Leap
Review
Leap
Review
| Volume 1, Issue 2 | March 1, 1998 |
In this issue. . .
Noted author and reading comprehension expert, Ellin Keene will be visiting Blanding Elementary School for two days of inservice this Thursday, and Friday—March 5th & 6th. Ellin is the co-author of the one of the hottest new books out,"Mosiac of Thought: Teaching Comprehension in a Reader’s Workshop." Ellin’s thoughtful approach to reading comprehension entails explicitly teaching students comprehension strategies that proficient readers use. The book carefully walks a teacher through numerous strategies while the authors reflect on their own understanding of text and meaning. Strategies discussed include: |
rereading, thinking aloud, making connections with what the students know from personal experience and other sources, creating mental images, determining what’s important, questioning author’s intent, making inferences to draw conclusions or make predictions, and synthesizing information to create personal meaning. This comprehensive approach seeks to help students develop deep structure comprehension which seems to elude most students. Ms. Keene is a former student of Dr. Dole. They will be working together in our district. We are delighted to have someone of Ellin’s calibre spend time helping us learn to teach comprehension more effectively. |
 |
"We were convinced that reading comprehension could
be
taught by showing children what proficient readers thought about as they read
and teaching children to use those same strategies themselves." |
||
Our district is fortunate to have Dr. Janice dole as a consultant this year. Dr. Dole, a professor at University of Utah, is working as a reading specialist for the Utah State Office of Education this year. The State Office recognizes our efforts to upgrade the district's reading program and has generously allowed Jan to schedule time with us this year. Jan has been invited to be a member of Blanding Elementary and Mexican Hat's Title 1 School Syupport Teams. She also works closely with the district office and regional service center to help guide literacy decisions.
Dr. Dole is a nationally as well as internationally recognized expert in the areas of reading comprehension, assessment of reading and writing, and learning from textbooks. She is also a profilic writer having published many articles in professional journals including Reading Research Quarterly, Journal of Reading, Review of Educational Research, and the Elementary School Journal.
Educators throughout the state are looking to Dr. Dole for direction in understanding the implications of reading research. A great wealth of new knowledge has been developed the past ten years. This new information should have a major impact in classroom instruction.
Dr. Dole has consulted for schools throughout the nation as well as in Europe. She has presented for the International Reading Association in Stockholm, Sweden, the Philippines, London, and Hong Kong.
Dr. Dole has a special interest in reading issues for bilingual students. She has consulted, written curriculum, and researched in Anchorage, Alaska while working with bilingual Eskimo children. Jan comes to our district not only with impeccable creditionals, but more importantly with a great personal interest in helping us be more effective with our students.
New
Assignment for Kathy Hurst
The bad news is...one of the district’s best language arts
teachers just left
the classroom. The good news is...she is going to be working on a district basis
to help all teachers develop writing curriculum. Kathy Hurst, Language Arts teacher
at San Juan High School for the past several years, has changed positions. For
the next year and a half, she will be working at the Media Center to complete
some tasks outlined in the Title VII Grant. Working closely with Patrick McDermott,
Grant Administrator, and Clay Hamilton of Paradox Productions, her time will be
divided among three primary tasks:
First,
she will create and administer San Juan School District’s Web Site.
The site will become a communications tool for teachers, administrators,
students, and the community. Although the site will be under construction for
some time, the beginning efforts will be up and running on the Internet some
time in March.
Second, she will develop lessons to help students at all levels improve their writing skills. The lessons will be created for use on computers and will integrate the State Core, the writing process, and the Six Analytical Traits of Writing.
Finally, she will help gather materials for a San Juan County Culture Map, which, with the expertise of Paradox Productions, will eventually be developed into an interactive CD.
These are exciting projects that will impact classroom instruction in a very progressive and positive way. We know Kathy will do a super job of pulling together materials and ideas that are currently floating around the district
If you have questions, or if you’d like to give suggestions or work with Kathy on any of the projects, contact her at extension 230 or e-mail her at hurst_kathy@sanjuan.k12.ut.us.
Two
days of intense work is over . For the third year, over
forty teachers gathered at the district office to score student papers grades
3-12.
