Making Response to Reading "Responsible"

So there I was this week, watching a one of the teachers on our campus do a mini-lesson on visualizing and she said something to her class like, "You know, kiddos, that as you read, you might make a visualization and then draw it. But then, you read a little more and then the picture you have in your mind starts changing. That's because as the author reveals more details, the images in our minds get more detailed and specific."

This line just stuck with me and the more I thought about it, I began to remember Louise Rosenblatt.

Louise Rosenblatt wrote the Transactional Theory, which I came across in Grad School at Arizona State. This theory was transformational in my practice as a reading teacher. She is easily my favorite theory-person (theorist?) because of how much this idea changed the way I view  and teach reading.

Her Transactional Theory said that each person who reads a text will read it in a different way. This happens for many reasons, one being our background knowledge. In her book Literature as Exploration (1938), she states,

The special meaning, and more particularly, the submerged associations that these words and images have for the individual reader will largely determine what the work communicates to him. The reader brings to the work personality traits, memories of past events, present needs and preoccuptations, a particular mood of the moment, and a particular physical condition. These and many other elements in a never-to-be-duplicated combination determine his response to the peculiar contribution of the text. (pp. 30-31)

She explains that each reader creates a "poem" as they read a text. She defines the poem as the experience the reader has with the text at that particular moment.

So, the "poem" the reader creates will vary from person to person, and might even change each time the reader meets the same text a second or third time.

Now, when kids read an interpret a text, they will usually be asked to share what they thought. Yes, getting children to participate with a discussion about a book is important, but we can't accept just any interpretation a child makes to a text.

Rosenblatt says that responses and interpretations of texts aren't all created equal. Some are superior than others. You can't just make any connection to a text, and because it's related to your personal experience, make it a great response. For example, you couldn't read The Diary of Anne Frank and then talk about an interpretation related to basketball or some other random topic. Interpretations have to be based on evidence within a text. She goes on to state,

Although there isn't a single "correct" interpretation of any text for all circumstances, that doesn't necessarily rule out responsible reading. We can consider some interpretations better or poorer than others. Or we can find that readers brining different knowledge and assumptions or in different social and historical contexts may have equally defensible interpretations.

They way I like to think about this is with a continuum:

Responsible Reading and Interpretations

A child's response to a text could fall anywhere on the continuum - depending on how much evidence from the text they have to support it. As we think about the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), we know that this assessment is relying heavily on evidence from text. A child can't just make a personal connection, that is only slightly related to the text, and call that a responsible interpretation. The more evidence the child provides to support their interpretation, the better.

Now CCSS is a topic for another day - but let's just note that an authentic interpretation can't happen on a multiple choice question. If a student is having to choose one of four answers, none of those answers could be the child's authentic thinking (because they are the thinking of the person who wrote the test). A *truly authentic* answer would be one that is constructed by the individual child and then shared, either verbally or in writing.

But, I digress...

Another author, Karolides, writes,

Thus, whereas a range of responses is recognized as probable and potentially meaningful, some may be irrelevant to the text, or confused and impoverished, invalid or less valid than other responses. Responsible reading take into account the language of the texts, in effect, reining in the reader. Rosenblatt notes that some postmodernists or deconstructionists have taken the leap of accepting all interpretations as equal, giving prominence to the reader. She rejected this position.

So there you have it. Responses to text have to be responsible.

Anyways, I write this to follow up with one of my teachers, but also to share with you my most favorite theory of reading, and the one that changed my philosophy from a very much behaviorist perspective to that of a social constructivist.

Who knew I'd get so deep for a Thursday evening?!

haha...lighten things up a little after all this theory talk!

Anyone else love Rosenblatt? If you'd like to read more about her, here's a few articles:

Karolides, Nicholas J. (1999). Theory and Practice: An Interview with Louis M. Rosenblatt. Language Arts, 77(2), 158-170.

Karolides, Nicholas J. (2005). Scholar, Educator, Advocate: The Range and Richness of Rosenblatt. Voices from the Middle, 12(3), 59-62.

And Rosenblatt's books:

and that is all for now. Thanks to Jennie for reminding me of the Transactional Theory!

