Reflection - Bursts and Bubbles

My inquiry question for this year was: Will implementing talk moves and collaborative activities during guided reading sessions enhance my students' confidence, facilitate meaningful group discussions, and improve their reading comprehension? I identified this as my focus after noticing many students were reading below their expected reading level and often couldn’t explain what they’d just read to their peers. This made me ask the question: what is really holding these students back and what can I do in my teaching to help these students become more confident readers.

To build a picture of my students' learning I looked at a range of different data such as Running Records, Probe, PAT’s, Anecdotal notes and reader profile surveys. I've broken this down extensively on my blog. 

The main patterns of student learning I identified in the profiling stage was that while students understood what they were reading, they struggled to put it into words for their group. These students were also able to answer literal questions from the text but got stuck on anything that required deeper thinking or making inferences.

From speaking to other colleagues, I found that many of our students encountered similar obstacles—building confidence and engaging in extended discussions was challenging for them. I was fortunate enough to be part of the Manaiakalani Reading Practice Intensive this year which provided me with a range of tools and resources to explore. After exploring research, I discovered strategies that could make a difference, such as using open-ended questions to encourage students to elaborate on their thoughts or respectfully challenge each other’s ideas.

The changes I made to my teaching was first introducing ground rules for talk, giving students a safe space to share, talk, and be heard. We started things off with light-hearted “Would you rather?” questions to ease students in and build their confidence. Gradually, we moved on to sharing their thoughts about what they were reading. I also added activities where students recorded themselves reading, completed response to text tasks, and worked together on vocabulary activities. We even used picture prompts to practise inferencing and discuss what the students had observed.

One of the easiest changes was creating structured follow-up activities for collaborative work after guided reading. Some of the challenges included building students' confidence to share with each other during small group reading. We spent a lot of time working on smaller, approachable conversation starters as a group. 

Overall, I would rate the changes in my students' learning as successful. My students can now confidently discuss texts with each other, leading to richer, more meaningful discussions. My mid-year data showed that most of my students made at least six months' progress. The small end-of-year data that I have available so far indicates a further year's reading progress for some of my students. 

A highlight from this year for me was comparing students' reader profile surveys from Term 1 to Term 4. Most students now genuinely enjoy reading, both in and out of school. The majority of my students also now see themselves as good readers—and believe their teachers and whānau share this view.

So what's the most important learning I made about my inquiry? Confidence and conversation are powerful tools in engaging students with their reading and helping them make inferences. My target students are now excited about reading and eager to share their ideas with each other.

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.

Mid Year Reflection

 My focus question for my CoL injury this year is:
"Will implementing ground rules for talk and collaborative activities during guided reading sessions enhance my students' confidence, facilitate meaningful group discussions, and improve their reading comprehension?" 
Through research and attending RPI so far this year I have been able to start implementing a range of different strategies in reading which I will outline in this blog post in more detail.

Ground rules for talk
One of the first things we looked into with RPI was setting up group norms and introducing ground rules for talk. These are the key rules that we have implemented in our guided reading sessions as well as follow up task time for the students.

1. Actively listen and don’t talk when others are talking.
2. Respectfully take part by giving ideas with reasons and evidence 
3. Ask questions to increase understanding
4. Make sure everyone has a chance to take part
5. Stick to the topic
6. Try to look at both sides of the issue. We learn from each other.

We have been using these rules during guided reading sessions and I have been having reading group sitting with each other after reading so that they can continue on these discussions. One thing that I have noticed is that there is a lot of teacher lead discussions during guided reading and this has allowed me to try and lessen this talk and allow the students to have conversations. It is a work in progress at this stage and next term I am looking at creating two smaller groups from my target group so that the students have more opportunities to share and hopefully smaller groups will allow the students to feel more comfortable sharing with each other. 

Would you rather

I have sourced a range of different would you rather prompts that I will start using at the beginning of my guided reading sessions as this will allow the students to have an opportunity to share their own ideas and thoughts around a topic and hopefully this will allow for more extended discussion during and after guided reading from the students. 

Data

It has been a really good time to reflect on my mid year data and to also make sure that I have collected enough baseline data to see if my intervention was successful at the end of the year. 

