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.