Thoughtful Literacy

1. Thoughtful Literacy Teaching Thinking Strategies “Through language, your students learnhow to become strategic thinkers, not merely strategy users.” -Peter Johnston, Choice Words Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

2. The Proficient Reader Characteristics: • Motivated/Engaged • Socially Interactive • Strategic • Knowledgeable Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

3. Outcomes Participants will have the opportunity to: • Discover the components of strategic thinking in order to promote thoughtful literacy. • Learn the language and process for modeling, instructing, and coaching thinking strategies. • Review resources and activities to incorporate strategic thinking in the reading classroom and all content areas. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

4. Warm-up Activity Entrance Ticket: What is a strategy? Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

5. Warm-up Activity Comprehension strategies are conscious plans – sets of steps that good readers use to make sense of text. Proficient readers use strategies naturally and follow a process in their mind to construct meaning from text. - Adapted from Put Reading First Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

6. Teaching Reading “Teaching reading demands a two-pronged attack. It involves cracking the alphabetic code to determine the words and thinking about the words to construct meaning.” -Harvey & Goudvis, Strategies That Work Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

7. Teaching Reading “If we are to help improve our students’ ability to comprehend text and learn to actively construct meaning for themselves, we need to devote as much direct instructional time teaching thinking as we do teaching decoding.” -Adrienne Gear, Reading Power Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

8. Effective Strategy Instruction What does it look like? • Explicit instruction and modeling of strategies. • Showing students how to use each strategy and articulating how they help make meaning in a variety of text. • Oral discussion and transition to writing that demonstrates the use of strategies. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

9. Effective Strategy Instruction • Opportunities to read with guided strategy practice. • Observation and feedback on students’ use of strategies. • Independent practice with strategies. • Discussion with students about strategies used to enhance comprehension. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

10. Profile of a Proficient Reader A good reader is metacognitive – aware of and able to use and articulate what strategies they used in order to interact with the text and enhance meaning. • What do I know or not know? • What do I understand or not understand? • Am I able to explain my thinking? • How will I solve problems? • What questions do I have? • What resources could I use? Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

11. Profile of a Proficient Reader • Proficient readers are proficient thinkers. Students need instruction on the following strategies: • Monitoring Comprehension • Making Connections • Asking Questions • Visualizing/Mental Imagery • Inferring • Determining Importance • Summarizing and Synthesizing Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

12. Laying the Foundation • Introduce students to “The Thinking Brain” (Ideas from: Comprehension Connections by Tanny McGregor and Reading Power by Adrienne Gear) • Visual of strategic thinking brain • The Reading Salad • Thought Bubbles • Color Cards • Thinking Stems Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

13. Monitoring Comprehension • Following Your Inner Conversation: • This is the heartbeat of a reader/thinker. • A voice in your head that questions, connects, laughs, cries… • The voice keeps you engaged and signals you when your mind wanders. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

14. Monitoring Comprehension “Think out loud” to show them how! Show how you think by verbalizing the process. Demonstrate the “inner conversation.” Reveal how you feel, react, connect, question, and infer as you read. Focus on the questions you think about when reading and how you monitor, clarify, and change your thinking. Demonstrate use of “fix-up” strategies. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

15. Monitoring Comprehension Leave tracks of your thinking: • Model for students how to jot notes. • Utilize thinking organizers that promote deeper thinking versus filling in boxes. • Conduct genuine conversation based on big ideas. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

16. Monitoring Comprehension Guide students through the process of listening to their inner voice. • What to do when your inner voice strays • Fix-up Tools • Stop, think, and react to information read • Tracking your thinking • Sticky Notes • The Reading Heartbeat (use a sentence strip to track the thinking of a reader, spikes in heartbeat would reflect thinking. Flat lines are not good – represent no thinking!) Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

17. Activate and Connect Making Connections: “Having students access and use their prior knowledge and experiences to better understand what they read is the launching point for strategy instruction because every student has experiences, knowledge, opinions, or emotions to draw upon.” Adapted from Strategies that Work by Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis, 2000, Stenhouse Publishing Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

18. Activate and Connect Making Connections: • There are three types of connections readers make before, during, and after reading: • Text to Self • “This reminds me of…” • “I used my background knowledge to…” • Text to Text • “I noticed…” • Text to World • “I never knew…” • “This changes my mind – now I think…” Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

19. Activate and Connect • Model for students how to activate and connect as they read: • Brain Files • Specialists • Meaningful Connections • Merging New Learning with Thinking Using Topical Brain File Folders Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

20. Activate and Connect Making Disconnections • Demonstrate for students that certain texts may cause a reader to have a disconnect. That is, some texts are so different from your life that you do not connect with it or how others may possibly disconnect from a text. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

21. Activate and Connect Schema: • Whole group lessons offer all learners an opportunity to share knowledge they have in their brain files. • Building specific background knowledge is critical for reading informational text or in the content areas. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

