Information on Inquiry Project

For the inquiry project I wanted to choose a topic of great interest to me. With the time that I have spent in a classroom setting I have grown to thoroughly enjoy the time teachers devote to singing songs with the children. I have found it interesting to see what types of songs that teachers will choose and whether or not it correlates to the material that the children should be learning. I began to ask myself, Are these songs even beneficial to the children? Even though the children appear to enjoy this time of day, are they actually developing any skills from this method? I knew that with the inquiry project I would be able to research my questions and discover if songs would be an aspect that I should implement in my future classroom; in particular I was interested in determining if there is a relationship between songs and the development of reading skills. Is the relationship positive? I was pleased of the information that I discovered on this topic.

For the research portion of this project, I began by referring to internet resources. I was surprise with the broad range of information that I found. The first article that I came across was titled; Singing to children may help development of language skills by Amelia Hill. I thought this article was interesting because it lays a solid foundation for my main topic. In order to read, one must first have developed language skills and this article provides evidence how songs can help with these skills. “Parents should sing to their children every day to avoid language problems developing in later life,” (Hill, 2011, p.1). The article provides evidence of how songs and music in general can help children begin to develop skills that they will need for the future. For example, singing traditional lullabies and nursery rhymes to infants can help with educational success as they grow and develop; it can also help with the overall emotional wellbeing. By singing songs to children at such an early age prepare their ear, voice, and brain for language; songs can aid children’s ability to be able to think in words. Not only does singing to children benefit them, but singing having them sing along can also be beneficial; this will help with the development of both sides of their brain. When children begin to enter nursery school most have inadequate language and difficulties with communicating, mainly because their parents have not helped them to develop these particular skills. The author believes that this may be transformed through music. “Children’s response to live music is different from recorded music,” she said. “Babies are particularly responsive when the music comes directly from the parent. Singing along with a parent is for the development of reciprocal communication” (Hill, 2011, p.2). The skills that children have the potential to develop early in life through songs can certainly help them with future skills, such as reading.

While investigating this topic I discovered quite a bit of research on music, in general, in the classroom. One article that I found to be beneficial was by Jackie Silberg and it was titled, The Importance of Music for Children. The article begins by providing some relevant background information to how music is linked to all cultures throughout history. Researchers have even discovered that these different types of music are connected to some of the deepest workings of the human brain. “Research has linked active music making with increased language discrimination and development, math ability, improved school grades, better-adjusted social behavior, and improvements in spatial-temporal reasoning, a cornerstone for problem solving” (Silberg, p.1). The article then asked, Why is music important for children? The author lists multiple reasons why music is so important, these reasons include: Music helps develop children’s self-esteem, it helps to develop their listening skills, music works with their math skills, it can help to stimulate brain connections, music relieves stress, it can make transitions easier, and it also encourages creativity in children. The most important benefit to music helping children that the article discussed, in my opinion, is how music has the power to develop children’s language and reading skills.

The next article that I found to be rather helpful came from Science Daily and it narrowed in on the issue of how songs can help children to improve on their reading skills. The article mentioned a previous article that had been issued in May of 2009 that had conducted a study on comparing children who had interaction with music often in school to students who did not. The children that were presented with music demonstrated superior cognitive performance in reading skills compared to the other group of children. The authors used the information obtained from this study to conduct research of their own. Joseph M. Piro and Camilo Ortiz, the authors, wanted to learn more about how exactly the presence of music can improve language and literacy. Based on their individual study they did find related discoveries to the study conducted in 2009. Piro and Ortiz determined that children exposed to music demonstrate significantly better performance on measures of their vocabulary as well as verbal sequencing. Not only is there a positive relation between music and literacy skills, but the authors also found positive connections between music and linguistic, mathematical, and spatial domains in children. However, the authors were most fascinated with vocabulary and verbal sequencing. According to the authors these terms are, “cornerstone components in the continuum of literacy development and a window into the subsequent successful acquisition of proficient reading and language skills such as decoding and reading comprehension” (Piro and Ortiz, 2008, p.1). In the study that the authors conducted in order to reach these conclusions, allowed them to work with second grade students and ultimately they concluded after extensive research that the children receiving more music exposure had developed more thorough reading skills than their peers.

