Professional Documents
Culture Documents
READ5463
July 31, 2015
Video Analysis #3
http://youtu.be/xGqjV2ioFI4
Introduction
Diamond Mine Cart is going into the fourth grade. The student is reading at a second grade level
independently and based on the assessments at the beginning of the semester had limited
strategies to use when he encountered difficulties in his reading. We started the lessons with the
strategy of asking questions. One of the questions that Diamond Mine Cart kept including was
about what a word meant or how to pronounce the word. That lesson lead to a lesson on
decoding strategies. For this final lesson, I was introducing nonfiction text features and how
they help us understand text and get more information. Some of the books used questions as the
headings and some of the headings could be changed into a question format to help understand
the text.
I selected this clip because I wanted to look at how I connect the strategies we have been using to
the new learning. On this particular day, my student had very little sleep. Unfortunately, this is
a common occurrence with the students at my school and we have to continue teaching them
despite these difficulties. I wanted to examine my actions and how they affected the students
attitude and willingness to problem solve.
This clip is the beginning of the lesson where I am reviewing previous lessons and introducing
new learning. The new learning is nonfiction features- visual and text.
Transcript
Note taking
T: Lets kind of review some things weve been
working on. This will be our sixth lesson.
Note making
Need to call it strategies. (clear noticing and
naming)
S: I dont remember.
(pause)
S: Asking questions.
T: Why do we ask questions?
S: Confirming
Remembered to call it strategy again.
T: Right. So, that was the strategy we worked on
in the beginning and we kept working on that a
lot. Then we looked atOne of the questions
you kept asking was what did a word mean or
what was the word?
Switched back to things instead of decoding
So we looked at other things we can do to figure
strategies.
out those words when you said you didnt know
the word. What were some things you did. to
figure out those words.
Student used anchor chart to list strategies.
S: Sound them out, look at the picture, go back
and re-read, link to words you know
(student continued listing information from chart)
New learning
T: The other stories that we read were fiction
stories and biographies. So today we are going to
S: Its purple
T: Does yours have a lot of pictures in it?
S: Mine is purple, the lightnings purple.
pages.)
book.
S: An atom.
S: Oh
Explain new word- features of diagram.
T: When they draw the drawing and label the
different parts, thats a diagram.
Even within this heading, I see here there in the
form of questions, and so that is something I
might want to notice. Theres another one about
how lightning forms.
Now we have another picture and another
diagram. What about this?
S: Look closer.
T: and what else?
S: Know that its not fake, know that its fake.
T: Use the captions underneath, that might help
you. Remember you just said (flips back) those
here that captions tell you what is happening in
the picturemight give you a clue to use.
Now we dont have questions as titles.
T: In
S: the year.
T: That just said thunderstorms (pointing to the
key). Thats why we look at it, could be the
number of storms days in the last 50 years- we
look at the title to see what it says.
S: Im pretty sure the next 53 years.
T: See it tells us, the average number of
thunderstorm days in a year, so thats why we
look at the text. We cant just think we know
what its about. We have to check that text.
(continue looking through book-found more
examples of headings, titles, bolded words, maps,
etc.)
T: Oh here we have a
T and S: Glossary.
S: Is M- here?
T: No, he wont be here all week.
S: words
T: We have visual things which we look at and
text features means something about the text.
So lets thing about somethings.
What were some things you found. What were
some nonfiction features you found?
S: Diagram
T: No, map.
S: mav
T: no, a maP
So is a map a visual feature, something you look
at or something about the text?
S: Something you look at.
Teacher Learning
In reviewing this lesson, I still find that some of the habits that I am trying to break still come out
especially when I am frustrated by how the lesson is going. Part of becoming an adaptive expert
is also about responding to students need and subtle shifts when lessons are not going well. An
example in this lesson was when I realized that the student did not have the vocabulary to name
the nonfiction features. I could have written a label for all the examples I was seeing in my book
and then having the student take those labels and place them in his book when he found an
example. That might have helped shift his focus to the components of the lesson I was
addressing instead of the photographs. The lessons themselves need to follow best practices, but
then I need to make shifts within the lesson when it is not going well or based on student
learning.
I also noticed that even though in this lesson I had to support him by giving him many of the
answers he viewed it as his work and not my work. This was important that no matter what
happened within the lesson that the student come away with the knowledge that he can do this.
I also noticed that even though my student was extremely tired he did not refuse to try or put
himself down as much as he had in the beginning lessons. This shows that he is feeling more
confident about his ability to problem solve when he encounters difficulties in his reading.
