Monday, October 31, 2016

Announcements and Reminders: Turn in your During Reading Practice homework!! Pull out your books and begin reading.

Targets for Today: I can list and describe the During Reading strategies. I can use strategies like re-reading, reading ahead, finding unknown words, using other sources, and asking for help when I don't understand what I read.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent Reading. Fill out your reading logs. Take the During Reading Quiz! On number 1, write "Making Inferences" as the strategy name, and leave it blank for now. We will go over that briefly after we correct the rest of the quiz. Good job for remembering those strategies! Making Inferences is very similar to Making Connections and Making Predictions. In fact, it is just one step further than Making Predictions. When you make inferences, you use clues from the text, memories, facts, experiences, and more to "read between the lines". You're not just looking forward to guess what will happen next, but you're looking at the whole text!  We will use an acronym to help us remember the important parts of making an inference. Key details/words Inference Support your inference Let's make some inferences about this picture. Pick a detail, infer something, and explain why that detail supports your inference.  What can you infer about the man on the right? What details support your inference? Why? What can you infer about the man on the left? What details support your inference? Why? Making inferences is a life skill, not just a reading skill! You make inferences all the time as you meet new people, decide if a movie is going to be good or not, or try to figure out what happened to that thing that you lost.  Now for some Fix-Up Strategies!! You'll use these when you're not understanding what you're reading. Pull out your BICUM brochure and copy them down in the outside, middle column.   The first two strategies here are fairly simple. If you're reading something and you don't understand, the first thing you can try is... Trying again! Rereading is something that even very good readers do. Often, reading is a it more carefully, even following along with your finger, will make it more clear to you. It might not seem like a good idea to keep reading ahead if you don't understand. Let's clarify- we don't want you to just read until the end and survive the hard parts! What IS helpful is reading ahead just a little bit to see if the next section will help you understand what just happened. If it doesn't help, then stop reading. Look at this example from the beginning of Gone With The Wind: "Having maneuvered them away from the boring subject of war, (Scarlett) went back with interest to their immediate situation. 'What did your mother say about you two being expelled again?'                          (Pause!! We had  no idea they were expelled! Why? From where?) The boys looked uncomfortable, recalling their mother's conduct three months ago when they had come home, by request, from the University of Virginia. 'Well' said Stuart, 'she hasn't had a chance to say anything yet. Tom and us left home early this morning before she got up..." The only thing that came before this was a description of what Scarlett looks like, and a short conversation about the beginning of the Civil War. Rereading wouldn't help you understand why the boys were expelled, or where they were expelled from. You have to keep reading to find out!  Now for our third strategy, Checking Unfamiliar Words. This could mean googling a definition, but there is actually a better way to build your vocabulary. What might that be? Context Clues!! Using the context clues in this sentence, what would you guess that the word "placid" means? Even though a storm had just passed through, the lake was strangely placid that afternoon. How about the word "replete"? The bin of potatoes in the cellar was replete; we would not run out of food all winter! How about "curtail"? The principal needed to curtail his speech, because it was almost 2:45 and time for the students to get ready to go home! Now for another strategy- Checking Other Sources. What if my class was reading The Outsiders, but I really wasn't getting it. What are some other places I could look to help me learn more about that topic?  Or last of all, it is ok to Ask for Help when you're reading!!  One way to remember the Fix-Up Strategies: If you're not sure what's going on when you're reading, it can be like feeling lost when you're driving. Here is what you might do if you were unsure how to get to your destination when driving. Reverse! (Reread) Just keep driving! (Read ahead) Check for weird landmarks around you (Unfamiliar words) Read all the business and street signs (Read other sources) Call someone who knows! (Ask for help) Now you're going to practice using those strategies. Here is a short story that might have some unfamiliar words. It might not be very clear in who it is talking about or what is happening. Let's read the directions together!

If You Were Absent: Turn in your During Reading Practice sheet. Take the During Reading Quiz. Copy down the Fix-Up Strategies in your BICUM Brochure

Vocabulary:

Happy Halloween-Time!

Thursday, October 27, 2016

Announcements and Reminders: Today is the first day of your new term!                         Turn in your Pre-Reading Practice sheets to the top wire basket. Pull out your books! Also a heads up- we will give you extra credit if you dress up as a book character for Halloween!! Start brainstorming and come show us your costume/send us a picture! For Term 1, if your grade was within 5 points of the next half-grade up, we most generously gave you those points.

