A Quicky: Engaging Students - What Does That Have To Do With Literacy?

Yesterday, I was talking with a friend of mine who related 
a simple story to me which bears repeating.

As a storyteller, my friend often visits schools with no more than her voice and her body, charged with the task of entertaining and engaging students with stories for 30 minutes.  She is superb at what she does and, after her presentation, she overheard this conversation.

"I just don't get it," said one teacher to another.

"What?"

"We have all kinds of bells and whistles, quick response exercises, hand and sound signals, technology and yet our kids are always all over the place.  This lady comes in with her voice and a story and suddenly then are mesmerized.  What's with that?"

What is Engagement?

Now certainly familiarity may be a part of this equation but I believe the question is worth pondering.  I also see it, not so much as a judgement of tools, but as a question - how do I engage my students?  Certainly with our tech savvy children of today, our various technology tools are important.  But there is something deeper behind whether those tools work in classrooms or not.  The real questions are

"What authentic teaching can I do that will capture their interest?": 

"Am I so much on the "delivery" channel that I've forgotten the power of teaching?"

The topic is certainly a bit broader than literacy but I see literacy as the doorway to engaging students. What about you?

Michigan State University's National Center for Research on Teacher Learning attacks the issue with some important information:  "Faced with the concerns for classroom time and "effective" use of it, can put difficult demands on teachers.  What it often comes down to is how good are we at helping students construct meaning, including having time to discuss and explore?

Take that back to literacy.  

Are we so into "drill and skill" - repeat the rule back fast - that we forget that education includes thinking?  I've met children who are compliant word callers and decoders but they don't have a clue of how to use reading as a tool to get information they need, to analyze and synthesize what is presented in the text.  Here are a few literacy-related questions to think about in your own teaching:

1.  Do you use read-alouds daily to engage and foster thinking about text?  Engaged Interactive Read Aloud techniques, covered in my new book Before They Read, are a most efficient means of exposing to student what great readers do when they read).

2.  Do you let the size of the class keep you on the "controlling" channel instead of the learning, exploring channel with students?  Professor Deborah Ball shows us how to avoid this pitfall. 

3. What is your goal for any literacy lesson you teach?  The goal MUST always be to nurture and foster the growth of an independent, thinking reader.  It can never simply be what I call "reguritation of facts" even when we are teaching facts.  What do those facts mean?  What is their significance?  Those are much more improtant questions..

4.  What does your writing instruction look like?  Writer's Workshop is a terrific approach to that authentic, engaging, interaction that needs to happen when students are creating text.

Introspection Improves Teaching

Dr. Deborah Stipek of Stanford University says,

 Teachers can motivate students only if they themselves are motivated.  They can make students feel valued and secure only if they feel valued and secure; they can foster enthusiasm for learning in students only if they are enthusiastic about teaching. The school culture can make or break a teacher in the same way that the classroom culture can support or undermine students' efforts to learn.

This thought-provoking paragraph is from her book Motivation To Learn:  Integrating Theory and Practice.

Why not use these questions as a basis for a staff or grade-level meeting?  They really boil down to whether we as teachers are sending learners to the next level or out into the world or whether we are so focused on them passing the "eternal test" that we end up providing only short-term memory/learning.  These questions also tie to the reality of the most common subjects of those meetings: 

how do we get more students to "benchmark" or pass the assessments?

Are you motivated?  If not, how do you change that?

Engagement for both students and teachers is key.

How do you motivate yourself for the challenge of the daily classroom?  How have you equipped yourself with a mastery of the subject matter so you have the freedom to engage your students and teach?  Share your secrets.

Your comments as the authentic voice in the classroom every day is essential on this topic.  I look forward to reading your posts.

Literacy As A Doorway for Family Engagement /Parent Involvement

I'm a regular follower of Dr. Catherine Snow's work at Harvard's Family Research Project.  When I talk with everyday teachers, I always hear strong feelings that family engagement might be a good thing but who has the time with all the other requirements and pressured placed on educators.  Do you feel like that?

Let me suggest a different perspective. 

