Reading to Learn PD 19-5-16

Yesterday I attended a PD day around Reading to Learn and the PaCT assessment tool for Reading.  PaCT supports teachers to make overall judgements on their students.  The aspects you select for each area is placed on a graded continuum and PaCT requires you to make a best fit judgement.  Once you have completed your judgements the PaCT tool then puts this information onto a graph and aligns the final result with National Standards.  This is a great tool to determine where a student is sitting within National Standards, and is the tool we will be using for reports to parents.Below are the notes I recorded about the PD day.  I then fed back to the Year 5 & 6 team about what I had learnt from the PD.

Reading to Learn PD

19-5-16

“Students need to do more than just read (or write).  They need to use their reading and writing to meet the demands of the NZ curriculum.

Pg 3, Literacy Learning Progressions.

Less of the technical steps to reading and more around the thinking and discussing of text.  Enjoying reading!

By end of year 3:

• Have ‘constrained’ skills pretty much under control (sounds, abc ….)
• Can monitor their reading
• Use some basic comprehension strategies
• Have some knowledge of how basic texts work
• Have built up a sight vocabulary
• Can evaluate straightforward information
• Can identify the writer’s purpose
• Are fluent readers

Start by reading the text with support, discussing etc then pull the learning/strategies DATs from the discussion points, needs that arise from the discussions.  (Work backwards from the discussion of the text).

Prior knowledge connections are so important to connecting and gaining meaning with the text.  You can’t assume kids know basic experiences/prior knowledge.

Dive deeper into texts.  It’s not about having a new text everyday.

Reading to Learn: Do the children have the knowledge and skills they need to engage with the curriculum?

By the end of year 4: locate and evaluate information and ideas.

Within texts.

By the end of years 5 & 6: locate, evaluate and integrate information and ideas.

Within and across a small range of texts.

By the end of years 7 & 8: locate, evaluate, and synthesise information and ideas.   Synthesise: a new idea is developed.  Come up with their own ideas and conclusions.

Within and across a range of texts.

Reading to learn strategies:  Tools that you use to achieve a particular purpose.

Reading and writing are tools to:

• Organise their thinking
• Construct and create meaning
• Communicate information and ideas in print and electronic texts
• Reveal their developing knowledge of content across the curriculum.

(Reading and writing standards Years 4-8 pg 5)

Teacher enthusiasm and passion.  Excitement about the text.  Reveal this to the students.  Teacher shares opinions about a text they have read - maybe positive or negative thoughts about the text.  Shares about emotions around reading.

ENJOY a BOOK!

Hi 5! Strategies: Enhancing comprehension

1. Activating background knowledge
2. Questioning (kids asking questions.  The person who asks the most questions - learns the most!)
3. Analyzing text structure
4. Creating mental images
5. Summarising  

Questioning:

Ask ‘wondering’ questions

Ask questions to ‘clarify confusions’

Ask ‘right there’ questions ‘think and search’ questions.

Make sure the students know what you want and are doing.  Tell them “I am going to ask a question about…. I am modelling to you how to….”

Sentence structures, language…. Change and vary depending on the purpose and audience.  (Science has different structures to maths etc)

Analyzing text structure:

Recognise common text purposes (describe, inform, recount, explain…)

Recognise common text structures in fiction and nonfiction text (sequential, descriptive, persuasive, cause and effect…)

Negotiate continuous and non-continuous text

Recognise different text types within a text

Use signal or cues words

Follow and keep track of pronoun references

Recognise and use specific language and visual features

Teach kids how to read complex sentences

Articulate how using knowledge of text structure, helps them read and understand the text.

Summarising:

Delete irrelevant details

Combine similar ideas

Condense main ideas

Connect major themes into concise statements (that capture the purpose for reading).

By the end of the PD day I had felt very overwhelmed and needed to take time to think about my reading program and how I determine the WALTS and success criteria.  Since reflecting about 'Clarity in the Classroom' and the delivery of my reading program, I decided to flip the order of my teaching sessions around.  I have started be beginning with LOOKING at the text.  Asking students 'What do you see? What do you know from looking at the text?...'  This has helped us to by ensuring we use all the visual cues provided to gain information about the text, and connect with the text.  From here we begin reading and discussing the text.  From the discussions about the text and specific questioning, I am able to gain what the WALT should/needs to be.  Sometimes this aligns with what I had planned the WALT to be, but occasionally a prior step is needed, so I can quickly adapt my teaching to suit.  Once the reading is over, the students know are able to identify what their WALT was and quickly identify the success criteria.  

We have been doing this new way of reading for just over a week now, and already the student feedback and response has been very positive.  They have said they prefer it the new way, because they get more time actually reading, they can quickly identify what they have learnt, and are able to independently state the success criteria because they know what they did to achieve their WALT.

Facilitating staff meeting and new leadership role

This week I have been appointed the leader of our school's literacy group.  In addition to this role, I was also invited to facilitate the staff meeting at a local school all round writing and the PACT tool.

