I watched the Education in the Digital Age: Insights and Findings
PBS webinar. I chose this program partially because I was slightly familiar with Digital Nation (an ongoing program about digital media and it's impact on children that PBS is focusing on). I had seen a documentary about the very beginnings of this exploration back in a sociology class in college. Plus, with the content being relevant for our current coursework, I figured that it was important to explore digital media. I also would have loved to have watched some of the Reading Comprehension or ELL focuses (and in fact tried to watch a webinar on Response to Intervention, but was not able to do so).
1) What are the advantages to watching a webinar as opposed to reading an article?
I like that the webinar gives you so much more interaction than watching a TV or listening to a sound clip would-- it is so much more of an integrated learning experience. The webinar that I watched had a "chat" feature on the side, as well as different tools to put the scope of the webinar in perspective-- an interactive map where teachers could mark where they were communicating from, plus respond yes or no, chime in as necessary, etc. Moderators exist to keep the conversation focused on the webinar ( mostly.. I was slightly disappointed at the off-topic sidebar discussion happening) but people can "type" in questions or actually verbally chime in during Q and A times. It was so much more interactive than reading an article and I think as such is in some ways "easier" or at least much more engaging.
2) How can you see this tool being used to support your own development as a teacher?
I plan on using webinars to learn more about other perspectives. Just in looking for one to watch, I found multiple webinars on RTI which our school site is in it's second year of experimenting with. I have just been exposed to a few other methods of doing RtI and I am curious about what else exists, what methods have seen significant progress and how I can use the information in the webinars to create more focused Independent Learning Plans (ILPS) to be used to plan RtI. Our school is currently improving their RtI methods and I think I could be much more of an asset to the school site, as well as generally more knowledgeable as a teacher, if I take the time to look at how I create goals for my students and follow up on them through RtI. Thus, I think this could directly affect the achievement of the 12 students that are currently in RtI.
3) What are some other topics on which you would like to see webinars?
I would love to also go into the ELL webinars. One of my REACH ongoing goals has been related to finding more methods to help my struggling ELL students. Without a base in Spanish to communicate, this is certainly an area of growth for me as a teacher and I intend to continue try to work on this and grow more as an educator. I think webinars on instructional methods could help me be a more engaging teacher with integrated visual/audio assistance etc for ELLs.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
115: Technology #1
1. Was there anything in the internet safety presentations that was new to you? What about for your students? Do you think they are aware of this information?
There was nothing that was particularly new to me in this, as the information in the cartoon video seemed to be more generated at teenagers than first graders in the specific community I am teaching in. That said, I think there are absolutely still dangers to my students in terms of technology, but it does not seem like my students risk the issues of cyber-bullying etc that older students are involved in. I think the largest benefit to me in terms of watching the presentation was that it covered various different forms of social media and how those things could be a danger to students even though they can also be a benefit as well.
2. What technology do both you and your students have available? Be specific & 3. What kinds of technology do you currently use in your classroom/what could you use?
I use my computer in the classroom on occasion. Our attendance is done via computer, the school site maintains an information database for filesharing via google docs (to assist with paperwor, and eventually, in theory, with lesson planning). Though I do not have a projector in my own classroom, I do have a pull down screen so that I can borrow our school's shared projector. I have used this for incorporating pictures, songs and images in UbD science and social studies units in the past and hope to integrate more into the general literacy curriculum for our students who are visual/auditory learners and would really benefit from these types of technologies.
I do often find myself using my personal computer, particularly in my planning (using teacher-oriented websites for Guided Reading books, phonics packets, etc). For my very lowest and most struggling students, I use one particular website (Starfall.com) where there are specific phonics activities, especially tailored to vowels, etc that those students really seem to benefit from.
For my students, they use computers every day in our learning lab-- I think they are very fortunate to have a daily computer class and I think it absolutely impacts students achievement. However, being totally honest, I am not positive what online curriculum they are currently using as I know our school has been testing out various types to try to meet students at their academic level as opposed to using a blanket "first grade" or "math" curriculum. I know that accelerated reader (the read a book, and then take a quiz online format) is used by them daily.
