# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Apps are fun and motivating for kids! Let Reading Rockets help you find the very best educational apps that provide practice with essential skills in print awareness, phonics, spelling, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing. We've also included apps for children with dyslexia, ADHD, and autism spectrum disorder that support organization and goal-setting, language and communication, and emotional regulation.

Find more recommendations, from the experts at Common Sense Education: Apps and Websites to Build Literacy Skills: Top Picks.

Recommended Apps by Topic

Apps that give kids tools for communicating with others, through simple pictures, picture-based stories, and text-to-speech. (Selected especially for children with autism or Aspergers.)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Apps are fun and motivating for kids! Let Reading Rockets help you find the very best educational apps that provide practice with essential skills in print awareness, phonics, spelling, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing. We've also included apps for children with dyslexia, ADHD, and autism spectrum disorder that support organization and goal-setting, language and communication, and emotional regulation.

# data[].attributes.headline
List of Oral Language games & lesson plans from Scholastic 

# data[].attributes.subject
List of Oral Language games & lesson plans from Scholastic 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Please select a section. You can find the password for Bubblegum, Books, and Bugs on its teaching plan booklet. For the Oral Language Kit and Inquiry Units please refer to the password card that came with the unit or the inside front cover of the big books. Passwords should be kept confidential.

Please note: Scholastic Canada Ltd. will host this site for a minimum of 10 years from publication date.

© 2017 Scholastic Canada Ltd.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
:: Welcome to Literacy Place for the Early Years, Grade 1 ::

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Please select a section. You can find the password for Bubblegum, Books, and Bugs on its teaching plan booklet. For the Oral Language Kit and Inquiry Units please refer to the password card that came with the unit or the inside front cover of the big books. Passwords should be kept confidential.

# data[].attributes.body
Verbal Literacy Games for Speaking, Listening & Thinking

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
These 12 games get kids speaking, listening and thinking. Great travel or waiting games.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Develop speaking, listening, thinking and reasoning skills with these twelve fun verbal games to play with preschoolers, kindergarteners and bigger kids.

# data[].attributes.body
The teacher will create an anchor chart with the assistance of her students. The chart will discuss how to ask questions and how to answer them.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Story Elements anchor chart -  characters setting and plot. | Writing anchor charts, Story elements anchor chart, Classroom anchor charts

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Aug 20, 2014 - Story Elements anchor chart -  characters setting and plot.

# data[].attributes.body
Throughout the book, the teacher will pause the read aloud and ask  the students questions about the  character, setting, and story elements. The students will have the opportunity to raise their hand and answer.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'The Day the Crayons Quit' by Drew Daywalt - READ ALOUD FOR KIDS!

# data[].attributes.body
The teacher will then have the students pair and discuss each task card that is uncovered on the board. The students will switch a few times and discuss different task cards with different partners. The teacher will then walk around and observe who is activity participating in the activity.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Hi there! I hope the beginning of your year has been a smashing success and that you are getting into the groove of things. Today I'm sharing some of my favorite activities for teaching story elements, particularly in grades 3+! It's one of the first concepts we cover in reading since it's key that they understand story elements in order to move on to more complex topics like main idea and theme!

Every year, we start by watching movie trailers on Youtube. I pick movie trailers that I know 99% of the kids will be familiar with (Shrek, Finding Nemo, Little Mermaid, etc.) since the trailers don't show the solution and we will need to know it to talk about it! We talk about each of the story elements in the movies. They LOVE this!

Then, we move on to our anchor chart and interactive notebook entry so that we have some good notes to reference and we can anchor our learning.

I decided to use a puzzle comparison to talk about story elements. Every story has just about every single one of these elements, so it's important to remember every piece of the puzzle!

Like always, they create a similar journal entry. On the templates, I have included one without definitions so that you can make them your own or if you prefer to have kids write the definitions, they can do that.

Then, we use another story that almost all students are familiar with, The Three Little Pigs, and we brainstorm the story elements and put them into our puzzle. Most of the time, we don't even read the story, we just complete the puzzle based off of memory. They love this, and it's a great way to get started. They are solidifying the concepts before they have read anything!

But of course, we are doing all of this with the purpose of preparing them to apply it when they are reading, so we move on to very BRIEF passages to review story elements in texts. We play a game of SCOOT with my multiple choice Story Elements Task Cards so that they can get in a lot of practice identifying the different story elements in a short amount of time. Since they are multiple choice, they are perfect for a game of whole-class SCOOT.

Next, it's on to our Story Elements Match Up! I have two different versions of this, one that includes basic one liners for the problem and solution and the other that is more of a paragraph describing the problem and the solution. They use fun fairytale and pop culture themes. You can use both sets to differentiate or you can use both sets with all students to scaffold!

After all of this work, they usually are starting to cruise! Once they have a solid grasp of the concept, I give them one of the extended Story Elements Task Cards to do on the left side of their notebook. There are two versions of this, so for the kids who truly understand it, I give them the version shown below. For students who need a bit of extra help, I give them a simpler version with basic identifying questions about each story element.

I usually have them complete several more of these cards as homework, in centers, as morning work, etc. They are great for review throughout the year as well. You can throw one on the document camera and complete it as a whole class, too!

At any given time during our units, we are always working on a novel. During our story elements unit, one of the culminating assignments I have them complete is a story elements tree map from Thinking Maps. Here's an example of one of the tree maps my students made.

The last activity we do is the culmination of all of our learning and helps the students apply what they have learned to actual literature! This is my favorite way to encourage thinking about texts, and it requires students to really think critically about story elements, much like the task cards above do, BUT they use their own books! Most years, I make the kids their own individual reading response task cards (You can read more about that HERE) so that they have a set with them all the time, but you can use these cards in a variety of ways. Each card focuses on different story elements and asks students to think critically about it and how it relates to their book. This is a GREAT time to get huge stacks of picture books and have students start reading and writing about what they are reading! I highly recommend it, and these task cards provide excellent summative assessments, too. :)

FINALLY, before I leave you with MANY more Story Elements activities from around the World Wide Web, I want to share with you a book project for Wonder by R.J. Palacio. I fell in love with this book, and I absolutely can't WAIT to have my students read it and complete this yearbook project! I'd love to hear feedback about it and see final pictures. I'll post pictures of ours soon, but I know a lot of teachers teach this as one of their first books, so I wanted to offer it up now if it might help others!

Wonder is also a fantastic book to use to story map the story elements since there is a pretty clear overarching problem and solution as well as several main events. This project also lends itself well to identifying the story elements within the writing that the kids will do.

And now, here are even MORE awesome activities for teaching Story Elements! Click each image to read more.

LOVE this Story Elements Box! What a great idea.

These Story Cubes would be a great culminating activity for story elements!

Story Sticks are the best! You could use regular popsicle sticks to make it a game, where students have to figure out if each stick is a problem, solution, setting, etc.

Here is a fantastic lesson for when you are ready to dig a little bit deeper into plot structure!

Here's another take on the story elements cube-- but it's a story elements kite!

How fun is this Follow the Yellow Brick Road Story Telling Map? Excellent to get kids up and moving!

What a FABULOUS idea for an anchor chart to keep up and keep reusing all year long! You can use sticky notes to change it for each story.

Here's another stellar Story Elements Anchor Chart that shows connections between settings and characters. Her entire blog post about story elements is great, too!

It's the perfect time of year for these Plot Pumpkins! Lovely!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Teaching Story Elements & A WONDER Freebie!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Hi there! I hope the beginning of your year has been a smashing success and that you are getting into the groove of things. Today I'm sharing some of my favorite activities for teaching story elements, particularly in grades 3+!

# data[].attributes.headline
Decoding x Oral Language=Skilled Reading

# data[].attributes.subject
Decoding x Oral Language=Skilled Reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Early Literacy: The Importance of Oral Language

# data[].attributes.headline
Oral Language Development and ELLs: 5 Challenges and Solutions

# data[].attributes.subject
Oral Language Development and ELLs: 5 Challenges and Solutions

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In this article written for Colorín Colorado, Dr. Lindsey Moses Guccione shares five key challenges related to the oral language development of ELLs, as well as tips for addressing each of the challenges.

Dr. Moses Guccione is the co-author of Comprehension and English Language Learners: 25 Oral Reading Strategies That Cross Proficiency Levels ( Heinemann, 2009).

Getting Started

As a former elementary teacher in a bilingual school, I developed a love and passion for finding effective ways to support oral language and oral reading development of emerging English language learners (ELLs). I discovered this passion when I began my first year of teaching in a second-grade classroom, where I encountered a handful of challenges related to my students' oral language development.

Many students were transitioning from a classroom with Spanish instruction into my classroom with instruction provided in English. I had students ranging from monolingual English speakers to students who had just recently moved to the U.S. from a Spanish-speaking country. The range of language proficiency levels crossed the entire spectrum. Having minimal experience with this range of diverse students and needs, I began reading, researching, and implementing new instructional ideas into my classroom. With each challenge I encountered, I gained new information about my students and their parents. I also began learning more about my own methods of instruction, and I learned a great deal each year about new challenges and successes.

