- Mapping refers to the use of the visual organization of ideas. It is most appropriate to help process knowledge or to review. The graphical representation can help struggling readers engage a text or concept and better remember it. In English it can be used to better understand relationships or similarities and differences between characters or words. For example, “simile” and “metaphor” are two often confused literary terms. While teaching I would show the students a couple examples of each. The students could then draw Venn diagrams for the two terms and compare their work in small groups, discussing discrepancies.
- Exit slips are a brief writing exercise taking place in the last minutes of a lesson that respond to the content of that lesson. They can function in a variety of ways, but to me they seem most suitable for informal assessment which points out areas of uncertainty in a student's understanding. While taking little time, it provides an opportunity for the students to take control of their own learning.
In my classroom I would probably use it as follows: in the last three minutes I would pass out notes for the students to write on. I would then give them 90 seconds to think of something that they didn't understand or wanted to discuss more concerning the class or the previously assigned reading, and write it down. If at the end of 90 seconds they still had not thought of anything, they could write something that they found particularly interesting about the class. I would look over these notes after school and use them to adjust the next day's lesson by addressing their concerns or interests, if it seemed valuable or necessary.
- The strategy of written conversation involves having the students pass curriculum-themed notes to partners based on a topic of focus given by the teacher. It is appropriate in most situations where group discussion would be considered advantageous, but particularly when the discussion could be related to the students' lives. Depending on the topic, it can strengthen reading comprehension and/or critical reading. It has the advantage of being in a form accessible and possibly engaging to students, that of note passing.
I might use this strategy as a way to solidify the assigned reading through the students reminding each other of details and exploring possibilities. For example, if the assigned reading was from A Passage to India, I might ask the students to talk about what they would do to avoid or correct the misunderstandings that happened during the trip to the Marabar caves.
- An Anticipation Guide requires students to express their opinions about ideas about life by responding to a statement with true or false (or perhaps on a scale) before reading a text. While reading the text the students should make notes about the statements in the guide as they relate to the reading. After reading, the students will reconsider their original responses. All of these steps can be accompanied with discussion. This strategy seems most appropriate for use with a text having clear narrative. It fosters critical reading and comprehension by encouraging students to consider their views in contrast with those of the text.
- Probable
Passage is a strategy for helping readers to predict while reading.
With a list of words, students try to predict the roles that the
words will play in what they read and think about how they could fit
together in a coherent whole. Probable Passages can lead to
discussion after reading the text through comparison of the readers'
predictions and the actual text. This strategy helps struggling
readers develop the ability to predict. It can be utilized before
the reading of any text in which one can form appropriate roles for
the words. It seems that the strategy is beneficial in direct
relation to the challenge that the text presents.
I think this strategy would be especially useful for understanding poems, a medium in which attention to each word should be rewarding. I would select some especially important words from the poem and put them on the page, and the students would work in groups of twos or threes to assign a role to these words. I might use roles such as speaker, speaker's mood, setting, other people, problem, and unknown words. After assigning the words and possibly writing a brief interpretation of the words in their roles, students would read the poem and compare it with their predictions. - Teacher-Student Correspondence
presents the students with the opportunity to communicate with the
teacher about a variety of different things. This correspondence can
take place as often as the teacher can handle it, but the Daniels
book recommends that it happen twice per class. Students write
letters to the teacher responding to the questions that the teacher
asks, probably relevant to the student's interest, progress in or
feelings about the course, misunderstandings, or possibly personal
issues. This can provide the teacher with a very subjective form of
assessment, but can also reach diverse learners and cultures by
giving them a voice to express their interests.
- Questioning
the Author is a strategy in which the students consider the
viewpoint of the author in comparison with other viewpoints. Some of
the questions used for this would be variations on “What is the
author trying to say? How do you feel about this?” These questions
invite students to transcend the limitations of the author's view
and read critically. This strategy can be used during or after
reading a text.
- KWL stands for
“what do you Know, what do you Want to know, and what did you
Learn”. Before reading a text, students make a list about what
they know relative to a given topic. They then make a list based on
the first about what they want to know concerning this topic. After
reading, the students review with a list of what they learned about
this topic, especially in response to their second list. In
pre-reading it is designed to help reading comprehension, and in
post-reading it helps retention and assesses to some extent. By
considering these questions before reading, students have more solid
goals while actually reading, and having connections to their prior
knowledge increases interest and helps them retain information.
Post-reading, the list reviews their knowledge and gives a sense of
accomplishment.
In an English classroom, I think this strategy would be most fruitful a little ways into a novel, particularly a confusing one like The Sound and the Fury. It might also be helpful at the beginning and end of a unit study. In the case of a novel, the topic discussed would probably need to be limited to a significant character so that the list doesn't become too large and scattered. - A
double entry journal requires the students to take notes on the text
on one half of a sheet of paper and then on the other half respond
to their notes by writing their thoughts. It should be very
profitable with any text, although students might find it more
gratifying when used with a text that provokes a lot of reader
response, such as a persuasive essay. This strategy gives the
students an incentive to understand the text by requiring notes,
thus building reading comprehension. It also builds critical reading
skills by inciting students to think about and challenge the text.
Finally, if the product is turned in it can function as an excellent
evaluation of students' skills and engagement with the text.
If I were to use this strategy in an essay, I would have the students read the essay first in class with the idea of answering a question about the general purpose of the essay. Before releasing them that day I would model the strategy of the double entry journal and assign it as homework. The students would then reread the essay at home while filling out the double entry journal. They would turn these in for a significant homework grade. - “Somebody
wanted but so” is a way to organize the essential elements of a
story. In some format (on a handout sheet for example) there are
four columns at the top—one for each of these words. The students
then fill in the blanks under the heading as they are relevant to
the text in question. Texts that present a challenge to the student
and have plots that are not easy to follow are most appropriate for
this activity. The focus is on boiling down a story to its essential
elements so that the story can be more understood. This strategy
will typically involve groupwork, which can better engage those
cultures which are accustomed to helping each other toward
understanding such as Native American and Vietnamese.
In the classroom I would probably tend to save this strategy for short stories. They are an especially good medium in which to use this as there won't be as many distracting details. For example, in the short story “Livvie”, the conflict is not explicitly stated. After rereading the story in class with a strategy like Say Something, I would have the students discuss the story with each other by trying to find the answers to each of the questions. The strategy could also work with films, novels, or even non-fiction.
To me this strategy seems like it would be even more helpful if used over the course of a unit. The anticipation guide would address topics relevant to several of the texts in the unit, and after each text, students could write notes about how their perceptions changed. I think this would help give the unit even more coherence, though I am a little concerned about keeping the experience fresh and interesting.
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