Currently October

Whoooo-hooooo it's already October! So crazy how fast time goes by! As I have been for the last few months, I'm again participating with Farley's Currently. I am once again so happy to share and link up with fellow bloggers!

To anyone who doesn't usually read blogs - if you look on Farley's page that I've linked - you will find literally 100's of teaching blogs to read. This Currently link-up is how I have gotten the few followers that I have and how I've found great teachers to network with from all over the country! You should definitely check it out....after you read my blog and follow me! : )

Listening to Jason Aldean

I'm not sure why I love this song so much, but I *super* love it! I listen to it almost every day on the way to work (well, that may be because I only have like 12 songs on my iPhone. I can't get it to connect to wifi, so I don't have much of my music...). But anyways, this song is awesome. 

Loving teaching Words Their Way to Kinders

Yesterday and today were my first days teaching in kinder with Ms. Optie at my school. I feel so grateful that she's letting me try out this word study program with her class...Thank you, Melinda! We are starting her whole class off with the very first sort of the Alphabetic Spellers book, and we are working on the sounds /b/, /m/, /r/, and /s/. I'm planning on blogging about it more after this week, but we did vocabulary and cutting yesterday and then did our first sort today. It was so awesome to hear the..."mm, mm, mop" and "rrr, rrr, ring" echoing through the room as they constructed connections between letters and sounds.

Here's one girl's list of words that start with the /s/ sound:

Notice circles. While it makes the sound /s/, it doesn't follow the pattern for how we write it, so we called it an "oddball." Sophie was totally okay crossing it off her list because of the different pattern it followed. Great learning happening, all with Sophie's thinking as a starting place!

Thinking about all the great things going on around our building...

In addition to Words Their Way in Kinder, a second grade teacher grabbed me today to show me her Daily 5 Lesson: Three Ways to Read a Book. I went in to see the kiddos - all totally engaged with their partner, either reading words, pictures, or retelling the story. This is the kind of thing that gives me goosebumps. Is that lame?

In third grade, I've been invited to coteach the writer's workshop on a pretty regular basis. We finally moved from the rehearsal phase of the process to drafting and modeled the Receive the Piece conferences today in class. I love Writer's Workshop and love that this particular class invites me so often, because I'm totally building relationships with kids (my most fave part of teaching!)

And finally...first grade. As a middle school teacher and with technology, I took so much for granted. I could tell middle school kids, "Oh, just go to google." or, "Please email that info to me." In first grade, it's quite different....

You have to build background. Like - what a website is. They need to be taught where to type the website link (in the URL, of course!) They need to look at all the letters mixed up on the keyboard to find them to type the page they're trying to reach.

The first grade teachers on my campus are AWESOME! The management is impeccable and the kids know exactly what to do to to get logged in, and get to a website like Starfall. The first graders I saw today were patient, helpful, and so so great, and nothing marks great management like a group of kids who know exactly what to do. So, so impressed!

Seriously, so so good!

Wanting Grad School to be finished!

Wait, what? I'm only 4 or 5 weeks into a two year program?

I'll put it this way: It's really interesting what I'm learning about Supervision and the Organizational Analysis of managing a school of teachers. (No, I'm being totally serious.) But then I have to go write all these papers and remind myself how to cite sources correctly using APA format. And I never finish my work on the weekend, so then I'm working in the evenings on Mondays and Tuesdays. And allll I really wanting to be doing? Watching Netflix, writing on my blog, and thinking about what pictures I'm going to put on my Christmas card this year. (Yes, I'm already planning!) Not even sure I even want to be a principal, but I've already begun, and I'm not the kind of girl who is a quitter, so I must continue. Blahhh.

PS - Let's be real: I'm definitely not losing sleep over grad school. I love sleeping!


Needing a few more yoga mats.

Have you been to yoga? Have you been to hot yoga? Well, I love it. Like... love, Love, LOVE it. No matter how busy I am or how stressed I feel about getting work done, if I go to yoga, I always come out feeling way better, even though I may have given up an hour I could have been 'doing homework.' (I use the term doing homework very loosley...what I'm more than likely doing is reading blogs, reading facebook, shopping online...anything but doing homework.)

