This is Michelle Franz's page
What strategies are effective for building English language fluency?
From my K-6 teaching experience, the most effective way to teach English Language Learners (ELL) is to provide meaningful and authentic opportunities to learn English. ELL students need many English language opportunities to listen, speak, read, and write. These opportunities should include a variety of language experiences that will increase fluency, expand vocabulary and deepen comprehension.
Seven ways to support ELL students are highlighted below:
1. Reader’s theater improves reading fluency and comprehension. When students act out story dialogue, they are compelled to interpret the text and make it a meaningful experience. Students increase their use of vocabulary and deepen comprehension.
2. Audio books, such as those found on Big Universe, can help students improve their fluency. Students listen to an entire text with proper pronunciation. This helps students learn pronunciation and aid comprehension without having to stop reading and concentrate on individual words.
3. Drama activities encourage students to use English language appropriately. While learning a play, children are encouraged to listen to, read and practice repeating their lines before “show-time”.
4. A book club improves comprehension and vocabulary, increases fluency and builds motivation. Students are provided the opportunity to read a variety of texts and share these experiences with peers.
5. Authentic project-based learning activities strengthen a student’s skill to listen, speak, read, and write. Also, students use language to communicate and problem-solve with peers.
6. Computer games engage students while strengthening literacy skills. Many computer resources offer packages for improving vocabulary, grammar, spelling and reading skills.
7. Many literacy intervention programs integrate the skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing to give students a variety of language experiences. Earobics, Read Naturally, LLI and Fluency First are intervention programs that can meet the needs of ELL students.
How do you support your ELL students? What support do you need? Finding appropriate answers to these questions can help ELL students learn the English language quickly and succeed in all academic areas.
What is important to know for working more effectively with learning disabled children?
Recently I watched the video, “How Difficult Can This Be?” presented by Richard Lavoie. This is a great professional video that emphasizes the need for us to be much more sensitive to the feelings and perspectives of children with learning disabilities. A few points that I found interesting include: how deficits and differences in visual perception impact students; why student engagement is difficult to achieve and maintain; and how processing delays cause students to become further behind. If you have not seen this video and would like to learn more about how children with learning disabilities struggle, this is definitely one to check-out!
Since watching this video, I’ve noticed just how much more sensitive I am to the students struggling in my classroom. I’ve tried to make every effort to consider my students’ capabilities and weaknesses prior to setting lesson objectives and learning goals. I thought I would share a few questions I often ask myself before planning my reading instruction for my struggling students:
- At what reading level is this student performing? What reading behaviors are evident and/or lacking?
- What is the student’s stage of writing and spelling development? How does this information help me understand the student’s stage of reading development?
- Does this student have an IEP? If so, what are the goals and accommodations? How can I best adjust my instruction to help this student meet his goals?
- What are the reading strengths/challenges of this student? What reading goals can I help this student set and eventually meet?
- What reading program is most appropriate for this student at this time in their reading stage of development?
- What resources do I have that will help this student meet the lesson objective?
- What is the student’s affective development? Does this student display a weak or strong reader self-concept? Why? How can I help in this area?
- What strategies do I currently use to work effectively with learning disabled children?
- How is this student performing in the regular classroom? How can I help bridge the gap between the student’s intervention services and classroom small group instruction?
- How can I best motivate this student to accomplish his work?
- What is this student’s level of social and emotional development? How can I use this information to help this student stay focused and on task?
What information is important for you to know prior to working with a student with a learning disability? What strategies do you use that help you work effectively with a struggling student? As we learn to be sensitive to our struggling students, our lesson objectives can be met successfully and our students definitely grow in more ways than one!
What professional goals are worthwhile to achieve in 2012?
Goal setting is a powerful thinking technique that gives us a long-term vision and short-term motivation. It helps us organize our time and resources to make the most out of our life. When we achieve our goals, our self-confidence increases tremendously and obstacles are overcome with a sense of great accomplishment.
As the year comes to a close, this is a good time to evaluate how well we met our professional goals. This is also a great time to set a new goal for 2012 that will make a positive impact next year. The list below highlights a few goals I have heard teachers share as well as a few of my own:
- “Learn more about the Common Core Standards by discussing them with my principal.”
- “Use Twitter to communicate ways to use technology in the classroom.”
- “Increase my classroom library and label previously bought books.”
- “Lessen the amount of work I take home.”
- “Spend more time with my family and not on school-related things.”
- “Seek online, engaging Apps to help my students learn how to spell.”
- “Increase my students’ reading stamina by creating a monitoring chart.”
- “Create a weekly schedule to help me be sure to conference with all students.”
- “Organize and accomplish my list of tasks by using a spiral-divided notebook.”
- “Organize and label my desk drawers and cabinets.”
- “Connect with parents more by sending home a weekly newsletter.”
