Remember your Wednesday post should be a comment or observation. What are you finding interesting? What do you want to try? What do you wonder about? Then your Thursday/Friday post should be commenting on the previous comment of someone else.
My favorite activity in the chapter is "vocabulary tableaux." It reminds me of charades, a game I still like to play myself. It seems like it would get students interested and looking forward to vocabulary and also have them thinking at a deeper level about a word. Like the example from page 53, what does the word oppression really mean, not just what does the dictionary definition say? This activity gets students moving (which they really love to do anyway, so this is one way for them to walk around and talk to peers without getting into trouble) and it has them laughing and being serious at the same time. Would there be any potential problems with this activity? What about an age range? I would like to try this with my 6th grade class when they have vocabulary, but I feel that it would also work with high school students.
I have always liked the idea of using visual images to get information across to students. I am curious how the lunch club videos would work. I know most students love to watch movies, but I do not think they would read the captions, or not all the students would read the captions. In my middle school placement, I saw how using visuals can help students remember their vocabulary words and meanings. Wilhelm, in chapter 3, is talking about using power point with images and flash cards with an image on one side and the word on the other and how the student can associate the word with picture. I created a vocabulary exercise with an image that represented a vocabulary word and then gave them the word, after they looked at the word they had to match up the definition. Then the next time I did a traditional read the word and definition introduction to the word. Before I left my placement, I did a cumulative review to see which words they remembered and the ones they struggled to remember. The words we used visuals with were much more ingrained into the students’ memories than the ones we just read. The students could remember the picture and were able to recall definition.
I LOOOOVED this chapter. I especially loved how much Wilhelm included. His beginning example was helpful because that is real life. I think my class would have more than a few Marko's, but I know they respond better one-on-one. I think Dr. Alby has done a great job with her own frontloading skills where she uses guided imagery and we drew pictures for vocabulary because those were in the book and I liked knowing that these were strategies that are applicable and easy to use. I am a huge fan of frontloading with images because as I was reading the 7-step sequence, I realized how much it takes to visualize and imagine during reading. You have to help them experience things they have not seen or heard or felt. Just today, I was reading a prompt for an expository essay from the state website asking kids to choose some classes they would like to see added into the curriculum and tell why. This seems easy at first, but talking to the kids showed me that they really had no idea what othef classes existed outside of their middle school in Milledgeville. Are they supposed to make them up? Unless they are watching a ton of tv about school classes or reading books, then I think it might be kind of difficult. So, I like the 7-step sequence a lot. It's probably my favorite part. I do like that Wilhelm gives us speaking prompts and activities as well. I used the picture-note taking in SPED class last night. Not gonna lie- I love it. It helps me remember and I learn to visualize the problems that I cannot directly relate to. Hope I can do all of these with my students sometime. (The sandbox was cool too)
I really liked the idea of watching a movie or tape with the sound off and just the captions on. What I found in my first placement was that a lot of students didn't really read on their own but watched a lot of movies. I think the whole visualization issue probably contributes to that. If we can get students to realize and understand that reading can in fact produce the same type of images in our heads that we see in movies, then reading becomes fun for them again. I also liked the part about teaching them to read through their interests. Like Marko, I was a sports nut when I was a kid and would read the sports page every morning before school. If teachers can prove that the same type of images students make when they read something they love can transfer over to everything that they read, I think we could be more successful in producing life long readers.
Picture Flash Cards would have really helped me as a student. I was visual. I had to both see it and write it down to understand it. I learned words from dictionary.com and I remember the antonym and synonym being especially helpful. I'm actually gaga about the idea of writing in sand or forming letters with a string. I don't know if it's because I could have a sandbox inside or because it seemed to help students.
I like the way he breaks down the scaffolding structure as opposed to the I/We/You (pg.46). He adds steps, but I think for a difficult topic or struggling class the extended scaffolding would be much more useful. I tried the vocabulary tableaux in my last placement (an idea I got from an old acting warm-up). Most of the students loved it. What I really loved about it was it required everyone in the group to participate. I like the visual think - aloud technique. I think it would be nice to give students an option of either pictures or writing for this, to appeal to multiple intelligences.