Next steps

I will continue to implement these changes into my guided reading sessions along with my reading planning. I will also continue to have regular check ins with my students as well as analyse my reflection data to see what areas need continued improvement. I will also continue to implement changes from our RPI sessions next term into my reading program. 

CoL PLG 5

Last week we had out CoL PLG where we were able to share what we have done so far with our colleagues and think about the implementation process for our inquiry and thinking about what we might have already done and what we intend to change with our inquiry. I love coming together with colleagues and hearing about their inquires I think it gives you an almost new and refreshed outlook on your inquiry and helps to take stock of what you have done so far and achieved. I have also learnt that I have a bit of work to do in making sure that I am making the most of the learning this term in the classroom. 

From this PLG I have been challenged to think about how to consider and monitor the changes from the intervention. There is still a couple of pieces of literature that I would like to look at from the research that I have already done. One big thing I am going to focus on this week and next week thinking forward to our next PLG is to really make sure that I am using this key into inference tool well in the classroom across multiple groups. I have also started to think about introducing roles to some of my reading groups so that all students are being heard. 

I am really excited to see how this will play out for the rest of the term. We have also had our share staff meetings this week and it was so great to connect with other teachers around the country and to share what we are doing in our inquires and to also have some feedback and maybe some ideas that we can take back to our spaces. I loved the conversations that we had around our inquiries and again this has make going into this week that much more exciting to look at my inquiry and the learners in front of me. 

Evaulating and Reflecting

To what extent was the intervention successful in changing factors such as teaching? To what extent were those changes in teaching effective in changing patterns of student learning?

From what I can see so far the intervention success can be seen through the use of vocabulary of my learners in their writing as well as an understanding of key words associated with a specific topic. I think that these changes have allowed the students the confidence to be able to try and understand new words and read them into the tex. Another thing I have noticed how my students have changed to have an excitement in reading and wanting to have SSR as well as go to the library and choose books that they want to read.

Reflection on professional learning through this inquiry cycle:

I have learnt a lot professionally through this inquiry one of the key ones I think which is so important is being it back to the well being of students and teachers. This year has been by far one of the most challenge in my teaching career with all of the uncertainty of what covid was going to being this year and by opening up the community it was a very strange and interesting experience. I think by allowing my time to think about how I was feeling at these times made me relate to my students and stop and think well if I am feeling this then what are my students and their whanau feeling? It has been a very long and stressful year this year with so much going on and I think coming back to thinking about well being as been so important for everyone. I had also always viewed reading and writing differently in my planning for some reason but this year by trying to link them has made my planning easier and I have found that my students are more engaged with writing, it has also meant that I can focus on other key elements of writing through the topic which has been great for writing structure and language features. I really have learnt a lot from this years inquiry and think that there is a lot more to learn in this area to continue on looking into.

Reflections and tweaks explained

 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.

This year has been interesting with my inquiry and I have found that I have needed
to be adaptable along the way. While my focus question has continued to look at reading achievement I have also focused on well being as well as reading for enjoyment. The reason for this change was looking at term 1 and all of the changes and interruptions we were having the most important thing for me and my class was student well being and trying to get all of my students to come back to school. I made this the focus for the whole of term 1 as it was a very uncertain time for everyone and I wanted to make sure that my students were doing okay and felt comfortable to come back to school. So I guess you could say reading took a bit of a back seat, we were still reading as a class just in more spaced out groups with masks on and it was hard to have those detailed conversations. 

Through this change in direction I also found myself thinking about reading for enjoyment and enhancing this. As it was a lot harder to have reading groups and being able to share it became really important for my students to want to be able to read by themselves and select books for enjoyment rather than just being told to read something. Social distancing meant that my students were working a lot more independently so therefor the change to my reading program came about. We started going to the library and students had a lot more choice. Reflecting on this has shown a really great outcome my students now love going to the library and ask for SSR (Super Silent Reading) as it is a change for them to unwind and explore what they are reading. 

I have continued to focus on linking reading and writing which was another thing that came out of the all of the changes this year. I think this has had a great impact on literacy for my class and I am finding that my students are able to link these together and begin to use different vocabulary in their writing. 

I have made all of these changes to ensure the best for my learners. I think by being able to be flexible and reflective at every step has helped shape my program this year and although it might have not been to plan for my original inquiry I have found some key things that I would add into my inquiry next time and would really like to explore this in a lot more detail again with my class next year.