Ten Word Summary

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The ten-word summary is another strategy from Reading Rockets. Here's how I used it in my classes:

1. I put students into pairs and handed each student one of the ten-word summary sheets below.

2. Students number each paragraph.

3. Student A reads the first paragraph. Student B summarizes what Student A read. Students alternate roles until the selection is over.

4. Review the passage by using equity cards/sticks to ask questions to check for understanding.

5. Combine pairs of students to form groups of four. Have groups compare their summary sentences and then decide on who wrote the best summaries and why.

6. Pass out poster paper and have students write up their group summaries.

7. Use the posters to do a gallery walk and have students compare summaries and decide on the main events or crucial details of the selection.

Love to do this activity to ensure comprehension of a chapter before moving forward in a novel.

Ten Word Summary

Four Corners

I love Four Corners for a variety of reasons. It's great for reviewing, to get a reaction, to help students process information. I like to give students a somewhat controversial statement that I know are going to generate varying opinions and have students defend their opinions to one another. They're also just great for getting students up and moving or mixing it up. I have the ones below are those that I have up in my classroom and I use them all the time.

4 Corners En español

Reciprocal Reading / Reading Rockets

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Since we are reading a number a number of novels this year, I’ve been trying to build up my repertoire of reading activities. These activities need to fulfill the following criteria:

1) Won’t bore students;
2) Activities will engage students in active reading;
3) And, will facilitate language acquisition (aligned to a specific learning objective)

So, when I learned about Reciprocal Reading Groups from Reading Rockets, I was pretty pleased to find a strategy that was student-centered and that fulfilled all three of the above criteria. Reciprocal reading groups are an activity designed to allow students to guide and instruct the reading in small groups. Each student is assigned one of four roles:

Predictor: makes predictions before and after the selection
Clarifier: keeps track of and helps to clarify any unknown vocabulary
Question Generator: responsible for coming up with comprehension questions (great idea here from Martina Bex in getting students to write comp questions—In French and Spanish)
Summarizer: responsible for summarizing the selected passage

The trick in these groups is to have students use their roles to interact with and teach their classmates. In order to do this, I started by explicitly explaining that the idea behind this activity was to get students to help one another to understand the passage. I then assigned each role an order. I had the students read the passage out loud to one another (paragraph by paragraph) while everyone followed along, indicating any difficult vocabulary. After every second paragraph, the group worked together to perform each of their tasks. I stressed that while each student had a specific role the entire group could and should help with each task. So far we’ve used this strategy twice in my classes and I’ve found the biggest challenge so far has been getting the Questioner to really use the questions to discuss the selection. Modeling this for the students helps and I also believe the more familiar the kids get with the activity the more effective it will be. Modeling the templates found on Reading Rockets, I created the bookmark and graphic organizer below: Bookmark

Reciprocal Reading Bookmarks Español

Graphic Organizer

Reciprocal Reading Group Graphic Organizer / Grupo de Lectura

Student Centered Activities

One of the things I struggle with as a CI teacher is that as the primary input source, I tend to be the center of attention at all times in the class. I find that this is sometimes at odds with what I want to accomplish. For example, I don't just want my students to become proficient at Spanish but I also want them to learn and practice collaborative skills. Not to mention that the class can become very boring if I don't give up the reins every now and then. I've been searching for ways to make my lessons more student-centered and interactive, while at the same time providing valuable input, and came across this list of teaching strategies from the Facing History Website. There are some great activities listed and I'm hoping that it will serve as a refresher whenever I'm pulling my hair out thinking of creative ways for the students to engage with the content.