Implementations

In this blog post I am going to outline all of the implementations that I have added into my reading sessions this year. This is a way of seeing if what I have implemented has made a difference to my teaching and the outcome of my learners and I will be able to check in against this at the end of the year. 

Individual Questions
I have created question cards that are for fiction and non-fiction texts that the students will be given for pre-reading. What this looks like is each student will have a question that they will need to answer during our guided reading session. They will be given 20 minutes prior to our reading session to read the text and think about how they will answer the question in our reading discussions. This will allow each student to share answer and become more confident in sharing. 

Reading Article and Specific Questions
After analysing my running records and PAT data from the middle of the year I could see very clearly which questions that the students were struggling with and which types of questions I should focus on unpacking during guided reading sessions. For my reading task boards this year I have continued to have an overall focus each week with an article directly related to the topic, this has generally been AI generated and at a year 6 reading level for the whole class. 

From this the students are then given journals at their reading level loosely related to the topic is possible. The article has a response to text task which is where I have focused on ensuring that each week students are exposed to these types of questions:

Literal, Inferring, Vocabulary, Applied Knowledge, Reorganisation, Reaction and Evaluation. 
I have done this to make sure that all of the students are exposed to these types of questions regularly so they will be able to understand how to answer them.  

Key into Inference
This is something that worked well last year so I have decided to bring it in again this year. We have been working through these every day of the week as a warm up activity which has been working well so far. 

Inferencing Images
Again this is another thing that I have introduced to get students to infer meaning through different types of media. This has been a warm up activity too which has been working well. 

Book Study
This is something else that I have created to get students engaged and excited about reading. We have been working on choosing a book to read for enjoyment and setting aside time each day to read this book. Through this the students can complete a novel study around the book they are reading. This is a work in progress and I am trying to make it look more engaging and enjoyable. 

Implementations

In this blog post I will outline some the implementations that I have used throughout my inquiry so far. This is a helpful way to see what I have been changing in my practice so I can see if there is a change at the end of the year.

Ground rules for talk
This is something that I have implemented into the classroom since term 1 as part of our homework for RPI. I have been using this during guided reading and have also set this up in a task form for follow up tasks. One thing I have noticed so far is that some of my students are starting to feel more comfortable sharing their ideas with each other during guided reading. One area that I need to improve this in is having the students continue these discussion with each other after reading with the teacher. Other colleagues of mine have been using this in their classrooms as well and have created a presentation that I have also been using with my class. 

Vocabulary Tasks

One thing that we have been focusing on during RPI is vocabulary and how we can create tasks that are specifically linked to key words from the text. I have been adding these into my follow up tasks. One of these tasks that I really love is word associations as it make the students think about other words that fit best with the new word they have come across and it allows them to really grasp the meaning of these key words. Another activity that my class really loves is the spotlight activity where before reading the students need to place a tick in a box for each word under one of these categories:

• Never seen this word before
• Seen it but don’t know what it means
• Sort of know what is means
• Can explain what it means

After they have finished reading the text they then need to be able to explain what this word means using the text. It also allows the students to see that they have been able to locate the word and can now explain what it means. 

Response to text tasks

Another key thing that I have implemented from RPI is follow up tasks that are really linked to the text and there is a learn, create and share element to this. By having a create task at the end of this task it allows the student to be able to create an image that will continue to solidify the meaning of the text and link to our learning intention from that week. I have also been more intentional with my questions in these follow up tasks. One key thing I have taken away from this is to have a really focused response to text task for the first text of the week. I then will have key questions from the text for the other text with follow up questions and then focus on using generic follow up activities that the students can choose from to continue to develop that skill but with a bigger focus on that first text and using the second text to supplement understanding. 

Picture prompts

Another key element that I have added into my follow up tasks and guided reading sessions are pictures. From these pictures I then ask a range of different questions that require the students to infer meaning from what they are seeing. Pictures are a powerful tool as they are a screenshot in time and are a less invasive way of getting the students to think critically about a text. 

I have used a range of different implementations so far and I will continue to evaluate these and check in with students to see that they are working. These are the key ones that I have been looking at with my inquiry and I will continue to develop and change these over the course of this term and term 4.