Currently, I am fortunate to work with many teachers who have the opportunity to impact the lives of children and families who speak more than one language. As I work with these teachers and families, I have found five common and reoccurring challenges that they seem to face in the area of oral language development that parallel my own experiences. I detail these challenges and questions below, as well as suggestions for addressing each challenges based on strategies I used in my classroom.

Questions and Classroom Scenarios

1. What do I do if they don't know ANY English?

Understanding the characteristics of language learners at different proficiency levels helps to think about how we can best support students in their oral language and reading development. Below is a chart that gives a description of the first two levels of language proficiency as well as implications for using oral reading. This is a nice place to start when thinking about how to interact with and support our Starting and Emerging English speakers.

Levels of Language Proficiency

Description

Implications For Using Oral Reading

Level 1: Starting
Students are in a silent period in which they listen, but do not speak in English. They may respond using nonverbal cues in attempt to communicate basic needs.

The teacher and other more advanced students should model oral reading. Students in the silent period should not be forced to speak, but should be given the opportunity to participate in a group activity where they won't be singled out.

Level 2: Emerging
Students are beginning to understand more oral language. They respond using one- or two-word phrases and start to produce simple sentences for basic social interactions and to meet basic needs.

Teacher and students should continue to model oral reading. Students should be encouraged to begin taking risks with simple, rehearsed oral reading in non-threatening situations.

Opitz & Guccione (2009). Comprehension and English Language Learners: 25 Oral Reading Strategies that Cross Proficiency Levels.

2. How do I provide instruction and support for the ELLs without holding back the students who are fluent in English?

Differentiation is the key to effective instruction for all students. Students of varying proficiency levels can learn the same content when the teacher provides a wide range of learning opportunities for students with different academic and linguistic needs. Three key strategies for this approach include differentiating or modifying the texts, creating grouping structures, and targeting the amount and nature of support based on students' needs (Opitz & Ford, 2008).

Modifying the text: Teachers can differentiate the text by selecting various levels of text difficulty on similar content, or they can also divide the text up into smaller portions appropriate for certain groups/individuals for a jigsaw activity. Another idea is to summarize text that might be too difficult and provide ways to make the text more accessible (such as vocabulary support, visual support, connecting to background knowledge, etc.).

Creating grouping structures that set students up for success: While some grouping structures can be established according to language or literacy skill levels and needs, it is also important to think about providing students exposure to interact with peers who demonstrate a wide range of different language and literacy skills. Additionally, teachers can improve engagement and motivation by creating choice/interest groups where students gather, read, discuss and work together on topics of common interest.

Targeting the amount and nature of student support: It is important to think about scaffolding the experience and using comprehensible input to make it accessible for all students. Comprehensible input means that students should be able to understand the gist of what is being said or presented. There are many ways to do this, such as selecting key vocabulary, using context or visual cues, building background knowledge, building on experiences the students have had, using consistent language, and providing images or visual representations to support vocabulary and content. Teachers can support their students by embedding comprehensible input into their whole-group instruction, but this also becomes particularly effective when used in the different grouping structures. Teachers can also modify the amount of support and interaction between teachers and students depending on their individual and group needs.

3. This student knows English - I hear him talking to his friends and on the playground. He just doesn't want to try in class.

I have heard many teachers discussing variations of this same idea. However, I would caution teachers and parents about jumping to this conclusion. Academic language (or the language specifically related to school and/or academic content) can be complicated to acquire. Students often first develop social language and demonstrate near proficiency or proficiency in English in social settings. A student may be demonstrating sophisticated use of social language, but they may have difficulty using language in more formal settings such as school.

Much of the academic language required to be successful in school - everything from instructions to expectations to content-specific vocabulary - requires assistance in acquiring. Students hear and use their social language in various settings from home, community, and school, but academic language is often only used in the school setting. These students need specific instruction and support surrounding their language development in this area.

The same children who appear to be functioning at a high level of English proficiency in social settings may actually be functioning at a beginning stage in other settings, depending on how they are called on to use language. The students need to feel safe and in a low-anxiety environment in order to begin to feel comfortable taking risks with their oral language. When they have less exposure and instruction related to academic language, this can often cause students to feel intimidated and less likely to be willing to share in class.

One idea for reducing anxiety and encouraging students to experiment with language might include allowing students to read, practice, and discuss their responses in partners and small groups before sharing out to the entire group. This allows students an opportunity to hear language modeled by peers, practice what they want to say, and possibly revise their original thought and/or language before sharing it in a public way. As students find more success with their language production and classroom participation, they will be more likely to share and take risks, and in turn continue building their confidence.

4. How is the child ever going to learn English if they don't speak it at home?

It is important to celebrate being bilingual and biliterate. Research has shown that development of a students' first language can facilitate development in the second language (Genessee, Geva, Dressler, and Kamil, 2007). Understanding this helps parents, teachers, and children to encourage the use and development of the students' home language while they are at home. All of the home literacy activities that we recommend for English speakers, such as reading aloud, making lists, discussing books, reading environmental print, etc., should also be encouraged for the English language learners in their home language. Students can begin to use more English as they feel comfortable in different settings, but it is important to note that speaking two languages will not hinder their English development.

Another important idea to remember is that we want to invite parents to feel confident in their interactions with their children regardless of their English proficiency level. As they begin to read or retell stories and discuss them at home, they are developing vital oral language and comprehension skills, and these skills will transfer over into their school language.

5. What kinds of activities should I be doing to help the student develop their oral language and oral reading?

McCauley and McCauley (1992) report four factors as necessary for acquiring a second language: a low-anxiety environment, repeated practice, comprehensible input, and drama. These are all important components of setting children up for success and language development.

A low-anxiety environment includes a setting where students feel nurtured and supported by their teacher and peers, and in turn, they feel safe to take risks without the fear of being laughed at or made fun of.

Repeated practice is just like what it sounds! Students need repeated practice hearing and using a new language. They need multiple opportunities to comprehend and express their ideas in a new language. Like with anything new that we learn, practice helps us get better.

Comprehensible input, as explained above, means finding different ways to make what is being said comprehensible and easier to understand. Things to consider with comprehensible input might include using speech that is appropriate for students' language proficiency, providing a clear, step-by-step explanation of tasks, and using a variety of techniques to support their understanding.

Drama, or a sense of excitement and engagement, can be found in activities like Reader's Theatre, dramatic play, puppetry, narrating wordless picture books, etc. All of these activities also have the other three factors embedded within them. These activities assist in the development of oral language in addition to introducing students to oral reading and rich literacy experiences and responses in a classroom setting.

Closing Thoughts

As you can see from these questions and examples, there are a lot of different approaches to helping ELLs build their oral language development skills, and you may have to try different activities until you find what works for your students. The most important thing, however, is to build your students' confidence while giving them new words and phrases to practice. Don't be afraid to try something new - and most of all, don't be afraid to have fun doing it!

About the Author

Dr. Lindsey Moses Guccione is a coauthor of Comprehension and English Language Learners: 25 Oral Reading Strategies that Cross Proficiency Levels. She is an assistant professor at the University of Northern Colorado and teaches courses in Early Childhood Education, Literacy, and Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Education. She is a former elementary teacher of English language learners and is currently researching how ELLs make sense of texts.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Oral Language Development and ELLs: 5 Challenges and Solutions

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this article written for Colorín Colorado, Dr. Lindsey Moses Guccione shares five key challenges related to the oral language development of ELLs, as well as tips for addressing each of the challenges. Dr. Moses Guccione is the co-author of Comprehension and English Language Learners: 25 Oral Reading Strategies That Cross Proficiency Levels ( Heinemann, 2009).

# data[].attributes.headline
Young Children's Oral Language Development

# data[].attributes.subject
Young Children's Oral Language Development

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Young Children's Oral Language Development

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The development of oral language is one of the child's most natural - and impressive - accomplishments. Get an introduction to when and how language is learned.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What Is Oral Language? Developing oral language means developing the skills and knowledge that go into listening and speaking-all of which have a strong relationship to reading comprehension and to writing.

# data[].attributes.headline
Oral Language Sample for Early Childhood Education

# data[].attributes.subject
Oral Language Sample for Early Childhood Education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Small Group Oral Language Sample for Early Childhood Education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
It’s Not Enough To Mean Well | Reading Rockets

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I came into the teaching profession aware that my White middle class experience would impact how I taught. I earned my teaching credential and masters degree from a program focused on social justice. There, I’d read and discussed books such as Teaching Other People’s Children and Bad Boys: Public Sc…

# data[].attributes.headline
Improve Your Students’ Oral Language Skills

# data[].attributes.subject
Improve Your Students’ Oral Language Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Oral language is one of the most important skills your students can master-both for social and academic success. Learners use this skill throughout the day to process and deliver instructions, make requests, ask questions, receive new information, and interact with peers.

As a teacher, there's a lot you can do during your everyday lessons to support the development of strong oral language skills in your students. Today's post, excerpted and adapted from Dyslexia, Dysgraphia, OWL LD, and Dyscalculia , by Berninger & Wolf, gives you 14 ideas for supporting oral language development in your students who are verbal. These teaching strategies can help students with specific language disabilities (including dyslexia), and they can boost the language skills of your other learners, too. Try these and see which ones work best for your students!