Consider that every time you effectively engage families in their children's learning, you lessen your workload.  You expand the horizons of a student and, especially among those who are termed "at-risk", you foster an extra level of intervention; you find a new resource for helping you bring more children to competency in the standards you are required to teach and in benchmarking those important assessments.

The secret is not to expect the parent to do what you do.  Meet them where they are, not where you want them to be.  That mostly just takes a little thinking time.

Families have important but unique roles, especially when it comes to literacy.   Early elementary school teachers have a special job since they are often the first face of education new parents in the school meet.  Take a little time to get to know your students' families early in the year and resist the temptation to write off those who don't come to the first open house.  Find out through a simple survey or a brief 1-2 minute chat what questions they have about their children's learning and what their goals are for their child.

A tiered, systematic approach works best, no matter what grade you teach.  

Tier #1:

For those that come to the school regularly and are comfortable, all you really need to do is to provide resources (books, a BIT of information about what assessment results mean and areas that they might help their child with at home).  They will take that information and run with it.

Tier I 2:

Send a personal note to every parent who wasn't able to attend.  You can get inexpensive, custom designed postcards or even business-card sized notes from Vistaprint (they even run specials where you can get as many as 100 postcards free, only paying shipping). 

In that note, voice your genuine regret that they were not able to come and share some small tidbit of information that they can use at home. It might just be that the family wanted to be there but they had a sick child, couldn't get a ride to the school or had to work.  Don't assume that an absent face is an uninterested one.  You're beginning to build a positive face for your classroom and your school.  Remember that busy or stressed families need regular encouragement to move them toward engagement.

Tier #3:

Determine that you will continue to send positive encouraging messages, even when you get no response, on a regular basis.  Schedule it into your calendar and stagger the notes so that you are only sending out a few a week or certain times of the month. 

An absence of response is not a "get away from me, I don't want any part of this" like we can assume too often.  It more likely reflects a negative experience with authority or schools on the part of the parent (either as a mom or dad or as a student when they were young), an incredible personal struggle just to put food on the table and a roof over their family's head, or some other personal barrier.  In a national study by Projectappleseed.org, fewer than half of all parents had been formally asked by schools what assistance they might need to be more involved in their child's education.  That's a place to begin.

Literacy As the Doorway
 Every family has literacy in some form; it just may not be the formal, academic literacy we focus on in school.  Hook on to that literacy, at whatever level you find it.  It may not be reading with their children, the traditional place we want families to start.  If that is not a part of their everyday lives, finger wagging and nagging them to do it is not going to be effective.  We have to start at a place that connects more to the current experiences of that family.

The National Center for Family Literacy has a wealth of information and ideas to help you get started.  Here are a few additional examples:

 Building on Parent Strengths to Promote Literacy is full of ideas that reach out to families.

Start at a level where parents are comfortable.  One principal in California began a storytelling festival at his school which eventually led to his students documenting their parents' stories and writing them down for a school-specific book that could be shared over and over again.  Everyone has at least one story to tell.  Think baby steps to move families a little closer to understanding your challenges and standards in the classroom.

The Council for Exceptional Children has an excellent, brief article with even more ideas to get you started.  Consider taking this resource and others you find here to your principal and asking if you can devote at least part of a staff meeting to discussing this important issue and what might work at your school with your population of families.  Not possible or the administrator not on that "channel"?  Take it to your grade level meeting and start there.

Involve your PTA/PTO (they support family involvement).  But ask them to think off the volunteer and fund-raising channel.  The voices of parent peers can sometimes be more effective than educators and they often know their communities, especially in these days where teachers may not be living in the neighborhoods where their schools are located.  If you aren't a member, join.

Ask the more involved parents, PTA/PTO or not, to reach out to a specific number of families (maybe only one other, or maybe two or three, as their time allows).  The ripple effect of this personal contact, without taking time away from your teaching, is an untapped resource.

Finally, if you have parents who are computer-savvy, send home a few assignments that create learning together opportunties at home. 