While most of my students do not have home computers available to them, I did notice on a few occasions at home visits that some students do. I was thrilled to have conversations with two parents who said that they translate the homework online when the language barrier means that they cannot fully assist their students. I know this must be time consuming for them and it is something I wish I personally had the time to do for them ahead of handing out the packets. Most of my students parents do have phones and texting, which I think we sometimes forget as a use of technology. A few parents will text or email me for parent communication.
There was nothing that was particularly new to me in this, as the information in the cartoon video seemed to be more generated at teenagers than first graders in the specific community I am teaching in. That said, I think there are absolutely still dangers to my students in terms of technology, but it does not seem like my students risk the issues of cyber-bullying etc that older students are involved in. I think the largest benefit to me in terms of watching the presentation was that it covered various different forms of social media and how those things could be a danger to students even though they can also be a benefit as well.
2. What technology do both you and your students have available? Be specific & 3. What kinds of technology do you currently use in your classroom/what could you use?
I use my computer in the classroom on occasion. Our attendance is done via computer, the school site maintains an information database for filesharing via google docs (to assist with paperwor, and eventually, in theory, with lesson planning). Though I do not have a projector in my own classroom, I do have a pull down screen so that I can borrow our school's shared projector. I have used this for incorporating pictures, songs and images in UbD science and social studies units in the past and hope to integrate more into the general literacy curriculum for our students who are visual/auditory learners and would really benefit from these types of technologies.
I do often find myself using my personal computer, particularly in my planning (using teacher-oriented websites for Guided Reading books, phonics packets, etc). For my very lowest and most struggling students, I use one particular website (Starfall.com) where there are specific phonics activities, especially tailored to vowels, etc that those students really seem to benefit from.
For my students, they use computers every day in our learning lab-- I think they are very fortunate to have a daily computer class and I think it absolutely impacts students achievement. However, being totally honest, I am not positive what online curriculum they are currently using as I know our school has been testing out various types to try to meet students at their academic level as opposed to using a blanket "first grade" or "math" curriculum. I know that accelerated reader (the read a book, and then take a quiz online format) is used by them daily.
While most of my students do not have home computers available to them, I did notice on a few occasions at home visits that some students do. I was thrilled to have conversations with two parents who said that they translate the homework online when the language barrier means that they cannot fully assist their students. I know this must be time consuming for them and it is something I wish I personally had the time to do for them ahead of handing out the packets. Most of my students parents do have phones and texting, which I think we sometimes forget as a use of technology. A few parents will text or email me for parent communication.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Health Course #3
How do you see the physical health, or lack of health, impacting your classroom? What are the explicit and implicit messages you give youth about their health and physical development, both positive and (inadvertently) negative? What efforts does your school make to support physical health and education?
I think I see more of the negative on this topic; lack of time for movement and play really impacting my classroom. It is hard to strike a balance at our school sometimes; I feel pressure to mold my students into perfect little scholars, but at the same time, I know students need more time to be physically active.
This is one area where I have always felt kind of a conflict between my own thinking and the school's philosophy. Having worked in schools at the opposite end of the SES spectrum, where movement, free play and creativity were paramount, I know that both systems can have immense payoff. It has been hard to strike a balance between what I feel comfortable with and the cultural expectations of the school. I am definitely still working on this.
Last year, I would often take my students outside to do our daily Read Aloud-- especially as we began reading chapter books together as a class. They would still need to be in LEARN position, still focused and listening attentively... but it made me feel at least a little bit better that they were spending time outdoors. Honestly, I think our 20 minute recess + their time with Coach Jessica is just not enough. They need more activity, more time exploring and enjoying the outdoors. I am so glad that the camping trip exists, but I wish we had hte funding and ability to do smaller-scale outdoor experience type of programs for the younger grades. If has made me think of our grade-level parent-family meeting being something outdoor/hiking/exercise related, just to give students that exposure that they may not necessarily be getting at home.
