text and gain meaning and comprehension from the text. Throughout the small group time, students take turns reading. They use decoding skills, picture cues, prior knowledge, and the words that they were taught in the beginning, like “fire truck,” to read and understand the text. If students come to a word that they do not know, it is their job to use the skills to determine the word. Also, throughout the reading, I use Marzano’s thinking clouds/questions as well as higher order thinking questions to monitor the students’ comprehension. It is a combination of all of these factors that children use in order to understand the author’s complete thought.

            Teaching reading will continue to be a learning process for me. I know that learning to read can begin at an early age though the process of learning letters, the letter sounds, blending sounds, sight words, and spelling words. This way of teaching reading is useful in combination with small group time where meaning of words and comprehension all work together in an effort for students to truly be reading.