Thinkfinity.org
FunBrain.com
and Adprima's resource list of free websites that are child and family friendly

The main consideration that educators often ignore is that presenting literacy in the light of real-life skills rather than an academic exercise is more meaningful to parents.  Think about literacy activities that will promote communication and relationship with their children, are fun and interactive, and connect to their everyday environment.

As you try these resources, I encourage you will also share your own through posts to this blog. 

Don't forget to visit Share a Story: Shape A Future  this week and share this family-friendly resource with the parents and caregivers you interact with.  It's a virtual blogging tour talking about all kinds of connections with reading and writing, brought to you by the Reading Tub.

Do You Know The Reading Tub?

Come to the Author Showcase at the Reading Tub

Those of you who are regular visitors to my blogs have heard of the Reading Tub.  I'm pleased to let you know that I appear in their author showcase this month.  You'll not only find the interview with me but archived interviews with other authors.  At the Reading Tub, you'll also find a blog (I'm also featured there), book lists and reviews and quality articles of interest to both educators and parents. 

In the interview, you'll learn a bit more about the Literacy Ambassador but, as usual, I'm also sharing resources (wonderful picture books for older readers, advice for parents, references to quality book lists, and an announcement about a special kit Maupin has created from my latest books called The Home/School Literacy Partnership Kit).  You can also watch my new Youtube video through a link on the blog (playing the game Rhymin' Simon).

Practical, Use in the Classroom Tomorrow Ideas

Even as school district budgets tighten, we all know the importance of continued quality in-service training/staff development.  Here's a unique spin for preschool and kindergarten teachers:  Check out the free facilitator's guide for a book discussion of Before They Read, my new title at Maupin House Publishers.  Invite your preschool colleagues to join you in discussions that will build bridges and help young children be ready for school.  You'll also find a sample activity, the table of contents and other excerpts from the book on the book page for that title.

If you'd like to plan a day with the Literacy Ambassador which could include staff development, a parent meeting, opportunities for students to group write with the Literacy Ambassador, contact me through this blog or TLA's website for more details. 

Next post we are back on the teacher channel, providing even more inspiration and resources for honored educators.

Gettiing Back on Track

The new year has started and well on it's way so I realized it was time I came back and started posting more frequently to this blog.  Please forgive my absence; we have some exciting new resources to share with you!

TEACHER RESOURCES

This past weekend I was privileged to see my friend, Dr. Steven Layne, at a conference here in Alabama.  Many of you may know him if you are members of IRA.  Wow! 

I never cease to be inspired by Steven's passion for literacy.  The fact that a partnership to produce a book and the related friendship helped draw him from the brink of death is an amazing story.  In addition to all the wonderful picture books and books for young adults Steven has written, he now has a great new book out entitled Igniting a Passion for Reading, for teachers.  In it, he asks an important question:  "how can we teach the 'how' without the 'why'?

Perhaps at no time in history is that more important to ask as our literacy requirements and the definition of literacy expands and the motivation to read seems to get so little attention.  If we do not give children authentic, meaningful-to-them reasons to read, then they will not choose to be readers.  And what a limitation that puts on the future of our world.

My question relating to this topic is:  are you as a teacher a passionate reader?  Do you read yourself?  Do you share that passion in the middle of decoding and fluency lessons with your students?

I just finished Donalyn Miller's The Book Whisperer, which is another title I would heartily recommend on this neglected subject.  Miller is a 6th grade teacher in Texas that takes what some might consider a quite unorthodox approach to teaching reading and social studies.  Yet, in this world of "teaching to the test" she has incredible results on her student's state assessments without doing so (in four years ALL of her students have passed the state reading assessment - not one failure to meet "AYP"!).




Both these books send strong messages:

MOTIVATION HAS A PLACE                 INSPIRE!

We must pay attention to the motivation of our students to learn to read and to sharpen their reading skills.  Dr. John Guthrie has been studying motivation of students for a very long time and, if you need research to back your attention to this element, and to "justify" its inclusion to your administration, he's the one to reference.

