Planning for Student Learning

Teachers sometime invite me to meet with them to discuss various issues that we face. Today I was invited to have coffee with two teachers. One of the teachers is changing grade levels and is at a loss as to where to start planning for her ELA block. On the kitchen table there is the Louisiana Department of Education (LDOE) Guidebook, Learnzillion (LDOE Guidebook 2.0) on the laptop, standards, teacher-pay-teacher products, and coffee.

We spent time talking about what lay in front of us, but the question remained how do we start planning? Honestly, there are more resources than teachers have time to use or sometimes even view. After lots of discussion we came up with this process:

Examine the assessments, determine what learning MUST take place. Label each item with a standards.

Write the target standards on a sticky note.

Put the sticky note in a place that remains visible throughout the unit or module. It is critical that the teacher and students know what learning (target standards) must take place.

Use the following questions to plan.

1. What do you want your students to learn?

Examine the Learnzillion lesson to determine if the target standard is being addressed. If it is not addressed, check the LDOE Guidebook. This is the place to look for explicit instruction (the one thing you want your students to learn).

This is a starting point for your instructional sequence for teaching the target standards.

2. How will you know they learned it?

Within the lesson plans underline opportunities for students to show their learning of the target standards. Look at activities that follow the explicit instruction, writing prompts, and discussion questions. This is called informal assessments and should guide instruction.

3. What will you do if they already know it?

There are teaching opportunities and activities for small groups and independent learning in the LDOE Guidebook. Select opportunities for students that already know the skill or task to extend their academic reach. Data from #2 will let you know who has or has not mastered a standard.  If there are no opportunities within the Guidebook, consult a list of Bloom’s Taxonomy verbs or a Depth of Knowledge chart and create an opportunity to use the skill or task at a more advanced level. Remember- hard and more does not equal rigor. Also, assigning the student(s) as a peer tutor is a cop out.

4. What are you going to do for the students who don’t get it?

By the fourth week of school you know the students that will need additional support. Look carefully at the standard, task, or skill and ask yourself what is it that a student must be able to do to master what is asked. Think about prerequisites. Provide the student with the learning that is needed to be successful. This is the perfect time for small group, teacher-led instruction.

Once instruction is completed, reflect on the lesson and student work to determine if learning took place. This process should focus on learning rather than covering the material.

Grab this FREE poster to remind yourself of the questions that you should be asking during the planning process:

Planning Question FREEBIE Poster

Vocabulary for comprehension and composition

For years I have recommend the book Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction by Isabel Beck, Margaret McKeown, and Linda Kucan to teachers of all grade levels. It is a great resource for learning how to teach vocabulary as well as how to choose which words to teach. Over the summer, I decided to reread it. As an educator who loves learn new things and share, I loaned my book out and it was never returned. So, I had no choice but to order a new one. This time I ordered the second edition.

The second edition is a page turner. (I am a nerd!) It may be because I am in a different place in my professional career or that I had tunnel vision when I read the original book, but I missed a big idea. There is more to choosing words to teach than I initially thought.

What remains the same is that we should not choose words just because we think students do not know them. As is outlined on page 28, words should be chosen based on importance and utility, conceptual understanding, and instructional potential.  Put simply, we choose words that we can use over and over again, words that are important to understand the big idea of the text, and words that can be used in other academic areas. I have preached this more times than can be imagined, but I missed a piece.

The critical piece that I missed was that we must consider “the utility of words for use in both comprehension and composition as the priority” (p.25). Students need words that serve them well in building their comprehension of a text as well as creating relevant compositions. Word knowledge is needed for both reading and writing. I have been missing the writing component!

The average student has a lot of words they are able to use and understand in their oral language. Students are much more limited in the words they can use to express themselves in writing. It is specific, content rich words that create an exact meaning. Word knowledge extends beyond processing word meaning to producing and expressing a thought. Attention to choosing and teaching words that will both increase reading comprehension and develop student writers must be given equal attention.

Sonya Louviere, Ed.D.

Why do we teach...