One thing I have been asking parents on my home visits is what their students are doing afterschool, especially since some of them now do get home at a reasonable hour. I have been advocating giving their students a break from homework to go outside and play after school, instead of doing homework and then staying inside to watch TV. Most parents have been pretty receptive of this, and it seems like most students are capable of getting their homework done in a reasonable amount of time independently this year. I have been happy that some parents have enrolled students in other activities; church afterschool programs where the students get to use the playground equipment, cheerleading, dance, football, soccer, karate, swimming, It is nice to hear that parents are taking the initiative to have hteir students involved in these activities.
I feel like I was much better about being explicit about healthy living last year than I am this year; I probably should put in more of an effort. My students last year all knew that they should be drinking water or milk with lunch instead of soda, that they should be eating fruits and veggies, etc. I took the opportunity, whenever possible, to remind them about healthy choices. This year I have only talked about it in relation to the core value of responsibility; working in messages about healthy diet and exercise into my morning message and their journal prompts will probably be a good way to get these points across without "loosing" learning time.
The yardsticks article really gave me a lot of proverbial food for thought; there were elements of it that Alicia and I were laughing about (i.e. my chewed up pencil bin being a natural thing for a six year old- we have often referred to them as goats since they WILL chew anything) but lots more that I just don't feel like quite fit with our cultural expectations and 100 culture items. Striking a healthy balance is not easy and I know I will need to keep working on this.
I think I see more of the negative on this topic; lack of time for movement and play really impacting my classroom. It is hard to strike a balance at our school sometimes; I feel pressure to mold my students into perfect little scholars, but at the same time, I know students need more time to be physically active.
This is one area where I have always felt kind of a conflict between my own thinking and the school's philosophy. Having worked in schools at the opposite end of the SES spectrum, where movement, free play and creativity were paramount, I know that both systems can have immense payoff. It has been hard to strike a balance between what I feel comfortable with and the cultural expectations of the school. I am definitely still working on this.
Last year, I would often take my students outside to do our daily Read Aloud-- especially as we began reading chapter books together as a class. They would still need to be in LEARN position, still focused and listening attentively... but it made me feel at least a little bit better that they were spending time outdoors. Honestly, I think our 20 minute recess + their time with Coach Jessica is just not enough. They need more activity, more time exploring and enjoying the outdoors. I am so glad that the camping trip exists, but I wish we had hte funding and ability to do smaller-scale outdoor experience type of programs for the younger grades. If has made me think of our grade-level parent-family meeting being something outdoor/hiking/exercise related, just to give students that exposure that they may not necessarily be getting at home.
One thing I have been asking parents on my home visits is what their students are doing afterschool, especially since some of them now do get home at a reasonable hour. I have been advocating giving their students a break from homework to go outside and play after school, instead of doing homework and then staying inside to watch TV. Most parents have been pretty receptive of this, and it seems like most students are capable of getting their homework done in a reasonable amount of time independently this year. I have been happy that some parents have enrolled students in other activities; church afterschool programs where the students get to use the playground equipment, cheerleading, dance, football, soccer, karate, swimming, It is nice to hear that parents are taking the initiative to have hteir students involved in these activities.
I feel like I was much better about being explicit about healthy living last year than I am this year; I probably should put in more of an effort. My students last year all knew that they should be drinking water or milk with lunch instead of soda, that they should be eating fruits and veggies, etc. I took the opportunity, whenever possible, to remind them about healthy choices. This year I have only talked about it in relation to the core value of responsibility; working in messages about healthy diet and exercise into my morning message and their journal prompts will probably be a good way to get these points across without "loosing" learning time.
