Multicultural Education

I love the text that accompanies this Ella Jenkins song- fits so beautifully with Kia Kaha principles

WALTS on blog

Started using Walts and photos to demonstrate them- thinking this could be a good communication tool with families and should generate some discussion at home. Also went online to record observations students made about gecko photos posted onto the blog. I was not happy with the layout of the text though and need to research how to improve.

Envirokids' presentation to the Mayor and Councillors

At David MacMillan's request we went along to Council to share what Enviroschools' means to us. I put together a power point presentation and used the Envirokids' ideas to structure a narrative for the students to read alongside the show. Not only did the Envirokids look really smart in the school jackets but they shone as outstanding representatives of the group. Each student stood tall and proud and gave a fantastic oral presentation. The feedback from the group was overwhelmingly positive. In particular the Mayor displayed genuine interest in and admiration for the work we are doing at our school. Well worth all the angst!!

Before/during and after Question chart

For the second day in a row I used the chart with a shared book after lunch. It was really successful in terms of deepening understanding. Some scaffolding was needed to formulate some questions. Have noticed one student in particular with exceptional skill with questions and comprehension- literal and inferential. The smaller version I'm using for guided reading is good- but the time involved is stressing me- will need to adapt. Perhaps it's not necessary to record the questions??

Question Wall

Class noticed added words to wall straight away- all good. We brainstormed ideas as to why we ask questions and recorded for reference- they definitely know why eg to find things out, to help understand something, because you want to know more etc and also lots of 'to get smarter, to do better learning'... I've been thinking that I don't use enough 'terminology' with the class. I need to explicitly use the actual terms rather than try to put them in child speak so much- . Something else to work on...

Question/Statement

We've been adding question words to the Question Word Wall and talking about how expression used by a speaker can often indicate whether what is said is a question or not. They tell me it's easy in text of course because there will be a question mark! There is a much higher recognition amongst the class of a 'question ' now.

Lesson for Rita

Used a shared text and planned a 'before', 'during', 'after' question wondering time. Didn't really go as planned- didn't feel good. Rita's feedback was to verbalise 'why we ask questions.... to become a better reader' which is something we talk about all the 'time, but of course I didn't say it then. Loved the text- Itiiti's Gift.Beautiful meessage, poetic language. Will add to Question wall.

Questions

As Envirokids were planning their oral presentation to the Council today, I got them to ask the questions that the Councillors might ask them about their topics. This proved to be a quick and effective way to help structure and guide the written speech. This strategy also seemed to scaffold the task- all of a sudden it seemed manageable and more focused- less wordy and waffly. Once again 'questions' proved their power!

Daily 5- Liz Hansen

Liz shared features of a programme in action that can lead to succuss or failure... the classroom supply of books needs to be plentiful and turning over- this is critical to maintain interest and ensure that the current interests and needs of students are addressed As a team we shared how it is going for us all and collectively felt pleased with what is happening in our rooms. Some good ideas I gleaned included: compiling a class reference list of 'What I can reas to self/to someone' the Daily Cafe newsletter has a constant supply of new ideas Trade Me second hand games are a good way to buy cheaper games constant revision of the 5 components is important blank game templates can be used to suit current/specific needs fabric piece with sight words and swatters- colours of levels Handprint for vowels Liz has compiled a resource to support the teaching of Knowledge ans Strategies for children of concern. The resource is being shared with us and will obviously need to be acknowlegded.

Questioning

Students talk about our brains, thinking and asking questions

Question Wheel

Using a question wheel, whiteboards and I am wondering chart ans sticky notes

Wondering

Using the 'If' text...

Promoting reading Comprehension

Really great example og using before, during and after questions

Wondering

A lovely 'wondering '  was put forward today that elicited many ideas and lots of earnest discussion. After reading 'The Three Little Pigs' and being invited to share any wonderings 'Why did the mother pig want her children to leave?'
The general consensus was that it was very unkind and not the sort of thing a mother should do.
Lots of lovely ideas as to why- maybe they were too naughty, maybe she just wanted peace and quiet...
Still thinking on what to add into the Wonderings book???

