Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Whitney's Reflection Lesson 2


·       What students learned and which students struggled with the lesson.
Students learned that paraphrasing is putting things in your own words.  They also learned how to paraphrase; read a text to get an understanding of it, and then restate what was already said in your own words.  Students learned why they needed to learn about paraphrasing; its an important strategy to learn because it helps you (the reader) monitor your comprehension because if you cannot paraphrase what you read then that means you need to go back and reread.  Students also learned the difference between summarizing and paraphrasing.  Some students struggled with paraphrasing.  They literally took a sentence and deleted words from the text and then read it as if it was suppose to make sense.  We talked about why that was not a good method of paraphrasing and how that was not making it your own at all.  The students that struggled with this seemed to understand based on their assignment after this discussion.
·       What are alternate reads of your students’ performance or products?
During the mini lesson as a class we went through examples together.  The main example we went through was about a Zebra. We read the article together and then I had them paraphrase the last phrase.  Students the shared their thoughts and that’s when I noticed that some students struggled with paraphrasing and I was able to have a discussion with students about why deleting words from sentences was not a good method.  Like mentioned above the discussion seemed beneficial because they did well on the paraphrasing they had to do on their own.  After the mini lesson they got a worksheet that had 5-6 sentences on it from their book club. They had to paraphrase the sentences and write their paraphrase below the sentence.  I collected these to gage what students understood and which ones needed more guidance.  Students also wrote a paraphrase in their reader’s notebook about what they read with their group and what they filled out on their KWL chart.  As I walked around I listened to what groups were talking about.  This was helpful because they all seemed to be engaged and really focused on what they learned.
·       What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?
I learned that students had a general idea about paraphrasing and summarizing.  Students knew that these two literacy practices were not the same and could give examples of what summarizing was.  Students also knew that if they read something and could not paraphrase what they just read then they needed to go back and reread because they did not comprehend the text.
·       When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?
Before the next lesson is taught we will revisit what paraphrasing is and I will have some students share their paraphrasing sentences from their book clubs.  This is also a practice that can keep being revisited because it’s always going to be important as they read.  I can always ask students or book club groups to paraphrase what they just read and so forth.
·       If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?
I would have more interactive examples for them to complete during the mini lesson.  I think this would have avoided the student’s confusion about just deleting words in a sentence and would have clarified paraphrasing for other students a little better.
·       What did you learn so far about implementing your ‘core practice’ and what do you need to do to continue your professional learning?
Implementing the core practice was easy for this lesson.  We discussed that if one cannot paraphrase what they just read then they did not comprehend the text and need to go back and reread.  We talked about how paraphrasing is a good way to check to see if you really know/understand what you are reading.  I will continue to have such discussion with my students in hopes to make the connections to comprehension like we did in this lesson.   

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