But, I digress.

Okay so in hot yoga, it's hot. Like super hot. Well, depending on the girl who runs the show though. The Monday night teacher has got that place on fire, but I've been on Thursday nights a few times, and I'm in there wondering when she's going to turn the heat on.

I seriously lol at the pictures I find for my blogs : P

But, I digress....again.

So I have an older yoga mat, and in hot yoga you get so sweaty that you slip on those things. Have your shins ever sweated? (Is sweated a word? omg. It's late and I'm getting loopy.) You basically just get super sweaty everywhere, including your hands and feet, so you have to buy these towels to go over your yoga mat or you'll slip right off.

I have two. They're both dirty. Now, I know some people (ahem...you know who you are!) who would probably just get the towels out of the dirty clothes and use them again, but I would hope that under these conditions she would not. I can't do it. They get so sweaty, they need a good wash.

So, I'm in need of a few more of those towels. Or, a new apartment that has a washer and dryer in the unit and I don't need to go to the creepy basement with quarters to pay to use it. 

I know, I know. First world problems. But hey - it's what I need!

So corny, and I LOVE it!

A Trick for Words Their Way:

As I mentioned above, I started Words Their Way with Kinder. Well, with six or seven kids sitting together around a table, all using the same picture sort, it's quite possible...no, probably a certainty, that their little picture cards would get mixed up. So, in order to know whose cards are whose, each child at the table has a different color. We write the child's name in color on the front, and then put stripes on the back with the same color. That way, if Jada (purple) gets her pictures mixed up with Joey (green) they can look to the back to know whose is whose!


Looking back on September...
And just to follow up...Last month I mentioned how I was going to Chicago in White in September. Well, we went and it was super fun! Some people went totally nuts creating crazy big centerpieces and whatnot, but my friends and I just brought some food and had great conversation. Here's a few pics from the night:

The ceremonious twirling of the dinner napkin to mark the beginning of dinner...

So fun to dress up! Here's Liz and I:

Our cake before....

And after:

(Red velvet....delicious!)

A picture the whole group... Liz, Anita, (me), and Diana

Anyways, September was a great month and I'm looking forward to October. Really excited for Halloween! My costume involves rainbow striped tights and my cousin said she'd be my sidekick. Can't wait to share about that next month. What are you all being for Halloween?

And....the next Currently will be on my birthday! So excited!

Happy October, blogosphere!

A Day in the Life

So I've been a Literacy Coach now for about 6 weeks. Here's what a typical day in my life is like now at work. btw....I'm loving my job!

7:30 - In early before contract time starts for a School Improvement Meeting. Meet in the teacher's lounge with my principal and a group of teachers to discuss our goals in the areas of continuous academic improvement, building positive partnerships with the community, safe and caring learning environment  and managing funds with financial responsibility. Great group, making jokes and having fun...even though it's only 7:30 am.

7:50 - Excuse myself to run over to the National Junior Honor Society's meeting at the middle school. Hoping to recruit at least ten 7th and 8th graders to donate service hours to our elementary school's Family Literacy Night. Run up the stairs and am out of breath as I explain the theme and what I'm looking for. Explain that it's going to be all fancy, as our theme is "A Red Carpet Affair," and I think they are hooked when I tell them that we need a red carpet, Hollywood stars, and some of them to be either VIP people or Paparazzi. All the kids raise their hands when I ask who's interested. Win!

8:00 - Head back to my first meeting. See my mentee on the way back and was happy to do so! Tell her I'm looking for help for our event and, thinking I'm asking her, she offers. What a nice girl! Buuuttt, she's happy to hear I was looking for kids and not adults.

8:03 - Sit back down in the School Improvement meeting. Try to figure out what I missed, and by the time I do, it's time to go.

8:21 - On my way out, ask my principal if we can feed the middle school kids who are giving us service hours. She agrees, and that's one less conflict on my to do list!

8:25 - Back in my classroom, I hurry up and update the power point I'm using for our common plan meetings. I add the norms for the current grade level and print their norm sheets out to give them. The reading specialist, Christine, runs down for the copies while I get everything else ready.