The yardsticks article really gave me a lot of proverbial food for thought; there were elements of it that Alicia and I were laughing about (i.e. my chewed up pencil bin being a natural thing for a six year old- we have often referred to them as goats since they WILL chew anything) but lots more that I just don't feel like quite fit with our cultural expectations and 100 culture items. Striking a healthy balance is not easy and I know I will need to keep working on this.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
107, Healthy Development
Question:
I'm not sure this is so much a question as it is something that I'm somewhat irked by, but I was frustrated by the over-simplifications on the role that gender plays in behavior and therefore achievement. The reading mentioned the issue with Kolberg's theory for instance, as being male-focused or male-dominant. It also talked about girls as having more care-based or altruistic social connections (Chapter 13, p. 436)-- this seems like it may occur moreso at the high school level but I think in first grade, at least over the course of the last year, I have seen males associate almost equally as much in this way. I also question the idea of masculine "helping" roles (i.e. boys will be more willing to help in situations that are actually dangerous- p. 442); I'd love to see this experiment done at the elementary level and see the results!
Comment:
It has been interesting for me to read these articles and work on this unit so far. I took a child development course back in high school, plus a few high school psych and sociology classes that talked about a lot of what I'm reading I have already read before. At the same time, it's totally different to read it now that I see it playing out every day in the classroom. On the other hand, when I was taking the child development class I also worked as an assistant teacher in a preschool-- it is so amazing to reflect on the difference that two years or even only a year and a half makes in terms of development!
I also thought the information presented about empathy was interesting (Chapter 13, p. 437)-- basically that around four years old, children begin to develop some sense of empathy and connection to others that helps develop sharing skills, etc. I have found that empathy is the most abstract of Rocketship's Core Values for the students. They struggle most with the idea that they should care about other people's feelings and make choices that demonstrate an understanding of others feelings and perspectives. I think, in retrospect, maybe the reason for this is partially developmental. It has always felt somewhat strange to me to teach empathy explicitly-- how do you teach someone to care? Some kids seem to be very genuinely empathetic naturally (I have 2 particularly empathetic students in my Thoroughbreds class that come to mind); many others are totally oblivious.
Quote:
"As children move into the middle and late childhood years, parents spend considerably less time with them. In one study, parents spent less than half the time with their children aged 5 to 12 in caregiving, instruction, reading and talking as when their children were younger." This quote really stood out with me because I think it's exactly what Rocketship as a community is trying to ward off with our homework packets and reading packets. We are ensuring that parents ARE taking that time; we can see on a daily basis that our students still need the support of people reading with them, giving them that attention, etc. It all plays into child development and I think we need to continue to work to make sure that those aspects aren't neglected.
I'm not sure this is so much a question as it is something that I'm somewhat irked by, but I was frustrated by the over-simplifications on the role that gender plays in behavior and therefore achievement. The reading mentioned the issue with Kolberg's theory for instance, as being male-focused or male-dominant. It also talked about girls as having more care-based or altruistic social connections (Chapter 13, p. 436)-- this seems like it may occur moreso at the high school level but I think in first grade, at least over the course of the last year, I have seen males associate almost equally as much in this way. I also question the idea of masculine "helping" roles (i.e. boys will be more willing to help in situations that are actually dangerous- p. 442); I'd love to see this experiment done at the elementary level and see the results!
Comment:
It has been interesting for me to read these articles and work on this unit so far. I took a child development course back in high school, plus a few high school psych and sociology classes that talked about a lot of what I'm reading I have already read before. At the same time, it's totally different to read it now that I see it playing out every day in the classroom. On the other hand, when I was taking the child development class I also worked as an assistant teacher in a preschool-- it is so amazing to reflect on the difference that two years or even only a year and a half makes in terms of development!
I also thought the information presented about empathy was interesting (Chapter 13, p. 437)-- basically that around four years old, children begin to develop some sense of empathy and connection to others that helps develop sharing skills, etc. I have found that empathy is the most abstract of Rocketship's Core Values for the students. They struggle most with the idea that they should care about other people's feelings and make choices that demonstrate an understanding of others feelings and perspectives. I think, in retrospect, maybe the reason for this is partially developmental. It has always felt somewhat strange to me to teach empathy explicitly-- how do you teach someone to care? Some kids seem to be very genuinely empathetic naturally (I have 2 particularly empathetic students in my Thoroughbreds class that come to mind); many others are totally oblivious.
