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Visual Strategies: Semantic Mapping

A minimum of one-paragraph stating why you chose the strategy you selected with an emphasis on how you think this strategy will benefit your CLD students (focus on the linguistic, academic, cognitive, and sociocultural dimensions of the CLD student biography).

I like this strategy because it creates links between new vocabulary terms and past knowledge. Basically it will help CLD students in term of its cognitive and their biography as well. Students can see links between the concept and the knowledge teacher represents to them. The links are various and multiples so basically it will help them to associate it with their thinking and knowledge.

Through visualization, actually CLD students exposing their ability to make inference by using images. This actually can lead to discussion among students, thus it is good for his sociocultural dimension and cognitive thinking skills by reasoning out their thoughts to their friends. Visualized create meaning to CLD students especially those who are visual learner. It helps them to construct their own comprehension.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how you introduced the strategy (was it modeled as a whole group, in a small group, pairs, etc.).

There are various ways to introduce it, firstly, it can be initiated by discussions/conversations when teacher ask questions related to words and students answer. From the answers, teachers can make links to the words; it means other ideas that have sort of relations to the words will be written to see the linking/connections.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was implemented (in what ways was the strategy practiced and applied by the students during the lesson).

The strategy is implemented in order to create hypothetical thinking in students’ minds. Teacher must know how to make connections to what are they going to read and study. Comprehension can be developed through elaboration of the links to students past knowledge.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was wrapped up at the end of the lesson (what was done to conclude the strategy with the students).

Teacher will celebrate the linking made by students and related it to the text they are going to read, as well as the past lessons.

? A minimum one-paragraph summary of the impact the activity had on your ELL students as a result of the adaptations.

The more links students provide, it will assist understanding better as long as teacher can make sense and relations to it. Post discussions will assist understanding. It opens up for discussion that I think can lower the students’ affective filters.

? What recommendations would you have for implementing this strategy in the future (e.g., what additional adaptations or materials would you use to further enhance the strategy for CLD students).
I am thinking that we can refine semantic map by stressing it as a graphic structure, where it can be a place to organize students’ thoughts. It is because visualization can interact with reader’s background knowledge to create vivid pictures in our mind. This is authentic as it is developed by those who can see the vivid pictures in their mind from their own perspective that is highly influenced by culture( CLD students)

Metacognitive Strategies: In My Head

A minimum of one-paragraph stating why you chose the strategy you selected with an emphasis on how you think this strategy will benefit your CLD students (focus on the linguistic, academic, cognitive, and sociocultural dimensions of the CLD student biography).

I like this strategy because it is very useful for limited English speaking skills. They will have guideline before they speak and it is crucial to develop self confident. Not just that, they can relay what they have by not specifically using words and sentences but using pictures as well including using their native languages. I like it because I can know individual students’ understanding as CLD students bring rich information pertaining to their culture and knowledge that we don’t have access to it and need to tap into.

This strategy is interesting to me as metacognitive strategy can be used in showing/reflecting comprehension of students. Students show their understanding through putting his/her self in the situation, for example, reflecting the drawing that they made and perceive it as themselves. I can understand the story of Pocahontas because I have a spirit like Pocahontas.

If the reader can/show some reflection upon their readings by specifically having inner conversation during reading, this might be jotted down in their note books. Not just that, this can be very obvious if students clarify their reading with teacher but asking/requesting the lesson that they should get from their reading materials.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how you introduced the strategy (was it modeled as a whole group, in a small group, pairs, etc.).

First will be distributing the handouts and when they finish reading, ask them to write/draw what they are thinking. Tell the students that they can use their native language to record their thoughts.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was implemented (in what ways was the strategy practiced and applied by the students during the lesson).

The strategy is implemented to know students realize on their own thinking. This is to develop good readers that monitor their thinking and understanding. This is to build their comprehension by their ability to verbalize their thoughts aloud while reading. Students will be thought to unleash anything that they have in mind without having fear that it might be discriminated.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was wrapped up at the end of the lesson (what was done to conclude the strategy with the students).

After the students explaining their thinking verbally/through writing, teacher will comments on students’ thoughts. Teacher will make comparisons with the students ‘thoughts and with others as well, to enrich variety of views as there are wide ranges of cultures and background experiences of CLD students.

? A minimum one-paragraph summary of the impact the activity had on your ELL students as a result of the adaptations.
It’s a good activity as students can freely put their thoughts on the materials that they read. They can express it through writing/ by drawing pictures and at the same time get helps from paraprofessional to assist them in conveying the information and understanding that they have in minds.

? What recommendations would you have for implementing this strategy in the future (e.g., what additional adaptations or materials would you use to further enhance the strategy for CLD students).