I thought this chapter was interesting because I had not previously realized how many visualization strategies my host teacher is using regularly in her classroom. At the moment our lesson is focusing on imagery and Ms. Newby has used many strategies similar to those presented in the book. The week before my first day at JC she did an awesome exercise called sensory experiment. Students moved around the classroom to different stations where they were asked to describe objects based on touch, taste, smell, sound, and sight. Students have spent a lot of time discussing what they see when they read poetry. They love comparing their pictures with the pictures of other students. Ms. Newby has implemented visualization by asking her students to draw their vocabulary words. One of my favorite activities was the visual think-aloud. It reminded me of the visual notetaking that we did in World Literature. I have learned that I am a much more visual learner than I originally thought. I feel that these activities could appeal to a vast majority of students.
For a kid who hates to read, Marco sure is the evocative poet: "Just a bunch of squiggles, like rabbit poop in the snow." Yes, please.
I think the most important point to take away from this section has little do with the actual visualization techniques. That's icing on the cake. The part I enjoyed the most was when Wilhelm drives home the point that struggling kids, even the ones who say they hate reading, are not necessarily resolving themselves to failure. If anything, it is frustration that they don't get it and that there's no one out there who will help them. I like that he pointed out that simply making it known that he wasn't going to give up prompted some sort of improvement.
Holy crap, I seriously want sandboxes in my room now. Side note: right now, in the Dollar Tree, you can get "Zen Gardens", so everyone has their own little personal sandbox. Kind of cool. At first glance, I thought that the sandbox idea sounded ridiculous until I realized how I myself do a variety of "air-writing" or actual writing techniques when I am unfamiliar with a word.
Erin, The sensory experiment sounds like a really great way to combine visualizing (as well as feeling, smelling, and hearing) and words. I think that would make for a great writing exercise that I would like to try. It is really hard for me to explain things like that sometimes, so I think it would be good for teachers to participate in as well. Maybe the kids could bring in their own object or something and write about it and have other students guess what they are talking about...who knows. I just really like that idea to get them interested and writing.
I also loved the vocabulary tableaux. The students in my first placement have been asking about doing something more active with their vocabulary words to review. One of them actually mentioned tableaux and I thought this activity would be wonderful! I can't wait to try it! Not only would it be engaging and fun but it would also get out some of the extra energy they have pent up in the afternoons. The students with kinesthetic intelligences would appreciate the activity and I think it would help everyone remember the words for their quizzes.
Brent, I thought the idea for reading the subtitles was wonderful too. Combining it with think-alouds where the teacher describes the images that appear in his/her head when s/he reads to the class would be a great way to discuss literature with the whole class and connect that to writing descriptively. Since meaning is made between the author/text and the reader/imagination. This would work especially well with books that were made into movies--what the teacher and the students imagine could be compared to what the movie director created and then compared again to any descriptions in the text. All this could be discussed along with writing strategies that authors use to describe scenes, items, people. I just love the idea that connections for struggling readers and between reading and writing workshops can be accomplished in two types of activities you could continue periodically for a whole unit or a whole year!
I believe we have heard of Marko before, and, if that is true, why didn't Wilhelm just tell us this stuff in the other book? I think building a desktop sandbox is a bit extreme. Whats the difference between that and a pencil and paper? Wilhelm says it helps kinesthetic learning, but I don't know. Maybe since I don't suffer from a LD I can't see the benefit of this.
I did like the steps that had the students moving from describing an object that is present to creating mental images of things that are absent. The students at Jones County hate learning vocabulary and I think it would really help them if they would try to make scenes that apply the word in ways that are relevant to their own lives.
I also loved all the attention Wilhelm paid to visualization! I guess since I love reading, I never would have thought that some people have problems doing what I don't even think about, and honestly I wish I had learned about different visualization strategies while I was in Undergrad because I feel like it would have proved to be useful while I read difficult texts that I had trouble deciphering. I had trouble relating to some of those dense academic texts, and I suppose the way I feel while reading those is the way some students feel while reading fiction, or anything else.
