Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Ch. 4: Early Intervention (Effective Reading Strategies)
By March 1, post a reflection here about one of the strategies from Ch. 4 in Effective Reading Strategies. What is it about this strategy that makes it particularly important to you as a teacher, or to the kind of classroom you hope to have, or to the kinds of students you hope to teach? What makes it "powerful"?
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One strategy that will be useful for my classroon is the use of environmental print. Since I hope to teach students with intellectual disabilities in middle or high school, this can easily be included as community referenced instruction. This kind of strategy is extrememly useful for this population of students because it is extremely important for them to learn words like this to gain independence. This strategy is powerful because students with intellectual disabilities have a hard time with abstract concepts. Bringing in examples or showing them signs while out in the community, can help bridge the gap between the abstract and concrete. Not only will it help them learn those words, but it will help them understand that words have meaning to be conveyed.
ReplyDeleteI also believe that the use of environmental print would be most useful in my classroom. I want to teach students with severe and profound disabilities, therefore I want my students to be able to read context inside AND outside of my class. I want to help them in their functional life skills as much as possible and I believe that having them be able to comprehend text in the community as well as the classroom environment will be most beneficial to them.
ReplyDeleteI liked the use of language experience inside of the classroom. I plan to teach younger children who have intellectual disabilities, and this will be a great way to demonstrate to them the writing process. This is also an awesome way of demonstrating how we take our thoughts and put them onto paper. After we have put the students thoughts onto paper, they are then able to read what as a class they have come up with.
ReplyDeleteI liked the idea of the shared book experience and hope to incorporate it in my classroom.It combines a lot of different elements into one. I want my classroom to be very interactive and I think this is a great way to do that. I think this strategy is powerful because the student goes from listening to the teacher to reading independently.
ReplyDeleteI fell that predictable text is of great benefit for young and emergent readers.Tunes or rhymes that are rhythmic in nature are often entertaining to young children while exposing them to a variety of sounds and patterns.Many children are taught nursery rhymes that are a great foundation for repetitive practice with a variety of words and sounds.
ReplyDeleteI really like the daily writing approach. It is something that my student will be able to relate to. If they are writing their own stories or journals we can go back and use that material, or if I write something I can tie it into whatever we are doing. I think that writing your own stories is powerful because I don’t know a kid who does not want to talk about themselves. It becomes interesting.
ReplyDeleteI believe that enviornmental print is the most beneficial to the students as well. I think that me most important thing for a student to be able to do is function outside of the classroom. Think about how much we read and look at text outside of the classroom. I want my students to be able to read newspapers, magazines, job applications etc and be able to comprehend the material. The most important thing for students is to take what they learn in the classroom and translate it to everyday life. I want my classroom to be an interactive environment as well. I want my students to be able to bring in articles and newspaper clippings from reading outside of the class and give them the opportunity to share with the other students news, information, and ideas that they find interesting to themselves. This helps the students learn and comprehend material as well as learn about fellow classmates.
ReplyDeleteThere are many effective reading strategies that could be implemented in a classroom. Some of these strategies will make a student a better reader and some with only confuse them. There is not a single strategy that can be used in a classroom that can accommodate every single student, but there are some that can be beneficial in some way. I think that there is one strategy that can help most students and that is the Environmental Print strategy. This allows students to read inside of the class, along with outside. The students may not have the desire or the help they need to continue their reading outside of my classroom, so I want them to be able to go home or to their environment and read. The material may be a magazine, book, newspaper, or even a comic book. As long as their reading something they enjoy, it will become easier for them to read and understand, and for me as the teacher to teach how to read. If they are able to go home and pick something up and read it and understand it, then we have made progress, even though it is not in my classroom. I think this strategy is powerful because hopefully it will spark a desire for the student to WANT to read inside the classroom and outside, and this will allow them to become a better student and boost their confidence in their selves.
ReplyDeleteGiven the group of students that I would like to teach (high school students) I think that a strategy that would be useful would be daily independent reading. I think that practicing a little every day in the classroom independently and letting them have 10 minutes of independent reading (instead of wearing them out with 4 hours of useless homework) would be very beneficial to building their confidence as well as helping them to become emergent readers. I also think that parental involvement is important at this level too. So many times at the high school level, students quit caring about their school for other reasons. If parents become more involved with their students work and continue to support them, I believe they will gain interest in reading. What makes these two strategies powerful is the element of caring (the parents being involved and wanting their child to be successful, therefore their child will want to read and become a better reader), and the element of being an independent reader is powerful because once a student can master reading on their own, that assistance that was once necessary, is no longer needed and they will eventually become emergent in their readings.