Another research article that I found conducted a study on third grade students. The author of this article worked with third grade students that were behind in their reading levels. “Teaching reading through songs improved the students’ accuracy, phrasing, and fluency in reading, she said. The same way a song sticks in memory long after facts have faded, the words connected to melodies stayed with the young readers,” (Munro, p. 2). The author makes a wonderful reference between songs being an anchor that a child can hold onto as they are thrown into an ocean of words. Not only did Munro find improvement with reading, she also found that these children were reading with more expression and confidence, overall they appeared to want to read more. Munro strongly feels that this improvement is due to the rhythm that songs can provide. She also believes that music and reading go hand-in-hand, “While the rhythm, phrasing, and dynamics of music are helping children read better, the reading skills also may possibly improve musical learning-especially reading music-at the same time” (Munro, p. 2). Munro expresses that music should be used with teacher instruction because it grabs the children’s attention and keeps it.

As I continued to find more research on my topic, I wondered how exactly music might affect children with special needs. I found an article that answered this question, it is an article by Judy Barker and it is titled, Singing and music as aids to language development and its relevance for children with Down syndrome. The author of this article, who is a teacher and actually has a child with Down Syndrome, states that music is vital for children with learning disabilities to reinforce basic skills, for example. She goes on to state how important songs are because they have the ability to stimulate auditory discrimination. It can also help with the development of their imaginations and their ability to express themselves and their ideas through words, music, dance, and gestures. For children with disabilities, singing can be used to reinforce academic learning in several ways, such as repetition. “Singing enables children to repeat words and phrases in a far more enjoyable way than just speech alone can provide” (Barker, 1999, p.133). Singing songs can also be good modals for how children should flow with the words that they are reading. “Song also contain rhymes, and recognizing and using them gives an essential skill which children with language difficulties need to absorb” (Barker, 1999, p.133). Singing can also help to develop phonological awareness because you must sing every syllable with the musical notes; without even noticing children will begin to identify onset and rime. Songs are also a great way for teachers to introduce new words and concepts to aid language development.

After gathering all of my information, I began to think how exactly that I would like to present this to the class. I stumbled upon a website that I know will be extremely helpful as future teachers. When going to the website you are to click on a certain subject that you might be working on and that will lead you to a page that provides examples of songs based on an area of content that corresponds with the particular subject. For example, on the main page you decide to click ‘Language Arts’ this takes you to another page where you decide to choose the song that is about comprehension because you are currently working on comprehension strategies. This is an excellent resource because instead of being presented with the words to the song and having to make up your own tune you can actually hear each song being sung. After conducting my research and learning about all of the benefits that singing songs can have on the development of children’s reading skills, I will definitely incorporate songs into my classroom schedule and I feel that this website is an excellent tool to help me get started.

June 28th Reading

Before reading the Running Records book by Marie M. Clay I was unaware of what Running Records actually are; now after reading, I have gained a better understanding. I feel that I will not be fully comfortable with this task though until I actually get in a classroom and practice. However, Running Records do seem to be a vital tool in helping teachers understand the progress of beginning readers. I also think that it is useful that teachers can use Running Records on both simple texts and more advanced texts. It was beneficial that the book advised to seek help from colleagues as well as taking some training sessions; this book was helpful as a beginning tool to learn because of all the information and examples that it provided. I certainly do not feel 100% comfortable with Running Records, but I feel that this reading has provided me with some basic knowledge of the task that will help me in the future.

I feel that the article, Matching texts and readers: Leveling early reading materials for assessment and instruction by Rog and Burton was interesting because I feel that it definitely built upon existing knowledge for me. It is helpful because it provides the reader with what types of texts are actually appropriate for students as they reach various stages during reading development and the authors also provide a criteria for determining the reading levels; this information will certainly be useful to me in my future classroom. I feel that the 10-step leveling system for beginning reading instruction, using these five considerations: vocabulary, size and layout of print, predictability, illustration support, and complexity of concepts is very beneficial. Vocabulary is very important to consider for the level of difficulty, for example teachers should determine the number of words on a page. It is also important for teachers to consider the appearance of the text and how readable it actually is when determining a book's level. Teachers should next determine how predictable a book is based on all literary patterns. It is also important to consider how well the illustrations support the text when evaluating a children's book. The final aspect to consider is how well the story line can relate to the reader. I feel that I will use these five considerations when evaluating books for my classroom. The ten levels also provided by the authors of this article will be helpful when determining what type of books I will use in my future classroom. The article then elaborated on reading strategies for each of these reading levels, which I feel will be beneficial with future reading instruction.