Teacher can make it more meaningful by finding the texts according to students’ culture rather than the whole class share the same text.. Teacher must be aware that whatever responses that he/she receives either in form of oral or written responses, it is actually a reflection of how kids show/monitor their comprehension. It is good if teacher can get overall ideas of his/her responses(students) before giving comments/judgment.

Social Affective Strategies: Critical Questions

A minimum of one-paragraph stating why you chose the strategy you selected with an emphasis on how you think this strategy will benefit your CLD students (focus on the linguistic, academic, cognitive, and sociocultural dimensions of the CLD student biography).

I choose this strategy because I realize my CLD students can be determined either they are proficient readers or not from the questions they ask. This strategy includes as well activation of prior experience and academic background knowledge. It also involves interaction with peers to verify and elaborate their learning.

In term of academic and cognitive, this strategy is good for CLD students because they will get involved with the passage (cognitively). This will help them to activate their past learning/schemata to ensure they will react to passage actively. When it comes to linguistic, teacher must choose text/articles/story that has connections with their L1/culture so that they can make meaningful association/connections.

I notice as well through questioning, teacher can help them to organize thinking and responding it in writing. Through organizing their thinking, teacher can make use of visual thus it helps CLD students who learn best visually. By responding to their thoughts, they can be in groups and this will assist cross information/discussion transfer through friends.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how you introduced the strategy (was it modeled as a whole group, in a small group, pairs, etc.).

It can be done in a small group, after students finish reading the text, I will give the hand out and read them the questions there and ask any misunderstanding/confusion pertaining to the questions listed in the handout. I will explain them to write freely on what they think of the topic without having any fear to be evaluated as it does not involve any standardized measurements. I will stress to them that there is no right or wrong answer. I just need feedbacks.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was implemented (in what ways was the strategy practiced and applied by the students during the lesson).

First, the students have to ask questions to themselves to monitor their own understanding, they are going to jot down their thoughts on the hand outs given. Later, they are going to find their partner to see and compare each other responses.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was wrapped up at the end of the lesson (what was done to conclude the strategy with the students).

After they finish discussing their responses, I can ask them to share it with classroom. By doing this, they can compare different responses and listening to different answers. Not just that, I will share as well my responses towards the text.

I will tell them that when reading any text, they must be active reader and explaining to them that one of the criteria for active reading is by doing self reflection and checking on personal experiences.

? A minimum one-paragraph summary of the impact the activity had on your ELL students as a result of the adaptations.

In term of affective strategy, this activity is good as it develops mutual give and take of information and opinions between CLD students. As student can make relationship with the text that they read to their own experiences, this activity is meaningful.

? What recommendations would you have for implementing this strategy in the future (e.g., what additional adaptations or materials would you use to further enhance the strategy for CLD students).

I will allow them to write in their own languages (if they need to do that as to establish connection with their prism model elements). In this case, I need paraprofessional to help me. I can as well put them in same language pair to enhance the communication/information transfer, anyway, when it comes to sharing to classmates, they are going to use English. Though this strategy deals with social affective, but I can see it has deep impact to students’ cognitive as:
a) It teaches students to predict the key words, the story lines and establish connections with their previous knowledge.
b) If they can not make any connection, teacher can establish a new connection by partnering them with other students. Other students can help by explaining ( explaining as if in story retelling). This will also help them to lower their affective filters.
c) Students can make relationship with points and themes in the story in their mind. Comprehension will improve greater.

Cognitive Strategies: Story Retelling
A minimum of one-paragraph stating why you chose the strategy you selected with an emphasis on how you think this strategy will benefit your CLD students (focus on the linguistic, academic, cognitive, and sociocultural dimensions of the CLD student biography).

One of the important purposes for story retelling is that CLD students can benefits for comprehension and memory retention through interaction with students. Students can get into groups, thus helping them to interact with their friends and this is very helpful as they can extend ideas by communicating with their friends, changing ideas and in fact learning language by reflecting from their friends without jeopardizing their affective filters. Basically, story retelling is beneficial for social and academic development, which I already mentioned the positive impact it has towards students’ social skills and in term of academic development, CLD students can gain benefit because listening to story again, help CLD students to reconstruct their understanding/comprehension towards the story through putting the concepts that they read into their own words.

I notice kids that I plan to teach loves talking. He and his brother love discussing the activities that they do together with friends at school with me and sometimes asking me about the recent video games I play online. By having Story Retelling as one of my strategies for them, I can see what is happening inside their brains (their thinking), their understanding, especially their preferences over the texts that I bring to them. Not just that, I will have opportunity to engage with my critical thinking questions pertaining to the topic to assist their further understanding.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how you introduced the strategy (was it modeled as a whole group, in a small group, pairs, etc.).