8:44 - On our way to the meeting, Christine and I notice all these boxes of books dumped outside the book room. She takes my things to the meeting, and I stay back to move books into the room....but, I can't get the lock on the door to open. I run to the office and ask them to see if maintenance can do it. Wouldn't be a big deal, but there was a Principal's Coffee today and parents were visiting classrooms. Needed to keep things tidy!

8:47 - Make it up to the meeting. On our agenda: review the Office Discipline Referral, share successes from the last two weeks, follow up with norms, guided reading groups, and scheduling, and then plan what skills and strategies they will be teaching for the next week. Talk about assessment of the skills and a multitude of other things. Feeling really great about the work we accomplished as a team!

10:00 - Head back to my room to grab the flyer original for our Family Literacy Night. Go down to the black and white copy machine to make copies to be sent home today, but the red ink on the original isn't showing up in black and white. Go back to my room, change all the text to black, and then reprint. But then I have to shrink the originals down to half size so I can get two flyers per sheet of paper.

Grab the purple paper, load it in the copy machine and make 176 copies. Take the copies, cut them in half, and begin counting out enough for each classroom. Paper clip them, label them, and then realize at the end I was somehow 20 short. I go back to the copy machine, load the purple paper back in, make 10 more, cut them to have 20, and finish my last set.

Go to the mailboxes and deliver.

Check something off the list.

This was just funny!

approximately 10:45 - Head back to my room and check emails, send out an email to all the teachers on the Family Literacy Night committee, and then take a few minutes to think about what is up next.

A second grade teacher stops by and tells me she's doing the I-PICK lesson for picking Just Right books and extends and invitation for me to come see her. I make a mental note to stop by after lunch.

The other reading specialist comes back in as I'm getting the norms sheet ready for the other grade level meeting I'm having after lunch. We catch up, I finish the norms and the corresponding power point, and then I run to make copies.


11:25 - In the office I'm doing just a little more revision on the norms, but while talking to another teacher at the same time, so I'm making all kinds of mistakes. Definitely can't deeply think and talk at the same time. End up having to reprint the norms like three times because I wasn't focused!

11:40 - Go back to my room to drop off the sheets and get everything in an organized pile before lunch. Grab my Qualitative Reading Inventory (QRI) book to ask a question of a colleague as I head to lunch.

11:45 - Stop by her room, ask a question, chat a little, then I'm off to lunch, 20 minutes late.

12:00 - Eat lunch fairly quickly so I can make it to playground duty on time.

12:20 - Pick up the 2nd and 3rd graders and go outside for recess. Beautiful day and I'm feeling lucky to be outside, and also that it's going to be so annoying when it's 10 below. But for today, Naylani hides behind me from Isaiah, a boy crashes into the fence and chips a tooth, and Halie shows me 14 cartwheels. I want to be a third grader again....minus that chipped tooth.

12:35 - Bell rings and the helpers put all the playground equipment away. They keep asking me the same question over and over, which doesn't need an answer for at least two weeks, so I just ask them to do their job and we'll worry about it later. When they continue, I ask them if they want to be fired today? hahhahaaa. (Middle school kids get my humor way easier...) They kinda laugh and then stop : )

12:42ish - back in my room and I have an hour till my next meeting. Decide I will make some of those QRI copies so I head down to the copy machine, but then I remember my mental note to go see the second graders and their I-PICK books. Stop in there and things are going so well with a shoe metaphor, so I run to grab my iPad to get a few pics. The teacher tells me to jump in and coteach...I love it! We tag team the lesson and get the kids reading, and then I slip out to go get those copies ready.

1:05 - When I get back to the office to make the copies, the secretary asks me when the jackets I ordered will be in. I realize I never completed the order, so I complete it now: print the doc, fill it out, scan it back to email, and the reply to the rep from the company. By the time I finish, I have to go to my next meeting. I also didn't get the QRI copies done.

