Session+3

__**Session Three**__

**3.1: Monitoring Understanding**

//How do you monitor students' understanding in your classroom? // I monitor my students' understanding in a number of ways. First, I tend to do a lot of quick check-ins in the form of small questionnaires, mini-dialogues or think-write activities followed up with paired check-ins and class-wide discussions to handle any larger concerns or confusions that were not cleared up when students checked in with one another. In a typical day, I might break a lesson down into two component parts and check-in on each of them. Also, I try to build in culminating activities that require basic understanding of the lesson, and I review these before a recap of the day's lesson objective at the end of the class period. I also try to incorporate a review of the objective as part of the do-now activity before the next day's lesson. Additionally, I am constantly circulating throughout the room during activities and student work time asking follow up questions and seeing if students need help. This is a great time to provide one-on-one or small-group instruction in small doses during class time. Of course I am always checking and reviewing students' homework and ticket-to-leave assignments, and I try to ensure that my students all hear and use French as much as possible.

//How might that practice change as you implement more technology? // //﻿ //I think that the most obvious change might be in the way that students interact about class material beyond the restrictions of a 56 minute period. If anything, having the students use virtual notebooks might open up the collaborative thought process outside of the classroom, allowing them to read and comment on their classmates' homework assignments and projects and support one another as they work to tighten their grasp on material introduced during class time.


 * 3.2: Before, During and After Reading **

__//Summary// __ This reading provides a detailed explanation of the "Before, During and After" reading framework, breaking each element of this strategic approach into steps, teacher tasks and related student activities. It also provides a guide for teachers looking to plan strategic reading based lessons, suggesting thought questions that could help them to ensure that the readings that they have chosen are purposeful, appropriate and related to the content at hand. It breaks these questions into groups to match the before, during and after reading phases of the process.

__//Discussion// __ I employ many of these strategies in my classroom, and I appreciate seeing them in the context of a clear, well laid-out framework geared toward improving reading comprehension.

Whether we are considering an explanation of a grammatical concept, a fill-in verb or vocabulary exercise or a reading passage, making sure that everyone is on the same page about prior knowledge is immensely helpful. At the start of each mini-lesson, I always try to jump-start the class by asking students to bring forth prior knowledge that might be helpful in understanding the new concept being introduced. This is usually very powerful because it shores up student comprehension of something old for the whole class and gets everyone ready for something new.

I am constantly encouraging my students to make predictions about what they are reading, either based on key words, context clues or illustrations. Additionally, I am a huge proponent of having students generate and ask one another questions. This gets the whole class thinking about and "in on" the process of reading for comprehension, and it encourages student-centered learning by assigning students the responsibility of helping one another to understand the material being considered. The teacher serves as more of a moderator during this portion of class time, circulating to verify that students are on task and answering their questions in a one-on-one or small group setting.

Finally, I always encourage reflections and responses through discussion and writing. This reflection process takes place both in class as students work in pairs or small groups to discuss what they have read and at home through short writing assignments discussed, collected and responded to the following class day.


 * 3.3: Wordle as a Before Reading Strategy **

//<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">What does it seem that Wordle can do for the user? // <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">It seems like Wordle offers the user a general sense of the most important or prevalent words and terms in a text. It basically gives readers a preview of the key themes and ideas that they might encounter in what they are about to read.

<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//How useful does Wordle seem to be as a before reading strategy for students?// <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">I think that Wordle could be a useful before reading strategy for students, particularly when they are setting out to read a long or complex text or literary work.

<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//What type of learners would benefit from using a Wordle?// <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Wordle might be most beneficial to students who get stuck on or confused by details, slower readers, or those who are daunted by reading something tricky or long.

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<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//What observations and predictions about your article can you make based on this Wordle? What connections to your background knowledge can you make?// <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Based on my Wordle, I would predict that this article has to do with the problems that young Tunisian immigrants who have sought asylum in France are facing. I know a fair amount about the struggles that many immigrants have encountered in France and the tension within French society that has developed as immigration has escalated. I also know that there has been a fair amount of upheaval in Tunisia in recent months, so I would guess that the increase in the number of Tunisians seeking asylum in France might have something to do with that. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">
 * <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">3.4: Annotated Article - During Reading Strategy **

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__<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Article Summary __ <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">This article, taken from TV5MONDE (6/25/2011), details the plight of exiled Tunisians in Paris and their very uncertain future in France. It discusses their journey to France by way of an Italian island, their lack of legal stature, and the response, or lack thereof, of the French government.

<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">__Comments__ <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">I feel like the Wordle gave me a pretty good sense of what the article was about, but the details in the article painted a much more vivid and multi-dimensional picture of the situation. I found the annotation process to be an extremely helpful way to identify the key points in the article and to find the vocabulary necessary for a deeper understanding of the issues presented in it. I always encourage my students to annotate as they read, and I think that most of them find that it boosts their comprehension tremendously.


 * <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">3.5: Top Five Vocabulary - After Reading Activity **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> 1) Réfugiés de Lampedusa - Name for the Tunisian refugees currently in limbo in Paris. They came by way of the small Italian island of Lampedusa. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> 2) squatter - A bit of franglais here - to squat or occupy without legal permission. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> 3) les migrants - People from another place. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> 4) sans-abri - Homeless (literally "without shelter") <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> 5) la révolution de jasmin - The Jasmine Revolution, the name given by the Western media to the events of late 2010-early 2011 in Tunisia. Jasmine is the national flower of Tunisia.