Running Record and Lesson Plan

Below is a link to the running record that I conducted on Nechama, a fourth grade bilingual student.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qy1016mav8jjlyk/RunningRecord-%20Nechama.PDF?dl=0

This fourth grade student, Nechama has good phonetic decoding skills. One thing that she relies on besides is visual cues to determine how to read a word that cannot be decoded. She recognizes words that are familiar, and automatically pulls them up from her brain while reading. This visual cueing can be a great strength for her to get to know many words, however right now she is not so well-practiced in such "sight words" so this skill is to her detriment, and was the basis for almost all of her errors in the running record we did together.

Mini Lesson:

Aim: to understand what a sight word is

          to familiarize student with high frequency sight words to the point of automaticity

Method: First, I would show the student a few high frequency words which can not be decoded through phonetic breakdown, such as "little", "own", "their". We would go through how the words would sound if we read them according to the phonics rules and how the words should really sound.

I would hand the student a paper which I call the "Cheetah Sheet". It is set up with three columns; one has an image of a turtle on top, the next a horse, and the next a cheetah. In the turtle column, I would have a list of such sight words which she would come in contact with. I would explain to her that we are going to practice the sight words on the sheet until she knows them so well that she can read them so quickly and automatically upon seeing them. Now the words are all turtles, because it takes longer to read them, but after practice, they will become faster like horses and even faster, like cheetahs!

I would have her read through the words in the column. Words that she already is fluent in, we would move over to the correct columns, and add new words in their place.

I would put this sheet in place as a drill in the beginning of every session, and keep adding new words to the "turtle" list as words are moved.

I would ask the student to explain to me what a sight word is.

I would end this lesson with a short reading so the student has done something that she is comfortable and familiar with. 

Running Record

The child in the video has strengths in his understanding and comprehension which can help him get through any reading difficulty should he have one. His comprehension of what he read was on a high level, and he was even able to summarize the information after, showing that he recognized what was important and was able to explain it in a condensed form. He has background knowledge and used the context to figure out words that were hard to decipher. He also had a good sense of what sounded right, and what made sense. He actually listened and processed what he was reading as he was reading. When he made a mistake, you were able to hear in his voice that he knew it wasn't the right word due to the surrounding words. He also used visual cues to recognize words and say them without even reading, which caused him to make the mistake of saying "must" for "most" or "thought" for "though".

I am curious what age level this student is. He has many skills which will be helpful for his learning in general, and his reading in particular.

Attached is the marked copy of the running record. According to my calculation, the student read 93 correct words, got 7 errors, and self corrected 5 times.

Ms. Perez classroom review

1. The shared reading activity of reading the poem, Hot Dogs Forever, Ms. Perez addresses a  number of essential components of literacy development. This lesson uses a poem and can therefore help fluency. The lesson certainly addresses word identification and phonics, because students encounter words which they can break down as well as words which they will have to figure out based on context or sound. Ms. Perez also creates an entire lesson for phonological awareness based on this shared reading activity, introducing the "rhyme" ot and demonstrating its sound and usage in other words. Shared reading is a venue to have all students read out loud and to help each other in getting through the text. Teachers can use such activities to promote literacy by addressing some of the skills and components that Ms. Perez did, as well as vocabulary, comprehension, and composition.

This activity includes and engages students of various literacy development levels by having them all read together and then addressing questions to specific students. Because the teacher is aware of the level of each student, she can address a question which focuses on a specific component of literacy to a child who needs improvement in this area. Additionally, all students were engaged the whole time, so they all paid attention to all discussion, giving them overall insight into all the factors that were brought out.

Ms. Perez encourages the students' effort which promotes their altogether motivation. Her usage of phrases such as "good trying" or "good for you" make the children feel good about their effort as opposed to only correct results. She also walks students through the steps of figuring out the answer and prompts them along if they require assistance.

2. Ms. Perez recognizes that by having the students explain the strategies they use to figure out the words. She explains that this way the students internalize it and use it more. 

Whenever students are required to verbalize a skill, they need to recognize clearly what the skill is and how they do it. They also have the verbalization in their head for the next time they encounter a situation where they need to use that specific skill and can pull it up.

In our classroom, we named the skill of masking, "word within a word". Students had this term in their brains and when asked how they would figure out a specific word, they would think and come up with the answer; "Word within a word"!

I like the window the students had to focus on different parts of the word and then stretch the window to see more of the word.

3. Ms. Perez's classroom is well organized to support a wide range of literacy learners.She sets up the class in groups according to levels and skills. Each group works on something different according to their needs. This enables each student to receive the instruction and attention they need to advance in literacy. This also enables Ms. Perez to overlook each group and assess further. Ms. Perez also institutes writing activities based on reading done in class. This gives the students a basis from which to form their writings and also requires them to reference the books they have read, and reread several times, becoming more fluent. 

4. Ms. Perez created a simple chart where she keeps track of the level of reading that the students are up to. This chart gives her a broad overview of what level of literacy the students have mastered, and shows the entire class together. The teacher can create groups based on this chart. She also continually updates her assessments and assumingly makes changes accordingly.

