Reading in English - How to
motivate and engage your students
29 May 2006
Chinese University of Hong
Kong
B6, Ho Tim Building
5.00 - 7:00 pm
Motivating and engaging low
proficiency students
Gertrude Tinker Sachs
Georgia State University
Overview
• Handouts – what are they about?
• Where are we in our thinking?
Understanding why – articulating why –
theories that inform our views and actions
• Strategies and approaches
• About taking action and being proactive
Handouts – are they useful?
Let’s have a look – pre-reading
Cooperative Learning
What it is not.
Shoulder partners and eyeball
partners – number off please
Let’s start with you
• School level
• How would you describe your learners?
• How would you describe yourself as a
teacher?
• Please put your name and school on the
paper and turn in.
Where do I stand?
How do I view Hong Kong teachers?
Major findings from research
• Children acquire the foundations of literacy
within their native language and culture
(Cummins, 1989; Wells, 1986; WongFillmore, 1991)
• There is a social nature to literacy learning
(au & Mason, 1981; Heath, 1983; Scriber &
Cole, 1981; Vygotsky, 1978)
Major Findings
• Background knowledge plays a significant
role in meaning making (Bruner, 1996,
Goodman, 1992; Langer, 1984)
• Reading and writing are interrelated (Clay,
1979; Harste et al, 1984)
Major Findings
• Becoming literate in a second language
takes time 5-7 years depending on the
individual, strength of native literacy, type
of second language instruction, and status
of the second language (pg.23)
•
Perez, B. (1998). Language, literacy and biliteracy. In B. Perez (Ed),
Sociocultural contexts of language and literacy, pp21 -48. Mahwah, NJ:
Erlbaum.
Creating Classroom Contexts
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Non-linear thinking
promoting risk-taking, problem solving,
Offering their own ideas about text
Open classroom for the flow of ideas
Meaningful literacy learning connected to
the real world
Thinking about thinking - metacognition
Classroom Contexts
• Scaffolding linguistic and background
knowledge – connecting to what they know
and have experienced
• Asking decontextualised questions will
limit use of linguistic code; ask what do
you think…
• Adopt an interactive stance in your teaching
Classroom Contexts
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Set a purpose
Students read their drafts to other students
Respond to stories read by their teacher
Respond to prompts
Create some prompts from current affairs in
HK, the region, around the world
Reader response strategies
• What is my purpose
• Why did the author write this text – what did s/he
teach me
• What parts to I like best/least/why
• Does the text remind me of another text –
similar/different
• What would I have changed if I had written it?
• Are there parts I don’t understand – what can I do
about it?
Reference
• Kucer 1995, Guiding bilingual students
“through” the literacy process. Language
Arts, 72, 23.
Response – Read Pair Square
• Hong Kong is full of people
• Ah Wah
Poems by Mike Murphy
Activity – work with slide 14 - RRT
Reciprocal Teaching
• What is it?
• Lesson observation – Grade 2 accelerated
students in a small group
• Review handouts
• Key elements – predicting, questioning,
clarifying, summarizing
• teacher modelling, student leadership and
responsibility, articulating processes
Metacognition
• Understanding why we use certain
strategies
• Articulating how we do things
• Working to reduce our weaknesses and
increase our strengths by understanding
what experts do
• TEACHER MODELLING is the KEY!!
Reciprocal Teaching Superfoods
Select your role – predictor,
questioner, clarifier, summarizer
Read your helpful bookmarks first
Literature Circles
• What is it?
• DVD observation – who are these learners,
what are they doing, how are the activities
structured?
• Article
• Look at the Highwayman Notes – read
quickly
• Let’s look at the poem
Extensive Reading
• Bring me three gifts – Doris Jones Yang
• Article – pre, during and post reading,
writing, speaking, listening, visualising
activities
• Interaction in the ERS lesson. Guidelines
June 2003, 25 (1).
Transforming extensive reading.
• May 2001, Horizons in Education, 43.
Dragon Boat Festival
• Activity – see next set of slides
• Culturally responsive teaching
• What activities can you get your students to
do?
• What did you learn?
Shared reading experiences
• Modeling reading and motivating students
• Listening to texts read well and forming
discussion groups
• Repeated reading, radio reading, choral
reading
• Readers’ Theatre
• DVD – Ivy Sun’s Coffee or Tea Drama
• Article forthcoming - TESOL publications
Follow-up activities
• Oral response – discussion, think-pairshare, oral reading
• Written response – writing to a prompt,
open-ended writing, journal writing, poetry
writing
• Visual response – creating a
drawing/picture, induced imagery
• Physical response – physical tableau,
pantomime, dance and movement
Motivating students
• How do we do it?
• Discuss
• Round Robin – quiet voices
• Lucky Draw
Purposeful Teaching
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Connecting to self
Connecting to text
Connecting to others
HK/Atlanta connections
Meaningful Teaching
• Low achieving students – what is your
belief?
• What can we do?
• What ideas can we use from this workshop?
• Numbered heads
Spirit-Centred Teaching
• Our beliefs govern our teaching
• Our attitudes govern our teaching
• We work with our like-minded peers to be
spirit-centered teachers who seek to make a
difference despite the mandated
difficulties
• Open-mindedness
• Always receptive to professional
development
It’s a profound joy to be back
with you – thank you!
• Gertrude Tinker Sachs
• Middle Secondary Education Instructional
Technology Department
• Georgia State university
P.O.Box 3978
Atlanta, GA 30302-3978
USA
gtinkersachs@gsu.edu
Workshop Feedback
• Thank you!!!