I also enjoyed reading the article, Looking inside classrooms: Reflecting on the "how" as well as the "what" in effective reading instruction. The article mentions the importance of small-group instruction, however the majority of teachers use whole-group of instruction for the majority of the time. The article begins however by clearly stating, "more accomplished primary-grade teachers provided more small-group than whole-group instruction, elicited high levels of pupil engagement, preferred coaching over telling in interacting with students, and engaged students in more higher level thinking related to reading" (Taylor, et al., 2002, p.270). However, based on the study that the authors conducted, they learned several different lessons about effective teaching practices. I had never considered the importance of small-group instruction over whole-group. I feel that often teachers conduct whole-group instruction because it is easier, however teachers should educate themselves first on which type is more beneficial. I feel that after reading this article I will implement small-group instruction into my classroom as much as possible. This article is helpful because it informs the reader of how important it actually is to have knowledge of the proper teaching techniques to ensure that every child can reach his or her full potential.

I enjoyed reading Allington's article The schools we have. The schools we need. because of the comparisons that the author makes; I found them to be quite interesting and surprising. I enjoyed learning about these comparisons because I feel that these are topics that teachers actually confuse. However, I feel that if teachers first assess their students and get to know them then there might not be confusion between these topics. I thought one of the comparisons that was most interesting was the relationship between understanding vs. remembering. "In our classes and on our tests we have focused children's attention primarily on remembering what they have read and routinely underemphasized facilitating or evaluating their understanding" (Allington, 1994, p.23). Students are more likely to be asked a simple question and to be assigned work that requires copying than they are to be asked to summarize and to be assigned a type of activity that asks them to synthesize information. Instead of focusing on comprehension we are using question-answering types of strategies, which is not effective. Children do not need to be asked questions all of the time; instead teachers should provide opportunities for children to engage with books and stories that they have previously read. It is important for teachers to educate themselves on how to make these improvements in order to help their students reach their full potential.

June 23rd Reading

My article was titled The Importance of Guided Reading: The Significant Benefits of Guided Reading & Specific Instructions on How to Use Guided Reading to Help Your Child or Student Advance Reading Skills. It began by giving a simple definition of guided reading and how adults can be effective in helping children to develop their skills; the key is to provide guidance. The article goes on to tell how important guided reading can be; research proves that not only can guided reading impact word recognition, but it can also help with fluency and comprehension. I thought this was interesting because it guided reading seems to combine a lot of the topics that we have been talking about in class. The article is also beneficial because it then goes on to provide some strategies for conducting guided reading, such as instructing students to read carefully as you have them read out loud to you. They also suggest that the minimum time this should be conducted is twenty minutes a day, but of course the more you can read the better. It also suggests to provide positive feedback to the children, which I feel is essential for effective guided reading. The article also tells some ways to help the children expand their vocabulary while doing guided reading, which I felt would be very useful in the classroom. Next the article provides other tips and suggestions such as, selecting high interest books for guided reading and make it more enjoyable by reading the book together, however you should also incorporate the students classroom reading material for guided reading. Ultimately I felt this article was very useful and I am glad that I can refer back to it when working on guided reading with my future students.

June 21st Reading

Before doing the readings on comprehension for this week, I tried to think back to when I was in elementary school to determine if I remembered learning about comprehension. The only time that I could recall working on this topic in elementary school was for TCAP practice. I can remember my teachers working on comprehension but just in relation of how to mark the correct answer in the fastest time for the test. Today I have trouble comprehending some of the reading that I do and often find myself having to reread; I wonder if this would have been different had my teachers taught me comprehension strategies, like the ones mentioned in the readings.