Quote:
"As children move into the middle and late childhood years, parents spend considerably less time with them. In one study, parents spent less than half the time with their children aged 5 to 12 in caregiving, instruction, reading and talking as when their children were younger." This quote really stood out with me because I think it's exactly what Rocketship as a community is trying to ward off with our homework packets and reading packets. We are ensuring that parents ARE taking that time; we can see on a daily basis that our students still need the support of people reading with them, giving them that attention, etc. It all plays into child development and I think we need to continue to work to make sure that those aspects aren't neglected.
Monday, April 20, 2009
111: Differentiation of Special Needs Student
Prompt: One of the key elements of TPA task 2-4 (and a key element of effective teaching) relates to how you differentiate, accomodate and/or modify your teaching to make sure that you systematically meet the special needs students and still make sure that they achieve the expected outcomes of the course. How do you make sure that special needs students meet your UbD outcomes and are successful on their assessments despite their disabilities? What do you need to improve?
I think one of the things that I have realized more and more recently is that I need to find my own 'style' especially in dealing with students outside of the mainstream. When we recently went on a classroom visit to a school at Stanford, the classroom was so open, unregimented and calm. While it did stand in total opposition to the type of teacher that our school site wants us to be, there was also an amazing (and nearly infectious) creative energy going around- the differentiation was incredible too! It really inspired me to step back and re-evaluate the time I am spending with my struggling students. It was such a positive for the children in this classroom-- doing special projects, having additional steps built in to ensure completion of a task (such as having their work 'pre-edited' by a parent, then typed back for them to evaluate themselves), etc. It was definitely apparent that there was a path to success for these students, and there are some critical links missing with my own. While I am not sure how well it would be recieved at our school, I think that a lot of what I read up on in Chapter 2 (movement, wait time, environment, lighting, 'safe space', softer relationships with the students, etc) could potentially really help my strugglers to feel safe with their challenges rather than hiding, averting their eyes, avoiding putting up their hand, etc. I also loved the idea of students learning how to self-monitor their own 'attention level' and having to guide them on how to pay attention- something I majorly lacked in my first semester of teaching. Whereas learning how to be a student came so naturally for other students, I questioned why these few kids couldn't just stay in their chair, keep their eyes on me, etc. Now I see that there were so many other factors in play most likely, that I had not even considered-- emotional/developmental maturity, etc.
There are a few ways that I think I've gotten decent at differentiating this year, or at least have made improvements in the last few months. I am fortunate to have E. in my class-- a student with mild emotional/developmental needs as well as fairly minor academic challenges. Despite his challenges, he is super cooperative, eager to please and really willing to let me try out new tactics on him before moving them onto other students. Communicating with his team of support staff there to help him has really helped me understand some 'small ways' to help my learning disabled students out, and it has made a HUGE difference. For instance, I was able to get an inflatable 'balance' cushion for students to sit on when they are struggling with moving in their chairs, two small rugs to place outside of the classroom carpet for students who need more individual space, and a weighted vest suggested by an Occupational Therapist to help the student regain focus or balance, especially when transitioning from a more physical activity to a more sedate one.
At the same time, there are some pieces I'm definitely missing. While I'm getting better about chants and movements, I still do not do nearly enough (especially not for D, a student with an IEP for speech who is still really struggling with spoken English). I need to work on incorporating this more-- I did just get a set of chants to try out in terms of grammar/vocab building and I'm excited to try these out. There is so much from the two articles that really I'd like to see if I can experiment with this year, to see if it helps me be more effective and find my teaching strategy with those specific lowest students. I often comment that I feel like I've found my teaching style with my 'other 34' but still can't figure out how to reach my lowest six. At this point, anything is worth a try-- be it better lighting, more movement, more sound, rhythms, bell sounds/transition sounds, effacy/personal responsibility individual reporting, etc.
