LITERACY GEEKS

2008-07-18T13:41:00.001-07:00

So school starts soon. And I am very excited!!! I really want to get my kids writing and reading and loving it. So I am trying to plan for ways that I can inspire that to happen. Here is a picture of my school....
You are looking at the hallways of the school. Then from the outside you go into the separate classrooms. It's crazy to me, but pretty cool.

Curriculum Based Measurement

2007-09-20T15:46:00.002-07:00

I'm here! I'm here! I'm here to tell you that I use curriculum based measurement weekly with some of my dyslexic students. They love being able to visualize their improvements, and that in itself is motivating.

The site that I love is Jim Wright's Intervention Central! Check it out. I believe I touched upon it in this post when I was first falling in love with CBM.

Assessment

2007-09-18T17:57:00.000-07:00

Alanna - fellow literacy geek - where are you?
I am currently learning about research-based assessments. Have you ever heard of CBA (Curriculum Based Assessment) and CBM (Curriculum Based Measurement)? It's a very interesting method of graphing student progress based on the norms of their specific classroom.
I was curious to know what type of assessment techniques do you have set in place at your job? What other types of assessments have you heard of people using? What do you think is most effective?

Here is a link about CBM if you're interested http://cbmnow.com/documents/cbaManualhand.pdf

BOOKS FOR LITERACY GEEKS

2007-09-13T07:30:00.001-07:00

Now that I am an up and coming literacy specialist I wanted to share some of the resources that I have found useful and am curious about any resources you have liked.
First is 'Words Their Way' by Bear. The spelling inventory is a great resource for guiding instruction. I have used it with my ESL tutoring, and I'm not quite sure how effective it is for the ESL student, but it has helped me recognize the vowel pattern sounds that ESL students have trouble distinguishing.
Still in it's plastic is 'The Mosaic of Thought' by Keene and Zimmerman, which was recommended to me by a 30 year veteran teacher of reading. She said this book changed the way she thought of reading comprehension.
Also there is a handy website for leveling books: http://home.comcast.net/~ngiansante/index.html

LITERACY GEEK

2007-02-10T10:32:00.000-08:00

Hello there my literacy friend. I am just trying to use technology to help me teach. Have you heard of webquests? Check it out at http://webquest.org

Interactive Books with Power Point

2006-08-24T16:04:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I've been neglecting this blog as of late...sorry folks. (In this case folks = Amazon Hil) I am here today, though, to tell you that I have learned how to make interactive books for young children, or the multiply handicapped by using Power Point. How cool is that? Last night I made one with Ten Apples Up On Top which is a Theo LeSieg (aka Dr. Seuss) classic. Granted, the computer "reads" it with my voice. I had to record each page and install a clip on each page. It took a while, but it was really fun and I like the way it came out.

Hil, if you ever have to do some assistive technology literacy project, this might be for you.

Very cool book exchange

2006-07-23T15:19:00.000-07:00

I only have a few minutes, but I have to rave about an international book exchange: BookCrossing. I for one have too many books that I love dearly, but I know I won't be rereading for a long time and they aren't appropriate to bring to school for my students. So I've been "releasing" them.

Basically, you register your book with BookCrossing (and it's free). You put release information...generally when and where you will be releasing the book. Other BookCrossing members in your area will be alerted to the title and location of the release. There is also an opportunity for non-members to find it. I have a book plate with the books registration number and a bookmark with BookCrossing instructions.

I've read about books on their website that have made it across the continental US. Some books have even become international. It's really a very cool way to get rid of books and let others have a literary treasure hunt of sorts.

Amazon Strength

2006-07-11T08:36:00.000-07:00

Amazon Strength
DOWN BUT NOT OUT

Yo, Amazon Hil!

2006-07-06T15:56:00.000-07:00

I need a report on your new class! Give it up, I'm dying to know all about it!

Readers' and Writers' Workshop

2006-06-22T17:33:00.000-07:00

I am totally geeked! I am taking a week long grad course on, you guessed it, The Readers' and Writers' Workshop. A huge part of literacy is writing fluency, which the Writers' workshop builds. Also, we must keep in mind that every time we write, we build new connections between our brain cells. Amazing stuff.

I will have to report on it as the class rolls out.

AMAZON.COM

2006-06-14T06:40:00.000-07:00

I just made my first purchase from Amazon.Com. Alanna, I thought you might be proud. I think as a literacy teacher, this might be a procedure that I should get used to. But let me tell you, it was scary. We'll see how it turns out when I get my new text book in the mail here at work.