I was shocked to learn that even though we have been made aware of how important teaching comprehension is, teachers are still not teaching it in the classroom. I found the readings to be extremely useful and they have informed me on just how to implement comprehension instruction in the classroom. All three articles mentioned the different areas that make up comprehension. In the article by Laura Pardo I learned how help children to become successful comprehenders by teaching decoding skills, helping students to build fluency, building and activating their background knowledge, teaching vocabulary words, motivating students, and engaging children in a personal response to a text. This can all be accomplished by providing children with interesting books and taking time out of the day for regular reading times, whether they be independent or in a group setting. Teachers should also provide explicit instruction of comprehension strategies and use multiple strategies. An important takeaway from this article was the Gradual Release of Responsibility model, I feel this is a good strategy to implement in the classroom.

In the article, Kindergartners Can Do It, Too! Comprehension Strategies for Early Readers, I thought it was interesting how Mrs. Hope's class could distinguish between a connection to the story, a visualization, and meaning construction. I feel that this approach would definitely increase children's comprehension skills. I feel this would require proper instruction in order to help children be successful. I also liked the different comparisons that Mrs. Hope made, such as comparing schema to a picture of a human head surrounded by ideas. I also thought it was useful how she got the children to begin thinking about visualizations and asking questions.

I found the article, The Comprehension Matrix: A Tool for Designing Comprehension Instruction and chapter seven from the text to have the most useful examples of how to implement effective comprehension instruction in the classroom. I feel that the Comprehension Matrix is an essential tool to use to determine prereading, during reading, and postreading activities for your class. Planning activities like these will help children to excel in comprehension. The Comprehension Matrix is something that I plan to use in my future classroom in order to help my future students be successful when comprehending what they have read. I also found some examples while reading the chapter in the Cunningham and Allington text that I would like to implement in my classroom. I would like to use the Oprah Winfrey interview; I feel that this is a great way to get children to practice literate conversations while they also practice comprehension skills because they must remember what happened to their particular character in the story in order to answer the questions. I feel this interview activity would also be engaging for the children. Another activity that I feel would be engaging and meaningful in the beach ball example. I think that this is an excellent strategy for helping students to practice retelling stories and comprehend what they learned from the story as well. Ultimately I feel that comprehension skills are important and should be given more attention during classroom instruction.

June 16th Reading

The readings for this week on vocabulary and read-alouds are beneficial to us as future teachers. Each article, and in the text as well, allowed me to gain further insight into these topics. I began by reading the Hart and Risley article and was intrigued by their study. I was aware, before doing the readings, that there is a gap between the amount of words children know based on their socioeconomic status; however I was shocked to to learn how drastic these numbers actually were. I immediately began thinking of ways to improve these numbers and after reading the other two articles and Chapter 6 from the textbook, I know feel that I have gained more knowledge on how to better the vocabulary experience for children.

In the Vocabulary Lessons article, Blachowicz and Fisher stated four practices that teachers should implement in their classroom in order to provide a comprehension approach to vocabulary development. They are: develop word awareness and love of words through word play, deliver explicit, rich instruction to develop important vocabulary, build strategies for independence, and engage students actively with a wide range of books. I have learned from this article the importance of creating environments that offer children proper resources and materials that enable them to play with words. Also when providing instruction of certain vocabulary activities it is important that a teacher select, teach, activate, and revisit; this is a modal that I plan to use in my future classroom. Inviting children to become independent readers is another strategy that I would like to implement in my classroom; the article stated one way this could be achieved was by instructing the children on how to properly use a dictionary. Child can only become independent readers in the classroom if they are provided with a wide range of reading activities, such as book clubs.

I also found the Lane and Allen article to be rather interesting. I like how Ms. Barker provided different classroom jobs to her students; I have seen this done in other classrooms, however I do feel that Ms. Barker took this concept a step further. I feel that it was beneficial that she began by using words that the children knew to name the various jobs, for example weather watcher. In order to expand their vocabulary the teacher challenged the children by replacing weather watcher with meteorologist. I think it is important to first learn basic concepts of words by practicing them and providing the children with repetition opportunities and then build on that knowledge. Ms. Riva did a similar concept to this with the work that she did with her class on adjectives. Both examples have inspired me to not just only teach the simple words when working on vocabulary with children.

