Peeling the Fruit

Peeling the Fruit

I have been curious to try the routine “Peeling the Fruit” with my kiddos, but have struggled with the context in which to use it.  In LLI, we fly through a new book every day, so I couldn't figure out how to use one for this activity.  It finally occurred to me that I could use it as a sort of summative assessment.  Through all of our work with UbD this year, I have really started to try to plan more intentionally based on formative assessments, but I need to also incorporate some sort of summative assessment into my end of year program.  I needed some sort way to gauge whether or not I have connected my program to the essential question I came up with in the fall:  How does reading impact and enhance our lives?

I used this routine with all of the first and second graders that I have had the pleasure to work with this past year.  I decided to ask the kids the simple question “Why is reading important?” and had them sit quietly and record their responses onto sticky notes.  They then helped me to categorize their answers onto one chart.  I had given some initial thought to how the chart would be organized (what the different layers meant), so that helped immensely in the categorization. 

To be honest, I really thought that the vast majority of ideas would fall into the “skin” category.  I really thought that the kids I see would be so focused on reading at the skill level that they might not actually be able to make the connection between those skills and the more substantial reasons for reading.  But, here is how their ideas about “why reading is important” turned out:

Outside Skin (Reading Skills):

• ·         If you can read it, you can spell it
• ·         You need to know what texts or letters say
• ·         So you can read “flooently”
• ·         So you can get better
• ·         So you can read
• ·         Figure out tricky words

Middle (Connections:  Academic, home, school, etc.)

• ·         It makes you smart
• ·         We got to learn math and science and read the books
• ·         Because you have to read to be smarter
• ·         Words are everywhere
• ·         It is important because people need help
• ·         So we can move on to a new high school
• ·         Reading is important. If you can read newspapers you can read really hard words.
• ·         It helps us learn
• ·         Reading is important because if I need to read something like a chart of food and I want a cupcake and I need to know does this store have cupcakes?
• ·         You can read to find out how to do something.

Core (How reading can enhance life)

• ·         It is good for you.  It is fun.
• ·         You have to have fun.
• ·         So if you marry someone and they have a baby you can read to them
• ·         Boss gives you papers and instructions for work
• ·         It will help you be what you want to be
• ·         Read instructions and instruction manuals to know how to do things
• ·         My mom reads all day
• ·         So you can get a job
• ·         To work
• ·         Sometimes you read for fun to listen to stories
• ·         Reading can help you with your job
• ·         If you don’t know how to read you can’t have a job
• ·         Sometimes you read for fun to listen to stories

I must say I was pleasantly surprised!!!  They really are making connections between the skills they are working SO HARD on, and the benefits and outcome to all of that hard work!  Some even stated “because it is fun!”  That, in itself, is a victory with struggling readers.  I am so excited to use this routine again next year.  Now that I have been introduced to it, it would be so great to use it at the beginning of the year, and then at the end of the year, and measure the change in ideas.  It was really neat to see these kids extend their thinking, and go much deeper than I gave them credit for!!

Headlines for UbD Vowel Study

I have been lucky enough to begin planning a unit on Vowels with the first grade team.  As I have mentioned often, I struggle with designing a unit around a basic skill.  However, it was through the planning process with this team that I have realized that even something as simple as learning about vowels can be much more interesting to students when it is planned with intention and purpose:  Planned with the end in mind.

Although this plan is messy (as Andrea says, “Planning IS messy!), it is a snapshot of how this unit is beginning to evolve.

The enduring understandings we have established for this unit are:

·         Vowels are essential in every word in the English language

·         Vowels impact how other phonemes sound: “Vowels Drive the Word”

·         Vowel sounds change for a variety of reasons

·         Understanding vowels impacts your reading and writing

The essential question we have developed is:

How does and understanding of how vowels work help us in our reading and writing?

The key knowledge and skills students will acquire are:

·         Vowels are in every syllable

·         What is a syllable?

·         Vowels say short sounds unless something changes it

·         There are always rule-breakers!

We also thought that it is critical that teachers use common language in instruction (critical for transfer between intervention class and the classroom, and between grade levels).  Some of the common language we have identified so far is:

·         Syllable

·         Vowel

·         Consonant

·         Letter name vs. sound

·         Long sound

·         Short sound

·         Schwa

·         Different sounds (rule breakers) such as mud sounds, sounds from a different linguistic/cultural origin

One of the best tools used throughout this study has been the creation of an anchor chart.  The chart is a visual tool the kids can use to remind them of all the “funky” things that vowels can do in our language.  It was actually eye-opening to me to realize that there aren’t many exceptions to the rules, and that they can be categorized quite neatly on to one chart!

