The school I am currently teaching in has four third grade classrooms. The teachers really work as a team to make sure that each students get as close to the same experience as possible so that when they move on to fourth grade they have been exposed to the same material and experiences. We meet as a grade level almost weekly to discuss things that are working and things we need to address. The last few meetings out topic has been reading comprehension, specifically on standardized tests.
While no teacher wants to teach to a test, they are a fact of life and are important to student success. We agreed that while we do not want to make test taking strategies a huge part of our curriculum, the students could benefit from being “armed” when they have to take these tests. We decided to try to build mini-lessons into our reading and writing workshops to give the students confidence when faced with the real thing.
Our school uses a program called Accelerated Reader. Students read books and then take AR quizzes, which are usually 10 questions. They get rewards based on how many quizzes they have taken. I agree that the AR program encourages students to read. The students in my class love to get the chance to take a quiz. The questions, however, are very basic. They skim the surface of the material and leave it at that.
I would like to find resources that allow students to answer more detailed questions about the material. I would like them to answer questions that go deeper than the names of the characters. I would like to find resources that encourage students to answer questions about the main topic, the problem, the solution, etc.
We also found as we looked at the scores from the last standardized test that students had trouble with questions that were worded “which of the following is NOT…” or “all are true EXCEPT.” I am hoping to find ways that students can practice answering these types of questions and learn strategies to figure out the best answer.
I currently use worksheets which students read and answer comprehension questions. We discuss as a class what the best answer is and how to find it. I can’t help but feel, however, that there is a better way out there.
Hi Chloe,
ReplyDeleteIt is very interesting that you and Allyson are both doing similar projects but with different software. It will be interesting to see how they compare. As I said on Alyyson’s page, teaching reading is just so vital and can be so tricky trying to motivate students to read especially struggling readers. How does your school work with the parents to help their children read daily? Does your school have any other before or after school opportunities to help kids read. In terms of class management, how to you manage the use of Accelerated Reader? How often will you be able to use it with the students?
The questions including ‘not’ and ‘except’ are always tricky ones and the children never do read the questions! (Well, not most of my Fourth Grade kids anyway). It might be interesting to incorporate our SIG here too. Maybe for the SIG you could look in to creating different types of quizzes on the Smartboard and that might help with this project too. At least it gives them a variety of ways to interact with the questions. Just a thought. Maybe you already do this. Good luck with the project and I look forward to your findings as I’m sure they will be of great benefit to all of us as we try to teach reading to our students.
Good Luck!
Sarah
We have very similar ideas! Reading is so crucial to everything. My kids struggle tremendously with comprehension. My school has strayed away from Accelerated Reader. We us StudyIsland and will start using Raz-Kids more. I find my students struggle more with informational text more so than informational. Let me know what you find. I'd love to check out any online resources you come across!
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like you have really pin-pointed an issue in your classroom. That is half the battle sometimes. I agree that Accelerated reader just doesn't cut it. My students don't care about the test the majority of the time. They just take it to take it. And like you said, the questions are very broad, and just skim the surface of the book. They should have more depth and require more thought.
ReplyDeleteHave you found a program that you would like to implement? Or will you be creating mew quizzes on your own? I wasn't clear on how you were going to tackle this...
I am excited to see what you end up doing as this is a common problem for elementary teachers. Best of luck!