Encourage conversation.

Every social interaction gives students a new opportunity to practice language. Some of your students might need a little guidance from you to engage in conversations, so spark interactions whenever you can. Ask questions, rephrase the student's answers, and give prompts that encourage oral conversations to continue.

Model syntactic structure.

Your students may not use complete oral syntax in informal speech, but encourage them to do so when they're in the classroom. When a student uses fragmented syntax, model complete syntax back to them. This builds oral language skills and gives students practice in a skill necessary for mastering written language.

Engage in eye contact with students during instruction and encourage them to do the same. Maintaining eye contact will help learners gauge their audience's attention and adjust their language, their volume, or the organization of their speech. This will help them be better understood, communicate more clearly, and successfully interpret nonverbal cues about their clarity.

Remind students to speak loudly and articulate clearly.

Ask students to feel the muscles used for speech while they're talking and monitor their volume and articulation. Remind them that clear and loud-enough speech is essential for holding the attention of the group and communicating their information and opinions effectively.

Have students summarize heard information.

Encourage students to verbally summarize or otherwise discuss the information they hear. This should begin in kindergarten and continue with increasingly difficult questions as students grow older. Teach students to ask for clarification when they don't understand something, and emphasize that they can ask you directly or query fellow students.

Model and guide sentence construction.

Some students have trouble getting started with the wording of a sentence. Saying the beginning word or phrase for the student can help the student structure their response. Give students time for thinking and formulating an oral or written response. Students' explicit experience in both producing their own oral language and processing others' language will help facilitate their comprehension of reading material.

Explain the subtleties of tone.

Your students have probably experienced playground arguments related to tone; misunderstandings are common when students are using loud outdoor voices. Remind your students how tone of voice-which includes pitch, volume, speed, and rhythm-can change the meaning of what a speaker says. Often, it's not what they say, it's how they say it that can lead to misunderstanding of motives and attitudes. Ask your students to be mindful of tone when they're trying to get a message across, and adjust their volume and pitch accordingly.

Attend to listening skills.

Ensure that your students are listening by using consistent cues to get their attention. You might use a phrase like "It's listening time" to give students a reminder. Some students might also benefit from written reminders posted prominently on your wall.

Incorporate a "question of the day."

During each school day's opening activities, ask a question to encourage talk. (You can even write one on the board so your students can read it and start thinking about their answer as soon as they come in.) Start with simple one-part questions like "What is your favorite animal?" If a student doesn't answer in a complete sentence, model a complete sentence and ask the student to repeat your model. Once your students are successfully answering these simple questions in complete sentences, move to two-part questions that require more complex answers: "What is your favorite animal? Why?"

Compile a class booklet of students' phrases.

Give your students a sentence to finish, such as "When my dog got lost I looked..." Have each student contribute a prepositional phrase to complete the sentence (e.g., at the grocery store, in the park, under the bed). Then have your students create a class booklet by writing and illustrating their phrases. When all the phrase pages are assembled into a booklet, students can practice reading the very long sentence with all the places they looked for the dog. Encourage them to come up with a conclusion to the story.

Some students may have difficulty with abstract concepts such as before, after, or following, and with sequences such as days of the week or months of the year. To help students learn and retain these concepts, you may need to present and review them many times and in multiple ways. For example:

You might ask students to identify which holiday comes in each month and then review holidays for other months in sequence: "Groundhog Day is in February. What holiday is in March? In April?"

Have students identify the month before or after a given month. "May is before June and after April." "May is between April and June."

Question to boost comprehension.

Asking questions before and after a reading assignment not only helps sharpen oral language skills, it also helps students think about what they're reading and absorb information from the words. You might try the following strategies to facilitate reading comprehension:

If there's an introduction to the story or passage, ask students to read it and answer purpose-setting questions: "Where does the story begin? "What kind of story or article is this? Why do you think so?"

Ask students to predict outcomes: "What will happen? How do you know?"

After the reading, ask students to reveal whether their predictions were correct and identify where the ending or conclusion begins.

Have students summarize the passage: "Who were the characters?" "What was the plot?" "What was the outcome?" "What was the main idea?" "What were the supporting details?"

Teach for oral reading fluency.

Oral reading fluency refers to how rapidly, smoothly, effortlessly, and automatically students read text. The goal is accurate and fluid reading with adequate speed, appropriate phrasing, and correct intonation. Here are a few activities that aid fluency:

Sentence completion: Read a phrase and signal for a student to complete the sentence. Then read another phrase and signal another student to complete the next sentence. This activity provides good modeling of rhythm and inflection and builds reading group skills.

Round-robin repeated reading: Each student reads a sentence, paragraph, or page, and then the next student gets a turn. Prompt each student to read with rhythm and fluency.

Partner reading: Paired readers choose a quiet, cozy spot to practice reading to one another. This activity provides additional practice after reading in small groups.

Monitored reading: Ask an aide or parent volunteer to listen to a student's oral reading and watch for good phrasing and rhythm.

Repeated reading: Parents may assist with repeated reading at home by asking students to read orally the same 150- to 200-word passage repeatedly over several days. Students do not have to spend more than 10 minutes rereading each night.

Never assume students understood your instructional talk.

You use oral language every day to teach-but some students may not be getting your message. In this chart from Berninger & Wolf's book, Beverly Wolf shares some examples of how students in her classroom misinterpreted sentences delivered orally:

Be aware of the potential disconnect between what you say and what your students hear. Go over your message and present it in multiple ways to be sure all students understand.

***

Oral language is one of the foundational building blocks of learning. Try the suggestions in today's post with your students, and give them the boost they need for future academic and social success.
Dyslexia, Dysgraphia, OWL LD, and Dyscalculia
By Virginia W. Berninger, Ph.D., & Beverly J. Wolf, M.Ed.

Learn how to provide effective instruction for students with learning disabilities while meeting the needs of all students! The first teacher training text to cover all four learning disabilities that require differentiated instruction, this book prepares educators to deliver explicit and engaging instruction customized to the needs of their students. Critical insights from diverse fields blend with lessons learned from actual teaching experience.

MORE RESOURCES ON LANGUAGE SKILLS

Multisensory Teaching of Basic Language Skills, Fourth Edition
Edited by Judith R. Birsh, Ed.D., CALT-QI, & Suzanne Carreker, Ph.D., CALT-QI

The most comprehensive text available on multisensory teaching, this book prepares today's educators to use specific evidence-based approaches that improve struggling students' language skills and academic outcomes in elementary through high school.
LEARN MORE
45 Strategies That Support Young Dual Language Learners
By Shauna L. Tominey, Ph.D., & Elisabeth C. O'Bryon, Ph.D., NCSP

Discover 45 of today's best strategies for teaching young dual language learners and supporting their families. Includes practical guidance on how to apply each strategy in real-world classrooms!

Quick Interactive Language Screener™ (QUILS™)
A Measure of Vocabulary, Syntax, and Language Acquisition Skills in Young Children
By Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Ph.D., Jill de Villiers, Ph.D., Kathryn Hirsh-Pasek, Ph.D., Aquiles Iglesias, Ph.D., and Mary Sweig Wilson, Ph.D.

Early identification is the first step to helping children with language delays improve their skills. Find the children who might need help with QUILS, a one-of-a-kind tool that helps you evaluate whether children are making language progress appropriate for their age group.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
14 Ways to Improve Your Students' Oral Language Skills - Brookes Blog

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
UPDATED: 3/23/22 Oral language is one of the most important skills your students can master-both for social and academic success. Learners use this skill throughout the day to process and deliver instructions, make requests, ask questions, receive new information, and interact with peers. As a teacher, there's a lot you can do during your everyday [...]

# data[].attributes.body
The Role of Early Oral Language in Literacy Development

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Supporting young children's language and literacy development has long been considered a practice that yields strong readers and writers later in life. The results of the National Early Literacy Panel's (NELP) six years of scientific research synthesis supports the practice and its role in language development among children ages zero to five.

The NELP was brought together in 2002 to compile research that would contribute to educational policy and practice decisions that impact early literacy development. It was also charged with determining how teachers and families could support young children's language and literacy development. Outcomes found in the panel's report (2008) would be used in the creation of literacy-specific materials for parents, teachers, and staff development for early childhood educators and family-literacy practitioners.

Through its work, the NELP uncovered a set of abilities such as alphabet knowledge, oral language, or phonological awareness present in the preschool years that provides the basis for later reading success. It also found that measures of complex and discourse-level skills are particularly strong predictors of reading success - a finding that is consistent with the fact that language is a complex, multidimensional system that supports decoding and comprehension as children learn to read.

In our book Early Childhood Literacy: The National Early Literacy Panel and Beyond,, we explore the NELP report, as well as newer research findings and the effectiveness of specific approaches to teaching early oral language development to establish a solid foundation for later reading comprehension. Below we expand on concepts to help educators understand how oral language relates to reading comprehension, word reading, and language development; where Common Core State Standards factor into the equation; and what teachers can do to foster literacy development.