ReplyDeletei like the idea of daily writings. Students can use a journal to both practice writing without pressure to perform as well as express themselves or questions they may have about school and life. By having daily writings, i as the teacher can learn more about my students and individualize lessons to what my students are interested in.
ReplyDeleteOne method i think is effective is to have students keep a journal to improve writing skills. Also to improve reading skills I will have students read books which relate to their interests. By offering readings which are interesting to the students, i hope to impart them with a love for reading and the pursuit of knowledge. Many students with autism tend to obsess about a particular subject matter. this is the subject which the reading should focus on. in this way I would take the students fixation and channel it into reading.
ReplyDeleteOne of the strategies from Ch. 4 in Effective Reading Strategies that I felt was particularly important to me as a teacher, to the kind of classroom I hope to have, and to the kinds of students I hope to teach is the use of environmental print. Environmental print is the text that appears in one's environment, from words on signs to logos on cereal boxes. Environmental print is powerful because it helps preschoolers' early literacy development because these are often the first words children recognize. It helps children understand that reading is about finding meaning in text, not just sounding out words. Additionally, environmental print helps develop functional life skills and creates an interactive classroom environment.
ReplyDeleteI think that the idea of daily writing is an effective strategy for all students including students with disabilities that I will be working with. Daily writings or journals provide a way for students to express themselves and get things out of their head that they may not want to verbally share with someone. Not only will this allow students to express themselves but it will also give them a reason to want to write, make writing meaningful and interesting, and improve their writing skills. These journals also give the teacher an opportunity to get to know the students better. I heard from a teacher who used this strategy, she would read her students journals and write a short comment back. She realized that in the students’ next journal entry they would sometimes refer to her comment. She began writing responses to her students’ journals and personal stuff about herself as well. These journals developed into somewhat of a written dialogue between the teacher and the students. The students began to share things with the teacher in the journals that they wouldn’t otherwise tell anyone. The teacher got great insights about her students and was better able to create a successful education for them.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of shared book experience. I would like to teach to middle school students. I think that this would be a great opportunity for them to learn how words look and sound. I would either start with a big book or create a big book from an experience that we all did together perhaps with environmental print. Since my students will be older there is a high emphasis on scaffolding to independent reading. I think this is a great exercise to achieve this goal. I think what is most powerful about this experience is that the students get to become comfortable with words while in a group and then get to enjoy them alone as well.
ReplyDeleteLee Carter
I believe that daily writings would be one of the most effective ways to incorporate learning and a therapeutic education in the classroom. It is important for students to feel as if they have an outlet for expression because in many cases they do not. Especially if there is confidentiality between the teacher and student that no one else could read them. The teacher would be able to give feedback on certain text a student had written or even help their students in certain situations. This is a powerful tool because it creates an amazingly strong bond between the teacher and the student. It is beneficial if you want to connect with your students beyond an educational level and more on a personal one, but in a way to broaden their educational experience.
ReplyDelete- Holly
I believe that the use of journals is the most effective reading strategy because it allows students to express themselves. This expression is empowering to each individual student. Students I plan on teaching are at the high school level and will be capable of holding up to the expectation of a daily journal. This will allow for them to practice daily to improve their writing abilities. This improvement can be assessed over time as well. This will help me as a teacher to realize what each individual student needs more practice on, in order for me to be a better teacher and adhere to students individual needs.
ReplyDeleteSince I want to teach at a low SES school, with younger children I feel as if they will not the foundation to be successful in the real world with what they know about environmental prints. This type of early intervention can really help my students out in the long run. Since this strategy is very practical, because it deals with traffic signs and community references that really can make a difference. These skills that they are learning in class can be transferred into the community so they can make a connection. These skills are very beneficial and can also be used in community based instruction.
ReplyDeleteI think that teaching using environmental print would be extremely useful in my classroom. Bringing examples of environmental print that the children see in their daily lives would be a great way to teach children to recognize printed letters. Being able to identify the words would it help them to develop important functional life skills. Not only will a child that learns from environmental print be able to recognize the context of the sign, but they will be able to read it. That way a child will be able to recognize the word "stop", for example, even if it isn't on a big, red traffic sign.
ReplyDeleteI agree that environmental print is a huge part of our everyday lives. From traffic signs to job applications, our students will need to understand language in the environment. As a special education teacher, I will be preparing my students for day to day life after they leave high school whether that is at age 18 or 21. I will bring examples from the community in to the classroom and I will take students in to the community so they can have first hand experience with environmental print.
ReplyDelete