Chapter #11: Summarizing and Synthesizing Information- The Evolution of Thought

The biggest things that I took from this chapter regards teaching students to be analytical in what they need to accomplish in their reading and writing about the text.  At my age, I am able to do this to a degree, but I feel that explicit instruction could have made me a better reader and subsequent writer.  I was never taught to examine my text and look for clues about how I should read the text.  While told that there are different texts, it was never made very clear to me how I should arrange my thoughts for properly processing different works. 

I feel that many of these strategies would be very helpful to students.  Harvey & Goodvis said, “When we summarize information during reading, we pull out the most important information and put it in our own words to remember it.  Each bit of information we encounter adds a piece to the construction of meaning.”  As educators, we need to better prime our students to go into an assignment prepared to read in a way that will allow them to pull the most necessary information from the text.  If I work with older students, I would love to spend time presenting these strategies, and giving students the opportunity to put those strategies to use with each kind of text.  I would also like to give them a chance to discern how they should read different texts.  These skills would most certainly serve them throughout their learning careers, giving them the tools to attack a text and get the most out of it.  

As a Kindergarten teacher I can begin to help my students to achieve these skills by reading picture books and modeling how to write a short summary. Students can learn to write their own summaries by jotting down a few words during/after reading and then using those words to construct their own summary. The teacher in the text provided the following tips to help early readers summarize:

1. Remember to tell what is important
2. Tell it in a way that makes sense
3. Try not to tell too much 

Chapter #10: Determining Importance in Text

I made a real personal connection with this text about finding out what is most important within a given reading.  In the book, an anecdote is told about a student that went back and looked back into her book and discovered that EVERYTHING was highlighted.  I did the exact same thing; looking back at my old textbooks, I highlighted everything as well.  I was never taught how to pick out what is most important in a text.  

Here are some guidelines to keep in mind when highlighting or teaching students how to highlight:

• Most important information is usually contained in the first and last lines of a paragraph.
• Focus on words and phrases rather than entire sentences.
• Utilize margins and sticky notes for paraphrasing notes
• Interesting details should be avoided- go for the meat of the article rather than the flash.
• Pay attention to signal words, Ex. "See page 15..."
• Non-fiction features like bold words and infographics, labels, graphs, etc, should all be focused on.
• Surprising information can tip you off that you are learning something new.
• You should be highlighting less that 50% of the paragraph as you begin to hone your skills.  Aim for a rate around 30% when you really get the hang out it.

As always, i am looking for ways to make a connection with our readings and bringing it to a kindergarten level.  I realized that I can do a better job of pointing out non-fiction text features so that my students are able to recognize what they are signalling.  Students will most likely not understand the significance of these features without being told at this age.  Hopefully, with some guidance, I can "highlight" the importance of these features so that my students are able to most quickly locate pertinent information.  

"When kids read and understand non fiction, they build background for the topic and acquire new knowledge.  The ability to identify essential ideas and salient information is a pre-requisite to developing insight." (page 156)  

I found some great ideas on pinterest that I already plan to incorporate into my lessons this week.  

Discussion #4: Visualizing and Inferring

Discussion #4: Visualizing and Inferring

Goudvis and Harvey stated that visualized and inferring are closely related. They said that, "When we visualize, we are in fact inferring, but with mental images rather than words and thoughts.  Visualizing and inferring don't occur in isolation.  Strategies interweave.  Inferring involves merging background knowledge with text clues to come up with an idea that is not explicitly stated in the text."  This basically means that students read between the lines. 

Recently, I started using the word "visualizing" in my classroom.  I told my kindergarteners that when you visualize, you are making a move in your head.  I began reading the Junie B. Jones series to my students to practice many comprehension strategies.  In the chapter book, there are very few pictures so students have to create their own mental images of the story. 

I am very curious to try the strategy in this text called Visualizing with Wordless Picture Books.  I have many wordless picture books in my collection, but I did not know how to incorporate them into my instruction with kindergarteners.  After students and I looked at the pictures, I would have the students draw, write, and then talk about their visualization.

I would also like to try the strategy called Inferring Feelings.  In this activity, a student has a feeling card on his or her back.  The students read the card, and have to give him/her clues as to what the feeling is without using the word.  For example, "My sister hit me with a golf club.  My dog died. My dad didn't let me go to the movies."  After students have shared their clues, the student with the picture card has to share the feeling and explain how he/she figured it out. 

Discussion #3: Questioning- The Strategy That Propels Readers Forward


Goudvis & Harvey stated, "Questions propel us forward and take us deeper into reading."   You could say that this quote even applied to me after the reading of this section.  When I finished reading this section, I asked myself how I could use this in my classroom.  I then thought about my weekly Friday "animal book" day.  During Animal Friday, I read to students a book about a specific animal and watch a video about that critter on Discovery Education.  For example, last week we learned about beavers, and the previous week we learned about anteaters.  Students are naturally very curious about the world, especially animals. After reading about the questioning strategies in this chapter, I became inspired to change my proposal strategy. 