I peronsally loved the activity using the "string" and sandbox to trace words with and spell words out with. I feel like this could be used in a lot of different ways. When I was little, I used a string to lay across the lines of books while i read and I would move it down as I read. It helped me focus and visualize a lot of the time. Wilhelm here though thinks that when students have a hard time learning and remembering words, that this helps, even into the student's older years.
Personally I think it's a fantastic idea. I have a student right now in my placement who came into her 9th grade year at the school, not knowing how to read or write. So exercises like this would be super beneficial.
Wes: It's different. It's the same concept, but remember, we're sparking these kids' interest. Writing on a sheet of paper with a pencil < writing on a mini-whiteboard < writing on a chalkboard < writing on an iPad < writing in a flippin' SANDBOX! Cool stuff everywhere.
I think the most helpful thing we've read from Wilhelm continues to be the tableaux strategies. I think that applies with vocab here too. When I first read about tableaux, the only thing I could think was "This is ridiculously idealistic stuff and the kids are, like me, going to think it's stupid." After doing it four or five times in my last placement, I found that the kids really dug it and I myself enjoyed it, too, and sort of wished my teachers had done it way back when.
Even though my students only get one word per week in my placement's vocab exercises, I think splitting them up into a few groups and just seeing what sort of creative stuff they can come up with would be beneficial. And they would enjoy it. Given the way that my school is run, I think kids would flip their lid just being allowed out of their seat without being under the threat of silent lunch. When you're planning out something like a tableau, you really have to think about what you're doing (often to the point where they sort of spend too much time thinking). But in a class where every single day, 20% of the classtime is wasted doing the SAME daily vocab/grammar warmup, I think this would be exponentially better.
Marina, I agree with you. I thought the tableaux vocabulary game was excellent as well. As far as making it for high school ages however, I think that almost any idea of Wilhelms can be modified for an appropriate age level. Even the sandbox thing could be used at a high school level (with Nick's idea of the little Zen gardens).
I think it is just all about how the teacher applies it. If the teacher doesn't modify the activity then of course it won't work. So I think it really is all up to how the teacher utilizes the activity.
Brittany, You're right, they respond so much more with individual attention. Last Thursday we split on of the "problem" class into small groups and they were completely different kids! One of the kids my host teacher put in my group made me very nervous. I had already seen him pick a fight with someone, and I've never seen him in a good mood. In the small group he was amazing, he even added pertinent comments to the conversation! I only had to remind him to stay on task a few times. Also, we gave this same writing prompt to the 11th graders at Putnam High in my last placement. Everyone in the English department split up the essays and sorted them into two piles; needs remediation, doesn't need remediation. But what shocked me is I remember having the EXACT same prompt, worded in the exact same way on my 11th grade writing test. I also remember having way too many ideas to form a decent timed essay. Did anyone else have this prompt?
Brent, I also liked the idea of watching the movies with the sound down. I think the key to this strategy is that the kids understand that if they get to watch some of their movies than they have to watch some of the teacher’s movies. I thought as I was reading about this, how would I know if the students are paying attention to the sub titles? I was thinking that the students could read the sub titles aloud and each student can take the role of a character in the movie or film, then I thought about how I have trouble keeping up with sub titles, so I am sure some students would not be able to keep up. It is still a very good idea. Seeing the words in action makes it easier to comprehend.
I also loved the sandbox and string ideas. I had some personal experience with a similar activity in my first placement. One of my LD students simply could not follow along in the book we were reading. I gave him a notecard and called it the magic place finder. I told him if he moved it as he read, he would never lose his place. Obviously, this is a little ridiculous and a senior would laugh in your face if you told him anything was "magic." However the principle is the same. We all crave attention and if a student believes he has been given special attention or something that other students didn't receive he is more likely to honor and respect whatever the focus of the special attention was. Sidenote: this specific LD learner also loved super brain yoga. He got antsy in the middle of a test, so I shared it with him. He passed his test. :)
I witnessed first-hand the comments made by Marko while I was in placement this week. Ms. Knighton has assigned her 1st period Brit Lit class to read Frankenstein. Although this class is tracked as "Advanced College Placement" (or Pre-AP), they are still showing obvious signs of "Senioritis." There are also a good many athletes in the class. I could hear most of the guys saying "I hate reading" while they were supposed to be reading the four letters at the beginning of the novel. I replied to one of them, "I bet you don't hate reading, just reading books that Ms. Knighton assigns you." I'm thankful that this chapter addresses once again the "I hate reading" syndrome. While I'm not sure all of the exercises can be applied to high school seniors, hopefully some of them can be used with them.
