Members of the MiddleWeb Discussion List and other interested
teachers are joining together to explore the Writing Workshop
and other ideas about supporting young adolescent writers and
readers. Juli Kendall, a reading-writing teacher/coach in Long
Beach, California, is helping moderate the discussion. Juli also
posts a weekly journal entry from her reading/writing classroom.
This year, Juli will focus on her efforts to integrate subject
matter into her reading and writing workshop approach. In her
first journal of the year, she explains
the rationale behind this move and some of her thinking about
how she hopes to accomplish this goal.
Find out more about our project at our Reading/Writing
Workshop homepage. You'll find Juli's background article here. Links to many of the tools created
by Juli and her colleagues are embedded in these journals. Most
often, when you click on them, a PDF file will begin to download.
You'll find a list of the downloads here.
If you'd like to join the daily discussion that parallels Juli's
Journals, find out how here.
"Show me, help me, let me."
Jeffrey Wilhelm in Action Strategies for Deepening Comprehension
It all started out so simply. I'd teach the reading comprehension
strategy of questioning to kids using informational text in science.
Then they'd develop their own questions as a result of their reading
and learning.
Well, so much for simple.
We've ended up out on the Internet taking eFieldtrips -- virtual
adventures -- and emailing our questions to the experts. Wow!
As we anxiously await our email replies, I have time to go back
and reconstruct what happened. It starts with my late night search
for Internet resources to use with questioning for informational
text in science.
Looking for a way to teach kids how to do questioning in an authentic
context, one with real life applications, I discover an eFieldtrip
website. One of the eFieldtrips, "The Wilderness and
You," is currently live. That means we can go on the virtual
visit to the wilderness and then email our questions to the Sierra
Nevada Wilderness Project, and they will respond by email. We
can also participate in a live webcast about wilderness.
Yes! This is exactly what I'm looking for -- a real purpose for
my kids to ask questions and a real reason for them to read informational
text.
In her book, Reading with Meaning, Debbie Miller lists
some ways readers use questioning to enhance comprehension. Although
this book was written for the primary grades, this explanation
of questioning helps me understand how I want to go about teaching
it.
Readers purposefully and spontaneously ask questions before, during and after reading.
Readers ask questions for many reasons.
Readers determine whether the answers to their questions can be found in the text or whether they will need to infer the answer from the text, their background knowledge, and/or an outside source.
Readers understand that many of the most intriguing questions are not answered explicitly in the text, but are left to the reader's interpretation.
Readers understand that hearing others' questions inspires new ones of their own; likewise, listening to others' answers can also inspire new thinking.
Readers understand that the process of questioning is used in other areas of their lives, both personal and academic.
Living in the middle of an urban, downtown setting, the concept
of "wilderness" is a new adventure for us. When I preview
the material, no one has any background information or prior knowledge
about what wilderness is. I guess teachers are waiting for the
kids to go to a week at our district outdoor camp before they
introduce this concept. There's no way my kids can come up with
questions to email about something for which they know little
or nothing.
In order to do the eFieldtrip, I need to teach kids how to navigate
on the Internet. Some have learned this at home, but many haven't
been exposed. Due to a change in focus, our school no longer has
a computer lab or a computer specialist, although there are more
than 16 computers networked with Internet access in my classroom.
I look for a way to develop expertise in the kids so that they
can "teach" each other, as well as, act as a resource
by answering questions about technology and solving problems.
I'm guided by Jeffrey Wilhelm's words from Action Strategies
for Deepening Comprehension: "Show me. Help me. Let me."
For this part of the lesson, I act as the "trainer."
I choose one student, a quiet girl, Michelle, to be my "trainee."
(I specifically choose a girl because somehow the boys always
seem to take control of the technology. There's clearly a technology
gap between boys and girls.) I take her through the whole eFieldtrip
so I can teach her what she needs to know and answer any questions
she has. Once she has learned how to do the eFieldtrip, she will
train another girl, Amy. Then each of them will train someone
else. And on and on, until every student has trained at least
one other student, and all the students have been trained (25total).
Whoa!
To scaffold this part of the process, I use a variety of resources.
"Wilderness and You,
Discover the Connection" Training Guide -- I developed
this checklist to guide the trainers as they go through the eFieldtrip.
It's almost self-explanatory and works well as I train Michelle.
It includes everything they need to do from logging onto the Internet
to filling out the evaluation.
Electronic
Fieldtrip Journal -- As a part of the eFieldtrip, "Wilderness
and You," there's a trip journal to complete. It can be downloaded
from the eFieldtrip website. This holds the kids accountable for
the reading they do on the eFieldtrip. It's fascinating to watch
them hope back and forth from screen to screen looking for the
information.
eFieldtrip Training Evaluation
-- When Michelle is finished with the training, she fills out
the evaluation. I created this form for the kids to use. This
is a way for me, as well as the other trainers, to get feedback
about the process and to see what our trainees like and what suggestions
they have Everyone answers, "Yes," to the question about
going on another eFieldtrip.
Now it's Michelle's turn to train Amy. They pull their chairs
up to the computer, log on to the Internet, and off they go. What
is most noticeable to me is the complete change in character in
Michelle as she becomes the trainer. As a trainee, she was quiet
and receptive. But as a trainer, she's in charge. She proficiently
navigates Amy through the eFieldtrip. It's a big lesson to me
in building independence. If I want the kids to be life-long learners,
this is something I need to foster.
So what about our questions? After taking the eFieldtrip, "Wilderness
and You, Discover the Connection," here are a few of the
questions the kids come up with to email to the experts at the
Sierra Nevada Wilderness Project:
Why is wilderness important?
In the wilderness, are there coyotes?
Why are there no fences in the wilderness?
What do you do when the place of forest is on fire?
If the trees burn, can they grow back?
Could we camp there?
Why does the wilderness have hikers?
I think Jeffrey Wilhelm is on to something here. This "Show
me, help me, let me" stuff really works!
SEE Juli's Curriculum Map for Content Literacy - Unit Two
Read next week's journal
Read last week's journal
Read Juli's backgrounder about her work
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