I'm teaching a practicum class for folks seeking their PRS certification. They send me videos and their responses. We collaborate - I'm their literacy Huckleberry - to make solutions and refinements to their existing practices, knowledge, etc. I take what they give me and we move forward.
In this case, we have a little girl that is really struggling and not really responding to grade level instruction. A recent special education assessment reveals some issues with low IQ, processing speed, memory, and other issues. A complex case for sure.
What I'm realizing is that most folks don't know how to really analyze miscues to reveal WHY a kid does that or intersect with a response that doesn't just address decoding and more phonics. (The teacher in this case isn't like that - but I am seeing that pattern.)
The KEY to making an impact and progress is selecting the main thing causing the child's reading miscues and underlying processes.
Below, you will read what I sent to the teacher after our collaboration to nail down what we had decided during our interactions. It includes our goals, the miscue analysis, commentary, and our lesson plan sequence. My hope is that you will find some differences in our approach and planning what the teacher will do with her learner next.
The Follow Up:
My goals for sharing this content:
- Review our conversation about your work with Anna
- Model and preserve our miscue analysis
- Interpret findings that reveal the child's thinking process
- Connect with historical documents and other assessment data
- Create a lesson in response to what we saw in the DATA
- Create a lesson that causes the child to revise their thinking process
Miscue Analysis:
Pat
|
Text |
Child |
Cues |
Analysis |
|
Pat |
Tap |
V See below |
Sound it out for me…/p/ /a/ /t/ |
|
Pat can sit. |
Pat can sit. |
V Sweeping with finger vs pointing with individual words as she did with the previous text. |
|
|
Pat can dip. |
Pat can dip. |
V S |
Teacher is sweeping and pointing. |
|
Pat can sip. |
Pat can sip |
V Notice she looks up at the teacher for approval. |
This means she is not relying on herself to make meaning and validate accuracy. |
|
Pat can tap. |
/t/ /ta/ /tap/ /p/ /a/ /t/ Pat can tap. |
V Looks up and smiles |
Teacher asks to sound it out and she tracks through the sounds again. |
|
Pat can dim. |
Tap h /pat/ Pat h tipum…/m/ /d/ /i/ /m/ dim. Pat can dip. Tat can…/p/ Pat can dim. |
V Look for teacher approval. Has begun to put hand over mouth and is no longer smiling. |
Teacher asks to sound it out. Sound it out - what letter is that. Teacher asks to read sentence again. Teacher says ooop - look at what’s there…Teacher /p/ and Anna rereads |
|
Pat can nap. |
Pat can nap. |
Back to happy. |
|
|
|
|
|
The learner is primarily using visual cues and some syntax. She is relying heavily on teacher validation |
Analysis and discussion:
Pat - title - notice she scans her finger across and still says Tap. So interesting. I’m suspecting something that I can’t confirm, but I’ll think aloud here to describe. Sometimes, eyes scan over the text like this p - a - t. Then the brain takes the most recent idea and uses it. This seems consistent with her processing speed and working memory span. So her brain took the most recent sound, /t/, and used that with the previous letters. In her mind, the word made sense - something she knows about - tap - vs something she knows less about - the name, Pat.
A Response: Because of this, our response is different…she needs to see what she said and compare it.
You said: Tap - make the words in your whiteboard Elkonin boxes.
Put it under the title. Ask her what she notices. Ask her what she can do to fix it. We move away from correction to revealing behaviors in a way she can see them and make decisions about them.
I really think she doesn’t have a good theory of what it means to read. She is seeking approval and wants to do well. She does not know why these things are so hard for her and is baffled by why they continue. She knows what she is supposed to do when she is stopped by the teacher, but she is not aware of the errors herself until they are pointed out. I think she believes that she is supposed to sound out the words - and that’s about all that is happening. Each word is a new world, each time.
As we have seen with her diagnostic evaluation, she’s not seeing the big pattern of the thing called reading. Ideas that just come natural to us - and things that we keep in our working memory are not happening. Because of that, she is not transferring sound knowledge to word reading and automaticity.
There’s a book I love called ZOOM, by Istvan Banyai. The book begins with a closeup image of a red and yellow mountain. When you turn the page, you realize it is a rooster. What appears to be one thing really is part of a larger scene. Right now, Anna is ZOOMING in too far. She’s focusing on each sound (the colors), each word (the comb on a rooster), as if they are new each time and never become a sentence (the rooster in a farm scene). We need her to zoom out and see the bigger picture of reading and how all the patterns work together.
Suggestions related to previous assessment: We know she needs manipulatives. She also is going to need explicit instruction on text features. She doesn’t know what it means to read something that is predictable. We’d think this would be obvious - but it isn’t to her. Each page is a new world and she doesn’t see the book as a whole or one that has patterns.
Related Wonderings: She gives a good summary of the book, I’ve always wondered why we take the book from them while they do the retelling. I think it is because we are checking for recall…but with text based responses now used and prioritized, I’m wondering if we need to have them use the book to show us where all that stuff happened. Perhaps the reason kids can’t cite evidence in later grades is because we have conditioned them to rely on memory. Hmmmmm.
