Using the Schoolwide Enrichment Model Reading Framework

1
Using the Schoolwide Enrichment Model Reading
Framework

• Rebecca D. Eckert, PhD
• University of Connecticut
• Rebecca.eckert_at_uconn.edu

Confratute 2008 University of Connecticut
2
Our Agenda

• Monday What is the SEM-R?
  (Sally Reis)
• Tuesday Practical teaching strategies
  for Phase 1
• Wednesday Practical teaching strategies
  for Phase 2
• Thursday Practical teaching strategies
  for Phase 3
• Friday Catch up Your Questions
  and Concerns

3
At-Risk Readers

• The Committee on the Prevention of Reading
  Difficulties in Young Children identified four
  risk factors
• Attendance at a chronically low-achieving school
• Low English proficiency
• Unfamiliarity with standard English dialect
• Living in a community of poverty
• (Burns, Griffin, Snow, 1999)

4
Characteristics of Talented Readers

• Demonstrate advanced understandingof language
• Use expansive vocabulary
• Use reading to acquire a large repertoire of
  language skills
• Use language for humor
• Display verbal ability in self-expression
• Use colorful and descriptive phrasing
• Demonstrate ease in use of language

5
How do we find talented readers?

• Parents offer a unique perspective
• Informal, formative assessments
• Observations at work and play
• Listening for advanced literacy cues
• Talking to the child
• More formal assessments
• Presenting opportunities for choice and reading
• DIBELS
• Data collected in language arts classes

6
Enrichment pedagogy

• Effective at working with all students,
  particularly in the context of a reading
  classroom (Reis, et al., 2004)
• Differentiated instruction can no longer be
  seen as an intervention or as a remedial measure
  its the way to teach all students (Ivey, 2000,
  p. 42)

7
How can we help teachers challenge all readers?
Three Goals of the SEM-R

• To increase enjoyment in reading
• To encourage students to pursue challenging
  independent reading both in school and at home
• To improve reading fluency, comprehension, and
  increase reading achievement

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Three-Legged Stool

• Renzulli (1977)
• Enrichment Triad Model
• Vygotsky (1962)
• Zone of Proximal Development
• National Reading Panel (2000)
• Need for further research

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Phase 1

• High interest read alouds and higher order
  questions

(pages 9-19)
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Phase 1 Components

• Read Aloud for pleasure and enjoyment as well as
  exposure
• Book Selection
• Genres
• Themes
• Fiction/Nonfiction
• Goal to have students ask for the book
• Decrease time in Phase 1 as students begin
  reading more independently

11
Read Alouds

• It is not just reading to children that makes
  the difference, it is enjoying the books with
  them and reflecting on their form and content. It
  is developing a supporting the childrens
  curiosity about text and the meanings it conveys
  . . . And it is showing the children that we
  value and enjoy reading and we hope that they
  will too.

- SRA/Open Court Reading Author, Marilyn Jager
Adams
12
Using Bookmarks in Phase 1

• Bookmarks provide higher order, open-ended
  questions
• An opportunity for you to model answers
• Help students tackle complex ideas or themes in
  literature
• Discussion about literature is more important
  than a test

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A Primary Focus

• Before you read aloud -- Take Three!
• Exposure Share why or how you chose the book.
• Critical Thinking Choose a question or a theme
  to guide your discussion about the literature.
• Connections Consider links to other books,
  websites, art, experiences, activities, or
  projects.

14
Developing a Question

• Help your students see themselves as
  investigators collecting evidence
• Ask open-ended questions.
• Tie answers back to the text.
• Modeling is a Must!
• Consider creative, offbeat ideas a bonus.