1:40 - Arrive at my next meeting. Tell some fun stories before we begin. Go through the same agenda as the last group and get lots done. Someone asks me a question about how to do something in first grade, and I reply, "Well, I never taught this grade level, so I'm just going to make this up...." They all laugh, I think aloud my answer, and they think it could work. Win. Productive meeting again...feeling awesome!

2:52 - The announcements come on and the teachers realize we were so involved we forgot our meeting ended at 1:50. One runs out to grab the kiddos. I run over to ask the principal a few questions about our evaluations, and then I head back to my room.

3:10 - Back in my room, catch up with Christine and the Stephanie. Talk about our day, and then the Steph heads back to her room to get some things done.

3:30ish - Christine and I had decided to work on a few things after school before we left, so I show her the online lesson planner, we talk about evaluations, and I show her her ePortfolio for the mentoring program. We decide we need to make an order for some supplies for Family Literacy night, but since it's already 4:30, we decide to wait until tomorrow.

4:30 - Wrap things up and head home. Get outside the school door only to realize I left a bunch of dishes in my room. I go get them, lock up the classroom and finally head home.

So that's all...a busy day, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm loving all the collaboration that's happening in various classrooms! Love teaching, love the teachers at my school, love literacy....that about sums it up!

Happy Friday eve!

Five for Friday

Another week gone by - I think that marks the fifth back to school? Crazy how fast time flies by! Here's my Five for Friday and a Link-Up with Doodle Bugs Teaching!

#1

One of the best parts of my week was all the classrooms I got to see. As Literacy Coach at my school, my weeks alternate: week one, I attend all the literacy common plan meetings with all grade levels, week 2, I'm off to model lessons, observe in classrooms, and work on other tasks, like creating an order for a Writer's Workshop Mentor Text library. (So fun!)

This week, lots of memories come to mind from the classroom, but seeing our Bilingual Kinder class in action was so fun. I speak enough Spanish to follow along and the kiddos were doing a read-aloud with their teacher and working on making predictions. It was the fact that they were kinders, plus the fact that they were doing a lesson on predicting, plus the fact that they all spoke Spanish, plus all the little management techniques their teacher used. I was sitting there thinking, "I wish I had my iPad - I want this on video" - but I was too engaged to go get it. Such a fun time in kinder this week...Actually all our kinder classes were deep into their literacy centers, working on building independence for guided reading that will be starting very soon. All of this makes my heart so happy, and reminds me how hard kinder teachers work with their kids. So happy to see these little ones engaged and having fun with friends in class!

#2
I taught the Watermelon and Seed Story lessons in a few classes:

So this lesson is great to get kids to think about whether or not their idea is big or narrow.

The watermelon story is the big juicy watermelon that is your life.

Within your watermelon story, you have lots of seeds - seeds about family, friends, vacations, school, houses you've lived in, celebrations, cousins....every memory is a seed.

Anyways, there's lots online about the Watermelon and Seed Story lesson - so check it out. It's great for kids because then your conversations go like this:

#3
Here's a great anchor chart created by one of our second grade classes:

So the anchor chart is awesome because it's all of the kids' language about Just Right, Vacation, and Future books. Teacher facilitated the discussion and recorded their words and now the kids have a great reference to use in their classroom!

4.
Part of the reason I haven't been writing as much is because of Grad School. Yes, I'm back for a second Master's...this time for a Principal's Certificate. It's not hard, just a lot of work. But, it's really interesting. Now that I have this position as Literacy Coach, I'm not just me, in my own classroom...I get to work with all the teams around my school. So, I can see lots of theory in practice.

Of course, I'd rather be spending my free time blogging, and watching Breaking Bad (new obsession now that I've finished Friday Night Lights) but I am reading about Organizational Structure and writing philosophy papers again. But, it's okay....like I said, super interesting and I love the people in my cohort at NEIU!

5.
The best weeks are those that involve me hearing from former students, and I heard from six of them since last week! My girls, Ali, Lillian, and Michelle are all doing well in high school, Baltazar sent me a picture of his progress report that was straight A's, and then Kirstin and Andy visited last night after school. Andy was so sure he was going to get space from another kid in from our homeroom last year, but now he still has two classes with him....and they're at a *huge* high school. Hhahaaa! Kids are so funny. I'm so proud of all of them - doing so well in their new schools, and keeping me in the loop with what's going on!

