Natalie Novotny's TPA (Elementary Literacy)



Planning Commentary Respond to the prompts below (no more than 9 single-spaced pages, including prompts). Central Focus Describe the central focus and purpose for the content you will teach in this learning segment. Text comprehension - being able to recognize and describe important events in Little House in the Big Woods, Chapter 10 – Summertime; summarize the text, predict what will happen next, and interpret cause and effect relationships in LHBW, Chapter 10. All lessons in this learning segment will focus on the conventions, word knowledge, skills, and underlying strategies associated with this meaning-making focus so that student’s may better make sense of the text.Given the central focus, describe how the standards and learning objectives within your learning segment address An essential literacy strategyRequisite skillsReading/writing connections In lessons 1 and 2, the learners will read passages aloud in sequential order from Ch. 10 of LHBW to their partners in order to demonstrate fluency and comprehension of the text. Specifically, lessons 1 and 2 will have students read to one another in pairs while being timed since they are only reading in chunks consisting of 4-5 pages at a time. Some pages have illustrations. This reading strategy allows students to both read and hear the text since partners take turns reading the same passage to one another. I then pose a series of 3-5 questions per passage to test their comprehension; questions are read aloud to students and displayed on the overhead. Students get a minute to write their answers on a mini dry erase board at their desk, so they have time to think independently. They then share their answer with their partners, and finally with the whole class. This forces students to think on their own first and then vocalize their answers, while hearing their peers’ answers too, which enhances comprehension and retention of the reading. I believe their scores on the past few quizzes have improved in large part because of this reading strategy. In lesson 3, learners will identify the relationship between cause and effect by identifying which events constitute a cause and which are effects in order to demonstrate logical connections in narrative texts. Students will also practice identifying cause and effect in order to demonstrate the relationship between cause and effect, a skill that aids in comprehension of what is read. If practiced, this skill can then be generalized and transferred to other narrative texts as well as informational texts.Explain how your plans build on each other to help students make connections between skills and the essential strategy to comprehend OR compose text in meaningful contexts.Days 1 and 2 were spent deciphering vocabulary in the chapter as well as reading the chapter together (each chapter in the book is like its own mini-story, although they build off previous chapters). Students must first know the vocabulary in the chapter if they are to truly comprehend the events that happen in the chapter. On day 2, we use a graphic organizer to make predictions about what might happen next in the chapter which helps students to think about their reading. Furthermore, it makes them realize that reading is an active process that involves using what you know and what you read in the story to predict what will happen next. I told students that even if they do not realize it, they are constantly making predictions on what might happen next in a story. The predictions graphic organizer helps to guide their thinking while they read certain parts of the story. On day 3, students then learn that identifying cause and effect in a story helps them to comprehend the story because it enables them make logical connections in the text. They also learn that re-reading the passages boosts understanding and retention of events within the story. We use a graphic organizer on day 3 as well which requires students to re-read parts of the chapter and then identify and write down causes and effects from the chapter. I believe this activity builds on the previous lesson’s prediction chart and the overall comprehension of the chapter they had just finished reading the previous day. It helps them to retain the information and make logical connections between events in the text too.2. Knowledge of Students to Inform Teaching For each of the prompts below (2a–b), describe what you know about your students with respect to the central focus of the learning segment.Consider the variety of learners in your class who may require different strategies/support (e.g., students with IEPs, English language learners, struggling readers, underperforming students or those with gaps in academic knowledge, and/or gifted students). Prior academic learning and prerequisite skills related to the central focus—What do students know, what can they do, and what are they learning to do? Students know how to make inferences in text (their teacher spent a great deal of time on that skill with them), and they can comprehend texts at or above grade level (as they are the enrichment class). Students also know how to compare and contrast characters in a story; they are aware that nearly every story has a problem and solution (I did a problem/solution flip book activity with them using an earlier chapter of the same novel) and they have presented book reports where they must identify the problem and solution in their books; they know sequence of story (that each story has a beginning, middle, and end, and I believe they can identify each part); they know how to identify unknown words using context clues from a story. Students have also learned about cause and effect in the past, according to their teacher. Students are still learning how to summarize and pull main ideas out of novels, especially novels of a somewhat informational nature like Little House in the Big Woods. Personal/cultural/community assets related to the central focus—What do you know about your students’ everyday experiences, cultural backgrounds and practices, and interests? Students are primarily Caucasian and live in a middle class suburb. While the school itself lacks in technology, the town has affluent sections and most children are not lacking in technology or resources in their homes. They are able to visit museums and go on trips with their families sometimes; most have computers at home; many of them like to read and enjoy going to the library or silent reading (if they can actually remain silent long enough to read). Some of them have kindles or iPad mini’s. Many students are fans of the current popular boy or girl singers or band today (Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, One Direction), so I have made references to pop culture during