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SoR - Module 2: Structured Teaching Takeaways

1/7/2022

I’m not going to lie, if Structured Teaching (ST) was introduced to me as a pre-service teacher I think it would have served me way better than the seven page documents I had to write in order to teach one class.

ST distills down exactly what Master Teachers do (see my previous post about this topic) and what students need to be successful. What will we learn, what do we know, watch me do it, let’s try it, what did we learn, let’s do more. That’s it. That’s all.

What will we learn - it is so important to set the target, otherwise we wander aimlessly in the wilderness.

What do we know - assessing prior knowledge - need I say more?

Watch me do it - I think this could be the most important step - model how the topic is done - and talk about your thinking as you complete the question. This is key - let the students know what the thinking process is in order to complete this. So many students can't articulate this - well I just did it in my head - yes, but what did you do? By talking about our thinking we will get our students thinking about their thinking - metacognition.

Let’s try it - we all work on examples in a zero stakes environment.

What did we learn - re-group and talk about the learning we just did - make any corrections at this stage.

Let’s do more - only now are students ready to work independently.

That’s it - students will be successful if we can follow this model for all of our lessons.
Simple. Concise. Managable.

That’s My View from the 86th Pew,
Michelle

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What Master Teachers Do Differently

1/6/2022

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Master Teacher. I hold this term in greatest reverence. I don’t use it lightly. The article I read about what exactly Master Teachers do is exactly what we should all be doing.
Master teachers were defined as such by their ability to present new material, check for understanding and support students. The researchers broke down what Master Teachers do into 10 parts.

Master Teachers

Begin the lesson with a short review of the previous lesson. Researchers found that review helps with the fluency of recall and that practice was paramount in order for retention and recall of material to occur. It is noted that this review only needs to be 5-8 minutes. This will allow you to review the concepts and vocabulary that was introduced.

Master Teachers
Present new material in small steps with practice after each step. Research proves that we can only handle a few bits of information at a time. We need to master step one and then move onto step two. It is suggested for optimal learning that students be taught in mini-lessons with lots of examples. For example, a 20 minute lecture with a demo, questions and working examples. Master Teachers provide additional explanations, many examples and sufficient instruction for students to be successful independently. An area that Master Teachers are proficient at is “teacher model and think aloud.” They will tackle a problem for students to watch and talk about their thinking as they solve the problem.

Master Teachers

Ask a large number of questions and they check the responses of all their students. It is proven that questions help students practice new information and connect new material to their prior learning. Students need to practice new material. Master Teachers manage this by spending more than ½ the class lecturing, demonstrating and asking questions. There are two types of questions that Master Teacher employ:
1. Factual Questions: fact based answers, ex: What is the temperature outside?
2. Process Questions: These are designed to test knowledge depth about a subject and the student’s ability to analyze it.

All students are involved in answering questions. Some ways to encourage this: tell your answer to your neighbour, summarize the concept, “me too” hand wave.

Master Teachers

Provide models. By providing students with models and worked examples Master Teachers recognize that they can help students learn and solve problems faster. Students require cognitive support to help them learn a new concept. Master Teachers do this by modelling and thinking aloud when solving a problem. These worked examples allow students to focus on the specific steps to solve problems and it reduces the cognitive load on their working memory. Master Teachers provide the prompt, they model the answer, they provide guided practice and then they supervise their student’s independent practice. One way they aid in this process is by providing partially completed problems in which students had to complete the missing steps.

Master Teachers

Guide student practice. Master Teachers spend more time guiding student practice of new material. Students need to spend additional time rephrasing, elaborating and summarizing new material in order to store it in their long term memory. Rehearsal helps students access this information. Master Teachers facilitate rehearsal process by asking questions. Good questions require students to process and rehearse the material. This rehearsal is enhanced when they are asked to summarize main points and when they are supervised as they practice the new steps. Master Teachers know that students are most successful when given small amounts of material at a time. Master Teachers know that students are more successful in guided practice and when more time is spent checking for understanding. When sufficient instruction is provided during guide practice students are better equipped to work independently.