I also missed opportunities to praise my student. I was busy keeping the pace faster to keep
him awake that I did not focus on what he was doing correctly or notice and name when he was
making connections. I was also abrupt in my responding with no instead of linking what he
said to the new information to clarify as in the response to the term map when he called it a
chart.
Student Learning
In this interaction the student realized that there were scaffolds (the anchor charts) he could use
to help him when he was struggling. He was also able to notice and name things he was doing.
The student now has strategies he can use to help him when he is stuck. He does not just skip
the word or not try to figure out what is happening in the story. He also knows the names of
some of the nonfiction features and how they can be used to help him figuring out what is
happening in the text. He knows that there are other strategies and information about text
structure that can help him when he is reading.
Teaching Goals and Action Plans
I have been working on the following goals:
Chapter 7- An Evolutionary, Democratic Learning Community
My goal is to increase my awareness and use of language that encourages students to take risks
and try out new strategies and concepts. I want to get better at helping them feel valued and
supported.
Even though I am more aware of my language, I still need to continue to monitor and change my
wording during lessons. I need to make all my words encouraging and supportive. I need to
continue to practice being clear in my wording, noticing and naming, and being explicit in my
teaching. I need to make sure that I include opportunities for students to try new strategies, and
choose words that support those attempts and not make the students feel as if they cannot do it.
Collaboration Feedback
After meeting with my collaborative group, they pointed out some things that I did consider and
gave me an opportunity to reflect on the choices I made and pointed out things that I had not
really considered.
They commented on how much this student had changed in his interactions with me from the
beginning of our time together, but also made me realize that I had missed an opportunity to
praise the student when he knew the text feature of bold words. In fact, I did not praise the
student in this final lesson. We discussed my choice of materials. If I had used the article, it
would have limited the distraction of the photographs. If the student had not been so exhausted I
would have picked a different type of text for this lesson, but I needed something that would
keep the student engaged. I had both types of text ready. I need to look at other ways besides
interest to engage my student. We also discussed the pace of the lesson. I kept pushing the
lesson forward despite the limited enthusiasm of my student, but did not make it so fast that he
could not keep up. Diamond did perk up as the lesson progressed, but it was still a challenge to
keep him motivated.
Diamond Mine Cart has made huge gains in our time together through this practicum. When
we first began, he was having difficulty staying focused on a story, limited knowledge of
strategies for problem solving when he encountered difficulties in the text and limited
knowledge of what he was doing to solve problems. He stated that he had recently started to
like to read. He had a very low view of himself as a reader and would articulate that he could
not figure out words or recall stories that he had just read. Most of his experiences with
reading at school included workbook stories with questions. He did not remember a time in
school when he discussed books or was taught strategies for reading. He would check books
out of the library, but if he didnt know a word he would skip it or ask for help and did not
know that there were strategies he could use to help himself. My goals for Diamond were to
make, confirm or change predictions to monitor comprehension; and use text structures and
the reading writing connection to compose personal and literary text.
In the first lesson, we started with asking questions, predicting and confirming. When we
started, Diamond did not realize that he already made connections and made predictions, but
many times the connections and predictions took his thoughts away from the text. By using
the strategy of asking questions in conjunction with predicting, and confirming those
predictions the student was able to remember more details from the story and keep his mind
more focused on what the story told him. The student was then able to recognize when his
thoughts were not in line with what the text was telling him. When we started I was using
post it notes to write the questions, but switched to a chart format so that if the answers to our
questions were not found on that page we did not have to go looking through the book for
the post it notes. It also allowed for going back and adding details that we discovered in
other parts of the book. Diamond still struggles with asking questions, but has gained the
strategy of predicting and confirming to help him understand the story.
One of the questions that Diamond would continually ask was about how to pronounce a
word or what did a word mean. At the beginning of the lessons, he would just skip the word
and not attempt to figure it out. We spent one lesson on word strategies that would help with
decoding a word and figuring out word meaning. After this lesson, the student applied the
strategies to help him decode words that were in his speaking vocabulary and more
importantly figure out the words meaning. Now when he comes to the question, what is this
word and what does it mean he attempts to figure it out on his own and even if he cannot
figure out the pronunciation, he many times he problem solves by figuring out the meaning
from what is happening in the story.