One summer afternoon my daughter asked me to review a comprehension kit. We talked about the purpose of the kit, how and when to use it, and why it is important to have kit. After our conversation I asked her, “Why do we teach genre?”  She responded with, “I don’t know, why?” Here is where I used the tough love of a mother; I told her that if she didn’t know why she is teaching something then she should not be teaching it.  I asked her to think on it and give me a call later. As I was getting into my car she said, “So they can understand”.  I responded with, “That is a weak answer”. This has been a common response when I've asked teachers this very question.

I too have pondered on why we teach what we teach.  Many years ago I was leaving a school after conducting a presentation on comprehension and I asked myself a similar question, “Why do we teacher character, setting, problem, and solution?” I went home and started reading and thinking about it. Here is what I have concluded.

Different genres have a different story structure. For example, narrative text has character, setting, problem, and solution; whereas fairy tales’ structure includes once upon a time, good vs. evil, and magic. Readers depend on the genre’s structure to predict, anticipate, ask questions, summarize, etc. By knowing the structure of the genre, one is more prepared to use their reading strategies to get to deep understanding as well as it provides them with a tool to interact with the story.

To support student learning consider:

·       Creating a bulletin board with the student illustrating the structures of genre’s read.

·       Asking questions that rely on them to use the structure to answer.

·       Having students predict based on the genre structure.

·       Have students identify the genre based on the structure.

·       Discuss and model for students how the genre structure supports deep understanding.

Structure provides a map (conceptual understanding) for new learning. You may even consider teaching the structures of genre as a scaffolding technique.

Sonya Louviere

Aha Moments

For years we as teachers do things in the classrooms based on how we were taught or from our college years.  BUT, then there is a time in one's career when you know you ARE a professional educator. I can remember those times as clear as day.

My first realization was when the instructional assistant (A.K.A. curriculum coordinator) asked me why I chose the book I was using. I sucked the air out of the room as I did not know how to answer. I never again was caught off guard because I began questioning myself. By doing so, I got to know my students' strengths and weaknesses better and was able to effectively plan according to their needs and the learning goal.

The second moment  was when I participated in a book study being conducted by the Lafayette chapter of the Louisiana Association of Reading (LRA). We read, discussed, and tried out instructional strategies. Giving myself the power of my own learning gave me the confidence to be reflective on my teaching practices. From then on I planned for and delivered instruction that would impact student learning.

"Educators must make a change every 5-7 years so that they continue to learn." -unknown principal from Lafayette Parish, 2002

What actions have you taken to move yourself towards being a professional educator? Let me hear about your aha moments.

Sonya Louviere

Preparing to Go Back to School

Recently, I walked into a discount clothing store in search of a bargain for my back to school wardrobe. I walked around for a few minutes then had to leave. On my drive to the next store I reflected on why I could not stay in the store and came to the conclusion that I was overwhelmed by the clutter. The chaos was too much for me to process and I was unable to focus on my task.

This scenario may be how some of our students feel in our classrooms with commercially produced posters, letters, words, and bulletin boards stapled, glued, and taped on every inch of the walls. Teachers spend hours and hours putting these thing up every summer and often times they are not taken down until the following spring, if ever.

Have you ever walked into your house and noticed something was moved, an object you never paid attention to until it changed? We get desensitized by things in our environment until there is a change. The same happens in the classroom. Again, teachers spend a good chunk of their summer time posting things on their walls. It makes for a print rich environment for the first couple of weeks of school but soon students stop noticing.

Here is a list of things that can be done in the classroom before school starts:

• Organize teaching materials
• Clean out the filing cabinet
• Put up the structure of the word or sound wall, calendar math, etc.
• Create areas of learning in the classroom
• Rearrange desk for optimal learning
• Get rid of store-bought items you did not use last year
• Take the rare chance to dust

Focus on zones of learning, processes and procedures, and classroom management when getting your classroom ready for the first day of school.

Once the classroom is organized and set up for learning, post materials that support learning on your wall as it is being taught. Because it is new, they will pay more attention to it. In addition, students will take ownership in learning material that is made with them or in front of them. Student learning material will support success far more than what one buys at the teacher store.

As a bonus, spend your money on those back to school outfits.

Sonya Louviere