Master Teachers

Check for student understanding. By checking for student understanding at each point teachers can help students learn material with fewer errors. Master Teachers frequently check to see if all students are learning. It is important to not ask, “Are there any questions?” Instead ask students to summarize, repeat procedures, instructions, ask them to think aloud as they solve a problem and/or defend their position - orally.

Master Teachers

Obtain a high success rate. They feel that it is important for students to achieve a high success rate during classroom instruction. Master Teachers are able to limit misconceptions by providing guided practice after teaching small amounts of new material and checking for student understanding.

Master Teachers

Provide scaffolds for difficult tasks. The teacher provides students with temporary support and scaffolds to assist them when they learn difficult tasks. A scaffold is defined as a temporary support used to assist a learner. Master Teachers gradually withdraw scaffolds as learners become more competent. Students may continue to rely on scaffolds when they encounter particularly difficult problems. Providing scaffolds is a form of guided practice. Scaffolds include: modelling steps by the teacher, thinking aloud by the teacher, tools such as cue cards or checklists model of completed tasks so students can compare their own work and anticipate possible errors and warn students about that. Master Teachers provide an exemplar as much as possible.

Master Teachers

Require and monitor independent practice. Students need extensive, successful independent practice in order for skills and knowledge to become automatic. Independent practice is necessary because practice is required for students to become fluent and automatic in a skill.

Master Teachers

Engage in weekly and monthly review. Master Teachers recognize that students need to be involved in extensive practice in order to develop well connected and automatic knowledge. Students need extensive and broad reading with extensive practice to develop well connected networks of ideas. The more they rehearse and review information the stronger the interconnections between material become. Master Teachers will review previous week’s work every Monday. They will review the previous month’s work every fourth Monday. Research shows that classes with weekly quizzes score better during the term and that if material is not adequately practiced or reviewed it is easily forgotten.

That's My View from the 86th Pew,
Michelle

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Science of Reading: Module 1 Take Aways

1/5/2022

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In this the first Module of The Science of Reading we learn about The Simple View of reading. Ironically enough it boils down to a mathematical equation: Reading = Decoding x Comprehension (R = D x C)

Decoding is the ability to see a word in print and use that to retrieve the word from our mental dictionary. In order for that to happen we need to be able to orthographically map. Orthographic mapping is the process of sorting words into our learn-term memory, turning unknown printed words into automatically recognizable words. Each of these words have meaning. Once a word is mapped this word becomes a sight word.

Comprehension is broken into two areas; spoken and written (reading). Spoken comprehension is the ability to understand spoken phrases, sentences and narrative that are received orally. Written or reading comprehension are the same skills but applied to print.

Code related skills include concepts about print, phonological awareness, letter knowledge and reading fluency. These concepts read to word decoding and spelling this in turn leads to word recognition and spelling.

Numbers that were quoted in the module are quite shocking. This reading states that over 50% of code related skills are typically taught in grade 1 curriculum. And that 30% of students entering grade 1 are at least a full year behind their same age peers and thus fail at their first attempt in reading. Because of these numbers we have to use a skill-based approach rather than a grade-based approach. Teachers should focus on assessing foundational reading skills that their students possess and actively teach the skills that enable them to become proficient readers.

Reading disabilities can be distilled down to three categories; 1) inability to code, 2) inability to comprehend or 3) both.

The simple view of reading asserts that both decoding and comprehension are essential

My big takeaways from this module is that I need to focus on a skill-based approach to teach reading, As well, decoding and comprehension are both required for the process to be called “reading.”

That's My View From the 86th Pew,
Michelle

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The Born Again Teacher

I am a teacher who came to education late in life, and like those who are born again I love to preach and teach about my vocation. I am a teacher who is always a student. Here you will find my thoughts on how to improve my practice as an Educator. I sign off with "That's my view from the 86th Pew," the reason is that I own an old church pew that sits in my front entrance and the plate on it says 86. I love that it is a play on words in that the view is what I see as well as what I think.

SoR - Module 2: Structured Teaching Takeaways

What Master Teachers Do Differently

Science of Reading: Module 1 Take Aways

The Born Again Teacher

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