The chapter in the text provides several examples of how to present effective vocabulary activities to a class. I think the section that described bringing objects from home is a simple way to prompt children to discuss with one another and expand their vocabulary. I also would like to incorporate teaching unfamiliar words from the teacher read-alouds into my classroom one day. It was also interesting how the text suggested to invite the children to locate their own words they think the class may not know from a book they read on their own; this is a great way to get each child involved in the learning process. The book also mentions how to display these words throughout the classroom. Ultimately each of these activities are important and should be incorporate into the classroom in order to expand children's vocabularies.

June 14th Reading

The reading for this week was related to phonemic awareness.  Last semester in my Child and Family Studies 353 class, we spent a large portion of the semester learning about phonemic awareness.  As a result I thought I would be able to breeze through these readings, however I was wrong.  I gained new knowledge and a better understanding for how important phonemic awareness is.  Phonemic awareness is a complex term that refers to how we can understand how child can become readers.  The Yopp and Yopp article began by informing the reader how, at times, phonemic awareness can cause confusion when trying to decide how exactly it should be addressed in a classroom.  Teachers can understand the process by first gaining knowledge of its two superordinate constructs, which are phonological awareness and metalinguistics.  The article provides three steps that a teacher should follow in order to have successful phonemic instruction: call for phonemic awareness activities that are child appropriate, phonemic awareness instruction should be deliberate and purposeful, and it must also be viewed by educators as only one part of a much broader literacy program. 

I also thought the article made an important point when it stated that there should not be a specific amount of time for phonemic awareness intsruction; I believe it should be the quality of the instruction presented by the teacher instead of how much time the teacher spends educating the children.  The Yopp and Yopp article provides a great explanation of how to ensure the teacher is presenting an effective quality of insturction, for example teachers should provide students with a linguistically rich environment.  I also really enjoyed reading about the various activities that the article mentioned.  My favorite was the twenty kids have hats activity because I feel this is a great way to get the children involved while still educating them.  This specific article stated, "phonemic awarenss supports reading development only if it is part of a broader program" (Yopp and Yopp, 2000, p. 142).  The next article by Kathleen Clark supported this statement by discussing the concept of coaching.

"Coaching is a highly effective instructional technique in which teachers craft instructional cues the enable students to apply their developing reading skills and knowledge of strategies as they attempt to complete a task" (Clark, 2004, p. 440).  I feel this statement sums up the article, however the article also mentions teachers' cues.  There are two broad types of these cues: general cues to prompt thought and more focused cues to prompt specific action.  I feel that both of these types are important depending on the circumstance.  I was confused by these terms at first, however I was able to completely understand each cue after reading the examples that the author provided.  The article is also helpful because it provides a clear understanding of how teachers can prepare to coach children; the information that I have learned from this article will be extremely useful as I begin to teach.

The chapter in the book also provides a clear understanding of how to teach children about phonics and spelling patterns.  I enjoyed reading about the activities the book suggests to use in order to help children decode certain words.  I feel that guess the covered word activity is a simple activity teachers can do that will have a large impact.  I also felt that the making words lesson is an activity that I will use in my classroom; not only will it help the children to learn, but I also feel that they will find it enjoyable to try and guess the secret word.  My favorite activity that the book mentioned was the activity that is based off of Wheel of Fortune.  I used to watch this TV show all the time and think it would be a great way to get children involved and to have fun while learning.  Even though I had previously learned about phonemic awareness, I have now learned even more from the readings that we were presented with.  I have also learned several new activities that I plan to implement in my future classroom.

Instructional Activities for Fluency

http://www.teachingheart.net/readerstheater.htm

This website gives several good examples for reader's theater scripts.

June 9th Reading

Before doing the readings assigned for this week, I was not aware of the term 'fluency readers.'  This reading has broadened my horizons and ultimately made me realize a new aspect of learning how to read.  In the first article that I read discussed the one-minute fluency assessments; this was also the first time that I have heard about this term.  I do not remember doing these types of assessments when I was in elementary school; I do however remember during first grade our teacher would take time out of the day for a small group of us to read to her once a week, and even though she did write some things down about what she observed, I do not believe I was participating in a one-minute fluency assessment.