Laying Down the Building Blocks
Through its research, the NELP discovered that the more complex aspects of oral language, including syntax or grammar, complex measures of vocabulary (such as those in which children actually define or explain word meanings), and listening comprehension were clearly related to later reading comprehension, but that simpler measures of oral language (e.g., the widely used Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test) had very limited associations with reading comprehension.
Put simply, readers must translate print to language and then, much as in listening, they must interpret the meaning of that language. Numerous studies support this approach by showing that word reading and language comprehension are relatively independent skills, but that each contributes significantly to reading comprehension.

Simple measures of vocabulary in which children simply point to the picture of a word or name a picture are not strongly connected with later reading comprehension. Nevertheless, many studies have shown that vocabulary plays an important role in fostering reading development in the years before and during formal reading instruction. The role of vocabulary is likely two-fold. The words, and the concepts that they represent, are obviously of functional importance in comprehension, and vocabulary might also support decoding or the translation of text into language. The NELP established phonological awareness as a key contributor to children's ability to learn to read. Of course, phonological representations are part of the linguistic system and the ability to gain access to these representations may in part be a by-product of early vocabulary development (Metsala & Walley, 1998).

Reading comprehension depends on language abilities that have been developing since birth. Basic vocabulary and grammar are clearly essential to comprehension because each enables understanding of words and their interrelationships in and across individual sentences in a text (Kintsch & Kintsch, 2005).

However, children who comprehend well go beyond word and sentence comprehension to construct a representation of the situation or state of affairs described by the text. In some theories, this is referred to as a "mental model" (Kintsch & Kintsch, 2005) and it involves organizing a text's multiple ideas into an integrated whole, using both information from the text and the reader's own world knowledge. To do this, successful comprehenders draw upon a set of higher-level cognitive and linguistic skills, including inferencing, monitoring comprehension, and using text structure knowledge.
Take the following story for example: "Johnny carried a jug of water. He tripped on a step. Mom grabbed the mop." The literal representation of the individual words and sentences does not enable the reader to integrate their meanings and construct a mental model. Successful comprehenders understand narrative structure and couple it with their knowledge to infer that Johnny spilled the water. They then understand why Mom grabbed a mop. They also monitor their comprehension of stories-either written or spoken-and realize the need to make an inference (that Johnny spilled the water) to make sense of Mom's response.

High-level language skills used to create mental models of text are not exclusive to reading. In fact, children begin developing these language skills well before formal reading instruction in a range of language comprehension situations. For example, young children rely on knowledge of narrative structure to do things like follow a set of instructions, share their daily activities around the dinner table, or understand spoken stories, cartoons, and movies.

Assessing Early-Stage Development
The skills needed for reading comprehension come into play as students progress. In the early grades, for example, reading comprehension depends heavily on emerging word-reading skills. As children accomplish the ability to automatically and fluently read printed words, language comprehension begins to contribute more to individual differences in reading comprehension. Most children who score poorly on reading comprehension tests have difficulty decoding words and understanding language.

Those with poor word-reading abilities (i.e., poor decoders) lag behind their typically developing peers on reading comprehension measures in the early grades, even if they have good language development. However, those with poor language comprehension, in spite of relatively proficient word-reading ability, usually do not lag behind their typically developing peers on reading comprehension tests until they have had one or two years of reading instruction (Catts et al., 2005).

It's important to point out that what appears to be a decline in reading comprehension for poor comprehenders is not the result of declining language skills. In fact, these students' language skills were already poor compared with their typically developing peers at the onset of schooling. A recent report found that poor comprehenders in fifth grade (i.e., those with poor reading comprehension despite good word-reading abilities) evidenced weak language skills as early as 15 months of age (Justice, Mashburn, & Petscher, in press) compared with their age-matched peers who went on to become good comprehenders and poor decoders, and NELP found that early language skills were predictive of later reading comprehension development, but much less so with early decoding skills.

Subsequently, many students who are labeled as "clinically language impaired" prior to, or just beginning, formal education in preschool or kindergarten, do not necessarily have problems learning to read initially (Catts, Fey, Tomblin, & Zhang) Their later "decline" in reading comprehension is thought to be related to the changing nature of reading comprehension assessments: the texts used to assess reading comprehension in the early grades require less complex mental models and very limited language processing, allowing those with weak language skills to answer basic comprehension questions as accurately as their typically developing peers.

In the later grades, however, reading comprehension assessments contain more difficult passages that require more complex mental models. Poor comprehenders lack the language skills needed to construct these complex mental models and begin to score more poorly on reading comprehension assessments when compared to their typically developing peers.
Poor decoders with good language comprehension abilities may be able to compensate to some degree for their weak word-reading abilities in the later grades. That's because even though they might struggle to decode all of the words, their language skills allow them to bootstrap their way to the text's meaning, using their good language skills and rich knowledge of the world to help construct sufficient mental models to correctly answer comprehension questions (Stanovich, 1980).

Helping Children "Crack the Code"
According to our book, a key challenge facing the beginning reader is the ability to "crack the code" or, learning how written language maps onto spoken language. This is because better decoders devote greater cognitive resources to the processes involved in comprehending text. Children's oral language skills serve as the foundation for both aspects of reading ability-word reading and language comprehension.

Because few preschool children can yet read words, we must look at precursor skills that develop into word recognition or decoding ability. Knowledge of the alphabet and phonological awareness are both strong predictors of later decoding and comprehension, and it is evident that teaching these in combination has a consistently positive impact on improving students' later decoding and reading comprehension abilities. Rapid naming, knowledge about print conventions and concepts, the ability to write letters or names, and oral language skills were also good predictors, but teaching these has not consistently led to gains in reading success.

How the Common Core Factors into Literacy Development
With 46 states now working to implement the Common Core State Standards which include grade-specific K-12 standards in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language, educators may be required to adjust their lessons to align with the standards and assessments used to determine student progress.

But what if the road to success with those standards begins when the student was an infant, toddler, or preschooler? This question was clearly answered through the NELP's extensive research, which emphasized the importance of print knowledge, phonological processing abilities and oral language skills as important predictors of later literacy skills, and with evidence that teaching these early on can have long-term benefits.

Additionally, assessment of these early literacy skills is important for identifying children who are likely to need more intensive instruction to achieve success with literacy. By identifying and working with students across all literacy levels at a very early age, today's educators can take a proactive role in ensuring that students meet or exceed standards across the board.

Making a Difference: The Teacher's Role in Literacy Development
Interventions focused on fostering language aren't easy to develop or implement. The interconnected and complex nature of language comes with a long developmental history and draws on a broad range of linguistic and cognitive capacities.
Furthermore, interventions occur within a social context where motivational, behavioral, and social factors can impact the learning climate. Children's attention to language input and their willingness to respond to it are affected by a host of factors, including their interest in the topic of the conversation, their relationship to the speaker, the number and identities of other conversational participants, and the setting.

Even more vexing is the fact that teachers - the most important source of language input in preschool classrooms - have a history of using language in ways that may not be consistent with the interactions found by research to be conducive to language learning. Teacher's interactions that best encourage language learning include having conversations that stay on a single topic, providing children opportunities to talk, encouraging analytical thinking, and giving information about the meanings of words.

For teachers, key considerations for instruction include the fidelity of the implementation (an extremely important aspect); teaching children letter names and sounds by performing phonological awareness tasks; and understanding that there is no link between curricula with a systematic and explicit focus (i.e. teacher-directed) and negative social-emotional outcomes for children.

Response to intervention in preschool holds promise for successful early language development but several key issues must be considered. For one, preschools often serve disproportionate numbers of children who need Tier 2 or Tier 3 services, which causes staffing concerns. Also, more research is needed on the effect of interventions for children from low-income families, children with disabilities, English language learners, and children from underrepresented ethnic groups.
The NELP report, along with other studies of children's early language development, suggests that early oral language has a growing contribution to later reading comprehension - a contribution that is separate from the important role played by the alphabetic code. As such, improving young children's oral language development should be a central goal during the preschool and kindergarten years.

In the end, making strides in this area of a child's educational development can begin with a very simple exercise-shared book reading. Although various approaches have been found to improve young children's language, the approach of shared book reading has gained the greatest research support thus far, particularly when such reading is carried out dialogically, that is, with much language interaction between the reader and the child. Combining shared book reading along with other language activities with explicit decoding instruction in the context of a supportive and responsive classroom, can make the difference between a child whose literacy development is at or above standards or one who struggles with reading, writing, and literacy throughout his or her K-12 education.

References
Catts, H.W., Fey, M.E., Tomblin, B.J., & Zhang, X. (2002). "A longitudinal investigation
of reading outcomes in children with language impairments." Journal
of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 45, 1142-1157.
Catts, H.W., Hogan, T.P., & Adlof, S.M. (2005). "Developmental changes in reading
and reading disabilities." In H.W. Catts & A.G. Kamhi (Eds.), The connections
between language and reading disabilities(pp. 25-40). Mahwah,
NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Justice, L.M., Mashburn, A., & Petscher, Y. (in press). "Very early language skills
of fifth-grade poor comprehenders." Journal of Research in Reading.
Kintsch, W., & Kintsch, E. (2005). "Comprehension." In S.G. Paris & S.A. Stahl
(Eds.), Current issues in reading comprehension and assessment (pp. 71-92). New York, Routledge.
Metsala, J. L., & Walley, A. C. (1998). "Spoken vocabulary growth and the segmental restructuring of lexical representations: Precursors to phonemic awareness and early reading ability." In J. L. Metsala & L. C. Ehri (Eds.), Word recognition in beginning literacy (pp. 89-120). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.
Perfetti, C.A. (1985). Reading ability. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Stanovich, K.E. (1980). "Toward an interactive-compensatory model of individual differences in the development of reading fluency." Reading Research Quarterly, 16, 32-71.

