reading

The problem with annotations right now

Posted on by Mark Isero

 Many teachers think that annotations offer an excellent way to peer into the minds of students as they read. I think so, too.

But right now, there’s a huge problem: Teachers don’t know what they’re looking for. There’s no agreement about how to assess annotations.

You don’t see this with writing. In a five-paragraph essay, all teachers are looking for five paragraphs. They’re also looking for a thesis, no matter if they call it a thesis, controlling purpose, overall claim, or main idea.

There’s just much more agreement with writing. It’s more public. We need to do the same thing with reading.

Many teachers like annotations, but few are ready to require students to annotate in a specific way. Annotating is considered “personal” to the reader; we shouldn’t tell students how to interact with the text.

I agree with this argument once students become advanced readers. In the same way that strong writers can break conventions once they learn the essay form, strong readers can annotate how they like once they demonstrate understanding of the basic requirements.

For most students, though, annotating is new and foreign, and there’s nothing wrong with teaching them one right way to do it. Several years ago, a few colleagues and I developed a system of annotating that we used in our ninth grade Humanities classes. This summer, I’m hoping to improve that system and to unveil it this August. I’ll keep you posted. 

reading

We have to make reading more public

Posted on by Mark Isero

 It’s typical for young people to love writing and hate reading. Writing is expression; writing is communication; writing is art. On the other hand, reading is boring; reading is private; reading is lonely.

This year, my students wrote 16 essays and read 12 books. They all said they became better writers. Only a few said the same thing about reading.

How is this possible?

It’s because writing is more public than reading. It’s more out there. You write something, and it’s on the computer screen or on a piece of paper. Even if you don’t want help on your writing, it’s in the world, all your thoughts and grammar mistakes right there, ready for a teacher or a peer or a writing mentor to critique, ready to talk about in a writing conference.

Because writing is more public, students feel they can improve their writing skills more quickly than their reading skills. Writing is a craft, while reading is just something you’ve done forever. It’s easier for students to have a growth mindset with writing than with reading.

That notion has to change. If we’re going to push our students to read challenging texts, we need to convince them that reading is a complex intellectual skill that involves much more than decoding and comprehension.

To do that, we need to make reading more public, more out there. We must challenge students to talk about their reading, both to us and to each other. We can’t be afraid to ask students to read aloud and process how they’re making meaning of a text. We have to build classrooms that celebrate reading “mistakes” as examples of growth.

Most of all, reading needs a product in schools that is equal to writing’s essay. Right now, there is no equivalent artifact. Sure, teachers have their reading questions and their Socratics and their book reports and other fancy projects. But very little exists that documents a student’s reading process and understanding of a text. Annotations come closest to achieving this purpose, but few teachers have taken them seriously (yet).

This summer, I plan on thinking about what can be done to make reading more like writing for my students. I want them to feel like they can track their growth as readers and to show evidence of their reading journey.

Please let me know if you have ideas. 

teaching

One last chance for connection

Posted on by Mark Isero

 My school has an Advisory program designed to promote strong teacher-student relationships. The philosophy is that students and families are well known by at least one adult at the school so that students do not fall through the cracks. The adviser works with a group of 16-20 students for four years, from the first day of high school to the last. The goal is not to lose any of your advisees.

A few days ago, I thought I’d lost one of my students. Deadlines had come and gone; the student hadn’t completed all her of requirements, including some Cyber High courses. Our relationship, always tenuous, had erupted in conflict, and we were no longer on speaking terms. I’d resigned myself to letting her go and focusing on my graduating seniors.

But my good friend and colleague, the vice principal at the school, did not give up, and neither did my student. While I prepared for graduation and began packing up my classroom, my advisee sequestered herself in the vice principal’s office, plugging away on the computer, hour after hour.

On Wednesday night, amid Senior Dinner festivities, my student completed her math class. I was happy with her accomplishment and hopeful that she would complete the World History component the next day. But because of our fractured relationship, I did not approach my student to offer assistance.

Luckily, the vice principal reached out. I received a phone call yesterday morning. She asked me whether I’d be open to helping my student with the history portion. Thank you, Beth, for your leadership.

I quickly agreed, went to school, and spent a couple hours coaching my advisee on World War I, Gandhi, and fascism.

My student and I didn’t apologize to each other for our previous mistakes. We didn’t spend time rebuilding our relationship. We just talked about history and did the work. There were no grudges from either side. We even allowed ourselves to laugh a couple times.

Later that day, my advisee passed the class and earned her right to graduate today on stage, on time, with the rest of her class. 

technology

ipadio is a great phonecasting service

Posted on by Mark Isero

 

 My friend Wil helped me find ipadio, a wonderful, free phonecasting service that I plan on using next year with my students. (Thanks, Wil!)

Phonecasting is a fancy word for podcasting. The only difference is that you use your phone and call up a number to record your voice, instead of using a microphone and computer.

The advantage of phonecasting for teachers and students is that it is way easier than podcasting. Students can record their voice anywhere — from their home, in a car, and even from your classroom.

This year, I had students record phonecasts and post them to iseroma.com, my class blog (check it out!), using Google Voice. It worked well, except I had to manually post each of my student’s podcasts to my website. This took forever.

ipadio does the same thing but also posts your phonecast automatically online. That means I can have my students call in, record their phonecast, and within seconds, their thoughts are published on iseroma.com.

Next year, I’ll use ipadio to make reading more public. Reading is too private, too internal. Socratic seminars are a good way to assess how students are reading, but they don’t hone in on the reading process itself.

I’ll have students do think-alouds while reading a new text live. With ipadio, they’ll record the cognitive reading strategies they employ. As a class, we’ll be able to compare and contrast what different readers  do when they get stuck. We’ll also be able to see how various readers bring different prior knowledge to a new text and what connections we make.

Even more compelling, students will be able to track their growth as readers because all of their ipadio phonecasts will be saved automatically. 

All 12 Kindles are back…finally.

Posted on by Mark Isero

 You may have been following my campaign to retrieve my Kindles from students. It hasn’t been an easy task. My students kept coming up with excuses about why they needed to keep their Kindle for longer!

But I report good news: I have all 12 Kindles back now, safe and sound. Finally.

It’s time for me to charge them up, make sure each of them is loaded with our full, 147-title e-book library, and get them ready for summer deployment.

Yep, that’s right: I’ve chosen 12 lucky ninth graders to borrow the Kindles for summer reading. The agreement is that they read at least three books this summer and report back to me twice a month about their progress.

The students are all wonderful, they’re all reading below grade level, and they’re all eager to improve their reading skills. My prediction is that all of them will meet the challenge, and my hope is that they will catch the thrill of reading.

We’ve heard about summer learning loss. I’m happy that the Kindles, for the first time, will be in students’ hands during the summer. I’ll let everyone know about how this little experiment goes.

Once again, thank you, generous donors, for contributing the Kindles!