Lesson Sequences:
Begin: The book we are about to read is about all the things that Pat can do. (Don’t show the book.)
Transition to Visuals we will use later: Look at my mouth. “Pat.” I want to help you prepare to read her name. When we hear words, they are made of sounds. Help me count the sounds in “Pat.” /p/ /a/ /t/ - put up fingers for each sound. We can also use our tokens to count the sounds. Show a three sound Elkonin box. Pull down tokens as you say each sound in Pat. You will pull down the letters later in the lesson.
Preview Text: Let’s look through the pages and see the things she can do. The child flips through the pages to do a “book walk” and talks aloud about the things Pat is doing.
Introduce word work: Books like this are predictable. This means that some things on each page are alike. Look at the sentences on this first page. Pat is the name of the girl. Let’s look at her name more closely.
Use the alphabet arc stuff: https://fcrr.org/sites/g/files/upcbnu2836/files/media/PDFs/student_center_activities/k1_phonics/k1_letter_recognition/k1_p003_alphabet_arc.pdf
Phase One:
Have the letters P a and t pulled down.
Pull out a three box Elkonin box.
I DO: Let me show you how to sound out her name.
As you say the letters, slide the letters into the box.
/p/ /a/ /t/ - NOTE - I need to show you how to make the p sound better. You are still making a whispered schwa sound. It’s so hard - don’t despair.
|
P |
a |
t |
WE DO Together, I lead: Now slide your finger across the bottom to blend the sound together to make her name, Pat.
Let’s do this together. Hand over hand, help her pull the letters down into the box, saying the individual sounds, sweeping the finger and blending.
We Do Together, You lead: Have her put her hand over yours this time. Have her tell you what to do.
You Do Alone: She does the same process without your hand.
Let’s try this with the second word in the sentence: can. See if she can find the letters on the arc, pull them down, and blend to make the word, can.
Phase Two: This book is also predictable because the sentences have some things in common. Look at each page. What is the same? See if you can find three/four things. She should notice that each page has a sentence that starts with 1) Pat 2) can. 3) Pat has a capital letter. 4) And each sentence ends with a period. Take what she can give you and show her the rest.
Phase Three: The sentences in this book are also predictable because of the words. Let’s look at how many words are in each sentence.
I DO: Point with each word, written on cards. Pull them down onto a sentence line. Note that you are not exactly reading the words yet.
Pat can sit.
1 2 3
We Do Together, I Lead: Let’s do the next one (Pat can dip.) together and see if there is a pattern. Have the words on cards. Your hand over hers, pull down the words onto the sentence line, counting the words. Put the sentence line over the previous line for Pat can sit. Notice they both have three.
We Do Together, You Lead: So far, we have two sentences that have the same number of words. Is that true for the next sentence (Pat can sip)? This time, her hand is over yours and she guides you.
You Do Alone: She completes the next sentences: Pat can dim. Pat can nap.
What did we find out about these sentences? They all have the same number of words.
Phase Four: This book is predictable in another way. So far, we know that each page says Pat can. The third word is also predictable! Let me show you how this works.
I Do: Pull out the sentence line that says Pat can sit. Let’s look at this last word. Pull down the letters in sit, saying the sounds as you pull them down. Put them into the Elkonin boxes, sliding them one at a time. /s/ /i/ /t/ - pull your finger across the boxes and blend into sit.
Read: Pat can sit.
When I turn the page, I see that there is a new word - dip. On the other page, we had sit. Pull down the letters.
|
s |
i |
t |
On this page, we have
|
d |
i |
p |
I see something that is the same! Each word has /i/ in the middle. Now I just need to take what I already know and put it with the new beginning and ending sound. /d/ /i/ /p/. Dip - Pat can dip! Look at the picture - what is she dipping?
We Do Together, I Lead: Hand over her hand. First we had sip, then we had dip.
Now let’s look at the new word and the letters. Help her pull down the letters for sip.
Let’s compare - what is the same?
|
d |
i |
p |
|
s |
i |
p |
I see just one change at the beginning. Now I have /s/ /i/ /p/. Sip. Pat can sip.
We Do Together, You Lead: She takes her hand and helps you pull down the letters for the new page, Pat can tap.
|
s |
i |
p |
|
t |
a |
p |
You Do Alone: She follows the process to read the next two ending words, dim and nap.
|
t |
a |
p |
|
d |
i |
m |
|
n |
a |
p |
Notice that the words in this book are not exactly in the word ladder order. There will be no letters in common for tap to dim. So don’t do that one. Skip to compare tap to nap.
Scoot all the stuff away and help her blend for dim.
Transition: This book is predictable because the sentences are very similar. We also figured out that the words change just a little. We just have to watch how the letters change. Now we can read the whole book using our understanding of what it means to read a predictable book! Let’s try it.
Read
Pat
Pat can sit.
Pat can dip.
Pat can sip.
Pat can tap.
Pat can dim.
Pat can nap.