Timothy Shanahan, Ph.D., and Christopher J. Lonigan, Ph.D., are the editors of Early Childhood Literacy: The National Early Literacy Panel and Beyond, available from Brookes Publishing Co. They are two of the nation's top childhood literacy experts and served on the National Early Literacy Panel (NELP).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Role of Early Oral Language in Literacy Development - Language Magazine

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Timothy Shanahan and Christopher Lonigan explore the connection between early oral language development and later reading comprehension success Supporting young children's language and literacy development has long been considered a practice that yields strong readers and writers later in life. The results of the National Early Literacy Panel's (NELP) six years of scientific research synthesis [...]

# data[].attributes.headline
Mystery Bag: Developing Oral Language Skills in First Grade

# data[].attributes.subject
Mystery Bag: Developing Oral Language Skills in First Grade

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Mystery Bag: Developing Oral Language Skills in First Grade

# data[].attributes.headline
Early Literacy: The Importance of Letter Recognition

# data[].attributes.subject
Early Literacy: The Importance of Letter Recognition

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Early Literacy: The Importance of Letter Recognition

# data[].attributes.headline
      Oral Language: Toolbox Assignment 

# data[].attributes.subject
      Oral Language: Toolbox Assignment 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Common Core Aligned Graphic Organizer for iPad Pages

This is an iWork Pages graphic organizer for students to answer questions about key details in a text.

Students download and open the graphic organizer on their iPad and enter their information.
Grades 1 - 2 Common Core Literature and Informational Text
iPad Common Core Graphic Organizer - Story Detective

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.1 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.1.1 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.2.1 Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.2.1 Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text.

Download: ipad-common-core-graphic-organizer-story-detective.pages
Download: ipad-graphic-organizer-story-detective-plain.pages

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
iPad Graphic Organizer - Story Detective

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This is an iWork Pages graphic organizer for students to answer questions about key details in a text. Students download and open the graphic organizer on their iPad and enter their information. Grades 1 - 2 Common Core Literature and Informational Text CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.1 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

# data[].attributes.headline
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.1Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

# data[].attributes.subject
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.1Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2
Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.5
Explain major differences between books that tell stories and books that give information, drawing on a wide reading of a range of text types.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English Language Arts Standards " Reading: Literature " Grade 1

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.2 Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson. CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.1.5 Explain major differences between books that tell stories and books that give information, drawing on a wide reading of a range of text types.

# data[].attributes.body
I would use formative assessment by creating an anchor chart. The chart will discuss how to ask questions and how to answer them. The students will be able to participate in creating the anchor chart through discussion. The teacher will then monitor the students through observation to see who is participating in the discussion. The teacher will then read aloud a short story with them. Throughout the book, the teacher will have the students answer character, setting, and story elements.

# data[].attributes.body
Students have now discussed the setting, characters, and story elements as a class so they will now have the opportunity to discuss more in depth questions about the story in pairs. The teacher will display a task card on the board one at a time. The teacher will read the prompt for each task card. The students will then discuss their answer with their partner. The students will switch partners 6 to 8 times depending on time. The teacher will monitor participation, collaboration, and knowledge.

# data[].attributes.body
The teacher will now pass a worksheet. The worksheet will have a story map. The teacher will write the questions on the smart board about characters, settings, problems, solutions, title of the book with author, and supporting characters. The teacher will read the questions and give the students enough time to complete the worksheet. They students will then turn in the worksheet when finished.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Story Elements | Story elements posters, Reading classroom, Kindergarten reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Aug 3, 2015 - This set contains posters for 8 elements: setting, characters, author, illustrator, problem, solution, publisher, and publication date.

# data[].attributes.body
Explain more in depth what are questions and answers. Give multiple examples in order to help the ELL’s understand what the activity will be about. Walk around and read the students cues. Ask if they need more clarification and address it individually as well as a whole. Have the students struggling with the activity go to the back table where the teacher will be sitting to help those who need more help.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Kids need to be able to learn to read text for meaning ... (and ask themselves) "Do I know why I'm reading this? Do I know what information I'm looking for?" ... We're always delivering the curriculum in a way that draws on language and reading skills.
- Dr. Nonie Lesaux

Do you remember buying used textbooks in college? If you were lucky, you got one that was highlighted by a skilled student, giving you clues to key information from the book that you needed for your coursework. If you weren't lucky, you got a textbook that had practically all words highlighted on each page and you were looking at a sea of neon pink, yellow, or blue, which could be very distracting. My guess is that a lot of high school students head to college without ever having learned to interact effectively with non-fiction texts. Since books are a precious resource in K-12 education systems, students aren't allowed to highlight or mark in them, and may rely more heavily on the classroom instruction and peer interaction than their reading material to grasp the main idea of a lesson.

Reading Non-fiction with ELLs

See more great ideas in our related resource section on reading non-fiction with ELLs!

Of course it's not just a question of highlighting important information - it's a question of learning key concepts and vocabulary by becoming familiar with different kinds of text, by learning to use a textbook's tools and structure, and by monitoring one's own comprehension of non-fiction text. Without ever having developed these skills, students will have a tough time when it comes time for them to learn information independently in more advanced coursework and in college.

This is especially true for English language learners, who are challenged by learning a new language and new content in that language at the same time. Teachers can help prepare ELL students to successfully work with non-fiction, (or expository) text, however, in many ways - and the earlier the better. Starting early is important because if elementary school classrooms have a predisposition towards fictional stories and literature, students may struggle when they get to fourth grade and need to engage effectively with non-fiction texts in order to learn new content.

In Colorín Colorado's Reading to Learn: ELLs in Grades 4-6 webcast, featured panelist Dr. Nonie Lesaux addresses this transition:

There probably is a fourth-grade slump, but the question is whether we're just picking something up in fourth grade that's already been there for a lot of years for a number of kids, and/or whether, in fact, there are differences in the comprehension demands of the curriculum, and certainly that's a question ...(because by fourth grade) we have reading that cuts across a number of areas of instruction, so reading is not just relegated to reading instruction but rather we need to have good reading comprehension skills for math, for science, for other areas of the curriculum.

While some of those challenges relate to reading instruction in content areas, they also relate to improving the instruction non-fiction texts for ELLs so that students can work successfully with content-area material. In this article I will highlight components of non-fiction texts and effective strategies to help ELLs gain the skills needed to not only understand the content, but understand how the text structure works so they will be able to access content effectively throughout their education.

Introducing text

First, let's look at definitions of types of text:

Narrative: The main purpose of narrative text is to tell a story. Narrative text has beginning, middle and end, characters, plot or conflict, and setting. Usually, narrative texts are written from the author's imagination.

Expository: The main purpose of expository text is to inform or describe. Authors who write expository texts research the topic to gain information. The information is organized in a logical and interesting manner using various expository text structures.

To increase ELLs comprehension of non-fiction expository text, teachers need to provide:

1. explicit instruction on how expository text is structured.

2. models of "what good readers do" to get information from expository text.

3. opportunities for practice so that ELLs can identify and interact with the text

4. opportunities for peer interaction with the content of the text in order to increase comprehension.

Let's look at these steps in more detail:

1. Provide explicit instruction on how expository text is structured.

Teachers need to spend some time introducing students to the format of expository text. This is a lesson intended to teach students how to get information from non-fiction text rather than on the actual content of the text. That instruction can be done once students are familiar with the text format and structure.

Help students recognize the structure of expository text. Introduce the various parts of the text, such as the table of contents and the glossary. Discuss how these different parts are used for informational reading, how the text is organized, where different parts will be found in a textbook, and how they compare with one another.

For example, have students compare the index and the glossary, and discuss what they would use each section for. You might try asking a question such as, "If I want to know the definition of a word, will I look in the index or glossary?"

Elements that are important to introduce include:

Although it may seem very obvious to teachers, something as simple as finding bold words and identifying their definition in surrounding text may be new concepts to developing readers. As students are instructed to find different components of the text, ask questions such as, "What does this graphic tell us? Why do you think the author wanted to put that there?" Make it a thinking exercise so the students will internalize the knowledge.

Chapter walk

One way to help students become familiar with new kinds of books is through a chapter walk, which can be used with fiction or non-fiction text. Students preview the chapter before starting their first lesson in a new unit, looking for headings, graphics, pictures, important words, and key information. Students can discuss what they've noticed and what they think will be covered in pairs, groups, or with the entire class. Once students have become comfortable with a new resource, this exercise can be used to preview content for future lessons and activate background knowledge.

