EDRD 6600
Strategy Lesson Paper- Jaylen Brooks
AJ Jordan
4/18/2013
Jaylen is a typical 6th grade girl; she is bright and has a big personality. She is focused on
friends, boys and having fun, but she is not really focused on her school work. She comes from a
single-parent home, where she lives with her mother and brother, and she attends school in an
urban school setting. Her mother has a lot on her plate, but she is concerned about Jaylen’s
grades and lack of focus on her school work. She wants Jaylen to go to college, get a good job,
and “go farther in life” than she has personally, but she understands that that is not Jaylen’s
current mindset, and she does not know how to change that.
After gathering research from urban literacy articles, Jaylen’s Burke Interview, and
interviews with her mom, I had enough information to create my strategy lessons. It was clear
from Jaylen’s Burke Interview that she views reading as a precise process of pronouncing words
correctly and reading without fumbling over words. She sees herself as an excellent reader;
however, she also admits that she avoids reading any books that are lengthy or difficult. A truly
confident and motivated reader would not avoid books that are slightly challenging. I felt it was
important to focus these lessons on meaning making through authentic literacy experiences that
would improve Jaylen’s reading comprehension strategies.
In order to increase Jaylen’s interest in the lessons, I chose two authentic texts that she
had mentioned wanting to read: The Diary of a Wimpy Kid Cabin Fever and Beastly. Each
lesson used these texts and incorporated technology and web-based activities with older methods
such as dictionary use, which gave Jaylen a range of literacy experiences.
The first several lessons utilized The Diary of a Wimpy Kid text. Jaylen read the text,
and we discussed what she liked about the book, as well as the genre of comics. Jaylen liked the
comic because it told a story utilizing words and pictures. In the next lesson we discussed one of
Jaylen’s most memorable reading experiences, and she turned this experience into a comic using
an online resource called Pixton. To turn her story into a comic, Jaylen had to understand how to
identify the main parts of a story, summarize and use pictures to tell the rest.
The next Lesson, Jaylen’s Beastly Diary, served as a transition between The Diary of a
Wimpy Kid and the second text, Beastly. Jaylen had seen the movie Beastly, so this activity
served as a primer to get an idea of what she remembered from the story and to connect the story
to her own life. The story is one that teenagers enjoy because the themes really connect to their
everyday lives, and they can understand the situations that the main characters are in. The
second Beastly lesson was about Characterization. First, we had a discussion about the main
character in the book, Kyle. Then we discussed what character traits are and how authors create
these traits in their books. Finally, Jaylen made a list of her character traits and a list of the main
character’s traits and compared the two. Jaylen was able to find similarities and differences
between her and Kyle.
Though Jaylen read Beastly fluently, she ran across words she did not recognize. We
spent time identifying these words and conducting word studies using reference materials. We
discussed definitions, origin and synonyms; she also used the words in another context.
The further we got into our lessons together, the more difficult it became to motivate
Jaylen. She became more resistant and it was rarely a “good time” to work on literacy. Her
biggest concern was missing time with her friends, so we decided to do a few group read-alouds
with her texts. During the first read-aloud, Jaylen and a friend took turns reading and answering
questions about what the other had read. This strategy seemed to ease Jaylen’s frustration with
working on her reading. Students often protest to reading because they see it as a solitary
activity and they want to be with friends, but reading does not have to be a solitary activity.
Literacy skills can drastically improve when reading is encountered in groups.
For our fourth lesson, we focused on inferences, making predictions and drawing
conclusions. Jaylen had read a good portion of Part 2 of the book, so she created a list of
statements and questions beginning with the words “I wonder….” Jaylen showed in this lesson
that she is able to think abstractly about ideas in the story.
The final lesson focused on inciting incidents. We discussed what inciting incidents are
and how authors use them to create character evolution throughout a story. We used examples
from our own lives to show how inciting incidents are real events that can change who we are.
Jaylen identified what the inciting incident in Beastly is and how it changes Kyle. She drew a
picture of Kyle where the left side represented him before the inciting incident (mean, ugly
inside, snobby, etc.) and the right side represented her predictions of how the inciting incident
would change Kyle. She predicted that he would become nicer, kinder and not as snobby. She
seemed to really understand the concept of inciting incidents.
Finally, Jaylen assisted in creating a literacy experience for other students at the Boys and
Girls Club. She worked with others to put on a birthday party for Dr. Suess. They made green
eggs, crafts, art, and read Dr. Suess books. She did a great job with this project.
Overall, Jaylen is a good reader. She excels in fluency, making connections, making
predictions and comprehension. Her main issue is that she lacks motivation. She is unwilling to
challenge herself and work to enhance her literacy skills. She lacks the mindset she needs to set
goals and improve her performance in school. She is satisfied with failing several classes
because she is “passing” the others. Learning and improving her skills are not priorities for her,
and therefore, her grades remain low. Her lack of desire to improve makes academic
interventions with her difficult because she has to want to improve for interventions to be
effective. She sees herself as an excellent reader and uses that as an excuse to avoid reading.
She needs to learn motivation, meaning making, focus and perseverance. She has all of the
potential in the world if she would simply apply it.
Throughout this project, I learned a lot about Jaylen, about teaching middle school
language arts and about reading in general. I learned how difficult, and yet, how rewarding
teaching can be. I believe that I will be a better educator because of this experience, but I also
believe I have a lot to learn about effective language arts teaching strategies and about
motivating students in their academics. I discovered that changing mindsets and motivating
students are as equally vital in effective teaching as effective content design and delivery. I
hope to continue to work with Jaylen on her literacy skills, and her motivation as a student.