I think that this course should give me a jumping off point to work with those six students-- and I think I'll really be able to devise a plan that more effectively hits their needs. As of now, I have all sorts of extra time blocked into the day for them, which I feel is somewhat taking away from my instruction of other students, but needs to be done because there is such a wide gap in my classroom right now between the 'low kids' and 'everyone else'. Until this gap closes a bit, I feel pretty powerless to help others when some are struggling so very much. However, in reading and thinking about this unit, I think there may be a huge part of me that is approaching my instruction of these students wrong, and perhaps that is really contributing to their lack of success. I plan on revising my plan for these students that I have with the academic dean to reflect some of the things I will come away from this course with.
I think one of the things that I have realized more and more recently is that I need to find my own 'style' especially in dealing with students outside of the mainstream. When we recently went on a classroom visit to a school at Stanford, the classroom was so open, unregimented and calm. While it did stand in total opposition to the type of teacher that our school site wants us to be, there was also an amazing (and nearly infectious) creative energy going around- the differentiation was incredible too! It really inspired me to step back and re-evaluate the time I am spending with my struggling students. It was such a positive for the children in this classroom-- doing special projects, having additional steps built in to ensure completion of a task (such as having their work 'pre-edited' by a parent, then typed back for them to evaluate themselves), etc. It was definitely apparent that there was a path to success for these students, and there are some critical links missing with my own. While I am not sure how well it would be recieved at our school, I think that a lot of what I read up on in Chapter 2 (movement, wait time, environment, lighting, 'safe space', softer relationships with the students, etc) could potentially really help my strugglers to feel safe with their challenges rather than hiding, averting their eyes, avoiding putting up their hand, etc. I also loved the idea of students learning how to self-monitor their own 'attention level' and having to guide them on how to pay attention- something I majorly lacked in my first semester of teaching. Whereas learning how to be a student came so naturally for other students, I questioned why these few kids couldn't just stay in their chair, keep their eyes on me, etc. Now I see that there were so many other factors in play most likely, that I had not even considered-- emotional/developmental maturity, etc.
There are a few ways that I think I've gotten decent at differentiating this year, or at least have made improvements in the last few months. I am fortunate to have E. in my class-- a student with mild emotional/developmental needs as well as fairly minor academic challenges. Despite his challenges, he is super cooperative, eager to please and really willing to let me try out new tactics on him before moving them onto other students. Communicating with his team of support staff there to help him has really helped me understand some 'small ways' to help my learning disabled students out, and it has made a HUGE difference. For instance, I was able to get an inflatable 'balance' cushion for students to sit on when they are struggling with moving in their chairs, two small rugs to place outside of the classroom carpet for students who need more individual space, and a weighted vest suggested by an Occupational Therapist to help the student regain focus or balance, especially when transitioning from a more physical activity to a more sedate one.
At the same time, there are some pieces I'm definitely missing. While I'm getting better about chants and movements, I still do not do nearly enough (especially not for D, a student with an IEP for speech who is still really struggling with spoken English). I need to work on incorporating this more-- I did just get a set of chants to try out in terms of grammar/vocab building and I'm excited to try these out. There is so much from the two articles that really I'd like to see if I can experiment with this year, to see if it helps me be more effective and find my teaching strategy with those specific lowest students. I often comment that I feel like I've found my teaching style with my 'other 34' but still can't figure out how to reach my lowest six. At this point, anything is worth a try-- be it better lighting, more movement, more sound, rhythms, bell sounds/transition sounds, effacy/personal responsibility individual reporting, etc.