This week I hope to focus on the lesson "The More We Learn, The More We Wonder."  In this strategy, I will begin by creating a chart titled "I Learned and I Wondered." Before reading the book, I will now ask students to wonder about our new animal.  Students will be expected to use a complete sentence.  For example, "I wonder what camels like to eat" or "Where do penguins live?" 

After we are done reading and watching the video, we will record on the chart what they learned.  Students will write in their animal books about what they learned.  They will be expected to write a sentence or two using invented spelling and sight words.  They should also include a picture with details.  The student samples will then be used as evidence for my proposal. 

I plan to use the other questioning strategies in the coming weeks. These include: Sharing Your Questions About Your Own Reading where the teacher takes a book they are reading at home and writes questions that they have on Post-it notes. The teacher then brings her book to class to show students the importance of creating questions. Other strategies I would like to implement are Using Question Webs to Expand Thinking and Gaining Information Through Questioning. I look forward to adding student work samples to my new weebly account.

Discussion #2: Activating and Connecting to Background Knowledge


"When we begin strategy instruction with children, stories close to their own lives and experiences are helpful for introducing new ways of thinking about reading." (Goudvis and Harvey 92)  In order to help students build background knowledge and to help them make connections, I like to use picture books.  Most of the books that I pick are realistic fiction and memoirs.  Before reading this chapter, I would mention the word "connections," but now I can see how I need to go further than that.  I can see how I can make better use of the connections they are making with the text.

One of the strategies I would like to try in my classroom is having students use the phrase "It reminds me of..."  Students could turn and talk to a buddy/partner about what the story reminds them of.  Then, I could chart their thinking on chart paper.  I believe that having the students actually see me write the information on the paper would be very meaningful to students.  They could actually see if in a much more concrete sense.  Later on in the year, I could divide the chart into two columns, one column for what the story is about and the other for what it reminds them of.  This directly shows their personal connections to the specific part in the story. 

"If we are going to teach our kids to make connections as they read, we must teach them about a type of connection that we have come to call the distracting connection."  (Goudvis and Harvey 95)  This section really reminded me of my kindergarteners and where they are at right now in their connection making skills.  For example, one of my students read a story and got stuck on the name of a character.  Her mom had a friend of the same name, and she was unable to add any details about the story other than the connection that her mother had a friend with the same name.  This seems to be pretty common for kindergarteners.  I would like to model someone having a distracting connection, and then helping them to see how to overcome it.  Because kindergarteners are so young, it is important to get them focus on their comprehension even when distracted. 

I also love the Building Background Knowledge to Teach Specific Content Strategy. p 99
When starting a unit on Africa, the teacher from the text realized that her students had very little background knowledge.  They went to the library, looked at photographs, and asked a lot of questions.  Whenever students asked a question, she wrote it down on a post-it note.  She also kept track of all that they had learned.  After much discussion, she had students write down a fact and draw a picture.  This is definitely a strategy that is appropriate for my kindergarteners. 

Discussion #1

Reading Is Strategic
During my reading, one snapshot stood out to me.  It was about a student named Alverro who was reading a story about giraffes.  While he was reading, he got stuck on reading the word "already" rather than understanding the meaning of the text.  As a kindergarten teacher, I spend a lot of time working on decoding strategies when I really should be putting more focus on comprehension.  The teacher worked with Alverro and came up with a plan where he would STOP and think about what he had just read at the end of every page.  In essence, the end of the page became a red light for him. 
In my classroom, I plan on making a stop light to act as a visual reminder for my students and I to take the time to really think about what we have just read throughout the text.  The text said "reading is thinking," and I couldn't agree more.  Teachers have a responsibility to help students to become active readers while still having strong decoding skills. 

Leaving Tracks of Thinking
In the text, the author spoke of the importance of connecting reading and writing.  I loved this quote from the text: "In the same way as animals leave tracks of their presence, we want readers to 'leave tracks of their thinking.'" This includes having students write responses to their thinking on post-it notes, in the margins, and in a writing notebook.
This year, I have been working diligently to have students track their thinking using reader response notebooks.  Everyday, we do a shared reading and respond to the text.  Students love being able to retell the story using pictures, and letters to represent words. 
I plan to tell my students the above quote to help them visualize what I want to see in their writing. 



Interactive Read Alouds
A focal point for me in the classroom this year is comprehension.  One way that I am achieving this is by doing interactive read-alouds, mostly in the form of short chapter books.  While I am reading, I try to focus on a specific comprehension strategy.  I model my thinking and questioning using high interest texts.  In the past I have used Junie B. Jones, Ready Freddy, and plan on using the Peter Rabbit series.  In the past I merely read the story and modeled my thinking.  This year I am trying to go further and I am naming a specific strategy and exposing them to words that will aid them as the progress in school.  For example, I have been using the word "visualize" with my kindergarteners, telling them that I am making a picture in my head. 
I also plan on jotting down my thinking on the easel as we do a read-aloud in order to model some notes or reminders about what I have read.  I also may have my students respond more to the interactive read-alouds in their reader response notebooks. 

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