Assessment is the key to keeping students advancing and the more frequently done, the better the teacher can personalize the lessons according to the students' needs. In my classroom, we also had group time. I would implement a weekly system that while the students are busy with their group activities, the teachers circulate from group to group and do an individual assessment on each student. This way, every student's progress would be evaluated once a week and can be carefully tracked and used to determine instruction.

Sheila Owen

Ms. Owen's students are viewed as "readers and writers from day one". She is a teacher who believes in the potential of every student to become successful in these areas and makes her students believe in themselves too. Before any other skill, I believe that this outlook of a teacher is a key to effectively teaching students, no matter what the course material. When a teacher believes that every child can learn, she will find the ways to connect to and reach this student in order to get the results she knows she can achieve.

Ms. Owen is an extremely devoted teacher who instills in her students the love and interest in reading and gives over to them the skills to read and write and to be able to use as a basis for further learning. In teaching reading, this teacher uses a daily routine of 4 types of reading activities. The teacher reads aloud, where she can generate the students interest in the text and discuss the relevant topics with them. This pre-reading discussion not only generates excitement for reading, but also gives the children an idea of the concepts in the book as well as a chance to connect prior knowledge to the new text. She then pulls back her instruction and lets the students fill in more and more, scaffolding as necessary through the steps of shared reading, guided reading and finally independent reading. These steps give the students the skills as well as the confidence necessary to be able to accomplish the independent reading even from day one. Specific reading skills which I noticed and appreciated included having students point at each word so that they connect what they see to what they are saying, and figuring out a word in a sentence according to context and first letter of the word. Another skill that the teacher encouraged students to use was to look at the picture and back at the word. Ms. Owen gives them this set of skills so that they can choose from their set of strategies and read on their own.

Ms. Owen also accommodates the ELLs in her classroom. The students who are learning English are encouraged to express themselves in their first language, so as not to lose that one and to strengthen comprehension in both languages simultaneously. The bilingual assistant in the classroom also helps to accomplish this by making sure the students understand the concepts at hand.

One point which impacted me was how she started the students with independent reading from day one without waiting for them to master reading before starting them with actual books. This method minimizes frustration because the students know that they are still in middle of learning, and will get better and better with time as opposed to feeling as though they completed learning to read but then still have trouble getting through the text. 

Sample Lesson Critique

Sample Lesson Critique

The sample lesson in poetry is interactive and informative for the students. This lesson gave the students the important concept of using words from an existing text and “scrambling” them to create a new composition. This is a great learning experience for creating poems-or any written work- with a base of words and phrases. This teaches the students to utilize their existing vocabulary and knowledge, and pull up what they already have and transfer it to a new work.

I approved of the lesson planner’s book choice because it was a simple and stimulating book so the students focus was not distracted from the task at hand.

The lesson was well planned and the materials helped clarify the students’ requirements. The teacher scaffolded by starting with reading aloud and then with modeling. She then progressed in to pairing the class with partners to work on the assignment. Also, having the children share their works with the class is always helpful for everyone else to hear their ideas.

By putting a definition to the term “found poetry”, the students clearly understand the term and the task.

The activity where the children formed a circle involves the students in a fun and interactive way without taking away from the focus of the activity at all. I like how the students can be rearranged, thus rearranging the poem. By continuing to use the poem that the class created, the class as a whole feels that they made something special and that the poetry they learned about is actually useful.

The lesson itself was quite well done, but one overall critique- I think that the concepts in the lesson and the required task would be too hard for the grade levels listed. To me, it would seem to be closer to a fourth grade level lesson.

ELA

     English Language Arts is categorized in to 5 key components and each of them must be addressed in ELA instruction. The first is reading, where the teacher's goal is to improve students comprehension of read texts as reading skills improve and higher level texts are read. The second is writing, where the teacher would give over to students the skills necessary to write different types of written compositions, and focus specifically on writing in connection with texts that were read. The third, speaking is the teaching of skills needed for formal presentation as well as informal communication and interpersonal skills.  Speaking goes hand-in-hand with the fourth category, listening; students need to learn to listen carefully to ideas, integrate information from various sources, and then be able to express ideas, and use tools to communicate and put speech in to context. The fifth category is language, which is the focus on the rules of standard written and spoken language, namely vocabulary.

     ELA  instruction must be up to par with the learning standards of that grade level. The learning standards do not give teachers the methods of how to teach, but they do provide teachers with the goals expected of their students in the subject material that is normal for that grade level student. This way, the teacher has the goals set and uses the curriculum accordingly.

Introduction

Hi Professor and fellow classmates,

My name is Nechama Lipschutz. As a teacher, I believe that the most important tool to success is to set goals. I hope that this class will teach me how to use curriculum to bring the students to the academic goals that we hope for them to reach. 

I am interested in learning about "new literacies" and "21st century skills", both of which are new terms to me.

I hope that I will be able to keep up with the technological aspects of this course.

See my voki for a bit more about me! http://tinyurl.com/za2azsy

Looking forward, 

Nechama