Despite my initial nerves, I managed to run an effective meeting all around how to use the PACT tool in writing, how to make OTJ's, tricks around getting quicker at making judgements, how to use the next steps to guide teaching and planning, and how I use my writing books and writing program to make my judgements.

The feedback from the staff was overwhelming.  Many teachers are now wanting to come and observe my writing program.  They were impressed with the student's writing books and the level and volume of writing my student's are producing.

My next step in my leadership role for literacy, is to present alongside our school principal at the Writing Symposium in Wellington in July.

Feedback emailed out to the staff about my staff meeting presentation:

Congratulations to Tineke who ran an amazing staff meeting for the G teachers after school yesterday. It’s a pretty tough thing to do in front of colleagues from another school and she did a fantastic job.

If you suddenly get an influx of G teachers through your class, blame Tineke….

Many thanks

L.

Teaching is a family business.

I have heard on numerous occasions that teaching is a family venture.  Today this was proven whilst setting up my new display for our inquiry unit on space.  Obviously my own children are frequently roped into helping me within the classroom, however today not only did I have my own children helping me, my nieces, my mum, and even my husband lent a huge helping hand.  There was lots of fun and laughter happening as we all got creative, creating a huge space display for my Year 6 students as they return back to school next week.

Here are some photos that I captured, showing the progress going on.

A fantastic maths lesson

Towards the end of last term, I felt like I wasn't getting enough quality teaching time with my students in maths.  I was running four maths groups and seeing each group for 20-25 minutes every second day.  Due to the constant interruptions the Year 6's have with extra curricular activities, responsibilities within the school etc, I found that for many students, the number of times I saw them was actually much less.  I was also finding that many students would just start to grasp the concept I was teaching, then have to move onto their next rotation and wait until the next day to practice that concept independently.  For my top maths students, this was working ok, however there are a number of students who were feeling rushed, and weren't overly confident working independently.  I was noticing that their confidence towards maths was dropping, and the quality of their independent work was not flash either.  So rather than continue teaching my maths program the way I had done for the last few years, I felt a change was needed in order for my students to get the best possible outcomes in maths.

It was time for a change so on went my thinking cap.  I began by talking with the students about what their thoughts were with maths.  Many of them felt they needed more time to work with the teacher so they could really grasp the new concepts, rather than a quick example and practice of it, then off to doing it independently.  

Sometime ago, I had also read about processing difficulties and the fact that many students require a lot of repetition of the same concept, before they can commit it to memory.  After talking with some colleagues as well as students, I decided to re-arrange my teaching rotations.

Changes that I made:

• Merged my two groups who I felt would benefit from a longer teaching session, and instead of having two 20-25 minute sessions, I now had 55 minutes to work with them.  The group was now of semi-mixed abilities.
• I introduced the WALT then gave the students a problem to solve by working together.  Materials were also available for those who wanted to use them.  (In the past - I would introduce the WALT and give the students and example by working it through with them.  This tended to be more about me showing them, rather than the students taking time to think and process the concept.  The students would then copy the example given into their books).
• Once the students felt they had an answer, they all shared their thinking.  Many had the correct answer, however hadn't used the strategy they were going to be learning.  Rather than say they were incorrect, I asked them to take a look at the WALT and see if they had solved their problem using the strategy we were going to learn.  Many said no and could answer they had solved it using addition rather than multiplication. 
• 
• From this point, I then used the materials to talk through each of the steps to solve the maths problem and achieve the WALT.  While I was modelling the steps, the students were following me with their own materials.

• Because I now had longer to spend teaching, I could now spend time with the students co-constructing the success criteria for their learning.  Because time had been spent manipulating materials, talking about the WALT and practising an example, the students were able to clearly identify the steps they needed to take, ignored to solve their maths equations and achieve their WALT.  Below is the success criteria we constructed.  The pink shows our first go at it.  The black was added after we had worked through a question and then realised that some more information was needed to make the success criteria clearer.

•  Now that the students new exactly what they were learning and how to achieve success, they all began working through the next two questions I had given them.  If a student felt they were stuck, their first port of call was to go back to the success criteria and check they had followed the steps.  For many students, this was enough to continue working independently.  I was now freed up to rove the group and monitor their learning.  Once the two questions were completed, the students shared their answers and their working out.  If they were correct, the students then carried on solving the remainder of the questions independently.  If a student felt they required additional support, they chose to come and work with me on the mat and we did another example together.  

Why was the maths session so successful?
This maths session was hugely empowering for all of these students, as they were all feeling success and had me to support if needed.  Because we had a longer maths session, students felt they had time to properly grasp the new concept and achieve success because they had time to go through the whole process, rather then it being rushed through.  Because the group was now semi-mixed ability, the students tended to ask their peers for help a lot more then in previous sessions, as well as opting to come and work with me if they felt they wanted further support.  For the students that chose to receive further support, it wasn't always because they got previous questions incorrect, but rather because they wanted the comfort/reassurance of having the teacher available to double check they were on the right track, rather than struggling away independently.  For the students who chose to continue working independently - because the questions were all their for them, they were able to carry on solving equations and practising the new concept, rather then having to wait for other students to catch up and finish.  This then helped accelerate those who grasped the concept quicker then others as they were able to carry on independently.