This article has allowed me to have mixed feelings on this particular assessment, however in my opinion the negatives outweight the positives unfortunatley.  I do understand that it is a good tool to help assess which students may be at risk for reading difficulty, however what I took away from the article is that there is not one specific way to determine this.  In the article various researchers educated the reader on their own definitions of fluency, and these definitions were all different.  The Literacy Dictionary states that fluency consists of four components: accuracy, rate or speed, prosody, and comprehension.  Where this definition is made of several different aspects, Torgesen argued that fluency is only measured by two components: accuracy and rate.  I agree with the Literacy Dictionary definition because I feel that several different components need to be measured in order to determine how accurately a child is fluent in reading.

The article then discussed fluency as a deeper view; this part of the article is where I found myself agreeing the most.  I feel that how we understand a child's fluency should not be narrow, but instead broad.  I also feel that by assessing a child for 60 seconds is not allowing the teacher to fully determine how well the child can read; like the article says, the child needs to develop endurance when reading.  I do feel that endurance can be worked on by having the child read longer texts for longer periods of time.  Even though I am not in full agreeance with the one-minute fluency assessment, I do realize that some teachers may not have a choice based on the school that they are teaching at.  These teachers should, however, educate themselves fully on these types of assessments.  The article provides the reader with two steps to follow in order to ensure they are taking away the most from the one-minute assessments.  The reader is also instructed on what exactly to do to instruct the child on fluency and endurance.  In my opinion, one of the most important suggestions the reading provided was to reread books.

In the Creating Fluent Readers article, it stated that rereading helps children to develop automaticity and prosodic reading.  "Students need to hear what fluent reading sounds like and how fluent readers interpret text with their voices" (Rasinski, p. 48).  By the teacher reading the story to the children, modeling prosodic reading, the children will then develop prosodic reading skills as they reread the text.  I feel that teachers should also have the children reread a story, because as I learned from the article, in order for children to develop fluency in their reading, they must practice.  "Research indicates that repeated readings lead not only to improvement in decoding, reading rate, prosodic reading, and comprehension of passages that the reader has not previously seen" (Rasinski, p. 48).  I also felt the article presented several good ideas that teachers can implement in their classroom, for example turning their room into a poetry cafe in order to help the children develop their fluency in reading. 

The reading from the Cunningham text, Chapter 4, also provides teachers with great ideas in order to increase reading fluency.  I like the idea of turning a story that the whole class finds enjoyable into a play by using the Readers' Theatre format; I know as a child I was always amused by acting out my favorite movies or by playing pretend.  I feel this is a great way to help children develop fluency while being creative and engaging in books.  I also think that the sections on the choral and echo reading are useful, and made me think back to the video that we watched previously in class where the teacher was doing just this while using a big book to ensure that every child could follow along. 

The section on recorded reading was also interesting.  Last semester one of my classes actually had to pick a book and do a recording of it for a Head Start classroom.  Looking back I realize how much emphasis I put on being expressive, I did not think that this could help children increase their fluency skills.  I also like the idea of recording you and your students as you read a book together; I feel that this makes the children feel important to know that they all had a part in creating the recording.  I also find the idea of the word wall to be helpful, and feel that putting the words on different colors of paper would be extremely helpful to the children.  However, I think that a word wall is only helpful if you use it; by creating the word wall together and using it throughout the day, for example while singing a song that incorporates the words, the children increase their reading fluency with the words that may be giving them the most difficulty.

This reading has definitely educated me on the topic of reading fluency.  There are so many different aspects that make up how a child learns to read and become fluent.  For example, I never considered how a child learns to read with expression, where to pause in a sentence for emphasis, or reading with the correct punctuation.  As I began to read the articles, I became overwhelmed that I would not know how to instruct my future students in the classroom on reading fluency.  However, I now feel more prepared and also have gathered several interesting ideas that will increase fluency in my future classroom.