Targets for Today: I can make predictions and connections when I read. I can make inferences when I read.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent Reading! Go ahead and fill out your reading log. Pre-Reading Quiz!! We will take it, then correct it together. Turn it in to the top wire basket. Let's talk for a minute- you all practiced using a Pre-Reading strategy at home. How did it go? Now who can remember the two strategies we practiced last time? There are three more During Reading strategies. We'll practice them today! The first is "Make Connections". Do these phrases sound familiar to anyone? Text to Self Text to Text Text to World If this were the text that I gave you, what kind of connections could you make? "Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay." -Robert Frost Text to Self? Text to Text? Text to World? How about with a nonfiction text? Can you still make connections? "Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations Secretary General, visited Haiti after Category 4 Hurricane Matthew devastated it earlier in October. The hurricane killed around 1,000 people in Haiti and left more than 1.4 million people in need of humanitarian aid. The UN Secretary General visited Haiti and witnessed the desperate Haitians’ looting of food trucks and fighting over bags of flour. In his speech, he firmly condemned all attacks against humanitarian convoys." Read more: http://www.newsinlevels.com/products/situation-in-haiti-level-3/ Text to Self? Text to Text? Text to World? Making Predictions is a skill that builds on those connections. As you read, your brain makes connections to your previous experiences and your background knowledge. Your brain takes those facts and experiences, and it can make guesses about how this story will turn out.  I'll read you a short fairy tale. I will stop in the middle and ask you to make a prediction, then I'll ask what made you think that. What facts/experiences make that seem like a good prediction? How about with nonfiction? What are your predictions about what this article will say about blushing? Use clues in the text and your own ideas. "What is this peculiar phenomenon called blushing? A skin reaction? An emotion? A kind of vascular expression? Scientists have never been sure how to describe it. The blush is at once physiology and psychology. On the one hand, blushing is involuntary, uncontrollable, and external, like a rash. On the other hand, it requires thought and feeling at the highest order of cerebral function. “Man is the only animal that blushes,” Mark Twain wrote. “Or needs to.” -Atul Gawande, "Crimson Tide", The New Yorker

If You Were Absent: Pick up a pink slip to make up your silent reading. Turn in your Pre-Reading Practice sheet. Take the Pre-Reading Quiz, and come pick up a During Reading Practice Sheet.

Vocabulary:

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Announcements and Reminders:                           Pull out your books! Remember that the end of the term is October 26, this Wednesday. Also a heads up- we will give you extra credit if you dress up as a book character for Halloween!! Start brainstorming and come show us your costume/send us a picture! Keep your hall passes for the rest of this term.

Targets for Today: I can preview before I read. I can visualize a text as I read. I can "talk with the text" as I read.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent Reading! Go ahead and fill out your reading log. And now a review from last time! What it means to "preview" something that you read? We did it together last time- now you get to practice previewing on your own. Good! You'll need to remember the strategies that we teach you. We'll be giving you regular quizzes from now on to make sure you remember what the strategies are called and how they are used. You'll also have the same kind of homework assignment multiple times: you'll take one of the strategies and practice using it at home. Let's look through your first Practice sheet together and then you can put it away. Pull out your BICUM Brochure! We finished our Pre-Reading Strategies and we're ready to learn some strategies to help us while we read. Copy this down on the inside middle column: Today we'll practice visualizing and "talking with the text". Close your eyes and listen while Mrs. Mace reads you a part of her favorite book (Freckles, by Gene Stratton-Porter). What picture do you see in your mind? Now let's try it with non-fiction. Close your eyes and listen, making a picture in your mind for what I'm going to read. "In 1939, just when the rest of this prairie might have been turned into farmland, the army came and protected this land. The army did not mean to save the prairie. The army used about 25,000 acres of prairie land to protect the nation, not the prairie. The army built a plant to make explosives for use in World War II. They built railroad tracks to carry the explosives away from the plant. They built thickwalled buildings called bunkers to store the explosives." -"Prairie Keepers", Center for Urban Education at DePaul University © 2008 As you read, visualizing and making pictures in your mind will help you understand what you read. You'll also remember it better! Now let's practice Talking with the Text. I'll model it for you as I read this poem called "Harlem," by Langston Hughes: What happens to a dream deferred?        Does it dry up        like a raisin in the sun?        Or fester like a sore—        And then run?        Does it stink like rotten meat?        Or crust and sugar over—        like a syrupy sweet?        Maybe it just sags        like a heavy load.        Or does it explode? Now you try! Check out the article that you were given and make note of your thoughts as you go. Let's read the directions at the bottom.

If You Were Absent: Complete the Previewing a Chapter Assignment and the Talk with the Text assignment. Pick up your Pre-Reading Practice homework and do that to prepare for the Pre-Reading Quiz.

Vocabulary: Visualize: the practice of making pictures and images in your mind that go along with the text you're reading "Talk with the text": the practice of thinking actively during reading; asking questions, comparing it to your experiences, forming opinions, making observations, etc. deferred:  postponed, put off, delayed

Tuesday, October 18, 2016

Announcements and Reminders:                           Pull out your book!! Remember to turn in any late or revised work by tomorrow, October 19! If you were given reading make-up homework to do, it was due today, but you may still drop by and hand it in to your class wire basket tomorrow.