That's all from me here at BigTime Literacy. Hope you have a great weekend!

Just Right, Vacation, and Future books in 2nd Grade

Yesterday I got to teach second graders how to pick books that were "Just Right." I call these JR books and you can read all about how to explain these kinds of books here, but I'm excited to share that this lesson that I used in middle school also works in the primary and intermediate grades!

So we started off gathering together on the rug. I had the easel next to me and some markers and chart paper. I told the kids our objective, that today we're going to decide if books are Vacation (too easy) JR, or Future (too hard) books. We composed a chart together:

and then I had them pick two books from a few boxes of books I had available. We decided to read for five minutes the first session, at which time I would call them back for a "Check-In."

Couple of issues came up in the first five minutes:

1. I left all the boxes of books scattered around the carpet, so when they would need to switch, they were distracting one another by stepping over each other. For the second session, I got the books out of the way and put them in another area of the room, which worked much better.

2. I have an armchair and another little chair in my room - I prompted them before we started that we can't argue about the  chairs and things like that, and they didn't. They were so quiet about it and respectful, but these two chairs still led to time off task, so in the future, I would have to assign them to two people just to take away the calling seat-backs and saving the chair for friends situation. Again, they were great kids, but they are kids and don't realize the very most important thing is to be engaged as long as possible.

Okay, anyways....

We meet back together as a whole group for check-in. I reminded them what each of the three kinds of books were - Vacation, JR, and Future. I then asked if anyone was reading a Vacation book. A few kids raised their hands and I had them come up to guide them through an explanation of why the book was a vacation book. Then we did the same for Future books, and finally we talked about JR books again. This conversation is so important for all the kids to hear, so they not only learn about what these three kinds of books are, but they also think about the book they are reading to decide if it's JR. This is essentially a teacher think-aloud, but with the child's  thinking!

We decided to do another session of reading - this time, 7 minutes (their other objective was to build their stamina), so they went back, maybe traded books, and then went to get to reading. I reminded them of their objective once again - to figure out if their book is a Vacation, JR, or Future book as they read.

We also talked briefly about how Reading is Thinking, so if we have to move around the room for a new book, we should be doing it soo soo quietly as to not disturb our peers.

Our seven minutes wrapped up - and the on-taskness (making up words: love!) was much better with the books in another place. Kids remembered to be quietly move around the room and they did great for seven minutes.

This time rather than sharing in a group, I wanted individual information on each child and their book, so I modeled this exit slip, one part at a time:

The hardest part was the Why? part, which I had two kids explain their answers to me and I wrote their why answer for them, showing all the others.

Here are two exit slips I collected:

And....

We wrapped up and that was that!

Here's what I learned:

1. This mini-lesson works in seventh and eighth grade, all the way down to second. First and Kinder - ehhhh....not sure yet!
2. This lesson is actually easier with second graders - they really want to find the book that is JR, and they don't have as much social pressure (like a 7th grader would) to read a certain kind of book.
3. This isn't the end of the lesson(s) with Vacation, JR, and Future books. I need to do more with this lesson - add more descriptors to the chart, have more sessions for kids to read and think about what kind of book it is, and more time for kids to share and evaluate their book choices. Little kids need lots of practice with this, and this is a conversation that will keep coming up all year long!

Centers vs. Independent Reading

Centers take so long to plan, prepare, and set up. It's the teacher who has to do all the work for the centers, because they have to be changed often. This is why I love independent reading (or listening to reading on tape, or buddy reading) so much more. It's less work for the teacher and it's more time with books and reading for the kids. I'd much rather have kiddos doing authentic, purposeful reading - volumes and volumes of reading - than stressing myself out planning 100 centers for the year!

Of course, there are times when you do need some kinds of literacy centers to build up the prerequisite skills to reading a book, but once they become independent with reading, and with the exception of some remediation for various aspects of their reading, independent reading is the way to go!

What do you think? Any suggestions for getting independent reading off the ground with primary kids? Please share your tips and tricks!

Until next time,