22. Activate and Connect • Use the language of the strategy and build anchor charts with students in order for them to become a resource your students “own.” • Utilize exit tickets and discuss with students how their connections assisted them as a reader and reflective thinker. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

23. Final Thoughts “There is no right or wrong way to make a connection. Every person’s life story is filled with different memories because our life stories are all different. When we read, we are all going to be connecting to different things in the story because we are all different.” -Adrienne Gear, Reading Power Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

24. Questioning “Questions are at the heart of teaching and learning. They open doors to understanding the world.” -Stephanie Harvey & Anne Goudvis Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

25. Questioning: The Strategy that Propels Readers Forward Readers ask questions to: • Construct meaning • Enhance Understanding • Find answers • Solve problems • Acquire a body of information • Propel Research Efforts • Clarify Confusion Adapted from Strategies that Work by Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis, 2000 Stenhouse Publishing Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

26. Questioning • Teach students to think about and question as they read. • Approach texts with a skeptical eye and an inquiring mind. • Asking thoughtful, insightful questions deepens understanding, increases engagement and enriches the reading experience. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

27. Questioning “Questions lead readers deeper into a piece, setting up a dialogue with the author, sparking in readers’ minds what it is they care about. If you ask questions as you read, you are awake. You are thinking. You are interacting with the words.” -Susan Zimmerman and Chryse Hutchins Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

28. Questioning Good readers: • stop, think and ask questions before, during and after reading. • recognize that some questions will be answered and others will not. • read with a question in mind. • use a variety of strategies for answering questions. • Consider lingering questions to expand thinking. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

29. Questioning • Students need explicit instruction in how to ask thoughtful questions that spark critical thinking. • Model for students how all questions are good. Some are “skinny” and are answered in the text. While others are “fat” and cause us to think about possible answers since the text does not answer them. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

30. The Umbrella of Inferential Thinking A variety of mental processes occur under the umbrella of inferential thinking. • Making Predictions • Vocabulary • Mental Imagery • Author’s Viewpoint • Interpreting the Text • Drawing Conclusions • Theme/Main Ideas Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

31. Mental Imagery or Visualization? • Visualization implies that readers only need to “see” a picture in their mind. • However, proficient readers utilize all their senses to truly experience the text. • Mental imagery involves sensory and emotional images to enhance comprehension. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

32. Mental Imagery • When students visualize they are in fact inferring using mental images. • Mental imagery strengthens inferential thinking; occurring at the intersection of questioning, connecting, and print. • Visualizing brings joy to reading as readers create movies in their minds. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

33. Into the Classroom • Movies in the Mind – Introductory Ideas • Visualizing with simple words • Words that do not evoke mental images (the, and, at) • Calling attention to “picture words and phrases” • Implement read alouds using highly descriptive text • Sketching images Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

34. Inference: The Bedrock of Comprehension • Inferring occurs not only in reading, but in many realms. • Reading Faces • Reading Body Language • Reading Expressions • Reading Tone Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

35. Inference • Teachers often refer to this strategy as “reading between the lines.” • However, this definition is not concrete enough for young students to explain or understand. • Rather, teachers should refer to inference as “filling in, in your head, what is not on the written page” or “what do I know for sure and what can I figure out.” Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

36. Inference • Allows the reader to become a book detective as the author leaks clues along the way. • Allows for multiple interpretations of the text as the reader will assimilate text information with their own background knowledge. • When proficient readers infer they are more likely to remember what they have read and are able to engage in reflective conversations about the text. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

37. Into the Classroom • Inference – Introductory Ideas • Looking for Clues in Pictures • Wordless Picture Books • Photographs/Illustrations • Observe, Wonder, Infer • “I Felt That Way When…” Game • The Mystery Bag of Trash • Creating Dialogue for a Picture Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

38. Summarize/Synthesize • The new standards in grades 1 and 2 call for students to retell and/or recount the text. • Retelling lays the foundation for students to later be able to summarize. • In order to retell/recount, students must know how to determine what’s important in a text by locating key details. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

39. Into the Classroom • Help students determine what’s important by identifying a topic and the key details that support that topic. • Model using a strainer or sieve so students can visualize how their brain stores key details and other details may “fall away”. • Use sticky tabs during reading to mark details that support the topic. Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

40. Into the Classroom • Practice oral retelling with book talks in partners or small groups. Students may prepare using: • Beginning, Middle, End • Story Maps • Story Bookmarks • Story Frames Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12

41. Resources • Reading Power Adrienne Gear • Strategies That Work Harvey & Goudvis • Comprehension Toolkit Harvey & Goudvis • Connecting Comprehension Harvey & Goudvis &Technology • Comprehension Connections Tanny McGregor • To Understand Ellin Keene • Mosaic of Thought Ellin Keene • Reading with Meaning Debbie Miller • Engaging Readers & Writers Jeffrey Wilhelm With Inquiry Office of Elementary Language Arts, Pre-K-12