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>>teacher: So, we are going to do a close reading today.
Today we're going to be doing a reading, and we're
gonna be reading a piece of text that's gonna be informational. So it's
gonna give us? >>class: Information >>teacher: Exactly.
So will you please look at the Elmo while I go
through and read it to you for our first read.
Close reading would be giving the students a um
piece of the text and doing a cold read of it. So it's a text they have not seen
before um and in that step
the teacher then would read aloud the text to-to the beginning readers. Um as I'm
reading aloud, I might be highlighting, I might be pulling out a vocabulary word,
but we will not discuss those parts until the second read, so I'm basically
just giving them kind of the gist - the first part of the reading. Listen closely as I
read in mark in the text. Leopards are skilled hunters they have many features
I don't know that word, hmm, that help them hunt. I also will think aloud
doing that. Oh, this is a word I don't know I'm gonna circle and put a question
mark by it, so that they see how to fluent read and they know that when they start
reading on their own that they'll be able to do those kinds-same kind of
activities with a piece of text. They're able to to tackle a difficult piece of text
in that way. Right now I want you to do is I want you to discuss with your
partner here's what you're gonna be discussing: you'll turn to your elbow
partner you'll select who's going to speak first and I want you to talk about
what something that you learned from this. You can use a sentence starters
leopards can, leopards are. Ok? So turn to your neighbor now, decide who's going
first and discuss with your partner about leopards. Let me know when you are done.
We might also include in there a little discussion because discussions should
always be included in-in some kind of text in that gets students to think a
little bit more about what it is that we're reading.
>>student 1: Ok. My turn. I think Leopards... I think like they eat the prey, and
and they wait for a little while so the prey just stands there
and looking for other prey - for other enemies to eat. So
the leopard got them. Then maybe it's a tiger and he might die.
>>teacher: So in the second reading of uh the same piece of text that-that we would be
using the teacher does the cold read again. I might have some students that
are able to read, read along with me. Some of them might read aloud some of them in
their head if I ask them to. Ok, eyes on your text. Leopards are skilled hunters
they have many features. Oh, let's circle that word features and put a question
mark because I'm not quite sure what that means. I'll start again; they have
many features that help them hunt. First leopards camouflage. I'm gonna underline
that because I know that word, we've talked about that. And as we read this time I'm
using those same vocabulary words but we're going a little more in depth, so we might
be talking about the definition, we might be using context clues around that word,
um in that we're also doing more partner discussion, So they're using sentence
stems to answer questions if they're beginning readers. Um we also are using some
type of comprehension skill. It might be factored opinion as it was in this case.
It might be main idea and detail. It just depends on what it is that we're working
on as a class. So here is my board you have yours obviously, and we've been talking
about fact or opinion. Remember a fact is something you can prove. And what's an
opinion? >>class: Something you think, feel, and believe.
>>teacher: So at the top of your board, I want you to write fact.
Besides the vocabulary and
comprehension skill, I also try to include some piece of writing. It might be
on a white board, it might be a sentence or your reaction to a text. Leopards use
their camouflage. Absolutely let's write that sentence. Ok? First-grade friends,
Are you ready? Look at your text. Jorge just found it for us; he told us about it too.
Leopards use their camouflage. Alright first grade friends, let's write that
together: leopards use - let's make the sounds. Class?
>>class: Yes. >>teacher: Let's finish-up this last part of
our close reading here. So we're going to work on the main idea and detail.
We've been working on this skill for a quite some time. Remember that the main
idea is what the whole thing is... >>class: About.
>>teacher: Exactly. And then we're going to add some detail to that.
The third reading that we did we used main idea and details, so as a class we
chose what the main idea was in the text, and then we-uh together wrote down one
detail that supported the main idea. I had the students work in pairs in order to
come up with two other details from the text. And I walked around and monitored
to make sure that they were finding those details in the text. A lot of them
found it easy to-to find the second detail, but a lot of them had a little
bit more difficulty. A lot of them needed more assistance in finding the
third detail to support the main idea. So what's something - a detail that's in
the text that we can use to support that leopards are skilled hunters? What's
something in a text?
>>student: They eat beetles.
>>teacher: Show me.
>>teacher: So we talked about leopards being skilled hunters and you
pulled out some details about them being skilled hunters that support
that idea. This video clip that you're gonna see right here is going to be just
a quick video clip about leopards being skilled hunters. Now this is real life
Yes? So we know that leopards do what to get their prey? They have to do what? >>class: Climb.
>>teacher: They have to hunt. Ok, and when they get their prey, a lot of you wrote down
this detail you said that a leopards are amazing...
>>class: Climbers. >>teacher: You said climbers and guess what, you're gonna see that in here as well
Ok, you'll see that, so make sure that you're... The video is my engagement piece, my
students like to watch video clips. I usually save it for the end because I
want them to understand that the text is where we get the information from. Yes,
videos can give us information as well but I wanted them to rely on the reading
more so than the video clip. I know if I had shown the video clip before asking
them to do a task of writing - discussing with their partner, they might have used
the video clip instead of the text as part of their support. So I wanted to
make sure that they use the reading first as their support before the video.
This is something that I've developed over a couple of years just noticing that
first and second grade readers also need exposure to the strategy of closer reading
so that when they get to the upper grades they know how to tackle a piece
of difficult text. So this strategy of beginning reading is just something that
I've developed over a couple of years - teacher doing first read and thinking
aloud and then engaging students as we go deeper and deeper into each reading.
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