I bring two different texts on the same topic. The texts have two different levels ; easy and difficult. Both of the texts related to Pyramid and Sphinx as both of them are from Egypt. I will give the easy texts first, when they are done reading, I will ask them questions pertaining to the text( main idea) and then ask them to story their experience/views as they are Egyptian.

They can choose from which aspects they want to tell me, maybe the history of pyramid, the scientific aspects or anything that captures their interest. From their stories, I will make connections with their readings.

Then from there, we are going to move on to the second texts which is more difficult. I will assist them with pictures and open ended questions to activate their thinking, this time, I will let them to refer to the text in order for them to understand and able to make connection between my questions and the texts.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was implemented (in what ways was the strategy practiced and applied by the students during the lesson).

I will know more about my students’ ability to comprehend text, so basically, I will ensure to put them together in the groups so that they can discuss first within their group members to exchange thoughts. If they want to tell in their native language, I think that will be fine. I will prepare paraprofessional to help me.As they are CLD students, it is not necessarily one to one questioning them; in fact, their group members can help assisting the story teller.

? A minimum one-paragraph description of how the strategy was wrapped up at the end of the lesson (what was done to conclude the strategy with the students).

I will wrap it up by doing summary of the texts, telling them what the text is all about. I will make corrections on misunderstandings pertinent to main ideas of the two texts. I will repeat the main ideas few times to ensure they listen and know what’s going on. I am expecting the answers/responses might be differences as it depends so much on students past knowledge and how they use their past knowledge to understand/construct the story again in their own words.

? A minimum one-paragraph summary of the impact the activity had on your ELL students as a result of the adaptations.

This activity will help teachers to identify the weaknesses in pronunciations that the students have. While speaking, teacher can listen to words that they utter, so it will be helpful to teacher because it provides plan for appropriate instructional designs and plans for remedy. Retelling provide significant amount of students’ understanding. Students view it meaningful because they will construct their own questions based on their schemata/past knowledge. It is authentic.
? What recommendations would you have for implementing this strategy in the future (e.g., what additional adaptations or materials would you use to further enhance the strategy for CLD students).

This can be done in group works. This will help to lower the affective filter of CLD students. Also, teacher must give students time to articulate/mentioning/explaining because sometimes CLD students are not familiar with the terms, but again through retelling, they can explain the concept very well. It is just that they need more time because they have to analyze their thinking first and then transferred to their L2.

Felicita’s Strategies In Teaching Reading: ( The videos can be seen at here under Literacy 786. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t416UlHAgNY&feature=channel_page)

The teacher using questioning strategies by asking related questions to students, plus providing photo to help the students. Before that, students were sit according to their reading groups. Felicita provided big cardboards that in the middle of the cardboards have photos taken from students previous reading. Please notice the teacher gives clear instruction including minutes and what should they do, this is to focus their attention and students will discuss pertaining to the topics and pictures. Teacher specifically mentioned, “You write what you see, what you know, you can label, you can draw, and I am giving you two minutes to do this.” This is meaningful for students as first, their affective filter level is low because they were grouping according to the reading group that makes them familiar with their friends. Regarding to the activity, nothing to be worried about as the activity is solely based on their previous learnings. The reading material itself is about ants which I assume is a common knowledge among CLD and Non CLD students.
Teacher focuses on students work, evaluating their work and focusing asking questions. Teacher can evaluate his students responses/understanding by repeatedly saying, “ I want you to write down your good thinking on the piece of paper.”Take notice as well teacher allows students to draw but at the same time reminding him to put his thinking on the photo. This I believe has elements of metacognitive in her teaching. In the bilingual classroom setting, teacher allows /using Spanish to help/ assisting bilingual student.Take notice the teacher herself explaining in Spanish especially when it is related to direction as it is mostly about playground language. The student himself arrived in United States not long time ago.
Later, the teacher asks the students to present and they do it in groups. Teacher uploads all the students’ work and pastes it so that everyone can see and discuss their works. Prior to that, groups will move from one group to another to view others’ works. They can comment and discuss as well as ask questions to respected groups.After that, students discussing their works while teacher observe and listen and correcting misconceptions that might arise. After that, teacher reviews/explaining what they learn and at the same asking questions to expand the thoughts and concepts that students already learn.
Teacher now moves on to second strategy on teaching reading/vocab. Every student was given a word. This strategy is to enhance students’ vocab. Students were given vocabulary quilt activity. Teacher gave instruction what they should do with the word that they were given. They will use the book and the word, finding/giving the definition, finding the word in the book, construct their own sentences using it and lastly draw pictures. While students completing this activity, again, Teacher provides questioning strategies to students, guiding them what to do, letting the students use the book to refer.
In conclusion, Felicita uses various strategies incorporating her reading lesson to the students. I feel glad being able to observe this great teaching that reflect her deep understanding on Teaching Reading using Differentiated Literacies Strategies.