What have I implemented?

This week I have been reflecting and thinking about what I have implemented and how I can see if there have been changes to what I have implemented with my inquiry. This is something that we discussed at our last PLG. 

"At the end of the inquiry cycle, you want to be able to attribute any changes in learner outcomes (in part) to changes in the experiences of learners. To do this you need to be able to demonstrate exactly how the learning experience has changed for learners"

This is what we have been asked to think about in order to see if what we have implemented has been successful. This is always an area that I forget about so often when I am doing my inquiry so it is a great reminder to think about what I am going to be be able to use data wise as a baseline to see if what I have implemented has caused a change or has been successful. So I have been thinking about the things that I have implemented for my inquiry this year and outlined this in detail below. 

• Picture Questions:
  The first thing I implemented with my reading groups was to have a picture with questions that require the students to think beyond the image that they are looking at. These pictures posed questions such as who is taking the photo along with a range of different questions that required the students to infer meaning. 
  
  
• Photopea GIF:
  Another one of the things that I have implemented was the use of Photopea as a create task in order to have students infer meaning from a story or article. This could be inferring the meaning of a characters feelings or new and unfamiliar words and phrases that we have come across. This has been a simple task to try and have students focus on creating a visual to show hidden meaning from the text. 
  
  
• Key into Inference: 
  Another key tool that I have continued to implement in the Key into Inference resource. This resource starts off by having students infer meaning from a sentence firstly focusing on who, what, why, where, when and how. Then finally as the text's progress the students are then required to infer meaning from paragraphs. This has been a very useful tool as it allows very quick results to see which students have grasped the concept and which students need further help. 
  
  
• Shared Reading:
  This year I have also really focused on having a shared text to read as a whole class. Through this we will unpack a text in detail and look at key questions that require inferring as well applied knowledge questions which are accessible to all learners in the classroom and allows to start focusing on that extended discussion as a class.
  
  
• Guided Reading:
  Finally I have focused on ensuing to explicitly plan for inference questions as well as applied knowledge questions. This is something that I have been doing previously but have made sure to be more explicit about this in my planning and in my teaching. Research and observations from this year have shown that when something is intentionally planned for then teachers are more likely to make time for this during guided reading sessions. 

These are the key things that I have implemented this year in my inquiry. I have found each one of these valuable and interesting in their own ways so far. I have been constantly looking into the effectiveness of each of these implementations and have changed how I use these in the classroom as a best fit for what works. As I outlined earlier it was a thing that started with looking at my target group but some of these implementations were working so well I tried it with a number of other students in my class. 

Implementation

During our last CoL PLG we were asked to discuss our implementation and answer some key questions to see how we are tracking. In this blog post I will outline these questions and my answers in detail.  

Question One:
Share data/info that you have collected/recorded about the implementation of your changed practices or intervention (what evidence do you have about what you did differently?)​ What methods have you used to collect information?​ ​- How have you been systematic in that collection? - What does the data tell you? - What are you going to do with the data in terms of ‘tweaking’ your intervention?

The evidence that I have to show about my implementation is my spelling tracking that I have been trying to remember to do each week. I do have a bit of data to share about this. This is where I test my students on a Monday before they have seen the spelling words. This way I am able to introduce them before we begin reading and place them into a sentence that is in context with what we are learning about for the week. The students then have a spelling task each week to complete and take these words home in list form to practice after school. I then complete a post test on Friday where I test to see how many words they were able to get right, using the same sentence. I then compare the data, for the most part I have seen my students make progress with their spelling words from the beginning to the end of the week. This is something I need to continue to work on remembering to do as I quite often forget to add the data.

I have also been using my reading data which I have in a spreadsheet for tracking. The surveys that I have been completing are also in a spreadsheet where I can analyse the data. I do need to do this survey again soon. Another way I have been collecting data is through taking notes during our guided reading sessions and compiling these together along with my next steps. I have changed some of my implementations over time which have been documented in my inquiry blog.