This strategy can also be used with fiction books by using illustrations and chapter headings or important words in the text.

Types of text

For older students, teachers can spend some time helping them understand the different types of text they will encounter, such as descriptive, sequence, and cause and effect. (See examples in this document and the graphics from the U-46 School District in Elgin, Illinois, featured on Reading Rockets.)

2. Provide opportunity for ELLs to practice interacting with the text and identifying key components of the text.

Giving the students to practice these skills will build confidence and offer many learning opportunities. Practice activities can be done to demonstrate how to get information from the expository text. For example, ask students to look for the main idea of a text, and then to explain what "clues" they saw that supported their answer. Students might say things such as, "The main idea is usually in the first paragraph." Or, "I saw the summary written on the side of the page." Engaging the class in discussion about these key components will give all students a chance to demonstrate learning.

Other strategies include:

Making predictions: One method is the Directed Reading-Thinking Activity (DR-TA), which encourages students to be active readers. DR-TA is a process where the students listen to a brief summary of the text, review a few key words or pictures, and then make a prediction about the content of the text. As they begin to read the text, the teacher asks more questions about how their predictions match what they're reading.

Word splash: Students receive handouts with key words and phrases from the text "splashed" randomly across the page. The students spend some time making clusters of information that goes together. They can do this by circling groups of words, highlighting them in different colors, or drawing lines. The class discusses what they've learned from their clusters and what they predict they will learn from the text. Once again, when they begin to read the text they should make note of which parts of their prediction were correct and how they know that based on "evidence" in the text.

Practice highlighting: Students can practice highlighting text on worksheets or by using this method: Give each student a clear plastic overhead sheet and a "write-on/wipe-off" marker. Have the student paperclip the plastic sheet to a page in the textbook and work together to circle new vocabulary words and underline key points. The plastic sheets can be wiped off and used again.

Margin bookmark: One way to allow students to practice making notes is by using margin bookmarks. Prepare scratch paper "bookmark" strips that fit in the crease of the textbook and within the margin of the print, or that can be attached to the outside margin using a paperclip. Students can use these bookmarks to make notes in the margin. Give them specific tasks such as, "Write the definition of one of the bold words in your own words," or "Write one fact, one question, and one thing that is important for you to remember." Provide examples so that students see how they can interact effectively with expository text.

Define the important information: As evidenced by those textbooks full of highlighting I mentioned at the beginning of the article, if a student doesn't know what's important, then everything is important. I like to have the students do an activity I call "Pack the Suitcase" so that they can start identifying the most important information in the text. In order to do this activity, give the students a short text (no more than two paragraphs) and a small envelope with a picture of a suitcase drawn or glued on it. Pass out pieces of scrap paper and tell students that they need to:

1. review the text

2. write "an important point" on each piece of paper

3. "pack" them in their suitcase.

Students can use as many or as few pieces of paper as they want. When the students are finished, tell them they are going on a trip but that they packed too much - they must look in their suitcase and take out half of their items. Students will really have to decide which items (points) are most important to bring on the trip. Finally, have students "travel" to the other side of the room and sit with a partner and "unpack" the suitcases. See if they have the same points, and discuss any differences and how they identified what was important in the article.

3. Model "what good readers do" to get information from expository text.

As good readers, teachers sometimes forget how mystifying and overwhelming text can be for students. I can recall many years of math classes where I looked around at my classmates in puzzlement and wondered how they figured all the answers out! Looking at the textbook didn't help me because I didn't understand what I was looking for. I believe ELLs ofent have a similar experience, but if teachers model "what to do" when approaching expository text, ELLs will become more successful readers.

Here are some strategies to try:

Think aloud*: Read an introductory portion of the text to the class. Pause to model what you are thinking out loud, such as by describing what you know about the text. For example, a teacher may look at a chapter with a picture of a volcano and bold words in the text such as lava, magma, and geothermic. The teacher could say, "Hmmm ... I see this picture of a volcano and I notice bold vocabulary words. The words look very scientific and technical. I bet this will be a reading about science. I think I will learn facts about volcanoes and how they work."

Demonstrate how to figure out vocabulary: As you come to new vocabulary words, pause and think about how you can figure out what that word means. Show how you look for clues such as commas after the word that contain a definition, or show how the word is related to something else you know such as a root word or cognate in another language. Finally the teacher may want to demonstrate how to ask someone next to you for help with the word, or refer to your personal dictionary of new words that you've created for the unit.

Use a graphic organizer: Determine what you need to know in the text and show how to complete a graphic organizer. Talk about how the graphic organizer will help you remember the important information in the text. For example, if students need to determine the characteristics of an active volcano vs. an inactive volcano, the graphic organizer can follow a comparison outline and students fill in the correct information as related to the topic. Be sure to emphasize that this kind of activity can be used in any classroom and with any content. The student just needs to determine what they want to know and make an "organized picture" of the information so they will remember.

Model "fix up" strategies*: Proficient readers know when they "missed" something or what they are reading doesn't make sense. Developing readers tend to "just keep going" hoping that eventually it will all make sense. Of course, this makes it much more difficult to comprehend the content and it leads to frustration. Show students how you "double check" information when you don't understand it or it doesn't make sense. Read a section of the text aloud - especially a complicated portion - and stop to reflect. Say out loud, "What did I just read? That didn't make sense. Let me go back and read it again." If it still seems confusing, ask the students for ideas about how you could "check" your understanding of this information.

Determine if it's "In the Book" or "In my Head": In the Question Answer Relationship (QAR) strategy students are taught to identify if information is in the book (literal) or in their head (inferential). Teachers can demonstrate this by using questions to model how they figure that out. For example, a literal question might be, "What are three characteristics of an active volcano?" An example of an inferential question is, "Are volcanoes dangerous?" This can be a very important skill to develop because many developing readers spend a lot of time scouring the text looking for an answer that is not defined literally in the text.

*Strategies from, "7 Keys to Comprehension: How to help your kids read it and get it!" by Susan Zimmerman and Chryse Hutchins. See Hotlinks for further information.

4. Increase peer interaction with the content of the text in order to increase comprehension.

Giving students the chance to interact with their peers about new content will engage them and offer more opportunities to practice talking, writing, and thinking about what they have learned. You can do this with the following strategies:

Develop study guides to guide ELLs through content area textbook reading. Study guides will focus student attention on the major ideas presented, and can include graphic organizers as described above, key vocabulary, and guiding questions. These study guides can be very helpful in preparing for final exams and students can use them to "quiz" each other. More advanced students can develop their own study guides in partners or in groups.

Assign reading partners. Pair ELLs with friendly fluent readers. Ask partners to read aloud to each other, alternating sentences or pages. After the first student reads, the other student summarizes what they heard. Then the two partners switch roles.

Encourage student engagement. One strategy is the "Say Something" activity. Students take turns reading aloud, and following the reading, each student 'says something,' such as asking a question, making a comment, making a connection to something already read, or responding personally to the text. The exercise also engages students as readers and gets them thinking about the text. For ELLs, teachers may want to have a "phrase wall" displayed so they have a sentence structure to begin their comments. Examples such as, "That reminds me of..." Or "Do you know..." or "That's interesting because..."

Have students re-tell what they have learned. After students read a section of text, have them re-tell it to a partner or write a few summary notes in their notebook and switch notes with a partner. The partner can add notes, questions or comments to the author's notes.

For more tips on supporting reading instruction in the ELL classroom, take a look at our reading tips for teachers, as well as some reading comprehension strategies. You may also find some helpful tips from the AdLit.org Strategy Library.

Closing Thoughts

Spending time working with text structure and guiding ELLs in how to access expository content effectively will have huge benefits for your students now and in the future. Textbooks are like other classroom tools, such as microscopes or computers. Without the proper introduction and practice, the student will only get a fraction of the information the teacher hopes they will gain. As teachers work with students to discover the secrets to using expository text for learning, they will be rewarded by deeper discussions and learning in the classroom. Most importantly, having learned these strategies, your students will be equipped to interact with a multitude of academic texts throughout the rest of their education.
Text Features: Non-Fiction Printed Page vs. Website Format
This chart from ReadWriteThink.org gives students a reference for comparing non-fiction textbook or printed material to website content features.
Colorín Colorado Webcast: Reading to Learn in Grades 4-6
This Colorín Colorado webcast features Dr. Nonie Lesaux, and addresses the challenges facing English language learners - and their teachers - in grades 4-6.
Colorín Colorado Webcast: ELL Comprehension
This webcast featuring Dr. Cynthia Lundgren and Kristina Robertson discusses effective reading comprehension strategies for teaching English language learner students.
Colorín Colorado: How to Help ELL Students Leap to Success
This article offers suggestions for helping teachers guide ELLs through the critical transition between third and fourth grade.
AdLit.org: Strategy Library
This resource offers comprehensive list of strategies for each phase of the comprehension lesson - before, during, and after reading.
West Ed: Reading Apprenticeship Framework
Website for the Reading Apprenticeship Framework that describes the elements of the framework and includes links to articles.
Text-Mapping Project
Step-by-step lesson plan on how to map text with students.
What's Special About Non-fiction?
This lesson plan from Scholastic offers ideas about ways to introduce students to nonfiction texts.
Time for Kids
Time for Kids offers a great range of informational text for different grade levels and related activities.
Education Oasis: Graphic Organizers for Vocabulary Development
Links to vocabulary development graphic organizers.
Vocabulary Activity: Prediction and Confirmation
An activity for vocabulary prediction and confirmation featured on the Florida Center for Instructional Technology website.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Increasing ELL Student Reading Comprehension with Non-fiction Text

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids need to be able to learn to read text for meaning … (and ask themselves) “Do I know why I’m reading this? Do I know what information I’m looking for?” … We’re always delivering the curriculum in a way that draws on language and reading skills. — Dr. Nonie LesauxDo you remember buying used textb…

# data[].attributes.body
Have the ELL students partner up with non-ELL students to discuss the characters, settings, and any other story element. The teacher will continue to observe the students to see how they are collaborating with one another. If the teacher notices that students are struggling, she will sit with them in the back table and explain more in depth the activity so they can comprehend the material.