Erin, I also think that Ms. Newby's imagery stations is a great idea! Ms. Knighton discussed with me an activity that she likes to do with Canterbury Tales. After reading the Prologue, she has the students take an online quiz that shows each student which character best matches his/her personality. The quiz gives them a visual for what his/her character would look like, what their societal position would look like, etc.
I liked a number of the activities suggested in this chapter. I think that some of them would definitely need to be modified in order to be used in a high school classroom, but overall there are some good ideas here. I especially liked the ideas Wilhelm gave for being able to visualize the reading..ways for getting students to really see what they are reading rather than just seeing words on a page. It's so important that students be able to do this in order to hold their interest and for reading to become more to them than simply a school assignment. I think that so much more would be accomplished through reading if strategies like "think aloud" and "guided imagery" were implemented.
Lorien, I agree that the vocabulary tableaux is a good idea. I think it would be great to use in the placement where I am now. Vocabulary is covered everyday, but I think more should be done with it to help the students really learn the words and understand what they mean.
I too liked the number of ideas in this chapter. I think that it's important that kids are exposed to different types of literature. Like Brent said with watching movies with the sound off and closed captioning on, this would create intense focus on what was being read and easily connect images with literature. I think that the picture book idea would be great. Starting from that level and as a class moving on to more challenging texts is a great way to make sure that all levels of comprehension were tailored to.
Josh, I dig your idea about having students play the roles in movies. I dig it a lot. Wilhelm said that he even used picture books with high school students and they liked it. I'd be curious to see someone in our cohort try that out in placement. I would but I have middle schoolers now. I know I would think it was silly, but then again I didn't have trouble reading in high school. I'd also like to see the sandbox tried out. I trust that it would work, but I just have to see things to believe it.
I have to admit, I thought the same thing as Wes when I first read about the sandbox project. I thought to myself "wow...you really just built a sandbox!?" However, I do see the reasoning behind it, and it is definitely different and would most likely keep any student interested. I also liked that Wilhelm mentions that we should "expand" our ideas on what we consider classroom texts. I like the idea of incorporating magazines, and even electronic media in the classroom.
Rose, I also really liked how he broke down the scaffolding technique. I think this is probably one of the most in depth pieces I’ve read in regards to scaffolding in the classroom. The suggested activities section that he gives us on visualization is also very helpful. I can tell that many of my students are visual learners, so this is something I really want to try in my current placement.
Through out this chapter I found myself acting like a kid saying "Oh that's cool" or "Oo I want to do that." I feel that Wilhelm as usual provides us with many opportunities to help engage our students and really capture their interests.
Nick and others, I love the sandbox idea, especially a zen garden. I constantly write with my finger on my palm when I'm trying to remember how to spell something.
Josh- I would like to try your suggestion of getting students to read the parts from the movie. Maybe this is something we should try as a class next time we are watching a movie as high school students.
One of my favorite reading strategies was creating the picture map after reading a complete novel or short story. While also creating an overall meaning and plot.I think this is a creative reading strategy in deepening the meaning of the text. The picture map only uses a few words and sketches to encapsulate the story and have a visual sketch to remember important elements.
Although a lot of these strategies seem practical and make sense to us, I don't they all would be effective for many students. Like what Allison said about modifying them, because using some of these strategies wouldn't be successful in one class but would be in another. I think Lorien's reasons with vocabulary tableaux is spot on. So many kids get distracted when reviewing vocab, adding a little differentiation in there would make it more engaging.