Although this UbD Plan is still “under design” for next year, I have been able to begin to shift some of my instruction this year by incorporating common language and more direct instruction surrounding vowels.  I was curious to see what my kids have learned about vowels, and what they know about the job vowels do.  We first brainstormed all of the things we know about vowels and I wrote these ideas down on a chart.  I was actually really excited that the girls were so able to recall and quickly articulate the rules they know about vowels (enduring understandings?).  

We talked about how these characteristics make vowels very important letters in the English language, and the impact they have upon our ability to read and pronounce words correctly.  I then modeled a headline for them, and then asked the girls to come up with their own…  I asked them to imagine they had to sell a magazine article about vowels, and that they needed to come up with a catchy way to title that article.  And here is what they came up with:

Backwards Lesson Design - Regions

      This year I have worked to clarify all of the stages of backwards lesson design.  I am pleased to plan the thinking strategy routines within the learning plan stage, but continue to struggle with whittling down Enduring Understandings and Essential Questions.  As we weave social studies content into the readers and writers workshop, I don't know which Understanding to focus on.  I see the power of focus and continue to determine the best focus for kids.

Regions Nonfiction Unit

Stage 1 – Desired Outcome
Established Goals:             Reader: Use strategies to make sense of difficult nonfiction/fiction text Writer: Integrate information from multiple sources to interestingly explain important ideas Researcher: Build knowledge through primary and secondary investigation of different aspects of a topic Social Scientist: Compare region’s economy, culture, geography and issues; Create connections
Enduring Understandings: Overarching understanding: Researchers use tools of interviewing, reading, searching, etc. to build background knowledge. Questions drive discovery of new topics. Overarching Understanding: Multiple sources about a topic may contain conflicting views or biases. We use critical thinking skills to analyze and interpret that information. Overarching Understanding: Authors use a variety of nonfiction text features and literary devices to enhance understanding. Overarching Understanding: Readers use multiple thinking strategies to make sense of text. Topical Understanding: A region’s economy, culture, geography and issues shape the uniqueness of that region. Topical Understanding: Each unique region contributes to the U.S. as a whole.	Essential Questions: Overarching question: How do researchers build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic? Overarching question: How do social scientists discern the difference between opinion/impressions and facts? Overarching question: How do writers integrate information from multiple sources to interestingly explain important ideas? Overarching question: How do readers make sense of difficult text? Topical Question: How do a region’s economy, culture, geography and issues shape the uniqueness of that region? Topical Question: How does each unique region contribute to the U.S. as a whole? What is the interdependence of the regions?
Key Knowledge and Skills:          Quote accurately from a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences.          Draw on information from multiple print or digital sources.          Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition or understanding.          Write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons and evidence. Apply precise language and domain specific vocabulary
Thinking:            Activate schema including background knowledge, experiences, and  connections in order to hinge new learning, and remember            Create sensory images that deepen understanding through details            Infer the motives, feelings, and perspectives of people to understand and empathize            Determine importance across texts while considering different perspectives            Monitor for meaning when analyzing  information to revise thinking            Synthesize information from a variety of sources to create new understandings

