Chapter 3 - Sabrina

This chapter on Building Background gave various suggestions to help students achieve greater understanding of vocabulary before diving into a lesson. Brainstorming about a topic before going into greater depth helps students have a firmer grasp on the subject at hand. When I was in school, we would always read the book first, and then watch the movie - as a kind of fun ending to the unit. What I'm reading here, and I've also heard other teachers in Kipnuk mention, is that watching a video before reading the story might help EL students understand what they will be learning a bit more than just beginning with reading the book. It also gives them a chance to have a visual when wrapping their minds around the abstract concepts they might encounter in the text.

New information must be integrated with what students have previously learned. This helps students realize that there is a process to learning, and that you must build on what you already know, simple concepts, to new, more complex concepts. The 3 Tiers of words helped me understand the type of scaffolding to use when introducing new vocabulary (and other concepts) to students. I also liked the idea of keeping the Word Wall current, not continually adding new words to the wall ending up with a crowded mess of words. After students master certain words, you can take them off of the Word Wall, and maybe have students write them in their word journals. I like the idea of the word journals for my students, especially since they're learning to sound out more words on their own, it could be like their own personal word wall, and they can practice reading those words on their own.

Reading this section was kind of a blast from the past - it had me reliving my elementary and high school experiences, since some of the activities mentioned were ones my teachers used in the classroom.

Sabrina