My favorite activity in the chapter is "vocabulary tableaux." It reminds me of charades, a game I still like to play myself. It seems like it would get students interested and looking forward to vocabulary and also have them thinking at a deeper level about a word. Like the example from page 53, what does the word oppression really mean, not just what does the dictionary definition say? This activity gets students moving (which they really love to do anyway, so this is one way for them to walk around and talk to peers without getting into trouble) and it has them laughing and being serious at the same time. Would there be any potential problems with this activity? What about an age range? I would like to try this with my 6th grade class when they have vocabulary, but I feel that it would also work with high school students.
ReplyDeleteI have always liked the idea of using visual images to get information across to students. I am curious how the lunch club videos would work. I know most students love to watch movies, but I do not think they would read the captions, or not all the students would read the captions. In my middle school placement, I saw how using visuals can help students remember their vocabulary words and meanings. Wilhelm, in chapter 3, is talking about using power point with images and flash cards with an image on one side and the word on the other and how the student can associate the word with picture. I created a vocabulary exercise with an image that represented a vocabulary word and then gave them the word, after they looked at the word they had to match up the definition. Then the next time I did a traditional read the word and definition introduction to the word. Before I left my placement, I did a cumulative review to see which words they remembered and the ones they struggled to remember. The words we used visuals with were much more ingrained into the students’ memories than the ones we just read. The students could remember the picture and were able to recall definition.
ReplyDeleteI LOOOOVED this chapter. I especially loved how much Wilhelm included. His beginning example was helpful because that is real life. I think my class would have more than a few Marko's, but I know they respond better one-on-one. I think Dr. Alby has done a great job with her own frontloading skills where she uses guided imagery and we drew pictures for vocabulary because those were in the book and I liked knowing that these were strategies that are applicable and easy to use. I am a huge fan of frontloading with images because as I was reading the 7-step sequence, I realized how much it takes to visualize and imagine during reading. You have to help them experience things they have not seen or heard or felt. Just today, I was reading a prompt for an expository essay from the state website asking kids to choose some classes they would like to see added into the curriculum and tell why. This seems easy at first, but talking to the kids showed me that they really had no idea what othef classes existed outside of their middle school in Milledgeville. Are they supposed to make them up? Unless they are watching a ton of tv about school classes or reading books, then I think it might be kind of difficult. So, I like the 7-step sequence a lot. It's probably my favorite part. I do like that Wilhelm gives us speaking prompts and activities as well. I used the picture-note taking in SPED class last night. Not gonna lie- I love it. It helps me remember and I learn to visualize the problems that I cannot directly relate to. Hope I can do all of these with my students sometime. (The sandbox was cool too)
ReplyDeleteI really liked the idea of watching a movie or tape with the sound off and just the captions on. What I found in my first placement was that a lot of students didn't really read on their own but watched a lot of movies. I think the whole visualization issue probably contributes to that. If we can get students to realize and understand that reading can in fact produce the same type of images in our heads that we see in movies, then reading becomes fun for them again. I also liked the part about teaching them to read through their interests. Like Marko, I was a sports nut when I was a kid and would read the sports page every morning before school. If teachers can prove that the same type of images students make when they read something they love can transfer over to everything that they read, I think we could be more successful in producing life long readers.
ReplyDeletePicture Flash Cards would have really helped me as a student. I was visual. I had to both see it and write it down to understand it. I learned words from dictionary.com and I remember the antonym and synonym being especially helpful. I'm actually gaga about the idea of writing in sand or forming letters with a string. I don't know if it's because I could have a sandbox inside or because it seemed to help students.
ReplyDeleteI like the way he breaks down the scaffolding structure as opposed to the I/We/You (pg.46). He adds steps, but I think for a difficult topic or struggling class the extended scaffolding would be much more useful.
ReplyDeleteI tried the vocabulary tableaux in my last placement (an idea I got from an old acting warm-up). Most of the students loved it. What I really loved about it was it required everyone in the group to participate.
I like the visual think - aloud technique. I think it would be nice to give students an option of either pictures or writing for this, to appeal to multiple intelligences.