Before/during/after question guide sheet

This guide sheet is working well for our big book and shared stories. It's easy to select an appropriate question.

It's interesting to observe the odd few who show that their understanding of the text was poor. A question with a body language response that others don't see readily provides informative feedback and guides where to next to clarify any misunderstandings- often due to limited prior knowledge I ahve noted. 

Before Questions- Guided reading

Posing inital pre reading questions based on the front cover and/or title is becoming an embedded practice. Still requires prompting at times and some rewording of the question  to clarify it's intention .

Typically the students love to see their name against a question and seems to be a motivating factor.

The questions certainly suceed in providing a purpose for reading and demand some thinking about what they are reading.

Daily 5 short teaching sessions

Today I tried the short teaching break between rotations-
I selected teaching points I had identified as needs during guided reading sessions
today- using punctuation to improve our fluency and accuracy and blends- going beyond the initial letter cues
the transition time needed to be swift and it was- after several ticks being erased!
I really liked the way it worked
A loss however is one less guided reading group was seen

Growing Brains

Questions Help us as Learners

 

We've been talking about how learning new things helps our brains to grow, so questions must help them to grow too!

I'm hearing alot more 'because' that magic word that leads to more information.

As much as questions are becoming part of the class culture, creating a question grammatically does present many with a challenge- lots of modelling and scaffolding is needed. 

Room C Wonder Book

Today I introduced a class 'Wonder Book'

We started with 2 wonderings-
Why is the cat on every page in the book?
How do you get photos into books?

2 great wonderings that created lots of discussion- lots of sharing of existing knowledge for the photos one. The cat question involved us questioning the author's choice and the class came up with a range of possibilities. Lots of possibilities and lots more questions as a result. We decided the cat being there made the story more interesting- he was naother charcter and it was always fun to look at his face and see what he was thinking.

I haven't added symbols yet- question martks to light bulbs...???

Effective Questioning- Professional reading

Professional Reading on ‘using effective questioning to raise achievement in reading’ Effective Literacy Practice (ELP) years 1-4 Notes of interest: 1. Strategic and purposeful questioning is crucial to students’ literacy learning 2. At a metacognitive level questions can be used to build students’ awareness 3. It can be an ideal way to generate thoughtful discussion 4. It can help students build the habit of becoming critically reflective e.g. How do you think… I wonder why… What have you noticed… 5. Well thought out questions can help a student get beyond the surface features of a text they are reading 6. We need to ask a range of questions and know why we are asking them 7. Questions become effective when- • They are directed towards helping students meet a learning goal • They are centred on and draw out students’ knowledge • There is adequate ‘wait time’ for students to think through their responses • Students’ responses are valued and not transformed by evaluative comments tha t suggest the responses are inadequate • Appropriate follow-up questions are used to extend students’ thinking 8. Effective teachers extend questioning well beyond the kinds of questions that only require students to feed back factual content or to make predictions that are purely speculative 9. Attending to the answers that students give is as important as planning and asking the questions 10. It is not necessary or even useful to plan activities based on categories of questions- the aim is to ask questions that reveal the students’ thinking, including any misconceptions or inappropriate assumptions that they may have 11. Questioning may unlock the understanding of a student who is struggling with an aspect of their reading 12. A teacher who uses questions effectively provides a good model to students and shows them how to develop their own questioning strategies. This helps them to bring a critical perspective to texts by asking purposeful questions of themselves as they engage with reading 13. ‘Comprehension strategies are specific, learned procedures that foster active, competent, self-regulated, and intentional reading.” Trabasso and Bouchard, 2002 14. Questioning helps to reinforce the habit of reading for a purpose 15. The T needs to help the students formulate appropriate questions , by modeling such questions during shared reading 16. Asking questions helps readers to engage with the text and with the author and with the reading task.