How do I know the session was successful?
At the end of the lesson, the group all came back together to mark their work and reflect on the WALT.  By the end of the lesson, every single student had achieved the WALT and had at the very least, managed to correctly answer their last question correctly and independently.  The students were smiling, and many said, "Can we do maths like this all the time?".

Apps to help struggling learners with the surface features of writing.

This week I have come across two apps to assist my struggling writers and dyslexic students with their writing.

Often struggling writers have good imaginations and stories but lack the skills to turn this into written text.  Through prompting and oral discussions, many of these students come up with fantastic stories yet when they go to write their ideas down, there is a significant mismatch between what they want to write and what they have actually written.  This challenge was highlighted for me after a discussion I had around writing with my 7 year old daughter who not only is new to Year 3, but also has mild dyslexia.

My daughter was describing something she had eaten.  She used brilliant descriptive language when she was telling me about it.  Her sentence was "That was so delicious.  It was a bit spicy and made my tongue feel a bit tingly".  I told her how great that sentence was and asked her to try and write it down.  When she showed me what she had written, what was on the page was 'It was really yum'  When I asked her what happened to all the fancy words she used to describe what she had eaten, her response was "I don't use them because I don't know how to write those words and spell them'.  I was pretty sad to here this answer because what a difference her writing achievement would be if she included this descriptive language.  I am sure I would also see a big improvement in her self-belief and confidence as a writer too if she were able to write what she thought.

I reflected on her response and set out to find apps that I could use in my class to help my students overcome this hurdle.   I have managed to find the speech recognition app for google docs and the voice recognition setting on i-pads.  Both of these apps require the person to speak to the device.  It then types their speech into words.  These apps will be able to be used in all areas of the writing process.  I hope to see my struggling writers using devices each time they write.  Initially to plan their ideas and thoughts, then draft, then again for proofreading and editing their work.

After trialling this today with one of my dyslexic learners during the proof-reading and editing stage of writing, the smile on his face when a word he wanted to use but didn't know how to spell it, appeared on the screen on front of him, was priceless.  Instantly a weight was lifted off his shoulders.  His ability to independently proof-read and self-correct his work has increased significantly, resulting in greater student agency.

These apps will hopefully see a big shift in student agency and student confidence as they can now be more independent with their writing instead of having to rely heavily on the teacher to scribe, or decode their writing.

What do I hope to see?

• Improved spelling
• Greater details and descriptions used
• Increase in a range of language features
• Increased self-belief and confidence in writing
• Improved accuracy and fluency of writing
• Greater independence.

What next?

• Have devices available for students to use during writing time
• Show the students how to use the apps
• Ensure students are using the apps when writing.
• Monitor the accuracy of their surface features.

Growth Mindset

Last night I came across this motivating clip on you tube which I have since shared with my Year 6 students.  The clip is a great way to introduce Growth Mindset and get students thinking about their goals and ambitions.

Growth Mindset Clip

Since watching this clip, my students have been asked to go home and think about their goals which they are going to write down and display on the class wall.  We will then work towards our stepping stones for achieving our goals.

I have reminded them it is perfectly fine to dream big.  If they have an ultimate goal which may take years to achieve, we will just work backwards from our ultimate goal and create mini goals (stepping stones) to help achieve it.  These goals will also help me think about my teaching and what I need to be doing to help my students achieve their goals.

Using technology in the classroom to assist learning and documenting evidence.

This year I am focusing on trying to use technology more in the classroom to assist students learning and also as a way of collecting and recording evidence.

Because of the large number of students who are out of class regularly for extra curricular activities, or school jobs and responsibilities, keeping them up to date with work has been tricky.  I am also trying to find ways of recording students work when they are using materials etc because they may not always have evidence of their work in their books.

So far this term I have set up a class google drive with a range of folders in it.  Each student has their own folder as well as a folder for each writing, math, reading group etc.  I am using the google drive to upload my planning, tutorial clips, resources, activities...

I have found using the google drive extremely helpful when teaching maths.  When I teach a new concept and model it with materials, I have had the students take photos of the demonstration and upload it into their groups folder.  This way they have evidence of how to work out the problem that they can later refer back to, or if a student was absent for the lesson, they can look at the examples and catch up.  This way of recording also allows me to keep evidence of students work when they may not have any written evidence in their book.  If I need to, I could always print the photos and glue them in too.

Below are some examples of some photos taken during maths lessons.

(Solve multiplication using the place value strategy)

 (Solve multiplication using our 5x tables)

I have also been using the goolge drive to upload group WALTs and Success criteria.  See an example below:

For writing, I am also finding google docs very helpful.  Instead of using a modelling book, I am using a google document to type examples up and the students can see this via our interactive tv.  Students can then access the writing example via their writing group folder on the google drive.