The other goal that I had for the student was in the area of writing. He hated to write and did
not understand that there was a structure to writing. After reading several biographical
books, we used those books and their structure to write a story about Diamonds trip to
Galveston. Using the text structure and through the use of modeling at looking at how to
take one sentence and connect it to the next sentence, the student felt very successful when
he wrote a story that was three pages instead of half a page. He left the lesson excited about
writing, which had been absent at the beginning of this practicum.
Our final practicum lesson was about nonfiction features since we had been looking at fiction
and biographies. This lesson was difficult because the student did not have the vocabulary to
name the features. At the end of the lesson that student was able to name some of the
features and now had a basic understanding of non-fiction features and how they can be used
to help him understand what is happening in the text and find information.
In looking back through all the lessons, the student went from being very active and even
scattered in his thinking to being calmer and focused. He also decreased in his negative selftalk about how he was not a good reader or writer and he could not figure out things for
himself. He stopped putting his head down and refusing to try when he encountered
difficulty. His self- esteem seemed to improve and he began to recognize and name
strategies he was using in his problem solving. As his confidence grew, his excitement about
learning in general grew. By the end of the practicum, he would take credit for things he felt
he did during the lesson even if they required extensive scaffolding by the teacher. The
student was rewriting his own stories and realizing that he is a reader and writer. He realized
that he now had strategies he could use when faced with difficulties.
thing instead of stating the strategy. Even though in each lesson I was improving in this area,
it is hard to break the habit and requires me to be aware of my use of specific words.
I also noticed that as the lessons continued I became better at noticing and naming the strategies
that I was using and those that the student was using. When I noticed and named strategies, my
student began to notice and name strategies. Johnston stated that, socializing childrens attention
to where they are being successful is also likely to develop their sense of agency.
I also had to focus on helping the student develop his sense of identity that he was a reader and
writer, so I was careful not to use the term good reader or writer and to call him a reader or
author. I also encouraged him to feel proud of the work he was doing and asked how he felt after
he had accomplished the writing of a story.
Since one of my main goals was on agency and becoming strategic, I had to change my words
that would signal to the student that he had the strategies that could be used to problem solve. In
the beginning of my lessons, I was not giving the student opportunities to problem solve. The
phrases like How are you planning to go about this? are still not natural in my interactions. I
did include questions like How did you figure that out? which helped the student name what he
was doing to figure out a problem. I also used the word but in the early lessons, which showed
that, I had the knowledge. I worked on using the word and to change the structure of the
interaction. I also gave the student some choice within the lesson to increase student
engagement.
My second goal was in the area of evolutionary, democratic learning community and how to use
my language to provide a supportive environment in which my student could take risks and try
new strategies. I started using the term we and you purposefully to draw students attention
to when he was applying strategies. I used we to help the student feel that not knowing
something was not unique to him, but something that all readers face. I also wanted him to know
that he had the power to use the strategies to problem solve. When I started the lessons I would
used the phrase Ill show you which relayed that I had the power and knowledge to problem
solve. I worked on changing the word show to share which signaled that he also had ideas
and strategies that he could share with me.
Even with the purposeful planning of lessons and reflecting on my word choice, I still need to
continue to build these skills until they become a habit. I also used the scales from Systems for
Change in Literacy Education to examine my own teaching. I used the General Aspects of
Teaching scale, to prepare and analyze my lessons. In examining my own teaching, I was
reminded how critical planning, engagement and rapport are to effective instruction. The other
scales for guided reading and minilessons were also used to reflect on my teaching and plan for
instruction.
Action Plan
Even though I could see changes in my teaching and interactions with my student during this
practicum, I also need to keep working on my goals to make me a more effective and efficient
teacher. To help me in my role as a teacher and instructional coach I will need to continue to
examine my own teaching, especially since I do model lessons for other teachers.
I will first reread Choice Words myself and then plan to facilitate a book study at my school.
This book was furnished to our school a couple of years ago for the purpose of a book study, but
was postponed.
I will also continue to video tape my demonstration lessons and small group lessons to review
and continue application of what I have learned.
I will share the coaching scales with my administration and colleagues to help facilitate learning
on my campus. I also will go back and read the entire book, Systems for Change in Literacy
Education.
Professional resources
Harvey, S., Goudvis, A. & Wallis, J. (2010). Comprehension intervention: Small group lessons
for the comprehension toolkit. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Johnston, P.H. (2004). Choice words: How our language affects childrens learning. Portland,
ME: Stenhouse Publishers.
Lyons, C.A. & Pinnell, G. S. (2001). Systems for change in literacy: A guide to professional
development. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.