# data[].attributes.body
The teacher would obtain the non-English version of the read aloud in order for the students who are struggling can comprehend the material in their language. She would also have more visual aids illustrating the questions on the board. Students will be given as many resources to help them decrease their anxiety got not understanding the material.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
We create practical, timely, affordable professional learning to help educators and instructional leaders provide students with a modern, equitable, and quality education.

# data[].attributes.body
The teacher will then give each student a worksheet with a story map about the read aloud. The teacher will have the questions written on the smart board. The teacher will then read the questions and have the students answer as best as they can. The students will then turn in the worksheet for grading.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Adler, C. (2004). Seven Strategies to Teach Students Text Comprehension.

Armbruster, B. B., Lehr, F., & Osborn, J. (2001) Put reading first: The research building blocks for teaching children to read kindergarten through grade three. Washington, DC: The U.S. Department of Education.

Boulineau, T., Fore, C, Hagan-Burke, S. and Burke, M. (2004). Use of Story-Mapping to Increase the Story-Grammar Text Comprehension of Elementary Students with Learning Disabilities. Learning Disability Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Spring, 2004), pp. 105-121

Nell K. Duke, P. David Pearson, Stephanie L. Strachan, and Alison K. Billman (2011) Essential Elements of Fostering and Teaching Reading Comprehension . From What Research Has to Say About Reading Instruction (4th ed.), International Reading Association.

Nell K. Duke, Alessandra E. Ward, and P. David Pearson (2021). The Science of Reading Comprehension Instruction , The Reading Teacher, Vol 74, No. 6 (May-June 2021).

Dunst, C, Simkus, A, Hamby, D. (2012). Children's Story Retelling as a Literacy and Language Enhancement Strategy. CELLreviews 5(4). Asheville, NC: Orelena Hawks Puckett Institute, Center for Early Literacy Learning.

Santa, C., Havens, L., & Valdes, B. (2004). Project CRISS: Creating independence through student owned strategies 3rd Edition. Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt Publishing Company.

Timothy Shanahan et al., Improving Reading Comprehension in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade (2010). U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences.

Trabasso, T., & Bouchard, E. (2002) Teaching readers how to comprehend text strategically. In C. Block and M. Pressley, (Eds.) Comprehension instruction: Research-based practices (pp. 176-200). NY: Guilford Press.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Story maps use graphic organizers to help students learn the elements of a book or story. The most basic story maps focus on the beginning, middle, and end of the story. More advanced organizers focus more on plot or character traits.

# data[].attributes.body
Read the story to the students and then have them collaborate with the teacher or the teachers aid in order to have that extra support.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Ms. Raya's lesson plan for her fourth grade class provides a good example of how self-questioning can be practiced to improve reading comprehension in all content areas. Ms. Raya's students recently learned about literal, inferential, and evaluative questions. They have been maintaining a collaborative document where they collect, categorize, and share these types of question based on diverse readings.

# data[].attributes.body
Reduce and simplify the amount of work in order for the student grasp the material. Use visual cues to help the students transition to the next activity.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
IEP Goals, Accommodations and Strategies

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Looking for IEP goals, goal banks or accommodations and strategies?There’s a lot of information here, so take your time. A solid IEP is time consuming.

# data[].attributes.body
Give additional time or days to complete the activities. For testing have the teacher or the aid read the questions out loud and reduce the questions.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Many a teacher has asked a student to "tell about the story" only to be met with a blank stare. This may be particularly true for students with autism. Some students with autism simply do not have the communication skills to be able to answer the question, others don't know how to communicate the information they do have, and still others don't understand enough about the story to respond.

Reading comprehension is often a concern for the teachers of students with autism. Many teachers tell me that their students with autism can read but that "they don't understand anything." It is always tricky to respond to such statements as many students with autism do understand what they read but cannot effectively express what they know. That is, some students with autism only appear incapable of comprehending text. Because students with autism have movement and communication differences, they may struggle to answer questions and express ideas in traditional ways. Some students might be unable to "find" the words needed to answer comprehension questions (or any question for that matter). Others may know the words but be unable to answer questions when directly asked to do so. It may be hard for some teachers to understand that a student could fluently read a text, know exactly what it means, and be unable to communicate that information. And those who do understand these gaps may be stumped at how to engineer other ways to help the student show what she knows.

If a teacher is confused about a student's ability to comprehend, he or she should give the students many ways to demonstrate understanding. When asking comprehension questions, teachers may want to try the following strategies: give students plenty of time to answer (even a minute or more); say the questions and present them in written form; or let the student write their answer or circle it rather than saying it. The teacher might also try approaches that make the interaction more informal and less direct. Some learners are more successful when questions are asked using a funny voice or foreign accent or when a prop such as a puppet or microphone are used in the lesson (Williams, 1996).

If students seem completely unable to answer comprehension questions, teachers might offer other ways to show understanding. They might ask students to draw or point to pictures (which may also be challenging for students with autism), use signs, gestures, or pantomime to "illustrate" a scene from a book, make diorama of a key scene, or create a collage or painting related to the text.

If a teacher uses all of these strategies and still cannot assess a student's comprehension, the student should not lose access to books, reading, and opportunities to learn academic content. Students with autism often demonstrate understanding in their own way. For instance, a high school teacher who works with a young man with significant disabilities, began reading him Thinking in Pictures(Grandin, 1995), the autobiography of a woman with autism. Before he was introduced to the book, the student was able to remain seated for no more than fifteen minutes at a time (for reading purposes or for any activity). When the teacher read him a book on autism, however, the student sat rapt for more than fifty minutes. The teacher reported that she had never seen him sit so still or so quietly. The teacher interpreted this behavior to mean that he was interested in and able to understand the text. She then chose other books to read to the young man and found that the student had a similar positive reaction to other texts she chose- especially those related to autism and disability studies. While she continuously worked to assess his comprehension of the text, the student did not lose access to books while she searched for new ways to learn about what he understood.

But what about those students who do need comprehension support? Having shared some information about students who know more than they can demonstrate, it must be acknowledged that many students with autism (and those without) need help comprehending text (Rosinski, 2002). Students with autism, for instance, may have problems making predictions; visualizing the events of a text; and identifying a purpose for reading. As one mother learned, some students with autism also have a hard time separating main ideas from details:

In fifth grade my son was assigned to write a paper on Benedict Arnold. When I looked at his rough draft, I noticed that he had included all of the important facts about Arnold's life except for one - the fact that he had betrayed the Revolutionary Army to the British for 10,000 pounds and a commission in the Royal Navy! I asked him whether he hadn't left out something important, to which he replied, "But all of it is important!" (Rosinski, 2002)

The following comprehension strategies may help some students gain comprehension skills and improve their ability to read and communicate about written material.

Build background knowledge

Student comprehension can also be boosted when the teacher helps the learner build background knowledge. Many students with disabilities, in particular, need this type of support as these learners are often excluded from the very activities that help students build background knowledge (e.g., socializing with peers, field trips).

Presenting background information related to the focus topic can help students better understand the text. For example, teachers might show students a movie related to the text, tell the learner a story related to the text, or help the student create connections between his or her experiences and the topic of the text. The teacher might also:

brainstorm with the learner and write ideas on chart paper

share personal stories on the topic

ask questions about the topic

make connections between the topic and a student's special interests

share other books related to the text

Perhaps the most significant support that can be offered is to include the student in the typical routines and activities of school life. Students will build "background knowledge" daily when they are included in the social life (e.g., recess, art class, locker routines) and the academic life of the school (e.g., math class, orchestra, academic clubs) and when their instruction is provided alongside their same-age peers.

Think aloud

To boost comprehension, teachers can help students monitor their own understanding as they read. One common strategy teachers often use in a whole-class format is the think-aloud (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000). A think-aloud involves the teacher reading a text to the class and modeling his or her own comprehension strategies such as asking questions, making inferences, determining importance, and making connections to personal background knowledge. The text or selected passage should contain information, concepts, and words that students may find difficult. The students should be encouraged to read the passage silently as the teacher is reading aloud.

