BIRE Pre-Meeting May 16, 2012

 Develop shared understanding of Tier I instruction for grade-level reading  Work through one example of how to work with general education to build grade-level lessons

 Access to academic language

 Students have come to rely on teachers to provide the meaning of the text rather than demanding of themselves that they read—and reread—until they make meaning out of the words on the page.  We are uncomfortable watching students wrestling with material that initially appears dense and difficult to understand.

 Trying to help students feel successful in their reading, educators have turned to materials written with low-level vocabulary and simplified sentence structures, without a clear plan of how to move students into authentic text.  How do we intentionally move to bring all students to experience success with grade-level text while still attending to their language development needs?

 Can ELL students do grade-level work even when it involves complex text?

 You know that students will be reading the Gettysburg Address in three weeks. All students will have to read and understand the text without the teacher telling them what each phrase means or translating it for them.  Read the unit, and identify three areas that you think teachers of ELLs should consider in addition to the questions provided in the general education unit developed by Student Achievement Partners.

 Think Aloud  Add your expertise to our thinking

 SECTION 1 What’s at stake: a nation as a place and as an idea  — Students silently read, then the teacher reads aloud the text of the Gettysburg Address while students follow along  — Students translate into their own words the first and second paragraphs  — Students answer guiding questions regarding the first two paragraphs

 “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

 Section 1 Activities  1. Students first read Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address silently.  2. The teacher then reads the text out loud to the class and students follow along in the text.  3. After listening, students re-read the first paragraph of the Gettysburg Address and translate it into their own words.

 4. The teacher asks the class a small set of guiding questions about the first paragraph of Lincoln’s speech.  5. After the discussion, students rewrite their translation of Lincoln’s paragraph. The teacher guides discussion of first line of second paragraph.  6. Wrap up.

 “Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”

“We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live.”  Look at the unit as written. What would you add, rearrange, or revise for ELL students?  How would you build in instructional support (like color-coding)?  Is there academic vocabulary that you want students to have used often prior to this unit? How would that familiarity be ensured?

 Did the work today provide you with any insights into how to provide access to grade- level reading for ELLs?  How will this impact the work your district needs to do to improve classroom instruction?

 SECTION 2 From funeral to new birth  — Students are re-acquainted with the first two paragraphs of the speech  — Students translate the third and final paragraph into their own words  — Students answer guiding questions regarding the third paragraph of the Gettysburg Address