Teachers can include both instruction in the mechanics AND create a strong rich environment that draws children of all ages and of all backgrounds to the reading table. 

Of course, it is challenge to do more than deliver a script, teach a lesson or assess our students, especially with the varied and heavy responsibilities all teachers face.  Many educators can get easily frustrated, discouraged or dulled by ignoring the part of them that drove them to be a teacher in the first place. In fact, what brought you to teaching in the first place was the same thing that we are talking about - a spark, motivation to make a difference, a love of learning. 

I encourage each of you to read these resources and others and recapture that spark in your teaching.  That is when we will have children benchmarking assessments, we'll have the wisdom to know how much assessment is essential and how much is counterproductive for our students, we'll get to know the needs of our students, have the standards stamped in the back of our minds and go out and teach.

RESOURCES FOR STUDENTS AND FAMILIES

Now that I've given you a few resources for yourself, I'll list a few ones for your students (and their families):

The Reading Tub, a family and educator-friendly nonprofit, is adding more and more book reviews and resources (for children of all ages). 

You can subscribe to their Scrub A Dub Tub Blog to get a regular dose of what's available.

Do you know that they have an Author's Showcase (which I'm excited to be participating in this week!)? 

They also have community projects you can involve your students in like Read it Together and Use Your ABCs?  And a newsletter called The Wash Rag?

Adlit.org (from the same people who bring us Reading Rockets) has terrific book lists for those teaching tweens and teens. Don't forget that among your "assigned" readings, you need to give your students at least a snippet of time to read something of their choice.

You can meet authors of nonfiction (how many kids do you have that like to read the real stuff) and get their insight into teaching and using nonfiction books at I.N.K.'s blog.  They share even more resources for using nonfiction to teach at their INK THINK TANK.

Don't forget your parents. 

If you teach kindergarten through 3rd or 4th grade, you have quite a bit of engagement and involvement from at least a core group of parents. 

1.  Encourage them to play a unique role with their child's literacy development (not the one you do with lessons and worksheets, etc.). 

2.  Help them learn to help their children use reading and writing in authentic, everyday situations. 

3.  Let them know it's OK not to like a book and to choose another. 

4.  Surprise them by telling them that you want them to have fun with reading and books, play games, and use the time they have with their child to strengthen their relationship (real chats with their children can do that and grow vocabulary).

If you teach 4th grade or above, children are becoming more independent and many parents don't see a role they have in continuing to support their child's literacy development.  Certainly the "snuggle and cuddle" bedtime reading doesn't work for many of them any more. 

Again, go back to that theme or authentic experiences.  Every family has to grocery shop, pay bills, do laundry and run errands.  Literacy is right in the middle of all of that.  Making lists, reading labels, checking figures and reading statements, checking labels so we don't shrink shirts or turn underwear pink, reading street signs, maps and billboards - that's the stuff real-life reading is made of. 

A CAVIAT:

It's easy to make the mistake of trying to teach parents techniques, strategies, etc. that you have learned are effective in the classroom but you will limit the number of parents who want to be engaged in that.  If we are going to help our most at-risk and struggling students, we provide more than rigorous classroom instruction.  We must draw families into the experiences that will create life-long readers, writers and learners.

For more authentic ideas for families, 

1)  share my blog for parents which fluctuates between postings from that "sit with your child and read" stage to the support of independent older readers. 

2)  If you teach children in kindergarten, Anytime Reading Readiness, my new book for families of children ages 3-6, is chocked full of quick, easy, ready-to-use ideas.  It's partner book, Before They Read, is a guidebook for teachers in preschool and kindergarten.

3)  The National Center for Family Literacy has a free newsletter for parents. 

4) Even if you choose to use "educationese" with your families (and they are receptive to that), make sure you translate that into family-friendly terms and activities.  The South Shore Regional School Board in Canada has put together a guide to do just that with parents who have K-6th grade children.  

5) The Peel District School Board has put together a rare guide for parents of independent readers in middle and high school that you must check out.  It's one of the best I've seen.

