Gradual Release Lesson Planning

Read Aloud:
"Slower Than the Rest" in Every Living Thing by Cynthia Rylant (1988)
Story about a boy who finds a turtle and makes it his pet. The boy felt like he was "slower than the rest" in school. He presents his how his turtle is slower than the rest and would be killed in a forest fire. His presentation won an award for his presentation. Leo felt proud, and for the first time felt fast.

Gradual Release

Plan
Modeling
Practice in Groups
Independent Practice

Model A LOT so that the whole class knows how to use the strategy. Follow with read aloud so that students who have it can practice and students who don't can catch on as you model more.
After a week or so of modeling then start independent practice. Hopefully this will help students all understand the concept before they are required to do it.

Vocab Activity:
vocab words on card, become an expert for you word, explain it to others, trade cards so they can take it and explain it to someone else while you explain your new word.

Read Write Talk--Waterloo Text

A Waterloo Text-- is a text that is really difficult and don't what to do with it. (ie--"Cardcaptor Sakura")

Applying background knowledge, could tell it was the back of the book by the barcode on the back. What does a cover look like?
How can I help students use what they know to make sense of a Waterloo Text using what they know?

Sharing
Once kids read, write, and talk they share with each other in a circle.

• First they share what they read.
• Next they share what they think.

Teacher asks them what strategies they used to comprehend. Reinforcing and encouraging them to monitor their own comprehension.

Engaging Students in Strategy Instruction
When you work with students on strategies the best way to start is with very engaging texts. Students will then move their thinking strategies to less compelling texts as a skill.

1. Compelling Texts
2. Valuing Students Thinking

Moving from just what the teacher thinks is important, to what the students are getting out of the text.

TEACHING (not assessing) Comprehension

Read Aloud: Chapter "Eleven" from The House on Mango Street by S. Cisneros (1991).
I loved the idea of our birthdays being like an onion or a stacking doll. When you turn eleven you also have ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, and one inside you. Some days you need to cry like you are three, only at the end of the year do you start feeling like a smart eleven.

Representing things visually.

• visuals help students understand new concepts.
• kids can grasp a metaphor (ie-- your ages grow on each other like an onion ring.)
• Make a visual of something that struck you from the text. The visual should help a viewer understand or explain what they are doing.

Research: "What Classroom Observations Reveal About Reading Comprehension Instruction"
By Dolores Durkin (1978-1979) Reading Research Quarterly Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 481-533.

• Abstract should be in your own words, but use the abstract as a format for the abstract you write.
• Purpose: to describe and time comprehension instruction during reading instruction.
• She had found no evidence of comprehension instruction in informal observations.
• Methodology: how they plan the research
  
• Findings:
• Teachers assessed comprehension but didn't teach instead
• Interrogation or gave assignments to test comprehension.
• Data: pull out what you think is important and represent it.
  

Sift through the article find the most important information and make a power point 10 slides or less.