I thought this chapter was interesting because I had not previously realized how many visualization strategies my host teacher is using regularly in her classroom. At the moment our lesson is focusing on imagery and Ms. Newby has used many strategies similar to those presented in the book. The week before my first day at JC she did an awesome exercise called sensory experiment. Students moved around the classroom to different stations where they were asked to describe objects based on touch, taste, smell, sound, and sight. Students have spent a lot of time discussing what they see when they read poetry. They love comparing their pictures with the pictures of other students. Ms. Newby has implemented visualization by asking her students to draw their vocabulary words. One of my favorite activities was the visual think-aloud. It reminded me of the visual notetaking that we did in World Literature. I have learned that I am a much more visual learner than I originally thought. I feel that these activities could appeal to a vast majority of students.
ReplyDeleteFor a kid who hates to read, Marco sure is the evocative poet: "Just a bunch of squiggles, like rabbit poop in the snow." Yes, please.
ReplyDeleteI think the most important point to take away from this section has little do with the actual visualization techniques. That's icing on the cake. The part I enjoyed the most was when Wilhelm drives home the point that struggling kids, even the ones who say they hate reading, are not necessarily resolving themselves to failure. If anything, it is frustration that they don't get it and that there's no one out there who will help them. I like that he pointed out that simply making it known that he wasn't going to give up prompted some sort of improvement.
Holy crap, I seriously want sandboxes in my room now. Side note: right now, in the Dollar Tree, you can get "Zen Gardens", so everyone has their own little personal sandbox. Kind of cool. At first glance, I thought that the sandbox idea sounded ridiculous until I realized how I myself do a variety of "air-writing" or actual writing techniques when I am unfamiliar with a word.
Erin,
ReplyDeleteThe sensory experiment sounds like a really great way to combine visualizing (as well as feeling, smelling, and hearing) and words. I think that would make for a great writing exercise that I would like to try. It is really hard for me to explain things like that sometimes, so I think it would be good for teachers to participate in as well. Maybe the kids could bring in their own object or something and write about it and have other students guess what they are talking about...who knows. I just really like that idea to get them interested and writing.
I also loved the vocabulary tableaux. The students in my first placement have been asking about doing something more active with their vocabulary words to review. One of them actually mentioned tableaux and I thought this activity would be wonderful! I can't wait to try it!
ReplyDeleteNot only would it be engaging and fun but it would also get out some of the extra energy they have pent up in the afternoons. The students with kinesthetic intelligences would appreciate the activity and I think it would help everyone remember the words for their quizzes.
Brent, I thought the idea for reading the subtitles was wonderful too. Combining it with think-alouds where the teacher describes the images that appear in his/her head when s/he reads to the class would be a great way to discuss literature with the whole class and connect that to writing descriptively. Since meaning is made between the author/text and the reader/imagination. This would work especially well with books that were made into movies--what the teacher and the students imagine could be compared to what the movie director created and then compared again to any descriptions in the text. All this could be discussed along with writing strategies that authors use to describe scenes, items, people. I just love the idea that connections for struggling readers and between reading and writing workshops can be accomplished in two types of activities you could continue periodically for a whole unit or a whole year!
ReplyDeleteI believe we have heard of Marko before, and, if that is true, why didn't Wilhelm just tell us this stuff in the other book? I think building a desktop sandbox is a bit extreme. Whats the difference between that and a pencil and paper? Wilhelm says it helps kinesthetic learning, but I don't know. Maybe since I don't suffer from a LD I can't see the benefit of this.
ReplyDeleteI did like the steps that had the students moving from describing an object that is present to creating mental images of things that are absent. The students at Jones County hate learning vocabulary and I think it would really help them if they would try to make scenes that apply the word in ways that are relevant to their own lives.
Brittany,
ReplyDeleteI also loved all the attention Wilhelm paid to visualization! I guess since I love reading, I never would have thought that some people have problems doing what I don't even think about, and honestly I wish I had learned about different visualization strategies while I was in Undergrad because I feel like it would have proved to be useful while I read difficult texts that I had trouble deciphering. I had trouble relating to some of those dense academic texts, and I suppose the way I feel while reading those is the way some students feel while reading fiction, or anything else.
I peronsally loved the activity using the "string" and sandbox to trace words with and spell words out with. I feel like this could be used in a lot of different ways. When I was little, I used a string to lay across the lines of books while i read and I would move it down as I read. It helped me focus and visualize a lot of the time. Wilhelm here though thinks that when students have a hard time learning and remembering words, that this helps, even into the student's older years.