THIS BLOG NEEDS YOUR VOICE

This blog is established as a sounding board, a collaborative tool, a chance for a community of teachers to find resources AND communicate questions, comments, encouragements and challenges. It will only improve with your input.   Feel free to share your comments about this important subject.

Invite a teacher friend to follow the blog and add their input as well.  If each of you do this, we can grow this community and spread important messages.  I can't do it without you!

More on RTI

PART II

The second point that jumped at me from the IRA Guidelines for RTI is that RTI is a framework, not a specific program or model.  I like that because it brings the leadership back to the teacher.  How will you use these tools in your classroom to maximize service to your students?    If you need help, did you know that there is an organization (the National Center on the Response to Intervention), funded at two universities (Vanderbilt and University of Kansas) that can offer you free resources and support?  They can provide support to your center or your district.  Check them out!

RTI is about modifying the standard classroom approach if it doesn't work for a group of or an individual student.  Again, in my mind, that goes back to a renewed respect for the professionalism of teachers and educator-teams.  What a refreshing idea.  But with that renewed respect, comes a great deal of responsibilty.  Responsibility to stay on top of what works, best practices.  Responsibility to connect to your fellow educators and experts in the field and keep up with research.  Responsibility to take that part of your job seriously.  When I travel the country, I hear teachers tell me they are fed up, up to their eyeballs with the wrong type of staff development:  boring, etherial approaches without "take back to the classroom" tomorrow ideas that are confirmed by the experience of the teachers.  One more part of the responsibility of a professional is to communicate what you need.  Here are a few print and Internet resources to get you started:

Evidenced Based Reading Practices for Response to Intervention, a book that includes the voices of respected reading researchers speaking to the subject.

RTI Actual Network's Blog.  Every teacher needs a place to speak her mind and share her ideas, ask questions.  One of the greatest things I've discovered about blogs and listservs and online groups is that you can learn so much from that virtual community and contribute your knowledge at the same. For those of you that live in Florida, specifically, there is a blog on literacy from your state DOE.  Other states may offer the same type of interactive format. 

Webinars.  Tired of professional development that you don't select?  Try a webinar.  The IRA has listed a February event which will talk specific about RTI.  Hurry and you can get in on Missouri DOE's free one.

My friend, Emma McDonald of Inspiring Teachers (who just happens to be the publisher of my e-book, Powerful Picture Books), is on the same channel.  Her recent newsarticle on Tiered Instruction fits well into this list of resources. You'll notice that she created a personal copy of my newsletter but you just need to scroll down a page or so to find the article.  She brings an interesting idea: considering Montessori methods within the context of differentiated instruction.  I found it fastinating and it immediately gave me an idea. 

I always encourage teachers to look for those activities during small group time that work with students on a variety of levels.  For instance, in preschool or kindergarten when you have children on different levels of phonological awareness, activities that fit the range of the spectrum from not understanding rhyming, to being able to read rhyming pairs and recognize rhyming patterns in print.  Think about pulling activities from that range.  There's a great little puzzle I found called Find The Rhmye: A First Rhyming Puzzle.  I'm not into "advertising" but this is a great little tool.  I'm sure you know of plenty of other sets of materials or ideas that will work with a variety of students.  Organizing them by skill level is key to being able to pull them quickly to meet the needs of your particular group of students for a given year.

If you know of other resources you have found beneficial, please share them with a post to this blog.  If everyone shares a bit of what they find, we'll have a tremendous resource built on the subject.

Last Post of the Week: RTI

It's the end of the week and now we have one more chance to look back at IRA's Commission on RTI.

The last statement that struck me was "instruction and materials selection must derive from specific student-teacher interaction and not be constrained by packaged programs."  What does that mean to you?

In many cases, I see that we have become curriculum driven rather than student driven.  Getting back to the idea identified by IRA's expert commission is a challenge.  It reiterates the idea that we have all heard so often (and know to be true):  that there are "many roads to reading" - Dr. Peter Hannon, University of Sheffeld, England.  Rebecca Novick's new book, Many Paths To Literacy, is also a good verification of that sage statement.