- “Use social media to learn more about literacy-related topics.”
Are any of these goals worthwhile to you? Choosing a professional goal might make the biggest difference in your career in 2012!
Happy New Year!
- A student can create a personalized, interactive online bookshelf.
- Each student can create and share books with friends online.
- Students will learn how to navigate social media features.
- Each student can choose to read several online interactive books on their personal independent and guided reading level.
- Students can accumulate AR points from reading the online books.
- Students will enjoy reading engaging, age- appropriate content.
- Students will be exposed to a variety of online books. The books have been written by various authors from several different publishing companies.
- A student’s online bookshelf is carried over from grade to grade
- Students can be the author of a personalized book through choosing from several design features
1. Create super powers for characters and rewrite your least favorite scene(s) using these powers.
2. Choose a character to create a descriptive “Wanted Ad”.
3. Create a department store ad using items from the book. You could also create book-related action figures to market and “sell”.
4. Choose a conversation scene to write what the characters may have written if exchanging emails and/or texts.
5. Choose your favorite scene(s) to create a play.
6. Create a “commercial” using persuasive advertisement techniques (bandwagon, repeated words, jingles & slogans, etc.).
7. Create a map by tracking the setting(s) throughout the book.
8. Rewrite the story in a different genre such as poetry.
9. Create a list of your favorite character quotes from the book.
10. Rewrite the story choosing a different setting, climax, character(s), problem, and/or solution.
11. Create comic strip scenes based upon the book.
12. Choose a character from the book to create a mock interview.
13. Use details from the book to create a song.
14. Create a crossword puzzle using vocabulary words from the book.
15. Use details from the book to create a Jeopardy game.
16. Use details from the book to create a test or quiz for a classmate.
17. Create letter tiles to play Scrabble. Only use vocabulary from the book.
18. Create a collage or illustration quilt based on the book.
19. Use details from the book to create “Top 10″ lists.
20. Use details from the book to create a “product”.
21. Create Charades cards to act-out literary elements from the book.
I have been working diligently to teach letters and sounds to Kindergarteners. It is amazing how quickly children at this young age can learn. However, as an Interventionist, I continue to seek meaningful ways to help struggling students learn these beginning concepts. I have found several manipulatives to help my struggling students learn letters and sounds efficiently.
1. Letter Arcs- This is an effective tool for teaching letter/sound recognition. Many engaging letter arc ideas can be found at this helpful website as well: http://alphabetmats.com/activities.html
2. Letter Sorts- This is a great way to teach similarities and differences among letters/sounds. (I use a Venn diagram to support my visual learners.) These are a few ways students can sort letters:
Letters with circles vs. No circles
Letters with tails vs. No tails
Letters with dots vs. No dots
Tall letters vs. short letters
Letters with slant lines vs. No slant lines
Letters with curves vs. No curves
Uppercase letters vs. Lowercase letters
3. Name Puzzles- Use construction paper to write down then cut-up a student’s name. Help the student put their name together. Instead of cutting up individual letters within a student name, try cutting names up by syllable or onset & rime. These are a few additional ways to use Name Puzzles:
Have students tell you the letters/sounds in their name
Use Math to count the number of letters in a name
Point to a letter and ask the letter name
Say the letters in the name forward/backwards
Trace and say each letter with a finger
4. Rainbow Writing- I like to use plain white paper to write the student’s name. Then I place this paper in a sheet protector (I find reasonable sheet protectors at Walmart). Encourage students to use colored dry erase markers to write over their name. My students enjoy this activity very much!!
5. Alphabet Books- Use alphabet cards with pictures to encourage students to name the capital letter, say the lowercase letter sound, and name the picture. Teach letters out of order to help students problem solve instead of relying on the “alphabet song”. Possible examples include the following:
“M, /m/, moon”
“A, /a/, apple”
“P, /p/, pig”
6. Sound Trinkets- I have a collection of trinkets that begin with each letter of the alphabet. After several shared experiences, I encourage individual students to sort these trinkets on a Venn Diagram mat according to the first sound they hear.
7. Sand Tray- I use a small cookie sheet filled with colorful sand for students to practice writing the letters of the alphabet. I prefer using the Fountas & Pinnell letter formation directions to teach my students. These verbal directions are simple for young students and easily remembered!
Many students struggle to read fluently. Fortunately, we can give prompts to readers that will provide them with opportunities to learn various reading strategies and tools for successful reading. The prompts below have helped my struggling students get back on track towards reading achievement!
Support Students to Self-correct
“You are almost right. Try again.”
“Something wasn’t quite right.”
“You made a mistake. Can you find it?”
“Point and slide through the whole word.”
Support Students to Search
“Use the picture to help you.”
“What letter would you see at the beginning?”
“Does that look right?”
