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Exit Ticket 9/22/2015

kimberly_hong — 2015-09-22 22:58:33 UTC

Be a Friend to Trees by Patricia Lauber

How would you make the reading interactive?

In the beginning of the book, it shows the different parts of the books and the teacher could even have the children pretend to be a tree and show how tall they can get - this could be a very short interactive activity that has them get up from their seats and stretch!

The book itself is already very interactive! Throughout its pages, it asks questions like: "Look around you. How many wooden things do you see? Make a list - don't forget to count your pencil and maybe your house". During this reading, you could ask the students to give some examples that they see in the classroom that is made of wood and how it has been useful to them. An example that the students could give would possible be: the desks, cabinets, and shelves help keep our classroom and materials organized. The book also shares some items that come from trees that children might now know like maple syrup which comes from sap, that can also make chewing gum, rubber and soap!

If I could have time to plan a little ahead of time, I would create a tree from construction paper and tape it onto the whiteboard so all the students could see it. Then I would a basket of cut-out items like paper, books, milk cartons, apples, oranges, bananas, soap, chewing gum that all come from trees and even animals like squirrels and chipmunks that eat the food that trees produce. The point of this activity would be to show how important trees are to the environment and how many different purposes they can serve!

What vocabulary words would you emphasize and discuss?

Some vocabulary words that would be emphasized would be:

branch
leaves
trunk
roots
outter/inner bark
sap
groundwater
soil
oxygen
energy
carbon dioxide
photosynthesis

How would this read aloud support language and literacy development?

This read aloud would support language and literacy development because it would give students a chance to discuss with their peers about the importance of trees and how they help to support our lifestyles. They would be able to learn about new vocabulary while reading this book and incorporate it into other activities throughout the week while focusing on the text.

How would you practice phonological awareness as an extension after reading this text in a connected way?

Since there are a few vocabulary words in the text that can be a bit challenging for young children to understand or even pronounce, learning these new vocabulary words would help the students expand their phonological awareness. The text is not a rhyming book, but falls more under an expository text, as it is informative about how trees are important to our world, and how it provides us food, oxygen as well as homes for animals.

Alphabet Knowledge Exit Ticket 9/29

kimberly_hong — 2015-09-29 23:09:34 UTC

I've come to to understand how essential it is to encourage the development of alphabet knowledge to early literacy. Encouraging children to become engaged when learning the alphabets helps their development of phonemic awareness, and strengthens there reading and writing skills, letter recognition skills, and their receptive vocabulary skills. Furthermore, it helps teacher understand each student and helps them to create appropriate curriculum based on their students abilities.

Encouraging the development of alphabet knowledge can be done in many different days, but I think it would be important to incorporate both implicit and explicit practices. Implicit practices could come from providing students with a fun read aloud on one letter that you've noticed that the children are having trouble with. For example, children will sometimes have trouble distinguishing between the letter b and d. Focusing on the letter D in its lower-case form, and choosing a book that focuses on something like Dinosaurs. Creating a lower-case "d" and allowing students to create a dinosaur with it, would be a great activity to help young learners to understand that the letter "d" is the first letter in "dinosaur", rather than B. Something like this: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/246642517069321118/

Something else would be to focus the entire day on a specific letter. Just like the video that we were shown about the Kindergarten teacher than create a lesson for her students for the letter S. The letter was highlighted throughout circle time, during the read aloud, and during an art activity. Allowing children a longer window of time to understand the "letter of the day" or something similar would be really helpful, rather than expecting them to understand the letter based off of a short 15 minute lecture on the letter and it's sound and other properties.

What would you look for in a classroom that supports diverse learners?

kimberly_hong — 2015-11-05 22:47:24 UTC

I would look for a variety of things including fairness, clearly communicated rules/expectations, adaptations made in the classroom, and a positive attitude modeled by the lead teacher. When discussing the idea of fairness in these types of classrooms, it was stated that it isn't necessarily "fair" to treat every individual student equally, rather create general expectations of the classroom while making modifications for different learners in the classroom. Adaptations should be held to the same standard as different activities are adjusted for these students' based on their individual needs as learners. The classroom teachers should provide clear directions for the students by using both verbal and visual steps and providing students with assistance when it is not yet clear what is expected of them. Another indicator I would look for in a classroom that supports diverse learners would be the practice of breaking of instructional time throughout the day. For example, rather than expecting students to sit down for 20 minutes a day for instructional activities, it would be ideal that these sessions be broken apart into two or three sessions.