Curriculum Based Measurement (or sometimes Assessment)

2006-05-25T16:33:00.000-07:00

I was lucky enough to attend a workshop on Curriculum Based Management yesterday with the brilliant Jim Wright. Jim is the guru who created Intervention Central. Intervention Central is an awesome website which contains tons of materials, probes, graphing downloads, instructions for training peer tutors, for the teacher of reading, math, or writing to learn and track struggling students' progress to the tiniest degree, thus monitoring the student to be sure that whatever interventions are in place, are being effective.

For fun, let's say I teach reading. (I know, I actually do, but bear with me.) I have a student who is in 6th grade, but can only read fluently at a much lower level. CBM is designed that I would

Be able to figure out the student's independent, instructional, and frustrational reading levels
Find ideas as to how to intervene and increase that student's fluency
Create reading probes so that I can have the student do timed reading once a week using appropriate instructional level materials.
Download and insert the information from the reading probe into a graph to check to progress or lack there of.

I like the idea of CBM, because how many times do students slip through the cracks because they receive intervention, but at the end of the school year did not progress? One of the ideas behind CBM is that by tracking this information we can see trends of progress or regression and know if the current invtervention strategy is working or needs to be changed.

Beautiful website! Kudos to you, Jim Wright!

NPR-WAMC (90.3FM)

2006-05-24T06:45:00.000-07:00

I was listening to Garrison Keillor's 'Writers Almanac on Tuesday, May 23, 2006, and found this very apropo....
It's the birthday of Margaret Wise Brown, (books by this author), born in Brooklyn, New York (1910). She wanted to become a writer as a young woman, and she once took a creative writing class from Gertrude Stein. But she had a hard time coming up with story ideas, so she went into education. She got a job researching the way that children learn to use language and found that children love language with patterns of sound and rhythm. She also found that young children have a special attachment to words for objects they can see and touch, like shoes and socks and bowls and bathtubs.
She eventually began to write books for children based on her research and in 1938 she became the editor of a publishing house called William R. Scott & Company which specialized in new children's literature. The Great Depression had made children's books into luxury items, and most other publishing houses had phased out children's literature. Margaret Wise Brown helped make children's books profitable, because she invested in high-quality color illustrations, and she printed her books on strong paper with durable bindings, so that children could grab, squeeze and bite their books the way they did with all their toys.
But we know Margaret Wise Brown for one book she wrote, and that was Goodnight Moon (1947), which includes the lines "Goodnight room / Goodnight moon / Goodnight cow jumping over the moon ... Goodnight stars / Goodnight air / Goodnight noises everywhere."
The New York Public Library gave it a terrible review, and it didn't sell as well as some of Brown's other books in its first year. But parents were amazed at the book's almost hypnotic effect on children, its ability to calm them down before bed. Brown thought the book was successful because it helped children let go of the world around them piece by piece, just before turning out the light and falling asleep.
Parents recommended the book to each other, and it slowly became a word-of-mouth best-seller. It sold about 1,500 copies in 1953, 4,000 in 1955, 8,000 in 1960, 20,000 in 1970; and by 1990 the total number of copies sold had reached more than four million.

Ch vs. Sh Sound

2006-05-22T07:04:00.000-07:00

I am trying to find games on the internet to play with my adult literacy student. I think in the Spanish language it is hard to distinguish between the Ch and Sh sounds. But this website, www.quia.com seems to have a lot of helpful games. I don't know if you come across the need for these types of exercises in your job, but maybe you would be interested in checking it out...
http://www.quia.com/ws/306682.html

English as a Second Language

2006-05-21T12:03:00.000-07:00

I didn't have much time to research, but I did find a neat website for teachers and second language learners: ESOL Links. I seems to have articles about all teaching many aspects of English. It appears to be well organized into areas such as grammar, vocabulary, writing, pronunciation, and listening.

I hope this helps!

And by the way, I know the picture barely has anything to do with the topic, but it was so awesome, I had to use it.

Welcome!

2006-05-18T15:21:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Literacy Geeks! This, I suppose, will be a blog for Reading Specialists, Literacy Coaches and those who see the Literacy profession in their near future! Although, anyone with an interest in reading, whether it be as a classroom teacher or parent are welcome to chime in!

Let us know of any topics you'd like us to discuss on this blog! Fluency, comprehension, Dyslexia, you ask, we'll try to post on it.

Introducing Literacy Geeks

2006-05-17T08:21:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Literacy Geeks!
www.lvorc.org is the volunteer group I am in, if you want to check it out.