Implementing Reading Apprenticeship in the First Month … · Implementing Reading Apprenticeship in the First Month of ... Begin SSR or Independent ... • How might I introduce

R E A D I N G A P P R E N T I C E S H I P

Strategic Literacy Init iative © 2004 WestEd Page 1

Implementing Reading Apprenticeship in the First Month of School

GOALS

• Begin building the social and personal dimensions of the classroom

personal connections, interests, motivations, experiences

norms for respectful collaboration, risk-taking, sharing resources

• Begin the metacognitive conversation about reading and thinking

classroom inquiry into reading, thinking, and learning

it’s cool to be confused; problem solving to make meaning

• Establish conversational routines for paired, group, and whole class work

individual – pair share – foursomes – whole class collaboration

• Introduce, model, and practice key metacognitive conversation routines

think aloud, talking to the text, metacognitive logs/journals

• Extend class time devoted to reading and talking about reading

daily warm up readings, reading to students, paired reading, silent reading

• Collect and use a variety of reading materials that offer different levels of difficulty

for the first unit or course topic to extend reading opportunities for all students

Planning Notes

Tab 13 - Implementing Reading Appr. in the Classroom - Page 1



Reading Apprenticeship in Math



own words…” Explains Dorothea, “I keep having this mantra in my brain, ‘They should

be working harder than me.’” During group work, Dorothea circulates, supporting both

social and intellectual aspects of group work. Group work is generally followed by whole

class debriefing.

Lesson at a Glance

Dorothea taught the videotaped lesson in early November, as part of a unit on positive

and negative integers.

Sequence. Dorothea introduced the unit by eliciting students’ prior knowledge of

opposites. After brainstorming a few examples (e.g., up/down) as a whole class, students

brainstormed additional pairs of opposites in table groups. The activated schema served

as a search engine. As students read word problems, they were alert for opposites that

signaled positive and negative. Dorothea began a list of these opposites on butcher paper

and added to the list as new “clue words” were identified.

Prior to the videotaped lesson, Dorothea taught two models for solving problems

involving positive and negative integers—number lines and positively and negatively

charged particles. Students applied the methods to several problems in their textbook.

Dorothea introduced Talking to the Text the day before the videotaped lesson. She

modeled the strategy, thinking aloud as she marked the text. Dorothea emphasized

the importance of explaining the significance of the notations she made on the text. “I

noticed a lot of the kids would underline every important thing, but not make a note to

themselves as to why it was important.”

Dorothea created groups of students who would support one another. “The problem we

were doing was a very, very long word problem and I knew some of the English learners

really could not read it. My reading it aloud and then having them work and negotiate the

text together, I found was the best solution. But also having them with a person they felt

safe with, who was not impatient.”

Learning goals. The “Number Sense” strand of mathematics includes the study of

integers. The inclusion of negative numbers on the number line increases the repertoire

of models available to a student. These models are crucial to the task of transforming the

written word into symbols in algebra. In this lesson, Dorothea wanted student to be able

to:

• read a story problem using “Talking to the Text” to monitor their comprehension;




Implementing Reading Apprenticeship



Ideas for Week 1

Student Reading Survey

Have students individually fill out the survey and share their responses with

a partner, followed by a whole class discussion about students’ responses.

What do students read outside of school? What are they interested in and

good at? Acknowledge and value students’ dislikes and difficulties, and share

yours as well. Have students bring materials they read at home into class.

Personal History/Math/Science/English Reading History

Have individuals reflect on and capture their own histories with words,

pictures, or a combination of both. Have students share their history with

a partner, and then combine two sets of partners into a foursome to discuss

commonalities and differences. End with a whole class discussion of what

discourages and supports their reading and learning, what resources they are

bringing to the class, and what kind of classroom community they want to

create. Use that discussion as a means to create norms for class work.

Capturing the Reading Process/Reading Strategies List

Using a high interest and accessible reading, have students read individually

and write about what they did to make sense of the reading. Have them

share with a partner and then in a whole group discussion. Make a list of

the reading strategies they share and post it on the wall in the classroom.

Emphasize how much they know about reading and how much they can

offer one another as learners.

Introduce Metacognition: Think Aloud with Play-Doh

With a non-reading task like the Play-Doh activity, have students learn to

externalize their thinking processes. Explain how becoming metacognitive

will help them monitor and control their thinking and learning, and

how sharing their thoughts will help the whole class. Debrief as a class:

Acknowledge the difficulties associated with thinking aloud, value students’

willingness to take risks.

Model Think Aloud

Using materials from students’ outside-of-class reading, demonstrate

your own comprehension processes and problems with these unfamiliar

materials. Model Think Aloud with other high interest reading materials.

Have students use the bookmarks to identify your thinking processes. As

Planning Notes







you introduce course materials, model Think Aloud to help students see

how you approach these materials and how thinking aloud can help them

learn to think more productively.

Other Ideas

Ideas for Month 1

Practice Think Aloud

Have students contribute to a group Think Aloud using the bookmark. Ask

them to contribute to each prompt: does anyone have a picture? A question?

Is anyone confused? Give students practice thinking aloud in pairs with

bookmarks. Add new strategies to the Reading Strategies List.

Model Talking to the Text

First Model Talking to the Text at the overhead. Have students contribute

to a whole group Talking to the Text on the next part of the text. Add new

strategies students are using to the Reading Strategies List.

Practice Talking to the Text

Have students individually Talk to the Text and share their work with a

partner. What did they do to make sense of the text? What comprehension

problems did they solve? What comprehension problems do they still have?

Have pairs share highlights from their conversations and debrief the process

with the whole class.

Help Students Choose Materials for Extensive Reading

Offer students a variety of reading materials to choose from as they

complete class assignments focused on curriculum topics. Model ways of

choosing texts according to interest and difficulty. Have a class conversation

about ways to choose accessible reading materials. At the beginning of a

Planning Notes







unit, encourage individual students to choose text selections that are at their

comfort level in terms of comprehension, and to move on to more difficult

selections as they progress in the unit.

Begin SSR or Independent Reading (if applicable) –– (See Reading for

Understanding, Chapter 4.)

Introduce Metacognitive Logs/Journals

Introduce metacognitive prompts for reading logs and journal assignments

to accompany all class reading. Model the kind of responses you are looking

for. Identify good responses in students’ logs and journals and share them

with the class. Always ask students to share their metacognitive logs and

reading experiences with each other, for example, looking for especially

good responses or interesting new strategies. Add new strategies to the

Readers Strategies List.

Other Ideas

Planning Notes


Refer to Tab 13 in your binder for a number of suggestions for implementing R.A. in first six

weeks of school.

As an individual, you may want to ask yourself:

• How might I introduce RA with students at the beginning of the year?

• How will I build the Personal Dimension including “talk to the text”, think-alouds, and

personal reading histories/surveys?

• How will I introduce “meta-cognitive conversation” in class?

• How might I build the Social Dimension by establishing routines for:

o Forming/sustaining cooperative groups,

o Generating group agreements about behavior in small groups, and

o Initiating and sustaining substantive conversations in small groups?

Ask a school team, you may want to ask yourselves:

• How can we support each other as we begin with reading apprenticeship?

• Do we want to meet at some times to plan and swap ideas?

• How might the “wave one” folks at my school help us get started?

• How might our literacy support folks help us?


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Documents

Implementing Reading Apprenticeship in the First Month … · Implementing Reading Apprenticeship in the First Month of ... Begin SSR or Independent ... • How might I introduce