a literacy lesson when teaching vocabulary. All students know what Angry Birds is (a popular game) and many have played it, so I used an Angry Birds anchor chart in my opener while teaching about cause and effect. Many students are also big fans of the game Minecraft, a simple game about breaking and placing blocks. For some of them it is an obsession.3. Supporting Students’ Literacy LearningRespond to prompts 3a–c below. As needed, refer to the instructional materials and lesson plans you have included to support your explanations. Use principles from research and/or theory to support your explanations, where appropriate. Explain how your understanding of your students’ prior academic learning and personal/cultural/community assets (from prompts 2a–c above) guided your choice or adaptation of learning tasks and materials. When appropriate, I tried to use instructional materials that I knew would be relevant and interesting to students, such as the Angry Bird’s anchor chart mentioned above. Knowing my students grow bored easily, I tried to activate multiple senses by using taste (honey tasting in this chapter and maple syrup tasting in a prior chapter), sight (making cheese video, visuals on the overhead such as pictures and written definitions of vocabulary words, typed out questions displayed on overhead), and sound (used oral repetition coupled with sight, playing fiddle music in a prior chapter) where possible. For my cause & effect lesson, I also chose to use a PowerPoint with a theme applicable to student’s lives and catchy graphics that students would find amusing. The PowerPoint featured a boy getting grounded for not being in the green at school, something most students could relate to even if they do not use the green/red/yellow color system for behavior. I incorporated appealing graphics and technology into my lesson to hook and hold them because children nowadays are drawn to anything that remotely resembles their lives outside of school – much of which is spent playing video games, watching tv, or being on the computer. I have noticed how quickly they lose interest or fidget if I do not find ways to relate to their lives, use technology, and/or keep them occupied for much of the lesson. As for prior academic learning, I knew students were capable of comprehending the novel given that they have been reading it for several weeks now. They are the only third grade class doing a novel study. Accordingly, I knew students would be capable of filling out the graphic organizers I gave them during 2 of the lessons as long as I modeled for and guided them on filling them out. I also knew they would be able to handle the cloze vocabulary worksheet I gave them for homework on day 3, since they have done similar homework before on this novel. Describe and justify why your instructional strategies and planned supports are appropriate for the whole class and students with similar or specific learning needs. Through mixed reading pairs, stronger readers will be able to read aloud to slightly weaker readers and vice versa. This will allow students to support one another. It also allows the slightly weaker or slower readers to hear the text read aloud before they themselves have to read it. Additionally, having the chapter broken down into various passages will enable students to better comprehend the text since I am not trying to assign a 20 page chapter in one sitting for students to read with no break in-between. Furthermore, having students discuss and write their answers to questions relevant to the text immediately after reading each passage will help them retain what they have just read. The questions will be both displayed and read aloud to them, catering to auditory and visual learners. Likewise, verbalizing their answers by sharing them with their partners and the class will enhance comprehension and retention of each passage.Moreover, I will point out and define on the board or overhead vocabulary words that may be unfamiliar to most students before each passage we read. Visual learners will get to see pictures as well as definitions of vocabulary words on the overhead. While my students are very smart, literate, and capable, they are still only 8 and 9 years old and as such need support, feedback, and scaffolding fairly often to help them stay on track when trying anything new during a lesson (such as the graphic organizers). This is why I will model and give examples while we fill out the graphic organizers together as a class. I will interact often with students, asking questions to solicit input and to check for understanding, to make sure they are all getting it and filling out their graphic organizers appropriately. Consider students with IEPs, English language learners, struggling readers, underperformingstudents or those with gaps in academic knowledge, and/or gifted students. Describe common developmental approximations or misunderstandings within your literacy content focus and how you will address them. One common misunderstanding I can think of within my literacy focus is that just because a student can recite something back to you – like what he or she just read in a text – does not mean the student comprehended what he or she just read. Besides, merely because a student is very literate and able to read a text silently to him/herself, does not mean he/she can recall or understand what was just read. For students to comprehend and retain text, they must be made to summarize or answer questions about the text in their own words as well as inference and predict what will happen next via high level questioning and metacognition strategies. Students must be able to express what they know about text they read both orally and in writing.One way I address this is by posing questions to students that compel them to answer in their own words and to think beyond what is spelled out in the text. Sometimes I would think of a question that I had not typed out to add to what we were discussing from the text, and I would pose the question to students as we went along to get them thinking further, especially if I realized the original question was too easy for them. Students will have a chance to write down their answers on mini-dry erase boards and then to discuss them with a partner before whole group sharing. In addition, my graphic organizers encourage students to think about what they read as they are reading it. For example, we will read snippets of the chapter together and then stop to consider and write down what we just read, what we know from experience or prior learning, and then use that information to predict what will happen next. We then read on to see if our prediction was true, writing down our new prediction in another box or adding to what we previously predicted. Filling