15
Spicing Up the Read Aloud

• Choose a book you love
• Be dramatic
• Model book selection criteria (highlight
  illustrations, chapter titles, information about
  the author, title page information, and book
  summaries)
• Start in the middle of the book
• Employ props

16
Spicing Up the Read Aloud

• Use student suggestions to select the books you
  read aloud
• Employ books on tape
• Visit your public library
• Focus on a particular genre, theme, or author for
  a week
• Invite a guest reader to your classroom

17
Phase 2

• Supported Independent Reading
• Individual Conferences

• (pages 21-43 61-72)

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Our Goals

• Students will . . .
• Enjoy reading
• Read appropriately challenging books (1 to 1.5
  above their current reading level)
• Develop the skills to enable them to read for at
  least 25 minutes each day

19
Ground Rules for SIR

• You must have a book to read
• If you arent enjoying a book and have given it a
  fair chance, ask the teacher to help you choose a
  new one.
• Remain in your reading area during SIR
• Only reading is happening
• Minimal quiet talking
• Do your best reading the whole time

20
Conferences with a Purpose

• Evaluate the appropriateness of the students
  book selection for comprehension and
  sophistication of ideas and content
• Provide support in helping students develop
  reading fluency and comprehension through reading
  strategy acquisition and higher level questioning
  of independent reading
• Make connections with students' interests
• Suggest possibilities for further reading and
  pursuits

21
What does an individual conference look like?

• Begin by reviewing the students log
• Inquire about the book
• Invite the student to read a page or two to you
  aloud
• Ask the student a series of questions to spark
  discussion and enable you to assess comprehension
• Record your meeting

22
Finding the Right Match

• After listening to the student read, ask yourself
  the following
• Does the book seem like a good fit?
• Does the book seem too difficult or too easy?
• Should the student be challenging herself more?
• If the student can easily read and understand
  every word, it is likely that the book is not
  providing enough challenge.
• Two areas of sophistication
• Language and grammar
• Ideas and Content

23
Interests and Reading

• Both average and talented readers disliked being
  forced to read materials that they had not chosen
  (Martin, 1984)
• Talented readers profit when
• teachers develop student interest in the reading
  and
• teachers provide cognitive and creative
  challenges with the literature

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Questioning Using the SEMR Bookmarks

• Can be used with any text
• Can be used while listening, reading, or viewing
• A quick diagnostic tool
• Discussions about literature that challenge and
  enrich childrens experiences

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Answering Questions Should Focus On . . .

• Important factual content
• Inferences
• Within text
• Text-World
• Text-Self
• Text-Text
• Thorough complete answers

Paris, 2004
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Ask Students to Explain their Thinking

• Describe the strategy they used
• Identify exact text information they used and why
  it was helpful
• Identify the obstacles to answering questions
• Generate their own questions and explain why they
  are appropriate

Paris, 2004
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Lessons Learned

• Establish a routine with clear expectations
• Contemplate a comfortable environment
• Management Tools
• Books on Tape
• Conference Cues
• Deli System
• Student-made bookmarks
• Sticky Notes

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Regenerating Enthusiasm

• Make your own bookmarks
• Author Awards
• Visitors
• Theme days
• Celebrations
• Develop a culture of literacy

29
Phase 3

• Self-selected interest and choice components

(pages 45-59)
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A Time for Inquiry, Research, and Exploration

• As they become more fluent readers and writers,
  students find out that reading a writing give
  them power the power to take control of their
  learning. (Open Court Teachers Edition, Level
  3, Book 1, pg. 19)
• How can you structure your Phase 3 time to
  encourage students to tap into this power?

31
Interest Development Center

• Allows opportunity for study in greater breadth
  and depth
• Allows introduction of topics not in the regular
  curriculum
• Can satisfy curiosityexplores hows and whys
• Allows student choice
• Draws on ability to make connections between
  fields and topics
• Opportunity for hands-on exploration

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• Speakers
• Books
• How-to books
• Local experts
• CDs
• Tapes
• Books on Tape
• Computers
• Tools of a particular trade

Available
Resources
33
Interest Development Centers

• Dont have all students do all tasks at all
  centers
• Monitor what students do and learn at centers
• Balance student and teacher choice about centers
  to be completed.

34
Independent Projects

• Encourage independence
• Allow work with complex and abstract ideas
• Allow long-term and in-depth work on topics of
  interest
• Tap into high motivation

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Authentic Products
Promote questioning, hypothesizing, analyzing,
reflecting, and problem solving

• Chronicle a historical walking tour of a city.
• Oral history interviews with past city mayors.
• Development of a simulation war game.
• Media presentation of the music of the 1940s.
• Oral history interviews recording a factory's
  influence on a community.
• A book summarizing local folklore.
• A family tree A study of
• genealogy.