A teacher might start reading a book by saying, "The title of the book is Running for Class President so I think it will be about kids being involved in student council or some kind of student government. When I look at the picture on the cover, I think maybe the main characters will be a boy and a girl. The cover has a picture of a classroom, so I think a lot of this book will take place in a school."

Teachers may even write their thoughts on chart paper so students can see and hear the process.

Drama

Comprehension can also be bolstered when teachers teach a story or a piece of text using drama. A teacher might have students act out parts of a textbook or a passage in a short story.

This technique is often used in lower grades, but it can be very effective in both middle school and high school classrooms as well. When students with autism study literature in the upper grade levels, they may have some difficulty understanding the motivations of characters in a story. This problem occurs because some of these learners have difficulty identifying and articulating emotions in certain contexts. Watching peers act out scenes from literature can help students with autism and others pair dialogue with appropriate facial expressions and voice tone. These scenes, therefore, can help learners better understand the meaning of the story.

Teachers may choose to use different types of drama for different lessons. Pantomime (Keefe, 1996), dramatic reading, and full-story performance are all types of drama that can be used in the classroom to enhance student comprehension and enjoyment.

Reciprocal teaching

Students can also be asked to help each other understand text. Some teachers ask learners to engage in "reciprocal teaching" (Palinscar & Brown, 1984). Reciprocal teaching is essentially a dialogue that takes place between teachers and students. The dialogue is structured by the use of four strategies: summarizing, question generating, clarifying, and predicting. The teacher and students take turns assuming the role of teacher in leading this dialogue.

Once students are comfortable with the strategies, they are invited to become "the teacher" and conduct reciprocal teaching dialogues with new material. At this point the teacher's role shifts from providing direct instruction to facilitating student interaction, monitoring progress, and providing feedback. As students become more skilled with the strategy, they can work in pairs or small groups to coach one another, ask questions, summarize, predict, clarify, and think aloud about what they are reading.

All students, but particularly those with autism, may need to see this strategy modeled more than once. Since students with autism are typically quite visual, the teacher may consider videotaping a reciprocal teaching lesson and allowing individual students to take the tape home for viewing.

Some learners may "fail" comprehension assessments because, in part, they are uncomfortable with the direct nature of question/answer interactions. For this reason, some students may respond well to the retelling strategy. Retelling is a comprehension strategy as well as a tool for assessment.

A retelling is done by the reader after he or she has read or heard a story. The student is asked to "tell everything" he or she can about story or text. Retelling reinforces story structure and the language and imagery used in the text and provides more information about a reader's understanding than comprehension questions or other traditional assessments. By repeating the story with one's own words, a student can learn to attend to the story elements during the initial reading and gain strategies for organizing his or her own thinking.

To help struggling readers engage in retelling the teacher might:

model the strategy

have other students model the strategy

allow the student to doodle or draw part of the retelling

give the student illustrations or photographs to use in the retelling

give the student specific strategies to use in retelling

encourage the student to take notes or draw pictures during the initial storytelling

allow the student to type or write the retelling if this is easier

allow small groups of students to retell a story together

have the student retell the story by completing a story map or other graphic organizer

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Tell Me About the Story: Comprehension Strategies for Students on the Autism Spectrum

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Reading comprehension is often a concern for the teachers of students with autism. The comprehension strategies described in this article may help some students gain comprehension skills and improve their ability to read and communicate about written material.

# data[].attributes.body
Provide support with students who have more experience in the assignment. Allow alternative assignments if they are not able to write their answers. Have an oral exam and allow extra time to process the information.

# data[].attributes.body
To reteach the lesson provides extra time to comprehend the material and provide more in-depth step by step understanding. Also providing relatable examples about interest the students might have will allow them to connect the examples which will increase classroom engagement and encourage the student to participate in classroom activities.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Are you struggling with what to do while reteaching a concept to your students? Try these six strategies to beef up your reteach, and make your students feel like rockstars!

Build Schema

Sometimes our students have a difficult time understanding a concept because they have no prior knowledge of it. Providing real world examples that they can connect to will increase engagement and allow their brains to build a framework for understanding.

One of my favorite ways to build schema is through YouTube videos related to the topic. Our students are deeply interested in video, and if you are able to find a current video that accurately explains a topic they get really into it. From there I encourage students to ask questions to build into our reteach.

Peer Coach

Sometimes students have already heard it from teachers several times and they aren't making the necessary connections to the content. When this happens, give peer coaching a try.

In order for peer coaching to be successful it is important to carefully think through who you have in the role of coach. It is tempting to select a student who has shown complete mastery of the content, but the more powerful choice is a student who is right on the cusp of mastery without having achieved it yet. This makes the coaching process powerful for both the coach and the students being coached.

I introduce the coach as the "content expert" to the group and give them the floor. In addition I love to record the way the coach introduces and teaches the concept to the group to refer back to. By having a peer coach, students are able to hear the content in a different way, from a different person who they trust.

These Big Ten Math Stations are a perfect took to use along with peer coaching. Each unit offers ten different stations built around the same standard to allow students ample practice towards mastery. They are available for second, third, fourth, and fifth grade in bundles or separately.

Cooperative Learning Strategies

I am slightly cooperative learning obsessed. I love cooperative learning strategies for all areas of the classroom and academic spectrum, but they are especially great for reteaching.

While there are far too many strategies to name that would be perfect for reteaching, my absolute favorite has to be sage and scribe.

To complete Sage-N-Scribe

1. Partner A has the pencil

2. Partner B thinks out loud while Partner A scribes for them giving them praise or corrections

3. Partner A and Partner B switch rolls and repeat

This strategy is amazing for all students, because voicing their thinking really makes them work on their metacognition and work on academic vocabulary. It also allows me, as the teacher, to hear how my students are doing. The power really is in the conversations.

Focus on Vocabulary

Vocabulary really is everything, it can not be underutilized in the classroom. I am a big advocate for pre-teaching vocabulary, but I also understand that it does not always happen. When students struggle with a concept it is imperative that we take the time to ensure that it is not the vocabulary that is getting in the way.

There are a myriad of ways to focus on vocabulary, the important part is that you do it. When students are comfortable using academic vocabulary in oral and written language they are able to better grasp concepts as a whole.

One of my favorite ways to include vocabulary, and get students writing, is through photo quick writes. I show students a photo as well as give them a word bank of vocabulary terms to use to write everything they know about the concept. Their writing is a great way to flush out what vocabulary they truly know and what needs some more work.

Another easy activity to complete with vocabulary is a word sort where students simply take a deck of vocabulary cards, like these word wall cards, and sort them into words they know and words they need help with.

Use Visuals

Our goal is always to reach learners in as many ways as possible, and one of the easiest ways to reach a new learning style is through visuals.

This might mean creating an anchor chart together, making individual mind maps, illustrating vocabulary words, or sketch notes. The sky is truly the limit, and follow the guidance of your students when it comes to visuals.

Check for Understanding Often

Often it is difficult to apprehend where the break down is when it comes to understanding, so it becomes important to stop and check for understanding as often as humanly possible while reteaching.

Whatever you do, just do it early and often.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Are you struggling with what to do while reteaching a concept to your students? Try these six strategies to beef up your reteach, and make your students feel like rockstars! Sometimes our students have a difficult time understanding a concept because they have no prior knowledge of it.

# data[].attributes.body
Utilize scaffolding to re-teach will help the students comprehend the material. Developing activities that are relatable and adapt them to the lesson. Provide extra intervention for those students who are still having difficulty comprehending the material by staying after school with the teacher. Give extra time in the activities so the students can focus more on the assignments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
You Taught it. They Didn’t Get it. Now What? 5 Strategies to Use When Re-Teaching

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Learn five strategies to re-teach content to help students learn, stay engaged, and improve their mastery of skills, concepts, and content.

# data[].attributes.body
In order to re-teach, one must determine which students are in need of the extra support. The teacher can utilize a few strategies for remediation like utilizing small groups during independent work for those students struggling with the material. Utilize more visual resources like videos explaining the material.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Best Practices for Remediation

Target students individually - use the data to determine which students need to improve on which skills or standards.

Use small groups or stations to let students work in teams based on similar needs.

Chunk skills into small tasks that can be done over time rather than giving one large review packet.

Use peer tutors to explain concepts in different words.

Take advantage of flipped remediation with videos and resources that have already been created.

Have students track results to see if their remediation led to improved performance on the next benchmark.

Use self-grading activities through Learn Study Island, Mastery Connect and other digital resources to give students immediate feedback.

Provide a little time each day to spiral review in addition to new content. Remediation should not be seen as punishment.

Have students reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, as well as the results of their class and home activities.

Create interesting graphic organizers to help students organize important information with more aesthetic appeal Sometimes all it takes is a simple stray-from-the-norm approach to help engage students. Check out these organizer ideas or these great mindmapping / organizing digital tools:

Bored with these? Check out Richard Byrne's of Free Tech For Teachers review of several mindmap digital tools.

Discovery Education SOS Strategies

Overview

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Target students individually - use the data to determine which students need to improve on which skills or standards. Use small groups or stations to let students work in teams based on similar needs. Chunk skills into small tasks that can be done over time rather than giving one large review packet.