The writing assessment is becoming increasingly important to our district. The assessment has been identified as one of our "multiple assessments" in all Title 1 schools in the district. The bilingual program recognizes the assessment as more reliable than the writing portion of the IPT test and allows for students who complete the district assessment to use that score in place of the IPT writing score.
Patrick McDermott is developing an extensive student data base that will include these scores. This will allow us to use the writing scores in a much more analytical way.
Student papers and scores will be returned as soon as the data has been entered in the database. Teachers should conference individually with each student to help them understand their scores. Schools are asked to develop a system to collect and store student writing assessments from year to year.
We sincerely appreciate all teachers who spent so much time helping with this process.
A CLIP Testimonial
by Paula Lewis
As
a teacher undergoing the CLIP (Collaborative Literacy Intervention
Project), I cannot say enough good about it. An early intervention program, CLIP
is a reading program designed in part after Reading Recovery, but it is so much
more.
In CLIP, students are taught reading strategies, and soon bask in their own self esteem, as they progress rapidly, Students read several short books each day. On the new book from the prior day, the teacher takes a running record, to determine what to teach the next day. Students write and assemble a sentence or two as part of the program, thus connecting reading, writing, and sound-symbol relationships. Parents, too are a part of the program, reading with their children each night. Students stay in CLIP tutoring only long enough to reach their grade level in reading, then another student enters the program.
Teachers are trained for an entire year. The current training for San Juan School District is in Mexican HAt. CLIP is unique in that it builds on the student’s knowledge, then determine how best to teach based on the things they already know. CLIP is also unique because we take what we learn each week and immediately use it to help our individual students learn to read. Another unique feature of CLIP is teaching reading strategies so that students learn how to figure out reading. Good readers have these strategies in place, but they rarely are taught in schools. Especially exciting is the methods we have learned for adapting CLIP techniques to be used in a classroom setting with groups of students.
While a teacher is a CLIP trainee, the work load is enormous. We have homework reading each week as well as various other assignments. There are lots of forms to complete to guide our instruction, several tests to place children in the program, and then more testing to place them in the correct CLIP reading level. We also must complete daily running records and lesson plans, as well as daily and weekly record-keeping. We also have to do self-evaluations. These help us to determine what we do well and where we can improve. All this goes on in between teaching our regular assignments, CLIPping our students daily, and attending our CLIP class. About the time we feel we have some things in our grasp, we learn an entire NEW set of things to do with our students.
CLIP is definitely a lot of work. But it is so worth the effort. Everyone in the CLIP program loves the results! Parents are enthusiastic, students are shining, teachers are ecstatic; just ASK one of us about CLIP! Simply put, CLIP is what teaching is all about—helping students to reach their potential!
Master’s in Reading Program???
The
district has approached both Utah State University and
University of Utah with the request to offer a Master’s in Reading Program. The
initial idea was to try to get both universities to collaborate on the project.
Utah State has decided to offer a program this fall. University of Utah is interested
in offering a program also. The prospects of collaboration seem dim.
There are significant territorial issues involved in determining which program will be offered. Utah State just developed a Master’s in Reading program for Wyoming and could bring it to our area. University of Utah has a nationally recognized program they would like to deliver in a distance learning mode. So far we have no specific information about either. When the universities sort out this conflict on a state level, and give us solid information, we will pass it along. Keep in touch! We would love many of you to be involved.
Let’s
Talk... Reading
by Lynnette Johnson
This
has
been a year of changes for our district. Changes
always mean some confusion and frustration, but they also give us the opportunity
to grow. As I visit schools and classrooms throughout the district, some of the
same issues surface. I’m not sure I’m communicating clearly with each of you,
so I thought I would try to clarify some questions here.
1. "The Scholastic program is huge. How am I supposed to teach it all?"
The Scholastic program was written with about 2 1/2 years worth of material for each grade. This is to allow teachers plenty of choices. You are not supposed to teach it all. Teachers need to identify the foundation skills in each unit and teach those thoroughly. Look at the unit assessments to be sure you address those objectives. Then try to select the best activities that fit your students’ needs.