“Does that sound right?”
“Does that make sense?”
Support Students to Cross-check
“Look for parts you know.”
“Check that. Does it look right and sound right?”
“Try that again and think about what would make sense instead.”
“Get your mouth ready to say the sound of the ___ letter.”
Support Students to Self-monitor
“You said _____, but does it make sense?” or ”…does it sound right?” or ”…does it look right?”
“Were you right? How do you know?”
“Try that again.”
“It could be____, but look at ______.”
Reading stamina is the strength to read silently for increasingly longer periods of time. Students strengthen their reading stamina through opportunities to read independently for lengthy periods of time. It is difficult for students to develop reading endurance when they are only exposed to short basal text selections, single chapters from books, or short nonfiction text selections that can be read in only a few minutes.
I feel it is crucial to find effective ways to help students develop strong reading stamina. By providing these opportunities for students to read, students gain the confidence to read lengthy texts, become better prepared for high stakes assessments, and strengthen strategic reading processes. The list below highlights ways we can help students develop reading stamina.
15 Ways to Develop Reading Stamina
- Provide incremental time for daily Sustained Silent Reading at school and at home.
- Use a reading interest inventory to provide appealing books.
- Expect students to read a certain number of words by the end of the month or school year.
- Teach students how to choose an appropriate book for independent reading.
- Hold individual reading conferences to instruct and assess reading stamina development.
- Create a peer recommendation chart for students to read and share books. Click here.
- Provide comfortable reading areas away from distractions.
- Provide opportunities for written response to independently read books.
- Provide a reading log for students to track finished books, genres, recommendations, and minutes read.
- Encourage students to set reading goals and track these goals.
- During classroom meetings, discuss “classroom” reading stamina progress and discuss ways to improve.
- Discuss and chart appropriate reading behaviors during independent reading time.
- Discuss independent reading expectations before and after reading time.
- Make books easily accessible in the classroom.
- Foster a love of reading by reading yourself during independent reading time and share a review!
Reference:
Tompkins, G. (2010). Literacy for the 21st Century. Boston: Allyn & Bacon/Pearson.
As a Reading Specialist, I continually refine my practice to offer new ways to provide high quality intervention services for our most at-risk readers. This relentless task can often be overwhelming.
Fortunately, I have achieved positive results instructing students using two reading intervention services; Leveled Literacy Intervention & Comprehensive Intervention Model. Both of these services embrace rich literature and texts used to increase student reading achievement. I attribute the reading success of my students to the plethora of engaging developmentally appropriate books and texts used for these intervention services.
4 Reasons to Use Leveled Books
- Richard Allington states in his book, What Really Matters for Struggling Readers (2001), struggling students are most likely reading books above their reading level and should be provided appropriately leveled texts for reading success.
- Students build fluency and comprehension skills while reading appropriately leveled texts.
- A gradient of text provides a way to assess student’s progress over time.
- Readers who experience only one type of text often develop a small range of strategies to process texts.
Book Leveling Criteria
- Length
- Layout
- Structure and organization
- Illustrations
- Words
- Phrases and sentences
- Literary Features
- Content and Theme
My 2 Favorites: Intervention Services
Leveled Literacy Intervention
Comprehensive Intervention Model
Reference:
Fountas, Irene, and G.S. Pinnell. Matching Books to Readers: A Book List for Guided Reading, K-3. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Educational, 1999.
Advertisements are constantly bombarding us from several directions-internet, TV, billboards, radio, magazines, etc. The persuasive techniques used in these advertisements “hook us”. These real-life scenario techniques can easily be taught to students for creating powerful book talks that “hook students”!
Common persuasive techniques used in powerful advertisements include:
bandwagon (You are urged to do or believe something because everyone else does.)
emotional appeal (You are deeply emotionally drawn to the words or images.)
repeated words (You hear words or phrases repeated that “stick in your head”.)
celebrity testimonial (You remember the celebrity product and sales pitch more compared to a common person.)
humor (You pay close attention to the sales pitch.)
The chart below highlights an example of persuasive techniques used for creating a powerful book talk:
|
Book Title
|
Persuasive Technique
|
1 minute student book talk
|
| A Call for a New Alphabet
http://www.biguniverse.com/readkidsbooks/1949/a-call-for-a-new-alphabet |
Repeated Words
“Celebrity” testimonial
Emotional appeal |
Student: “I’M EXASPERATED, EXASPERATED, EXASPERATED! Hi, I’m X from the book A Call for a New Alphabet. I am exasperated because every other letter in the alphabet besides me has so much to do and plays more important roles in making words. I expect more! I want us all to vote NOW for creating a new alphabet that is fair and equal! Find out more about our voting day by reading A Call for a New Alphabet located online at www.biguniverse.com. Hurry now, our alphabet might not last for long!“ |
