LITERACY CONVERSATIONS

TAKE A CLOSER LOOK AT RUNNING RECORDS What insights do you have into the reader’s strengths and needs? What happens after errors or at difficulty? Look for patterns in the reader’s success or difficultly in noticing and correcting errors and in solving words in flexible ways.

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY IN READING

3 WAVES OF TEACHING EFFORT First Classroom Instruction Second Additional Assistance Third Further Assistance / Referral

Transition into RR Transitioning into having a strong processing system Transitioning out of Reading Recovery Transitioning to developing a self-extending system

Independence Passive to active Child as a learner Teacher lifting child to higher levels of processing

Sense /Meaning Does it make sense? Visual Does that look right? Sounds Say it! What can you hear? What would you expect to see? Structure Does that sound right?

BehaviourStrategyStrategic Activity

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY Fast brainwork that occurs without us consciously having to direct it. Clay

Different kinds of information in print come together to contribute to a decision. Early decision making is refined and expanded into more efficient decision making.

What on the surface looks like simple word-by-word reading of a short and simple story involves children in linking many things they know from different sources (visual, auditory/phonological, movement, speaking/articulating, and knowledge of the language). When problem-solving texts children dip into these ‘different ways of knowing something’ and make a series of decisions as they work across texts.

Mobilising several resources needed for a specific task Integrating different kinds of information Demonstrating alternative ways of using information

EFFECTIVE SUCCESSFUL PROCESSING Picking up visual information from the page Working on the information Putting the information from the page together with other information known: story information, real world information Making a decision Evaluating that decision

BUILDING A PROCESSING SYSTEM Monitoring with known information Searching for a best fit between the known and the unknown information Comparing and evaluating choices Making a decision Self-correcting based on analysis of all this information

GOALS FOR THE CHILD: To problem-solve by searching the picture, the language and the story To improve processing of information To support the continued expansion of the processing system itself, to cope with more features of language. GOAL FOR THE TEACHER To assist the child to construct effective networks in his brain for linking up all the strategic activity that will be needed to work on texts

SEARCHING FOR AND USING INFORMATION Meaning Make meaningful attempts at unknown words? Use the meaning of the story to predict unknown words? Reread to gather more information to solve the word? Reread to search for more details – information, characters, plot? Use information in the pictures to make a prediction? Use headings or titles to think about the meaning in a section of the text? Use the knowledge of the genre to help in understanding a text? Reread to gather information to clarify confustons?

SEARCHING FOR AND USING INFORMATION Structure Use knowledge of oral language to solve unknown words? Reread to see if a word ‘sounds right’ in a sentence? Reread to correct using language structure?

SEARCH FOR AND USE INFORMATION Visual Information Use the visual information to solve words? Use the sound of the first letter(s) to attempt to solve a word? Use some, most, or all of the visual information to solve words? Use sound analysis to solve words? Make attempts that are visually similar? Use knowledge of a high frequency word to problem solve? Use analogy to solve unknown words? Uses syllables to solve words? Search for more visual information in the word to solve words?

SOLVING WORDS Does the reader Recognise a core of high frequency words quickly? Use a variety of flexible ways to take words apart? Use the meaning of the sentence to solve words? Use the structure of the sentence to solve words? Use known word parts to solve words? Work actively to solve words? Use base words and root words to derive the meanings of words? Make attempts that are visually similar? Use sentence context to derive meanings of words?

SELF-MONITORING Does the reader Hesitate at an unknown word? Stop at an unknown word? Stop at an unknown word and appeal for help? Notice mismatches? Notice when an attempt does not look right, sound right, make sense? Reread to confirm reading? Use knowledge of some high frequency words to check on meaning? Check one source of information with another? Request help after making several attempts?

SELF-CORRECTING Does the reader Reread and try again until accurate? Stop after an error and make another attempt? Stop after an error and make multiple attempts until accurate? Reread to self-correct? Work actively to solve mismatches? Self- correct errors some of the time? Self-correct errors most of the time?

MAINTAINING FLUENCY Does the reader Read without pointing? Read word groups (phrases) Put words together? Read smoothly? Read the punctuation? Make the voice go down at a full stop? Make the voice go up at a question mark? Stress the appropriate words to convey accurate meaning? Read at a good rate: not too fast or not to slow?

CHANGE OVER TIME Children begin to make better estimates of what a word might be. They are not just guessing. They are computing the likelihood of the features that they recognise belonging to the word they have predicted.

CONSIDER How does a learner learn to work on different kinds of information in the text? Separately, at first; and then in some integrated way?

PROMPTING A call for action to do something within the child’s control.

Do the prompts activate problem-solving? Do the prompts promote consolidation and integration? Are they adjustable according to what the reader needs?