Our friends in the educational publishing world (no names please) have become so expert at telling us that their product is the "fix all, end all" for instruction that it may have blinded us to this important fact.  I recently read this excellent article about supplements and alternative approaches that work well for students whom the curriculum "doesn't fit" and hope you will find it just as helpful.

Let's narrow in on literacy for a minute, down from the broader subject:

Reading Rockets (I hope you know this site) recently published an article entitled "Best Practice for All Students" and included a reference to a familar term "differentiated instruction".  This article emphasizes that Tier I instruction must be exemplary and not just "delivery of a stock curriculum".  It must include adaptations which include small group collaborations to address differences in skills such as fluency, vocabulary, or comprehension.  This article also correctly clarifies the distinction between groups in Tier I instruction and a Tier II level group.

Betty Hollas, author and veteran educator, provided a session at the last IRA conference in Phoenix, AZ (February 2009) entitled Differentiating Literacy Instruction for Intervention and Advanced Students in the Same Classroom.  What I love so much about Betty's presentation handouts are that she included useable tools like the Literacy Contract and a connection to Bloom's Taxonomy which helps level questions asked about literature or stories read.  She's also the author of several excellent books on the subject.

We've come to the end of our postings for this week.  I hope you've found valuable ideas and I encourage you to come back and visit us again.  And remember postings from you make this blog better so post away!

Resolutions and RTI

When I think of new year's resolutions, I often think of teachers.  You now have a good handle on the personalities, hot buttons, learning styles and capabilities of your students.  The second half of the year will fly by before you know it and you are already back in the middle of it all. 

As I was thinking about my own resolutions, I was reminded that the International Reading Association's Response to Intervention Commission has published their Guidelines (and a working draft of guiding principles).  These guidelines focus on several important keys for today's teachers and move us from a restrictive, repetitive approach to teaching which relies too heavily on curriculum (to the neglect of other important factors).

The next few blogs this week will address each in turn.  I solicit your comments about your experiences, what your school is doing with RTI, and how you'd like to see teaching change (for the better).  During your implementation of RTI, what have you learned?  There are even books such as Beyond the RTI Pyramid which have study guides to help you work through those answers.  After all, our resolutions (at least some of them) should be on behalf of our students and their families.

RTI is first and foremost "a prevention model", according to the Commission.

Are you seeing the form of RTI being implemented in your school or district as "just more work"?

Or, is it resulting in less referrals to special education, extensive intervention and diagnosed learning disabilities?

One of the purposes of RTI is to prevent unnecessary referrals (and perhaps premature ones) to those programs.

What a grand idea!  Giving students what they need in order to succeed.  Here's hoping that it makes its way from these high ideals down to the everyday classroom.  The National What Works Clearinghouse gives some guidelines of their own that can help make sure that happens.

One of the best ways I've seen for doing that is for the entire school staff to be on the same page:  literacy coaches/ reading specialists, librarians/media specialists, other staff specialists and classroom teachers, along with administration.  You may have heard of a "problem solving model" for RTI.   Is that happening where you are? How is it working?  What problems have you encountered in getting the end results you want?

Another way schools can insure proper implementation of RTI is to include parent education as part of the solution. There is a great resource to share with parents from NH's Parent Information Center which explains  RTI in a family-friendly format.   It may be that this helps you understand RTI better too.

When I talk about involving parents, I don't mean lecturing to parents about what they "ought to do".  That's counterproductive.  Instead I mean a genuine respect for what they can bring to the table in terms of authentic "in the real world" applications to what is being taught in the classroom. After all, what motivation will we give students of any sort to succeed and learn if they do not see any meaning for their lives?  That is nowhere more important than in the area of literacy.

Parent involvement as a part of RTI also means giving families information in a format that is friendly to them.  For some of you, that will be during parent/teacher conferences, for others through a website posting or email blast.  Think about your parent base at your school before you plan how to make them a part of RTI.  Your job of evaluating and identifying students, helping them at the various tiers will be easier with the engagement of families.

More later this week - add your comments and stay tuned!