TechQuest
Draft 1
According to Dr. Yong Zhao, when it comes to technology integration in the classroom to address a particular problem, the problem has to be “mine.” One problem I have in my classroom that I would like to address is reading comprehension, more specifically reading comprehension when it comes to informational text. It just doesn’t stick in their brains and it drives me nuts! The majority of the students in my school are below, or significantly below grade level in the subject of Reading. We are constantly trying to improve in that area and midway through last year, we hired a Reading Specialist for our building. I teach fifth grade and have a class of thirty wonderful students. Ten out of the thirty are Special Ed and have IEP’s. Twenty out of thirty have failed at least one time. Obviously, I have many challenges When reading narrative text, for the most part, my students comprehend very well. They can summarize, retell, respond to questions, etc pretty good…probably because narrative text is more “fun” to read. However, in the areas of Science and Social Studies…not so good. I am a very hands-on, visual person and as I mentioned, love my Promethean Board, so of course I incorporate all of those aspects into all subjects especially Science and Social Studies. Often, I pair my students Hi/Low when we read from our Social Studies and/or Science texts. According to Brophy, pairs and small groups aide in student learning and achievement. I agree with Brophy, but I feel bad making all of my high level students read with low partners because they really want to do their own work and I can tell they get bothered always having to be a helper. Also, my low level students have to be able to read independently because obviously, they won’t always have a partner in the real world. Unfortunately, reading informational text is a very important life aspect and can’t be ignored or brushed aside. In conversation with other upper elementary teachers in my building, they share my struggles. Our main question is, “What can we do to increase informational text reading comprehension that our students will be on board with?” In 810, I designed many learning aides with Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel for this problem. In 811, I designed a StAIR for the Revolutionary War. The materials from both classes aide to an extent, but there is still something missing. For my TechQuest, I plan on incorporating Raz-Kids.com to aide in informational text reading comprehension.
Raz-Kids.com is a website for grades K-6 designed to improve students reading skills by allowing them to listen for modeled fluency, read for practice, record their reading, and check their comprehension through assignments and quizzes. Students can either choose books in the bookroom and read freely or read books assigned by their classroom teacher according to their DRA level. As students read fluently and comprehend, they earn stars. With the stars they earn, they can purchase parts to construct their own rocket and move up in the Raz Rocket Rankings. Raz-Kids.com also gives educators choices such as being able to listen to books read aloud, read with vocabulary and pronunciation support, read without support, and track student reading progress through assignments and quizzes over fluency and comprehension. There are many varieties of story types, genres, and themes to choose from. New books are added regularly and all stories are animated. This website must be purchased. The cost ranges between $50.00 and $70.00 per classroom. This tool can be accessed anywhere where there is internet access. Parents and guardians receive a letter giving an overview of the website. The letter also supplies them with a username and password for home use. According to “Teaching” by Jere Brophy, “students learn more when most available time is allocated to curriculum related activities” and he also stresses the importance of curriculum alignment “to create a cohesive programme for accomplishing instructional purposes and goals.” I plan to use this tool at least once a week during our scheduled computer time.
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Hi Alison,
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like you have a very challenging class. Empowering children to read is such a huge challenge in elementary school, particularly when they reach Grades 4-5 and are still struggling with reading. I have never heard of this particular program, although we have used a similar one before. I enjoyed reading your rationale and am very interested in how it pans out. The problem seems a perfect one to solve for your situation. My main thoughts when I was reading it is how many of your children have Internet access at home. Will there be children logging on at home and will there be children who are able to log on daily and use this? It would be so interesting to chart their progress against someone at the same level who is only using it once a week in the lab. Conducting the tech survey this week as part of 812 might also be interesting to find out about the kids IT habits outside of school. Once you start the program it might be interesting to create a survey – or get them to – about their reading habits and feelings towards reading and this program to see how they are motivated by it. My main concern with this program, as with any reading program, is that only being able to do it once a week the kids might not make as much progress as you hope. ( I know that’s due to lab access and other curriculum constraints). It’ll be very interesting to see.
Teaching informational reading is always a tricky one, as it is so essential for kids’ school work and research and yet often times, so uninspiring for the kids. Hopefully, our SIG project will also give you some good ideas about using the Interactive White Board in more ways to help you model the program and use develop other strategies to complement it.
Good luck and I am really interested in seeing how it goes.
Sarah
Great problem. This is huge for just about any teacher I have talked with. I personally had the problem myself. I had a very difficult time really comprehending informational text. I had to learn the skill fast once I hit college. You have developed the issue and supported it with examples and some research. You have some text that is fine in a blog but should not be in the final paper. Example "drives me crazy"
ReplyDeleteI have not seen this site and look forward to checking it out.
It sounds like you have really put some thought into this issue. I will agree that reading can be a tough skill to master. I understand what you mean about the "high" kids not wanting to always be a helper. I have been using the same concept with my math students and the high kids sometimes just want to do things on their own with out coaching another.
ReplyDeleteThis website sounds really cool. I think the kids will get a kick out of the rocket ship concept. That sounds like a neat incentive. My school used a program by Scholastic called Read180 that the kids really enjoyed. It was the same kind of concept. A computer-run reading tutorial and our students really took well to it. Their reading has improved, as well as their attitude towards reading. I hope yours will have the same effect. Best of luck!
Raz-kids sounds fun. How will you work it into your reading program? Do you have enough computers so that each student will get to use it on a regular basis?
ReplyDeleteI am looking to improve reading comprehension as well. Besides looking for technologies to help motivate students and hone skills, I am also wondering about how it will fit into my Reading Workshop. It may be that I will choose to work it into other parts of the day as mini-lessons.
Just food for thought...