CHANGE OVER TIME Change over time in using prompts: early - middle - later Change for each child: moment by moment

To develop an effective processing system from the start To develop the foundations for neural networks in the brain To lift the level of processing

FINDING FIXING

PROMPTING Not just talk Depends on where child is at, at this point in the text Teachers need to consider what else needs to be added into the child’s reading processing Prompts should send the child in search of a response in his network of responses

TEACHERS MAY PROMPT TO… Indicate where he should be attending. Prompt him to locate something useful. Direct his attention to text meaning or to language structure or to letter-sound information. Prompt to fine tune the information processing system Prompt to interrupt or break into an old habit.

EXPLICIT PROMPTS Read it with your finger. Do this. Cover the end of the word. Use your finger and make it match. What is the first letter?

PROMPTS WITH AN INFERRED ACTION Do you know another word that starts like that? Check it! You made a mistake on that page. Can you find it? Was that Ok? What’s wrong with this? Try that again.

PROMPTING PROMPTING FOR INDEPENDENT MONITORING Were you right? Does that make sense? Can we say it that way? PROMPTING FOR INDEPENDENT SEARCHING What can you try? Try that again and think what would make sense? Try that again and think what might sound right?

CONSIDER How do your prompts help the reader learn how to search, cross-check, make links, make decisions and evaluate those decisions while working across print?

RUNNING RECORDS

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY Attending and searching -Looking purposefully for particular information, known words, familiar text features, patterns of syntax, and information in pictures and diagrams

WHAT LEARNERS DO Focus attention on particular letters or letter clusters and draw on what they know about letter-sound relationships Identify the words they already known Look for information in illustrations and diagrams Use analogies – that, use their knowledge of familiar words (can, get) to work out new words (man, ran, pan; let, set, pet) Attending and searching

HOW TEACHERS PROMPT AND SUPPORT Tell me the first sound of this word ? What letter does this word start with ? What do you notice about the end of the word ? Can you find a word you know on this page ? Who can you see in the picture ? What do you notice about this words ? Attending and searching

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY Predicting - Forming expectations or anticipating what will come next by drawing on prior knowledge and experience of language;

WHAT LEARNERS DO Draw on their letter-sound knowledge Draw on their awareness of the patterns of text Sound out the word or parts of the word and use meaning and syntax to narrow the possibilities Focus on a detail in an illustration or diagram Repeat or rerun the preceding text and sound out the first letter Use their prior knowledge to predict what a character might do next or what the next step in an argument might be. Predicting

HOW TEACHERS PROMPT AND SUPPORT Read that again. What sound does this word start with? What would make sense? What could you try? What sound do these letters make? What’s happening in the picture? What will the fly do now? Has it noticed the praying mantis? That’s right. The fly comes b….. What do you think will happen next? Predicting

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY Cross-checking and confirming - Checking to ensure that the reading makes sense and fits with all the information already processed

STRATEGIC ACTIVITY Self-Correcting - Detecting or suspecting that an error has been made and searching for additional information in order to arrive at the right meaning.

WHAT LEARNERS DO Draw on meaning or pattern of the text and use illustrations and word knowledge to check and confirm their prediction. Reread a word, phrase, or sentence Use their knowledge of spoken language or book language to decide whether the piece of text ‘sounds right’. Think about the meaning of what they are reading. Cross-checking, confirming and self-correcting

HOW TEACHERS PROMPT AND SUPPORT Does that word look right? If the word was ‘called’, what would you expect to see at the end/in the middle? You said, “There is a hole in my sock.” Check the first word again. Look at the end of the word. Something wasn’t quite right. Try that again. How did you know what was wrong? Cross-checking, confirming and self-correcting

AttendingSearchingPredicting Cross-CheckingConfirmingSelf-Correcting

SEQUENCE OF THINKING BY THE TEACHER What will the child need to be able to do to read this text ? What acts of processing are observed ? How can we prompt for more efficient processing ?

ANALYSIS OF RUNNING RECORDS Cues used and neglected How the reading sounds How has the child monitored? What is the highest level of processing for this child, on this text?

CONSIDER Different levels of processing on running records. What is the highest level of processing for each child?

Where are you at now ?

GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE TEACHING How do I support children’s processing? How do I support phrasing and fluency? What evidence do I see of good problem solving? What problem-solving did the readers initiate? How did I help children expand language and vocabulary? How did I support effective processing strategies? What changes do I see in the readers’ ability to initiate problem-solving actions?

A FINAL THOUGHT… Our goal for all readers is independence in smoothly processing text. When you teach and prompt for effective reading behaviours, your goal is to help the reader learn to do something strategic that she can do whenever she reads. We want readers to be flexible in the way they engage in problem solving while maintaining a focus on the meaning of the text.

WHAT DO YOU NEED TO ACHIEVE ? What will be the benefits of achieving this goal? What are the crucial success factors in achieving this goal? WHAT IS HAPPENING NOW? What do you have in place that will increase the likelihood of achieving this goal? What have you tried so far? What’s working? What’s not working? WHAT COULD YOU DO? What are the options / possibilities for achieving this goal? WHAT WILL YOU DO? What will you do, specifically?