out our prediction and cause/effect graphic organizers will guide students to think about what they are reading as it is being read.4. Supporting Literacy Development Through Language Language Demand: Language Function. From the list below, choose one language function essential for student to learn the literacy strategy within your central focus. Listed below are some sample language functions. You may choose one of these or another more appropriate for your learning segment.Analyze ArgueCategorizeCompare/contrastDescribeExplainInterpretPredictQuestionRetellSummarizeIdentify a key learning task from your plans that provides students with opportunities to practice using the language function identified above. In which lesson does the learning task occur? (Give lesson/day number.) Predict: During lesson 1/day 2, students will fill out a “Precise Predictions” graphic organizer. As students read the selected passages up to their sticky note, they think about what has been read up to that point and what is already known from personal experience or has been learned. They write this information down in different bubbles on the graphic organizer and then use it to predict what might happen next in the story. After writing a prediction in a box between the What I Read and What I Know bubbles, we read on to see if our prediction was accurate. We then fill out a new box that says to add to or make a new prediction.Describe and summarize: During our discussion of the text and after reading parts of the chapter in timed chunks, students will describe certain events that happened in the text in their own words and also help summarize what we read so far at the end of each lesson. (lesson 1/days 1 and 2)Additional Language Demands. Given the language function and task identified above, describe the following associated language demands (written or oral) students need to understand and/or use. Vocabulary or key phrasesPlus at least one of the following: Syntax Discourse Students will need to know the vocabulary identified in the chapter which we will go through in chunks before each passage students read. The vocabulary words will be displayed on the overhead in a Word document with pictures accompanying the definitions. We will go through the vocabulary words one at a time before filling out the Precise Predictions graphic organizer. Since it is an enrichment class, some of the vocabulary words I identified from the book students may already know to some extent (like grooves and dreadfully), while some are specific to the time period in which the book was written and are not used in regular language today (curd, whey, embroideries), so students would not necessarily know them. While students are able to use context clues to figure out the meaning of some words, it aids in overall comprehension to feel familiarity with a word and to be able to form a picture of the word in one’s head. Students need to have basic understanding of the words in the text in order to fill out the prediction graphic organizer and also to describe events that happen in the chapter when asked a question. For example, students need to understand what curd and whey is before they can write their answer to how it is made. Luckily, the author helps readers by defining some of the unknown words and processes in the book through detailed explanation, but in mostly simple terms (i.e., Laura thoroughly describes how she and her Ma used curd and whey to make cheese in Ch. 10).Discourse: students need to be able to communicate their understanding of what is read from the chapter in writing and orally to describe and summarize what they read using synonyms. Also, in order to fill out their predictions graphic organizer students may need to understand any unknown terms they read in the chapter and will need to be able to discuss it if asked. Students may use quotes from the text while answering questions asked but for the most part must use their own words.Consider the range of students’ understandings of the language function and other demands what do students already know, what are they struggling with, and/or what is new to them?Language Supports. Refer to your lesson plans and instructional materials as needed in your response to the prompt below. Describe the instructional supports (during and/or prior to the learning task) that help students understand and successfully use the language function and additional language identified in prompts 4a–c.To help students understand what curd and whey is and how it is used in the cheese-making process, we will watch a YouTube video at the beginning of day 2/lesson 1, before the children read about cheese-making in the book.Additionally, before each timed passage students will read, I will pull up vocabulary words and their definitions plus a visual that corresponds with each word in the chapter. We will spend approximately a minute or more on each word, depending on its complexity. This way students will be introduced to the words right before they read about them in the book.). Below is an example of how I will familiarize students with the chapter terms. Our first word for day 2 is quivery (which is an adverb form of the verb quiver). A definition plus a picture of jello will be displayed in Word on the overhead. I chose this image since the word is used in this context in the story when discussing cheese making [“In a little while it thickened into a smooth, quivery mass”].I will read the definition or have a student read the definition as I show students the picture and meaning on the overhead.I will use the word in one or two sentences but in its verb form (i.e., The jello quivered as I set it on the counter). As students if they ever noticed how jello seems to shake due to its texture.I will then give an example of what quivery is not (an antonym or example). I might say “Is cookie dough a quivery substance?” I will do the same process for each vocabulary word introduced so students become familiar with each one, with the exception of a few words with no antonyms such as curds and why. After students have read the next passage, I will ask if they noticed any of the vocabulary words we discussed in their reading. I will call on students to tell me the terms they recognized as well as their meanings. I will also ask students to identify any other words they were unfamiliar with in the text that I did not previously teach them. I will see if students can figure out meanings of any other unknown words based on context clues, and ask if any other students in the room might be able to describe the meaning of a word that their classmate(s) might not know.On day 2/lesson 1, I will pass out a Precise Predictions graphic organizer as a “during reading” assessment to monitor for understanding as we read the