Loved. I will get to know my students on a personal level so that they feel accepted and valued in my room. I will get to know their background and interests (Simms & Marzano, 2019), and learn about what makes them who they are so that they feel appreciated.

Self-esteem. I will demonstrate resilience in my classroom and give specific feedback to show my students that they are enough and that they are going to be growing as individual students in my classroom.

reading.

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, September, 4) Creating a Community of Learners[Lecture].

Demonstrating intensity and enthusiasm. To create an engaged and motivated classroom I will model to my students what it looks like to be intense and enthusiastic about learning. According to Peter Dewitz, modeling should be done by people the students respect (Dewitz, 2019). By being intense and enthusiastic, I hope to gain the respect of my students, so our classroom can succeed in a literacy learning environment.

Creating opportunities for student engagement. In my classroom, to create opportunities for my students, I will give them the choice to choose books that interest them. This will lead to engaging in the reading because they are enthusiastic about the topic or book. I will also be filling my classroom walls with my student's work, such as writing because this shows that the student's work is important and valued. This creates a sense of engagement because they want their best work to be shown on the wall.

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, September, 18) Motivation/Engagement and Read Alouds [Lecture].

High expectations-  to make sure that all my students are constantly growing I will set high expectations for every student. I want all my students to succeed and by setting high expectations they will be always striving to do their best. If my students, see that I believe in them they will gain confidence and a sense of belonging. Every student in my classroom is capable of success no matter their background.

Connect curriculum to students background- By connecting the curriculum to my students background they will feel more engaged and feel like their learning is relevant. When integrating my students background into the curriculum they will feel seen and valued (Vander Kolk, 2024).

Mini lesson- to ensure that my students understand what print concepts are, I am going to teach them about it. Every student has a different development of print awareness and one way for them to improve their skills is active engagement and modeling from adults. I will point out the features of print and my students will know that the prints carry meaning, can be used for different purposes, and lastly know that print corresponds to speech, word for word (Vader Kolk, 2024).

Read-alouds- I am going to specifically implement read-alouds in my classroom so that my students can learn how books work. Read-alouds also create engagement with the text because my students will be answering questions or making predictions. Lastly, read- alouds are important because students are going to be introduced to new words that they wouldn’t encounter in independent reading.

Creative activities. To help my students learn phonological awareness, I will be using activities such as creating poems with rhyming words. This will make learning personal for my students. We will recite the poem every class while I slow it down and put emphasis on the sounds. I will also use activities that involve deletion, substitution, and reversal.

Opportunities for practice. To ensure that my students are getting time in class to practice phonological awareness I will put my students into small groups. To fully understand phonological awareness, it takes rigorous work, which is why there needs to be opportunities for practice.

Read books- To ensure that my students are getting the opportunity to apply the skills that they are learning, I will have them read daily. Reading is rewarding because students are able to practice decoding words and understand the sounds that form words.

Phonics group work- Group work is very important in my classroom because it allows collaboration. In groups, my students are able to learn from each other. The stronger readers will be able to help their group with sounds or pronunciations. Lastly, group work encourages engagement and active learning which is crucial in my classroom.

Anchor charts- I will give my students a set of directions every single time I introduce a new word. I will have them look at, spell, and write the word. This quizzes their brain and will help imprint the newly learned word into their brain (Vander Kolk, 2024). Once I feel like we have learned the word, I will put it on the board so that they can always refer to it.

Sight word swat. I will write a bunch of words on the board, and whatever word that I shout out they need to swat as fast as they can. They need to swat the correct word to move on. If they cannot get it, I will have another student come up and explain it to them. This is a very engaging game because it adds competitiveness and an interactive element.

Provide opportunities for practice- After I  teach and model the important skills needed for fluency will have my students practice. when students are constantly practicing the skills that were modeled, they will get more comfortable and confident. Repeated reading practice build automaticity they are able to shift their focus from decoding each word to being able to comprehend the text.

Encourage reading-I am going to encourage reading because fluency develops through repeated practice. I will encourage my students to read on their own and I will help them find a book that they enjoy so that they can take it home and read. Reading on their own will give them confidence became they will start to know and understand the words that they are reading, and they will be able to advance their skills.

Activities that promote vocabulary engagement-  To keep learning engaging, my students will be interacting with vocabulary activities throughout the week. One specific activity that they will be doing is show and tell. This is a great activity because it helps connect a word to a real-life object, making it easier for the students to retain the word learned.

Read books to students- I will read more advanced books to my students to expose them to more mature, and figurative language (Vander Kolk, 2024). While I am reading, I will make the experience interactive by asking questions about the text so that I can see if my students are understanding. Through these interactive discussions, my students will develop critical thinking skills while deepening their use of vocabulary.

Engaging read alouds-  To make sure that my students are understanding the texts I will specifically implement read alouds. While I am reading to my students I will pause and ask specific questions to gauge if they are understanding the text. I will have them predict, question, and visualize. By implementing read alouds my students will be able to engage and make sense of the book by making the comprehension strategies understandable.

Activate prior knowledge- Activating prior knowledge is important because it helps students connect new information to what they already know, making it easier to understand. I will activate their prior knowledge and integrate it with text-based information from the text and illustrations (Vander Kolk, 2024). By activating prior knowledge my students are able to connect personally with the text and better understand what the story is about.

Modeling good listening. To create an environment where there is healthy dialogue, I will model good listening. This will set a high standard in my classroom showing that I expect respect.  If my students feel respected, they will feel heard and be more likely to share their opinions in our discussions. Modeling good listening enhances good classroom discussions and creates a culture of collaboration and trust.

Exploring opposing opinions. To ensure a classroom where students are not just communicating but growing in their discussions, I will teach the importance of valuing other people opinions. Every student comes with a different experience, and it is essential that we ask questions and get to know their thoughts and opinions. In my classroom, we will create something better than we found it because we are learning other people’s opinions and using it to grow as a classroom.

 I will make sure that my students are developing the needed skills for reading fluency by having mt students read a passage to me one on one every month. The passage will be short, and I will have them read the first 100 words out loud. I will be keeping track of errors such as mispronunciations, substitutions or hesitations will then calculate the number of words per minute by subtracting the errors from the number of words per minute. This will help me determine what instructional level they are at, and how I can best go forward teaching them. (Vander Kolk, 2024)

To assess my students, I will give them each a passage to read. After they are done reading there will be a specific set of questions that go along with the book. If were able to comprehend what was happening, they will be able to answer the questions. If they were not able to answer the questions, I will pull them aside and work one on one with them to continue to practice the skills needed for reading comprehension.

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, October 21) How Aware are You? [Lecture].

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, October 23) Phonemic Awareness and Phonics Instruction [Lecture].

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, October 30) Sight Word and Fluency Instruction [Lecture].

reading.

Vander Kolk, B. (2024, November 4) Comprehension [Lecture].