Project Description

Educational Need
I am currently teaching at Country Oaks Elementary in a third grade classroom. My school has four third grade classrooms. The teachers work really well as a team and do their best to make sure that each student gets 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 have has similar experiences. We meet as a grade level almost weekly to discuss things which things are working and which things need to be addressed. The last few meetings our 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.
My Plan
I plan to create a wiki which will organize different test taking strategy sites. I will organize them so that when I want to find a certain lesson or technique I will be able to refer to the wiki I have created and find the lesson I need. I will organize the resources and decide how they fit into my daily schedule. I plan to introduce the strategies and practice them daily until I feel the students are comfortable. Then I will back them off a bit, practicing them daily, but in different contexts and for different subject areas. I hope to find SMARTBoard lessons, practice sites, and worksheets.
I plan to work over the summer to add to my wiki. I hope to have a full time teaching position in the fall, so I plan to turn my wiki into a resource that can be used in the fall to prepare for the MEAP and throughout the year as practice. When I return in the fall I will share the unit with other teachers.
Research
There are several sites out there that have links to SMARTBoard lessons. It can take hours and hours to weed through all of the site to find lessons that are appropriate to the information you are trying to teach and to the level of your students. A few of the sites that I have found helpful so far are http://www.edontheweb.com and http://www.bbc.co.uk/skillswise/. I will continue to accumulate resources on my diigo page and begin to organize them.
Common Places of Education
Someone Teaching: The teacher will be teaching for my project. I hope to find resources to facilitate my teaching. I will find ways that other teachers are demonstrating how to read for comprehension. I will also find resources which will offer mini-lessons which will reinforce what students are learning through modeling and discussion.
Someone Learning: Students will learn strategies for reading for comprehension, especially on standardized tests. They will learn the difference between reading for pleasure and reading for a test. Also, they will learn how to go back and look for information in text they have read.
Subject Matter: The subject matter is test taking strategies. Most of my lessons and practice will be built into my Reading Workshop, but I plan to build mini-lessons into all subject areas so that students can practice with different types of text and subject matter.
Setting: My lessons will take place in my third grade classroom. Students will work as a group in our meeting place. They will also work at their desks both individually and as a group using the SMARTBoard.