Gina, Would you recommend this book for teachers K-8??? Leslie In a message dated 10/24/2008 2:05:13 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
This is the first post from the Mosaic Professional Book Review Team on thebook "Put Thinking to the Test" by Lori L. Conrad, Missy Matthews, CherylZimmerman, Patrick A. Allen. Foreword by Ellin Oliver Keene. The book ispublished by Stenhouse: http://www.stenhouse.com/0731.asp. Since the day high stakes testing darkened the door of my classroom Iconsidered totally ignoring the test, and simply clinging to the notion that goodteaching would prove itself on test day. In moments of panic and doubt I also thought about creating anentire unit around the test genre. In the end neither approach seemed satisfying orfair to my students. I feel like I discovered a gold mine when I was reading "Put Thinking to theTest." I realize the focus is on bridging the disconnect between classroomstrategic reading and showing proficiency on reading test passages, but there were so many originaland new ways to teach metacognition that it became a tool kit for reading comprehension any day of the week. Powerful StrategiesI loved the continual focus on students noticing and thinking...the way the authors led kids totheir own analysis and ownership of thinking about whatever genre was infront of them. There is a consistent theme about monitoring the kids and then allowing them tocreate the teaching points. (P.16,26) Wow.exploring poetry through tests! The Venn diagram comparing the two was"deep" as it led the kids to notice their thinking about poetry will need tochange on the test (page 33) On page 102 there is a model of a great visual, a time line, for teacher andstudents to track their thinking through a piece. The idea of making connections can be a bit sticky when students bring nobackground knowledge to the material. Problems also arise when theirbackground knowledge would mislead them rather than enlighten, and we knowthis happens on test passages. The lessons about teaching students to decidewhen to ignore their own schema were the first of that kind that I have everseen. (P. 118-119) I think what most impressed me was the intelligent use of testing passageswhich honored sophisticated thinking, rather than distilling it to somesurface level list of tips on how to outsmart the test maker. I think it is rare to find a book that illuminates my perspective on acontroversial subject and becomes one of those activity books that I milk allyear long. Gina _________________________________________________________________ Want to read Hotmail messages in Outlook? The Wordsmiths show you how. http://windowslive.com/connect/post/wedowindowslive.spaces.live.com-Blog-cns!2 0EE04FBC541789!167.entry?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_092008 _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. **************Play online games for FREE at Games.com! All of your favorites, no registration required and great graphics – check it out! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100000075x1211202682x1200689022/aol?redir= http://www.games.com?ncid=emlcntusgame00000001) _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