ReplyDeletePersonally I think it's a fantastic idea. I have a student right now in my placement who came into her 9th grade year at the school, not knowing how to read or write. So exercises like this would be super beneficial.
Wes:
ReplyDeleteIt's different. It's the same concept, but remember, we're sparking these kids' interest. Writing on a sheet of paper with a pencil < writing on a mini-whiteboard < writing on a chalkboard < writing on an iPad < writing in a flippin' SANDBOX! Cool stuff everywhere.
I think the most helpful thing we've read from Wilhelm continues to be the tableaux strategies. I think that applies with vocab here too. When I first read about tableaux, the only thing I could think was "This is ridiculously idealistic stuff and the kids are, like me, going to think it's stupid." After doing it four or five times in my last placement, I found that the kids really dug it and I myself enjoyed it, too, and sort of wished my teachers had done it way back when.
Even though my students only get one word per week in my placement's vocab exercises, I think splitting them up into a few groups and just seeing what sort of creative stuff they can come up with would be beneficial. And they would enjoy it. Given the way that my school is run, I think kids would flip their lid just being allowed out of their seat without being under the threat of silent lunch. When you're planning out something like a tableau, you really have to think about what you're doing (often to the point where they sort of spend too much time thinking). But in a class where every single day, 20% of the classtime is wasted doing the SAME daily vocab/grammar warmup, I think this would be exponentially better.
Marina, I agree with you. I thought the tableaux vocabulary game was excellent as well. As far as making it for high school ages however, I think that almost any idea of Wilhelms can be modified for an appropriate age level. Even the sandbox thing could be used at a high school level (with Nick's idea of the little Zen gardens).
ReplyDeleteI think it is just all about how the teacher applies it. If the teacher doesn't modify the activity then of course it won't work. So I think it really is all up to how the teacher utilizes the activity.
Brittany,
ReplyDeleteYou're right, they respond so much more with individual attention. Last Thursday we split on of the "problem" class into small groups and they were completely different kids! One of the kids my host teacher put in my group made me very nervous. I had already seen him pick a fight with someone, and I've never seen him in a good mood. In the small group he was amazing, he even added pertinent comments to the conversation! I only had to remind him to stay on task a few times.
Also, we gave this same writing prompt to the 11th graders at Putnam High in my last placement. Everyone in the English department split up the essays and sorted them into two piles; needs remediation, doesn't need remediation. But what shocked me is I remember having the EXACT same prompt, worded in the exact same way on my 11th grade writing test. I also remember having way too many ideas to form a decent timed essay. Did anyone else have this prompt?
Brent, I also liked the idea of watching the movies with the sound down. I think the key to this strategy is that the kids understand that if they get to watch some of their movies than they have to watch some of the teacher’s movies. I thought as I was reading about this, how would I know if the students are paying attention to the sub titles? I was thinking that the students could read the sub titles aloud and each student can take the role of a character in the movie or film, then I thought about how I have trouble keeping up with sub titles, so I am sure some students would not be able to keep up. It is still a very good idea. Seeing the words in action makes it easier to comprehend.
ReplyDeleteDanielle,
ReplyDeleteI also loved the sandbox and string ideas. I had some personal experience with a similar activity in my first placement. One of my LD students simply could not follow along in the book we were reading. I gave him a notecard and called it the magic place finder. I told him if he moved it as he read, he would never lose his place. Obviously, this is a little ridiculous and a senior would laugh in your face if you told him anything was "magic." However the principle is the same. We all crave attention and if a student believes he has been given special attention or something that other students didn't receive he is more likely to honor and respect whatever the focus of the special attention was. Sidenote: this specific LD learner also loved super brain yoga. He got antsy in the middle of a test, so I shared it with him. He passed his test. :)
I witnessed first-hand the comments made by Marko while I was in placement this week. Ms. Knighton has assigned her 1st period Brit Lit class to read Frankenstein. Although this class is tracked as "Advanced College Placement" (or Pre-AP), they are still showing obvious signs of "Senioritis." There are also a good many athletes in the class. I could hear most of the guys saying "I hate reading" while they were supposed to be reading the four letters at the beginning of the novel. I replied to one of them, "I bet you don't hate reading, just reading books that Ms. Knighton assigns you." I'm thankful that this chapter addresses once again the "I hate reading" syndrome. While I'm not sure all of the exercises can be applied to high school seniors, hopefully some of them can be used with them.