Try not to "cover everything", but try to teach well what you do decide is important, and move in a timely fashion through the units
2. "I’ve heard that because Scholastic is mandated I can’t use any other materials."
Scholastic is the district wide reading series and teachers are expected to use the program. However, there are other materials and activities teachers can and should use to build a strong literacy program. Examples are: the 6 Traits Writing Program, Accelerated Reader, Waterford, CCC, and CLIP. Using additional phonics materials to beef up the decoding instruction is an excellent idea.
This is why we have encouraged teachers to attend inservice using Pat Cummingham’s "Phonics They Use," and other good resources. Materials that support the District Reading Plan and the Scholastic Series are always appropriate. What would not be acceptable would be for a teacher to decide they preferred another series to Scholastic and to use that in its place.
3. "Some of the Scholastic stories are too difficult for my students. How am I supposed to keep students at their instructional level and still use Scholastic?"
This is perhaps the most difficult issue confronting teachers. We don’t want children unsuccessfully reading frustrational material, but we do want to raise the expectation level for every student, especially for those reading below grade level.
Part of the answer lies in understanding the role of a basal series. A basal is used to structure curriculum around skills. Most basal series do not have enough stories for students to learn to read fluently. The pace is simply too slow. I once had a professor tell me that the only thing he had against a basal was if students were reading the amount they should, they would be done with the whole series in less than two weeks.
This
means our
students need many more opportunities to read every
day. Each classroom, especially primary grades, needs to have an abundant supply
of leveled readers as well as numerous other books and print material. These
books should be used with the Scholastic program for guided reading and independent
practice. Teachers should be able to take running records on a very regular (daily
or weekly for struggling students) basis to place students in an instructional
level and tailor instruction to their needs. This is a big goal to work toward.
Most of our teachers and classrooms are not prepared to do this yet, but this
is the direction we need to move.
We are still committed to raising the expectation for students by using the Scholastic material on grade level. Teachers who have below level students will need to support children by scaffolding instruction. This means helping students as much as they need help to understand concepts. Methods such as: teaching concepts prior to the story, teaching vocabulary, reading the story to them, re-reading, buddy reading, and using conceptual comprehension strategies are all ways to keep students on grade level without frustrating them. The task requires teachers to be thoughtful and at their best.
4." I don’t like the scope and sequence of Scholastic. It seems some of the skills are in a funny order."
Language arts is quite different than subjects like math. There is no "correct" sequence to teach skills. Teachers who have used another series for years will usually have a difficult time adjusting to a different sequence. Sometimes we see concepts as more logical when presented in an order we like. If you are experiencing difficulty with sequence, be flexible and teach what you think needs to be taught. If you believe your students must know what a noun is before they can master a pronoun, by all means teach that concept.
I appreciate the hard work teachers are doing this year. I know to make the changes we have asked and to be effective requires many hours of additional time. When we decide to implement something district-wide there is always some room for disagreement. I appreciate those of you who have not always liked some of the changes, but have been professional enough to do your best for the children you teach. I especially appreciate those of you who have been so gracious in allowing me to visit your classroom to watch you teach and to ask questions. I learn every day from you. This has been a very difficult year. Thank you for your help and support. I do want to do what I can to help you. I believe we can develop an exemplary reading program, but the critical element is you. Please let me know how I can support you.
Reading Network Teachers in San Juan
Elementary schools in our district have the opportunity for a teacher to represent them in a regional reading network. This group of teachers meet on a monthly basis for inservice and program planning. Rebeccan Donaldson, the Regional Reading Specialist from the Southeastern Service Center in Price, coordinates and funds the efforts of this group.
These teachers
not only
have extra inservice opportunities, but given membership
in the Utah Council of the International Reading Association (UCIRA), as well
as a collection of professional literacy books. Network teachers have made a
committment to share information with their schools and to work with the district
to improve the literacy program.
Network teachers include: Aaron Brewer—Montezuma
Creek Elementary, JoAnne Smith—Blanding Elementary, Paula Lewis—Bluff Elementary,
Barbara Silversmith & Monique McDermott—Mexican Hat Elementary, and Lorrain
Westcott—Monticello Elementary.
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