I think that this course should give me a jumping off point to work with those six students-- and I think I'll really be able to devise a plan that more effectively hits their needs. As of now, I have all sorts of extra time blocked into the day for them, which I feel is somewhat taking away from my instruction of other students, but needs to be done because there is such a wide gap in my classroom right now between the 'low kids' and 'everyone else'. Until this gap closes a bit, I feel pretty powerless to help others when some are struggling so very much. However, in reading and thinking about this unit, I think there may be a huge part of me that is approaching my instruction of these students wrong, and perhaps that is really contributing to their lack of success. I plan on revising my plan for these students that I have with the academic dean to reflect some of the things I will come away from this course with.
Monday, April 6, 2009
110: Equity Resources
After browsing through a few other resources, I chose to really look at the Rethinking Schools site. I was more than impressed with what I saw, but most impressed with the quarterly magazine. I read a few of the articles-- the one that stuck with me most was about the integration of technology in the classroom. I've over and over again said that I should try to get some grant money (or Donors Choose) to get a projector in my room-- having the kids huddled around my computer in the classroom is not ideal at all. I know from home visits that very few of them had computers in the home-- and if they did, they were not up to speed with modern technology. Reading the article-- about how much access to technology can affect end result in education brought me back to that. However, the article also put things into perspective-- what we stand to lose by over-emphasizing technology in education. Would it push consumer culture? Or disadvantage those students who did not learn best that way? The article, in the end, left me thinking that while I think better technology in my room still could really positively impact UbD (and give some students outside context), it is not the saving grace that I had previously imagined it to be.
I also really liked the listing of links/other resources that Rethinking Schools Online had. I was already familiar with using the ERIC database from a few college papers, but this list encompassed just about anything I could possibly need in terms of academic journals designed to improve cross-cultural equity. I could see myself coming back to this list in my planning next fall and to get new ideas of ways to ensure that my classroom becomes more and more equitable.
I also really liked the listing of links/other resources that Rethinking Schools Online had. I was already familiar with using the ERIC database from a few college papers, but this list encompassed just about anything I could possibly need in terms of academic journals designed to improve cross-cultural equity. I could see myself coming back to this list in my planning next fall and to get new ideas of ways to ensure that my classroom becomes more and more equitable.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
112: QQCCalla Handbook Chapter 3
Quote: "In our view, academic language can be best identified by describing the language functions and the level of the thinking skills needed to engage in specific content activities. Thus discrete language elements such as vocabulary, grammatical structures, spelling and pronunciation are integrated into the language functions used in the content activity, not taught as separate functions of content subjects." (41) This piece stood out for me for a few reasons. First off, because I see so much success with this in my classroom amongst some of my higher readers-- they are so much more willing to try out new vocabulary that they have picked up from a book. I have been reading Alice in Wonderland to them lately, for instance, and it has been awesome to see them using some of the more obscure words that we have pulled out as our vocab from the book, as well as some of the words that we did not specifically define but that I think they pulled from context. On the other hand, I think my lower readers are often disserved by the lack of grammatical sophistication in what they are reading. This is something I had touched on when our reading consultant came for professional development lately-- that they do not get the "fun", quality literature from which vocab can really explode. This is something that I am trying to make more of a priority in my classroom.
Question:
In a classroom with a wide range of ELLs, what is worthwhile to target in terms of vocabulary? I am pretty decent about pulling this out when I'm creating UbD units, but really poor about integrating academic vocab otherwise. Resources of what academic vocab a first grader should have by the end of the year? Most useful?
Comment: I think I got a lot out of reading this chapter. I really had not put that much thought into academic language versus social language, and in recent CFUs since beginning this unit, I've found that vocabulary is way more of an issue than I had previously realized.
Question:
In a classroom with a wide range of ELLs, what is worthwhile to target in terms of vocabulary? I am pretty decent about pulling this out when I'm creating UbD units, but really poor about integrating academic vocab otherwise. Resources of what academic vocab a first grader should have by the end of the year? Most useful?
Comment: I think I got a lot out of reading this chapter. I really had not put that much thought into academic language versus social language, and in recent CFUs since beginning this unit, I've found that vocabulary is way more of an issue than I had previously realized.
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