Academic Vocabulary

I found this article about Academic Vocabulary by Baumann and Graves to be a bit predictable.  In all my education classes, we've always talked about the importance of academic vocabulary.  Every single subject has its own academic vocabulary, and students must master this vocabulary in order to be successful a subject.  The most important thing I took from this article was the importance of not assuming that students already know what is considered to be basic academic vocabulary. Even if it can seem redundant, reviewing these "basic" terms might make the difference for a struggling student.

Much of the article discussed domain specific vocabulary.  In foreign language, the academic language can sometimes be overwhelming for students who struggle with grammatical concepts int English.  So much in learning a foreign language relies on knowing parts of speech and grammatical terms.  I think I too often assume that the students all know what a direct object or a pronoun is, for example.  to make sure everyone is on the same playing field, I will make more of a conscious effort to define academic terms more often instead of assuming students are already familiar with the vocabulary.

BBR Chapter 5- Strategies for Developing Vocabulary

By far, this chapter has been the most applicable to teaching foreign language, which consists almost entirely of learning new vocabulary.  When presenting new vocabulary, I always try to give context clues or act out the definition rather than saying the translation straight away.  Many of the strategies in this chapter encourage students to find the definitions of vocabulary by using context clues or by creating meaning based upon prior knowledge.  Some of the graphic organizers presented in the book gave me some good ideas of how to present upper level vocabulary.  It's easier to some use the methods in higher level classes when the base knowledge of vocabulary is better, but I especially like the idea of having students use more visual examples rather than writing definitions.  One of the homework options I assign has students draw a "pictionary page" of the vocabulary words.  As I was looking at the Verbal and Visual Word Association strategy,  I liked the idea of adding examples and counter examples to the visual description.  I'm really wanting to improve the way I present vocabulary in my class, and I feel like I can manipulate many of the strategies in this chapter to fit my class.

D&Z Chapter 11- Help for Struggling Readers

Chapter 11 in the D&Z book discusses what teachers can do to help struggling readers.  The main point that I took away from this chapter is that the student-teacher relationship plays an integral part in the student becoming a better reader.  In order to effectively help students improve their reading skills, a teacher needs to learn about the students and tailor instruction so that the material is the appropriate level and also that it is interesting and relevant to the student.  "There are hundreds of ways for teachers to make supportive connections with their students, and the individuality of these is what makes the message powerful." For me, this one sentence really sums up the message of this chapter.  All the other strategies discussed build upon having a strong foundation with the students.

This chapter also emphasizes the importance of choosing materials that are appropriate for the students. If a text is too difficult, the student can easily become frustrated and discouraged.  Students need to gain confidence and learn reading strategies in order to continue to improve reading skills on their own.  Helping struggling readers has little to do with helping students understand a specific text.  It's about giving them the base knowledge and the skills they need to learn to decode and understand a text on their own.

BBR Chapter 6

Chapter six discusses several different strategies to help improve students' comprehension of difficult texts.  Though each strategy is a little bit different, they all help students determine the main idea and most important parts of each text.  When presented with a text, students can feel intimidated easily, and they might not even try to understand what they are reading.  These strategies give students the support they need to read a text, and they also build interest, which is sometimes overlooked.  I thought that the "text appetizers" was a great way to gain student interest before reading a text.  In the example, they made a reference to a city council threatening to close down a skate park and then related it back to the American Revolution.  By putting something historical and somewhat difficult to understand in terms that the students can relate to, students will make a meaningful connection to the material, and they will be more likely to comprehend and remember the information.

Another strategy from this  chapter that I use regularly in my classroom is the graphic organizer.  When writing a verb conjugation, I always use different colors and try to organize each verb in the same way. I have also done this when we were talking about the history of the French language.  As an in class assignment, students read a short text and made a timeline with what they thought was the most important information.  What I took from this chapter was that measuring comprehension does not have to happen in the form of a test.  These strategies work for different kinds of learners, they each build interest, and they give students the support they need to understand a complex text.  I'm definitely going to try more of the visual strategies in my classroom!

The Value of Read-Aloud

As a child, I would ask my parents to read the same books to me over and over again so many times that I would "read" them at two years old by reciting the words.  I even knew when to turn the page at the appropriate times.  This article was great at giving specific examples of why reading aloud is so beneficial for kids.

First, the author pointed out that reading is not only about comprehension.  It can open up so many avenues for subjects that could peak students' interest.  Everyone knows that reading is a very important, if not the most important skill that a student learns in school. This article focused on the reasons why teachers should have read-aloud time on a regular basis in class.  Hearing the words brings the text alive for the students.  They will hear tones and inflections that they might have missed otherwise.  They will hear excitement, sadness, exaggeration, and they will learn to apply these things to text when they are reading independently.

I really enjoyed reading the sample read-aloud texts in the article.  The important part of choosing a text is making sure it is something that will spark student interest.  Whether it is the sound of the words, or just the conversational nature, students need to be intrigued by what they are hearing.  My mentor teacher is really fond of using authentic materials like poems and short stories in this manner. In a foreign language, so much of becoming proficient in the language involves being able to hear and understand spoken conversation.  In this way, read-aloud activities in class are extremely valuable.

Reflection 3

Chapter 5 in Subjects Matter by Daniels and Zemelman is all about different strategies that can be used before, during, and after reading to help students make connections and better understand the reading.  As I was reading each of the different strategies, I noticed that so many of these have been used not only in my high school classes, but in my college classes as well!  I had already been using some of the strategies, like the "post-it response notes" when reading difficult texts.  I would put a star next to what i I didn't understand and go back later.  

While each strategy is different, they share a similar theme of teaching students to analyze a text and not just read the words on the page.  Each of the mentioned strategies teaches students to make connections and assumptions that give them an extra layer of understanding of the text.  As teachers, we employ many of these methods without even realizing we are doing it.  When I read a text with my students, I do a lot of modeling of my thinking process.  I'll look at a word and make connections to English cognates and say, "hmm, what word in English does this remind me of?"   I also use exit tickets most days, and especially when something new has been introduced.  Even though my students will not be reading complex text it is just as important to learn to analyze and not just take the text for face value.  I really liked several of the strategies mentioned, and I will definitely be implementing some of them into my class!

Reflection 2

"Teaching Text Structure to Improve Reading Comprehension" discusses how a child learns to read informational texts, since children are more used to reading narrative pieces.  The biggest thing I take away from this article is that children cannot be expected to just look at a text and analyze it.  They must be trained to use first figure out what kind of text it is, and then learn strategies to most efficiently read each type of text.  I thought that the images of guided reading practices were actually really interesting.  They are all similar, and yet different enough that the student knows exactly what he or she is looking for.

Even though lower level foreign language classes do not really read difficult texts in the target language,  there are times when a culture lesson is presented in English.  By using the strategies in this article, students can pick out what is really important.  So, even though my French I kids won't need to do this every single day, it is a base for being able to read and understand any text in any subject.  This skill is so important, and even in college, I've known people who truly struggled with reading and comprehending informational texts.

So, it's not only the responsibility of the English teachers to develop this skill in students... All subjects should be regularly practicing guided reading that helps students become better readers.  More importantly, we want the students to be able to look at a text and know by its structure what is important.  That doesn't mean that all subjects need to teach a novel, but even just an article on the latest news in the subject or about a historical event can give students some really great practice!