Targets for Today: I can conduct a SELF reading check. I can preview the things I read.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent reading time. Fill out your reading logs! Partner Fluency time! Last time we talked about doing a SELF check before reading. What does SELF stand for? Let's see if we can really use this to help make our reading better. Everyone pull out a blank piece of paper! On that paper, write out an example of each: Study area (where/when they are reading) Emotion (how the readers feels inside) Level of difficulty (give an example of what they are reading) Feeling (how the reader feels physically) I'll ask for 12 volunteers, and they will write their examples on the board. Now here is the good part!  We'll roll a die and select a random reading situation. Using that situation, write the answers to these questions on your paper.  Will this reading experience be easy or difficult? Why? What could the reader do to make their reading go better? We'll talk about it, and roll again!  Good review! Now let's learn some more Pre-Reading Strategies. These will go on the bottom half of the column that you started last time. (The inside of the brochure, the left side) Add these strategies: Let's watch a movie preview together. Think about this question: Why do producers make movie previews? We can do reading previews before we read! Let's try some of that!  What do we notice as you preview these pages? Will knowing that help you when you start to read? How will it help you? How about this one? Preview it with your partner.  -What titles, bolded words, italicized words, pictures, and other details do you see?  --How will this help your reading? We do this with leisure reading as well!  Now you're going to try! Get ready for a Previewing the Chapter activity that you'll do all on your own.

If You Were Absent: Pick up a pink sheet to make up your silent reading. Pick up a Previewing the Chapter worksheet and article and complete that.

Vocabulary:

Friday, October 14, 2016

Announcements and Reminders:                           Pull out your books! Remember that the end of the term is coming up on October 26. You have until October 19 to turn in any late work to our class!! Don't forget to complete any reading make-up work (homework) if you have been given a pink sheet in your folder.

Targets for Today: I can define metacognition. I can begin my BICUM brochure.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent Reading! Go ahead and fill out your reading log. Partner Fluency practice! When we call your names, one of you should grab the marker and eraser, and the other should pick up the new articles to read. Now I need two volunteers!  Image: recyclenation.com Did the first person see different results than the second? What did they do differently? Thinking about our thinking is called metacognition. It's like looking inside your brain and discovering that it is actually a really nice, really powerful car. Sometimes we expect our brain car to just get places, and we think it will drive itself there. But here is the catch!! You get to be the driver! You have the controls.  Image: pixabay The rest of this class will help you recognize the controls in that car and practice using them. These skills will help you be a better reader, and they'll help you in a lot of other ways as well! We'll call them strategies. We'll keep track of these strategies in something called a BICUM brochure. But what does BICUM stand for??  "Be In Control: Use Metacognition"  Come up to the front and grab a colored piece of paper and a couple colored pencils. Watch this demonstration on how to fold your brochure!  Your front column will look like this:  You get to draw any picture you want on the front! If we have time, we'll also practice a couple of pre-reading/thinking strategies. On your inside left column, copy down these four steps to a SELF check.  Let's walk through a situation together. Imagine this: "Winifred is used to getting up early, but today it was especially hard. Last night she stayed up really late watching a scary movie with her friends, and she woke up with barely enough time to get ready and catch the bus. When she got to school, she realized that she had forgotten to finish her reading for English! It was only a short article, and she had glanced at it when the teacher gave it to her. It was about the 1950s, a topic she actually liked and knew a lot about. She rifled through her backpack and found the article, then sat down on the closest bench in the commons area. She started to read." -What was her study area like? -Her emotions? -The level of difficulty of the thing she had to read? -How was she feeling physically? Now you come up with a situation!! Make sure to include some description about: Study Area Emotions Level of difficulty of the article/book/assignment Feeling physically Write down your story situation on a blank piece of paper!  When you're finished, read your story to your partner. They will do a SELF check to decide if this is a good situation or a bad situation for reading and understanding.

If You Were Absent: Make a BICUM brochure and copy the sections above. You can ask for help from Mrs. Mace or Ms. Dorsey. Grab a pink slip to make up your reading time.

Vocabulary: Metacognition: awareness of our own thinking, knowledge, and mental strategies. Strategy: a specific way of reaching a goal; a method or tool

Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Announcements and Reminders:                           Pull out your book!! Don't forget to complete any reading make-up work (homework) if you have been given a pink sheet in your folder. All late and revised work is due by October 19 -- next Wednesday.

Targets for Today: I can define plagiarism. I can differentiate between plagiarizing and synthesizing.

Today’s  Agenda: Silent reading time. Fill out your reading logs! Now check out a painting that Mrs. Mace did over the summer! Okay, so Mrs. Mace really didn't paint that. Isn't it confusing when we claim someone else's work? Let's go to the lab now and learn more about that! You'll do the activity, then open your school email and complete a short student survey. Let us know if you have questions! Bring your things with you just in case we don't have time to come back to class.

If You Were Absent: Pick up the Plagiarism worksheet and complete that during Cavetime, before or after school. Pick up a pink slip to make up your reading time. Find the Student Survey email in your school email address and fill out the survey.

Vocabulary: Plagiarism: Taking someone else's work (writing, art, design, etc.) and passing it off as your own original work.  See our Plagiarism Cartoons. Synthesis: A combination of things. In this case, the appropriate combination of your original work and correctly cited work from someone else.