Day 4 (AM)
Foundational Literacy: Make it Flow & Bringing Words to Life
Foundational Literacy: the ability to read words and bring meaning to text.
Session Focus Questions: What are the essential skills students need to learn to be able to read? How can teachers better understand and support the cortical, cognitive and linguistic journey our children are on to become literate?
SESSION OBJECTIVES
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understand that fluency is not just speed, it is also accuracy and expressions
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know that fluency is the bridge from word-level reading to comprehension
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learn direct, explicit, and multisensory strategies to develop fluency & vocabulary
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understand that it is important to teach vocabulary both in and out of contex
Mindful Moonshot Morning Routine
The morning began with the Moonshot Mindful Routine. In an Activity to Unite participants gathered in groups and posed for family portraits in their table families.
Strategies for Effective Vocabulary Instruction
Actor's Toolkit and Vocabulary Gestures. Fran McDonough reviewed the "Actor's Toolkit," a way to help students use their body, voice, mind and imagination to learn vocabulary.
Meet K.I.M. Leslie introduced a strategy called K.I.M. to use with students.
K=Key Vocabulary Word
I=Important Information/Definition
M=Memory Clue (visual representation)
Participants learned the K.I.M. strategy to help internalize vocabulary. They had the chance to practice the strategy in their table groups.
A Moonshot Talk with Liz Remington: Bringing Words to Life
Liz Remington presented on what the research says about teaching vocabulary.
"The more you know about a word the faster you can decode it and give it meaning."
Oh Make it Flow: What is Fluency?
Liz Remington presented on the importance of fluency and how to teach it. Fluency is in the service of comprehension, but often, ineffectively, it is treated like a speed drill.
Visual Vocabulary
Debbi Arseneaux introduced Visual Vocabulary as an interactive, multi-sensory way to demonstrate vocabulary comprehension.
Participants were given a phrase from Malala's Magic Pencil and then created a picture using colored paper (ripped, not cut) to represent the text.
Story Nuggets
Story Nuggets is a great way to develop fluency and preview text. Using small "nuggets" of the story, participants performed the text in small groups.
I can't wait to use this in my classroom! My kids will love this and want to put it on their YouTube Channel. - Participant Feedback
Nutty Professor
Participants practiced a strategy adapted from Whole Brain Teaching, called the Nutty Professor. In pairs, they took turns reading a page from the book multiple times, with new instructions for each repeated reading.
Day 4 (PM)
Applied Literacy:From the Word to the World
Applied Literacy: the ability to apply skills and knowledge gained to authentic, real-world contexts
Session Focus Question: What does it take to grow and show comprehension of text in meaningful and relevant ways?
SESSION OBJECTIVES
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Know what deep comprehension looks like - comprehension is both individual and social
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Be able to demonstrate knowledge of comprehension in various formats
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To increase comprehension, reading and writing activities should be purposeful (there should be a reason for why they are reading/writing).
Mosaic of Thought: Strategies for Comprehension
Kurt Wootton, co-author of A Reason to Read: Linking Literacy and the Arts, dives deeply into key ideas around comprehension. A transactional view of reading says that the book needs a reader to give it meaning. Readers bring their own experiences to the text.
Comprehension:
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is transactional.
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is social
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is applied
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needs rich and challenging texts
Expert Roundtable
SWBST
Educators re-read Malala's Magic Pencil, individually then in pairs. In their table groups, they then used the strategy SWBST - "Somebody wanted . . . But . . . So . . . Then . . ." to summarize a story. Each person started with the next prompt, retelling the story around the circle.
Keyword Outline
Liz Woody-Remington shared a strategy to glean meaning from text by turning comprehension into a game. First, choose 3 key words from each sentence that convey the key details. Then, see if you can recreate the main idea of the sentence using only those words as the prompt. From here, write your own version of each sentence and make it even better.
Headlines
The Headline strategy gets to the main idea of a story in a fun and interactive way. Participants were asked to summarize the story and write a news headline to share with the group.
Transfer Time
Every day in the morning and the afternoon, participants break into job alike groups and plan how they will transfer their new learning and strategies to their practice.
Pictures from Day 4