Question Two: Describe the evidence you have so far about the effects of your changed practices/intervention on desired learner outcomes and how you summarised and recorded these: What methods have you used to collect information?​ - How have you been systematic in that collection?​ - What does the data/information tell you?​ - What are you going to do with the data/information in terms of ‘tweaking’ your intervention?​

What I have found so far is that linking the reading and writing is working. I can see this from my students use of new vocabulary in their writing throughout the week. The students are also showing that they are understanding these words while they are reading in our guided reading sessions. I am also finding that the students who are practicing their spelling words throughout the week have shown that they are able to make progress in the learning and understanding of these words. Again these have been recorded and outlined in my blog and are recorded in my CoL data sheets that I have been using throughout the year.

Question Three: Explain the reflections and tweaks you have made along the way and the reasons why you made these changes. Share your evidence for these decisions. What methods have you used to collect information about the tweaks? - How have you been systematic in that collection? - What does the information tell you? - What are you going to do with the information in terms of understanding what needed ‘tweaking’ and why?

Some of the tweaks I have made is changing the spelling words of my students from the essential spelling list and just overall topic specific vocabulary to focusing on new words that the students are coming across through their reading texts in guided reading sessions. Another tweak I have made it chaining from 3 writing groups to 4 and these follow along with my reading groups. I do have specific writing sessions that are group according to my three groups but making sure that the spelling and language in writing is related. I decided to start tracking spelling progress as well which has been great but I also do keep forgetting to do this unfortunately.

Through this discussion at the meeting I have been able to clarify my implementations as well as reflect on what is working and what I might need to tweak a little bit more.

Implementation of a new tool into my practice

From looking at the data I have collected so far I can see that vocabulary knowledge is an area that needs development. My students are able to read the words in the text however quite often will not understand what the word means or how it fits into the sentence. So this has made me think and question what can I do as a teacher to make sure that we are working on this area and strengthening this for my students. So what have i changed?

1. Word Wall:
   This term our topic is "Healthy Me, Healthy You" and we will be looking at the upcoming Olympics and Paralympics along with what we can do to keep ourselves fit and healthy. I have started off this team with a word wall where as we come across new words I will add this to the word wall which can be seen and accessed in the classroom at all time for my students. We will discuss each of the new words that we come across and talk about what they mean. These words will then be added to the word wall which will hopefully allow the students to constantly see these words, understand the meaning and be able to use them in their daily learning. 
   
   
2. Topic specific reading:
   This is something that I started to implement last term and will continue to implement this term. My weekly reading learning will have a specific topic for that week. This week is looking at the history of the Olympics. At the beginning of the week we have a class discussion around things that we already know about the Olympics and the history of how it began. Then there will be tasks and activities that are related to that specific topic for the week. In the initial whole class lesson we will discuss new and topical words that come out from our research and add these words to the word wall. I will then have journal articles that are related as closely as possible to the overall weekly topic that will also include some of the new words we have already discussed. This will mean that the students have access to these new words in a range of different ways throughout the week. 
   
   
   
   This is the introduction section for my reading that I use with my whole class when introducing the new topic each week. The is 4 facts and a research task for all of the students to complete each week which opens up a range of new vocabulary that is related to the topic. 
   
   

   

   
   

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

   Then for each of my reading groups I try and link the texts that we use for guided reading each week to the particular topic that we are learning about. This can also provide new and topical vocabulary related to the topic. 
   
   
3. Spelling:
   This term for spelling I create a spelling list that is related to all of the new vocabulary we will be learning about the topic. Spelling is a daily activity that the students need to complete so they are getting continued access to the new vocabulary for this topic. I was initially using the essential spelling list for reading however will use this more in my writing program so that the students are learning new topical vocabulary each week. This allows the students to think about the topic they are learning and can try and read in vocabulary for meaning rather than just words on the page. 
   
   
4. Guided reading:
   For my target group the focus for the beginning of this term will be on reading in new and unfamiliar vocabulary to try and make sense of the words as we are reading. Previous years I have also looked into having the students record themselves reading the article or story aloud and recoding this on their chromebook. This has been effective in the students being able to listen to themselves reread the story and also try and make sense of some of those new and unfamiliar ideas. 

These are some of the key things I will be implementing in term 3 which will hopefully allow the students more access to vocabulary as well as some tools and skills to try and understand new and unfamiliar words.