ReplyDeleteErin, I also think that Ms. Newby's imagery stations is a great idea! Ms. Knighton discussed with me an activity that she likes to do with Canterbury Tales. After reading the Prologue, she has the students take an online quiz that shows each student which character best matches his/her personality. The quiz gives them a visual for what his/her character would look like, what their societal position would look like, etc.
ReplyDeleteI liked a number of the activities suggested in this chapter. I think that some of them would definitely need to be modified in order to be used in a high school classroom, but overall there are some good ideas here. I especially liked the ideas Wilhelm gave for being able to visualize the reading..ways for getting students to really see what they are reading rather than just seeing words on a page. It's so important that students be able to do this in order to hold their interest and for reading to become more to them than simply a school assignment. I think that so much more would be accomplished through reading if strategies like "think aloud" and "guided imagery" were implemented.
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ReplyDeleteLorien, I agree that the vocabulary tableaux is a good idea. I think it would be great to use in the placement where I am now. Vocabulary is covered everyday, but I think more should be done with it to help the students really learn the words and understand what they mean.
ReplyDeleteI too liked the number of ideas in this chapter. I think that it's important that kids are exposed to different types of literature. Like Brent said with watching movies with the sound off and closed captioning on, this would create intense focus on what was being read and easily connect images with literature. I think that the picture book idea would be great. Starting from that level and as a class moving on to more challenging texts is a great way to make sure that all levels of comprehension were tailored to.
ReplyDeleteJosh, I dig your idea about having students play the roles in movies. I dig it a lot. Wilhelm said that he even used picture books with high school students and they liked it. I'd be curious to see someone in our cohort try that out in placement. I would but I have middle schoolers now. I know I would think it was silly, but then again I didn't have trouble reading in high school. I'd also like to see the sandbox tried out. I trust that it would work, but I just have to see things to believe it.
ReplyDeleteI have to admit, I thought the same thing as Wes when I first read about the sandbox project. I thought to myself "wow...you really just built a sandbox!?" However, I do see the reasoning behind it, and it is definitely different and would most likely keep any student interested.
ReplyDeleteI also liked that Wilhelm mentions that we should "expand" our ideas on what we consider classroom texts. I like the idea of incorporating magazines, and even electronic media in the classroom.
Rose, I also really liked how he broke down the scaffolding technique. I think this is probably one of the most in depth pieces I’ve read in regards to scaffolding in the classroom. The suggested activities section that he gives us on visualization is also very helpful. I can tell that many of my students are visual learners, so this is something I really want to try in my current placement.
ReplyDeleteThrough out this chapter I found myself acting like a kid saying "Oh that's cool" or "Oo I want to do that." I feel that Wilhelm as usual provides us with many opportunities to help engage our students and really capture their interests.
ReplyDeleteNick and others, I love the sandbox idea, especially a zen garden. I constantly write with my finger on my palm when I'm trying to remember how to spell something.
Josh- I would like to try your suggestion of getting students to read the parts from the movie. Maybe this is something we should try as a class next time we are watching a movie as high school students.
One of my favorite reading strategies was creating the picture map after reading a complete novel or short story. While also creating an overall meaning and plot.I think this is a creative reading strategy in deepening the meaning of the text. The picture map only uses a few words and sketches to encapsulate the story and have a visual sketch to remember important elements.
ReplyDeleteAlthough a lot of these strategies seem practical and make sense to us, I don't they all would be effective for many students. Like what Allison said about modifying them, because using some of these strategies wouldn't be successful in one class but would be in another. I think Lorien's reasons with vocabulary tableaux is spot on. So many kids get distracted when reviewing vocab, adding a little differentiation in there would make it more engaging.
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