The Art of Comprehension

After reading through the Applegate text I was able to make connections to the definitions of the different types of comprehension that people possess. The types of comprehension are Literalists, Fuzzy Thinkers, Left Fielders, Quiz Contestants, Politicians, Dodgers, Authors, and Minimalists.  The type that I believe fits best with my type of comprehension is the Quiz Contestant. This type of thinker searches their previous knowledge for an explanation and disconnect from the text. A logical answer is provided but one that is justified without the use of the information from the text. I find myself talking a lot about a subject but usually lack in using the new information learned from the text in my discussion but the information I'm comfortable/ familiar with. 

The Gregory text talked about the Velcro Theory which is characterized by learning new material by connecting it with information already in your head. This theory is used in almost every classroom when the teacher tries to introduce new information by connecting it to previous knowledge or scaffolding the material with similar concepts. The main strategies to take away from the reading is visualization/ Mind movies, asking questions, using schema, making connections, and infer about the text. These strategies will help students succeed in comprehension of the text by making it meaningful, sticking in their brains.

Learning about the readers in my classroom will help me better understand the knowledge they are drawing from or lack  there of and how to best support them. The students comprehension type will help me figure out what fund of knowledge they connect best with and what areas they need help to further develop. I see this a lot in my placement classroom where the students will answer a question or give their thoughts to what happened in a story but lack the ability to back their thoughts up with why they think it or what details in the text helped them come to that conclusion. They can be also be characterized as Dodgers where they first start out by answering the question but then get side tracked and continue to talk about a tiny concept that has very little connection to the main idea of the entire story/ the purpose of the main question.

Do you see any of these strategies in your classroom that your students use? What ones do you use as a reader? 

Lupita

After reading about Lupita and getting a sense of her involvement and general interests in the class I feel as though there are a couple of things that the teacher can do to help improve the environment and learning experience for her. Lupita showed in her interaction with her classmates, helping to complete the puzzle evidence of positive pro-social behavior. The occurrence of Lupita not really interacting with the teacher and the other students in the class may be due to the fact that she has a language barrier/ not as comfortable using English. Due to this barrier there is a difficulty with social interaction. To make Lupita feel more comfortable in the class try to integrate her home language into a lesson in the class. She could teach her fellow classmates a couple of words, such as how to say hello etc. The teacher can also help Lupita by explicitly connecting/ labeling things in English, providing her with the vocabulary she is searching for in order to be a social member of the classroom. 

Eddie

Eddie

                                 Strategies to Help ADD/ADHD Students

From Mrs. Potter explanation of Eddies habits it seems like he could have ADD or ADHD. He seems like he cannot focus his attention on one thing for a long period of time without getting distracted and start fiddling with something else. Mrs. Potter needs to come up with a way to gain his attention throughout the entire lesson.

In the Breitfelder article it talks about all the different strategies you can use to keep ADD/ADHD students focused and engaged in your lesson. One of the first things it talks about is always having visual support available for these students. Things like having a schedule on the board for the whole class to see. This would help keep him keep track of what is going to be going on and it would help to clearly define what he is expected to do.

            Another thing that Mrs. Potter can do to make sure Eddie is absorbing her information is to use manipulative during her lessons. For example, say Mrs. Potter is giving a lesson and she is using her own manipulatives to teach the lesson, she should give Eddie his own set of manipulatives so he can focus on what he is doing and not begin to day dream. The manipulatives will keep him absorbed in the lesson and prevent his mind from wandering to other places. When Mrs. Potter gave the lesson about tadpoles she didn’t have anything for Eddie to fiddle with that would enhance his learning. By giving him a manipulative he might have been able to answer her question about frogs.

What Do You Think? (Jonathan)

Effective Strategies Will Help with Reading

Christine Chern

         From the description, it seems like Jonathan is struggling with reading and possibly unmotivated too. He may not know the strategies for reading, so it would help if Mrs. Potter taught the class some reading strategies. In this way, students can share the strategies that they use with the class, and discover other reading strategies. Mrs. Potter could design different workshops for different strategies to use. When working in groups, Jonathan would get help from peers when they do the strategies together, so that he would not have to struggle with reading the materials alone and not knowing what to do to applying to the strategies. The possible strategies, like highlighting, making a concept map, note cards, a KWL chart, and taking notes, are helpful for students to keep track of what they have read. Once they have strategies for reading, they will become less unmotivated to read. Furthermore, after the workshops, Mrs. Potter could make the reading strategies into visual aids to put around the classroom, so that when students are struggling in reading, they can look at the visual aids to remember what they should do.

         I am currently assuming that Jonathan is six-year-old. To such a young child, reading is very difficult and unmotivating, because there are so many words and letters. It would help to have pictures and images in the reading, so that they have an idea what they are reading, and it would make more sense to them. For younger children, Mrs. Potter would definitely want to try with picture books first. When reading picture books, the class could read it together and in groups. There are several types of choral reading that Mrs. Potter can use to engage students and assist them in reading. Echo reading is appropriate when the student, like Jonathan, is struggling in reading. Mrs. Potter or another student who’s reading ability is at the grade level can lead, while the others follow. Gradually, when Jonathan becomes more comfortable reading, Mrs. Potter can slowly take away group reading and have him read individually more.  Another appropriate strategy is partner-reading, which is pairing up students of low and high reading abilities. Since Jonathan has no problem with social skills, he can very quickly improve with his peers’ help.

Literacy Center: Activity Ideas

Two Sites I found that both have a ton of ideas of what activities to put into a literacy center.


http://www.msrossbec.com/literacy_index.html


http://www.busyteacherscafe.com/literacy_centers/index.html

Literacy Center Ideas-Alyssa

I really enjoyed this website. It has some great ideas as well as some of the materials to get started.

http://www6.swlauriersb.qc.ca/crestview/ls/Teacher/Teacher_Literacy_Centers.htm