2 things:
For Mythology...I did a unit where students "Climbed Mt. Olympus" by doing
different tasks. We started in the valley, went to foothills, ended at the
peak, etc. Each section had something to research or an activity to do.
Students could plot their progress on a large chart as they completed tasks
(one year we actually moved pictures up a large mountain). We looked at words
that came from myths, read myths, wrote myths, hunted for advertisements that
referred to myths, etc. There was a lot of choice which is motivating at this
time of year. I set the assignment up as a flip chart with the lowest part of
the Mr. Olympus being on the bottom flap of the chart.
Dr. Leu's findings may be consistent with what Brain research is saying. When
they take pictures of adolescent and college brains now, they are finding that
different places of the brain lights up when solving problems compared to the
older generations. This is believed to be happening because of technology and
the way the younger folk attack problems. Us older folk think in a more linear
way looking for one good quick answer. Video games may not ask for one answer,
the problem may have more than one solution and there may be more than one
path, and the outcome may not be as important as the journey. Maybe the
students who better are more comfortable with the journey and not coming up
with a solution right away. There fore they do better than those who read
better in a more "traditional" way.
Kay Kuenzl-Stenerson
Literacy Coach
Merrill Middle School
"We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It's easy to say,
'It's not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem.' Then there
are those, who see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes." ~
Fred Rogers
________________________________
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Sent: Fri 4/18/2008 11:00 AM
To: mosaic@literacyworkshop.org
Subject: Mosaic Digest, Vol 20, Issue 18
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Today's Topics:
1. teaching legends and myths (Ann)
2. Online Reading Comprehension (Joy)
3. Kindergarten preparation (Heather Wall)
4. Re: Less is More Book Review (Tom and Amy Windus)
5. Re: Kindergarten preparation (KENNETH SMITH)
6. Re: Kindergarten preparation (ljackson)
7. Re: Kindergarten preparation (Dr. Heidi Maier)
8. Re: Online Reading Comprehension (Dave Middlebrook)
9. Re: Less is More Book Review (HERBERT Suzanne)
10. Re: Online Reading Comprehension (HERBERT Suzanne)
11. Re: Online Reading Comprehension (Renee)
12. Re: Kindergarten preparation (Renee)
13. Re: Kindergarten preparation (Renee)
14. Re: Online Reading Comprehension (Kitty Ainsworth)
15. Re: Mosaic Digest, Vol 20, Issue 17 (Kuenzl-Stenerson Kay)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:31:38 -0700
From: Ann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [MOSAIC] teaching legends and myths
To: "Mosaic: A Reading Comprehension Strategies Email Group"
<mosaic@literacyworkshop.org>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
I am getting ready to teach a unit on mythology and legends next week. I'm
trying to motivate myself to plan some fun activities for my 7th graders. This
time of the year is difficult trying to keep the kids interested in school. If
anyone has any ideas for me, I'd welcome some!
Ann
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Fri, 18 Apr 2008 03:31:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [MOSAIC] Online Reading Comprehension
To: Mosaic <mosaic@literacyworkshop.org>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Yesterday I attended a lecture by Donald Leu, "How Reading Comprehension Has
Changed While We Weren't Looking."
I learned that online reading has some novel literacy skills; however, many
connected back to Ellin's work. Questioning is very important. Students must be
able to identify important questions because in order to do a search or analyze
the results they have to know what question they are trying to answer. They
must citically evaluate the usefullness of the information, or determine
importance. They must synthesize the information in order to answer their
questions. Finally, they must communicate what they learn to others. Dr. Leu
asserts that your create your own text with each click.
The biggest problem he sees is that there is no correlation between state
reading tests and online reading. Evidently the US is way behind the rest of
the world in this respect. He showed us data that indicates that being able to
read online well is not correlated to high/low reading abilities, and that the
kids who tested poorly in traditional reading actually scored the highest for
online reading. He believes teaching online reading skills to the less able
readers is the way to go (rather than allowing students who finish first to go
online, he suggests starting the lowest readers online, and allowing them to
teach and scaffold their peers.)
I join faculty, staff, and graduate students at NC State today for a lunch
discussion about the "New Literacies" today. I hope to learn more, and make
more connections. This is fascinating.
Has anyone else had any experience with this? Do you see the things he
describes?
Joy/NC/4
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
How children learn is as important as what they learn: process and content go
hand in hand. http://www.responsiveclassroom.org
<http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/>
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