text. I will explain and model how to fill it out as we go. This activity will provide students with opportunity for practice with some of the chapter’s vocabulary words.As students read the selected passages up to their sticky note, they think about what has been read up to that point and what is already known from personal experience or has been learned. After the third passage is read ending on p. 195, tell students to close their books and get out their prediction sheet. Ask students to tell me what just happened at the point we stopped reading. Pa found a bee tree and got heaping piles of honey from it. Pa also ran into a big bear.Tell students to fill in this information on their What I Read bubble on their prediction sheets and ask them to hold it up when done. Ask students what they know from personal experience or from previous chapters and from info given in the story. Solicit responses from students for the What I Know bubble. [Pa didn’t take his gun. Bears are fat and lazy this time of year. From personal experience though, bears are still scary and could easily overpower any of us. Pa somehow got the honey, maybe using a tactic he used in an earlier chapter.]Tell students to fill in their What I Know bubble based on what we just discussed.Ask students what their predictions are based on what they know and what they just read. [Pa somehow got the bear to go away so he could get the honey. What did he do?]Students then write their predictions in the first box. Continue reading the text until we see if our prediction was accurate (p. 197). 5. Monitoring Student Learning Refer to the assessments you will submit as part of the materials for Task 1. Describe how your planned formal and informal assessments will provide direct evidence that students can use the literacy strategy and requisite skills to comprehend or compose text throughout the learning rmally, students will be answering questions about the passages they read with their partners on their dry erase boards directly after reading each passage. Students will share their answers with their partners and we will then briefly discuss the answer(s) as a class. Each student must participate which means each student will be actively engaged in showing their comprehension or lack thereof. I will walk around during the pair & share questioning to make sure students are on the right track and to make note of the answers I hear.Students seem to comprehend the text better when they read it to a partner and were read to by their partner. We’ve been doing the chapter readings for this book like this for 2 weeks now and the students’ quiz scores have improved greatly. I also notice that students are remembering details of the story better. It helps that I break the reading of the chapter into small passages (3-5 minutes depending on the page numbers assigned) and that I asked follow up questions directly after the reading. Additionally, students seemed to comprehend what they read when they had to answer questions first on their dry erase boards and then share them with their partners. It helped further that I solicited answers after each pair & share and clarified or repeated the answers each student gave.The students’ prediction sheets which we will fill out as a “during reading” activity while we read parts of the chapter together will show if students are able to use prior knowledge and comprehension skills to predict what might happen next in the story.In lesson 3, I will use questioning during our re-reading of passages in Ch. 10 of LHBW to prompt students to think about different instances of causes and effects in the chapter, to identify components of each, and to notice the relationship between cause and effect in the chapter. If I call on a student to identify the cause of a sentence (for example, in the PowerPoint) and he/she gets it wrong, I will remind the class what a cause is. For example, I will repeat the definition of a cause or an effect. I also will prompt students to tell me if the cause came first or second, and remind them that just because a cause is an event that happens first, does not mean it comes first in the sentence. In other words, I will re-teach and remind students throughout the lesson as needed based on their responses to my questions and activities. If I see a student isn’t getting something or is a little off, I will clarify and maybe call on other volunteers to help or to come up with an alternate answer that might work. The activities in lesson 3 are structured in a way where I will interact frequently with students and as such continually monitor their understanding and learning throughout the lesson. I will walk around while students fill out their cause/effect charts and discuss with them to check their understanding during that activity. The cloze vocabulary worksheet given for homework after lesson 3 will demonstrate student’s ability to understand the vocabulary we learned in the chapter as well as identify cause and effect, since students have to know which part of the sentence given happened first (the cause) and which came second (the effect). The quiz given on day 4 after the completion of the TPA lessons will ask students to tell if a statement from the chapter is true or false, and if false to explain why. This strategy will show me if students really know and remember what happened in the chapter. Students will have to activate their knowledge of the story to explain why something was false and pay attention while reading each question to make sure they don’t miss anything.Explain how the design or adaptation of your planned assessments allows students with specific needs to demonstrate their learning. There will be a variety of activities catering to different learning styles: visual, auditory, and kinesthetic, so that the entire class is supported throughout the lesson. I will check for understanding throughout the lesson by walking around, asking questions, checking students’ graphic organizers and dry erase boards, and observing students facial expressions and body language. Every student will have a chance to offer input during each lesson whether they like it or not. As it is an enrichment class and there are no specific needs in this group, most students enjoy a bit of a challenge and look forward to showing off their knowledge when they are confident in their answers and interested in the activity. My cause and effect activities especially challenge students to think outside the box and use their minds to answer appropriately. Consider all students, including students with IEPs, English language learners, struggling readers, underperforming students or those with gaps in academic knowledge, and/or gifted students. ................
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