If a change in the weather is coming, these students at Rosalyn Heights Elementary School
will be among the first to know it.
There's no wind. There's no wind. And the wind is sort of blowing. And it's, uh, the
temperature.
Oh, the temperature is about thirty.
These kids are becoming avid readers. And not just of thermometers and barometers.
Okay, you guys. It's time to go back to class.
Margaret Barnes: So I have gotten us a really great book. And it's called "Storm Chasers."
Teacher Margaret Barnes uses a framework called CORI to teach reading comprehension skills
to second and third graders. CORI, developed by Dr. John Guthrie, stands for Concept Oriented
Reading Instruction. Organized mostly around nonfiction books, each eighteen week reading
unit guides kids to come up with their own questions, dig up facts, integrate the findings
and share the highlights with the class.
And when they go over the water, they turn into water spouts.
Students pursue their own interests with hands on experience which shows boosts motivation
more than say simply looking at pictures. Kids are also encouraged to ask their own
questions.
The questions I'm trying to answer are cloud questions. My first one is how many clouds
are there? And how do clouds float?
Key to CORI is a large collection of irresistible books, from haikus to history.
I like to have a lot of books to choose from. So that I can get information. But it's hard
to choose from. Because there's so many. And I like tornado books. But I have to look at
cloud books. So that I can get information.
We know that choice is one of those intrinsic motivators. Social interaction is an intrinsic
motivation. But when children have choice to find their books and then be able to talk
with their friends about what they found and maybe, maybe someone will share, "Hey. I found
this about tornadoes. Why don't you read this book?" And they can recommend the book. Then
that just lends itself to more engagement.
CORI offers explicit strategies for plucking information from a book. By thinking aloud,
Ms. Barnes shows kids how to find the factual diamonds among the less brilliant stones.
Wheel, wheel, silence blur. People hurry to a radio or TV and quickly flick it on. Hmm.
I wonder why they're doing that. See, I'm starting to think about this. As you read,
do you think about things and kind of start to make questions in your mind?
Ms. Barnes has also shown her students how to find information by using an indexed glossary
or table of contents.
Let's check on the other.
After the students' own questions have been posed and researched and after the facts have
been sifted and connected, kids can then communicate their findings to the class.
Our report's on whacky weather. Did you know it can snow pink snow? Well, it can. Because
when picked up by gust, it carries it to snowplows. And then it snows pink snow.
Being able to communicate to others is an aspect of CORI that's important. Because it
validates that children are learning for the sake of learning. And when they ask their
own questions and find answers and are able to express that and communicate that to others,
it validates that they're a learner, that they're a thinker and a reader and a writer.
Nate.
Um, did anything break in the farm?
Well, I think that the farm got knocked down and stuff, but not those three things.
Research shows that CORI works. Kids in CORI classrooms are not only more motivated and
curious than those who get traditional instruction, they also score higher on reading achievement
and conceptual knowledge. For kids who don't enjoy fiction, many boys don't, CORI offers
a new route to reading engagement through non-fiction topics. CORI's impact can last
far beyond elementary school.
I watch children's lives change. Because they may never have thought of themselves as a
good reader. It changes the way they see schools It changes the way they see themselves as
readers and writers. They remember it always. They remember the experiences they have in
CORI classrooms forever. Right.