Stage 2 – Assessment Evidence 6 facets of understanding – explain (generalize, make connections, put in their own words, have a sound theory), interpret (student offers a plausible and supported account of data, text, experience), apply (the student can transfer, adapt, adjust, address novel issues and problems), perspective (student can see from different points of view), empathy (student can walk in the shoes of people/characters,  self-understanding (student can self-assess, see the limits of their understanding, reflect metacognitively)
Performance Tasks:     Students will research one of the regions, compare facts and design a ThingLink or green screen interview to share knowledge.  After reading several sources, students will write a multi-genre product including information, opinion and narrative to answer the essential question: What makes each region unique and how do the qualities within the regions connect?			Other Evidence:            As an assessment to activate students’ background knowledge about the thinking strategies, we will use the thinking routine Chalk Talk.         The four questions students will answer in a "quiz"  include:  1) What makes each region unique? 2) How do different industries effect regions? 3) In what ways does geography affect the development of towns? 4) How does culture show in food, festivals, holidays, etc.?
Stage 3 – Learning Plan Long Term and Daily Targets (Content Language Objectives) Learning Plan – What activities, experiences and lessons will lead to achievement (Acquisition, Meaning Making, and Transfer)
Planning Day	April 8 Region overview How do we learn about new concepts? Chalk Talk	Researchers/Readers/ Social Scientists/ Writers Impressions and Interviews – Create questions What Makes you say that?		Truth/Fact and Impressions/Opinion	Skim and Scan Textbooks Choose a region with a group Think Puzzle Explore
April 14 Sort impressions CSI 50 States – Nifty Fifty	Create chart – Economy, Geography, Issues, Culture Textbooks	Teach note taking		Note taking and paragraph synthesis	Vocabulary
April 21 Zooming In	Research	Research		Research	Synthesize Research
April 28  What is synthesis?	Synthesizing perspective	Synthesizing perspective		Practice script	Practice Script
May 5  Research and synthesis	Green Screen Technology	Review Sources		Thinglink technology	Assessment Day
May 12 Collaborate in teams to make connections across content	Write informative essays	Poetry		Step Inside	Multi-genre work
May 19  Headlines about uniqueness of regions	Chalk Talk connecting all regions	Reflection		Reflection	Reflection
Memorial Day	May 27 Parent Share Night

At our Professional Learning Community, we created a metaphor for Backwards Lesson Design.  This is an image of our metaphor.  It is like creating a pasta dinner as the desired result, the evidence of success would come from the consumers, and the learning plan comes from all the components of recipe, etc.

Padlet Article on Assessment and What Makes You Say That?

I am often struck by the fact that I am completely, 100% reliant upon assessment in my instruction (Running Records).  This sometimes seems really daunting, but through our books study of Understanding By Design, I have realized this is OK!  Where I have found I need to grow is in the feedback I give to my students.  I have always used assessment to drive my instruction, but I have not been skilled in sharing that information with the student. 

On Michelle’s padlet, I found the article “Bowling with Your Eyes Closed:  Students Need True Formative Assessment” by Ben Johnson. 

http://padlet.com/mmorrisjones/AssessingUnderstand/wish/23019895

The portion of the article that struck me most was “Assessment provides needed information for the teacher to adjust instructional activities, but that is a by-product of the real reason for doing it.  True formative assessment engages students and puts them in charge of their own learning.” 

I also found David Wees’ compilation “56 Different Examples of Formative Assessment” on the Padlet to be a great resource and suggest taking a look at it!

http://padlet.com/mmorrisjones/AssessingUnderstand/wish/23019783

When I noticed that this resource mentions running records as a formative assessment, I made an immediate connection.  My question became:  could what I do on a daily basis to assess my students and drive my instruction actually be used as part of a thinking routine if I engaged my students in feedback? By adding the simple question “what made you say that?” when a student stumbled on a word, or (more importantly) self-corrected a word, feedback had much more impact.  I was able to gain insight into what the student was thinking at the point of error, and help the student articulate the strategies they used to make a correction.  This is such a simple way to enhance meta-cognition!  I was so excited to realize that something so simple could so greatly enhance feedback!

In the past, I would have quickly glanced at a student’s running record, picked one strategy I thought the reader needed to focus on, and incorporate that into my next mini-lesson.   Typically this teaching point would be focused at the skill level on word attack skills:  visual, meaning, or structure.  After reading this article, and incorporating feedback, I have noticed that my students have shifted from exclusively using phonics to figure out tricky words (or appealing to the teacher for help, and are now using meaning to help when they are in a tricky spot. 

When I began working with the student represented in the running record pictured above, she was a phonics queen!  She could absolutely slaughter a word!  By the time she came to the end of a page, she was exhausted and might as well have been speaking a foreign language based on the way the words sounded when she read them.  After MONTHS of feedback (explicitly showing her what she did when she read out loud to me (I would even re-read her running records out loud exactly as she had read them), followed by LOTS of support and reminders to think about “what would make sense” when she was caught on a word, the work has paid off!  Her fluency has increased by 300% (!), and the mistakes she makes are typically meaningful.  She often thinks aloud (“what’s that?”) while reading, and although she still falls back on phonics, she no longer perseverates on a word to the point of exhaustion.  The use of explicit, immediate feedback from her running records has made such an impact! 

In shifting my view of running records from just formative assessments, and viewing them as part of a thinking routine, I now have a regular formative assessment that has a huge impact on both the student and teacher.  They are no longer just a measure of how a student decodes, but serve as real-time snapshots of how as student uses his/her schema, inferences, and questions to navigate tricky text.