Sharing - RPI

In the world of education, sharing is a fundamental aspect of the learning process. It bridges the gaps between individuals, fostering connections, and creating a sense of community. In the Manaiakalani Reading Practice Intensive (RPI), sharing takes center stage as a powerful tool for enriching the reading experience of young learners. Today, we delved into the different facets of sharing and its significance in the context of reading education especially in the Manaiakalani cluster and network.  Today was also the last session of RPI for my cohort.

Dorothy started by acknowledging how as educators, we often find ourselves pressed for time, and sharing is the component that sometimes gets squeezed out of our routines. It's important to recognise that sharing is a force that brings people together. It is an essential part of our humanity, allowing us to connect on various levels.  

Sharing extends beyond the classroom, reaching an authentic audience that chooses to engage with our thoughts and ideas. This audience can include peers, classmates, the school community, families, and even the broader global community. In today's digital age, blogging has become the primary online space for young people to share their thoughts, experiences, and learning journeys.  Student blogs serve can serve as rich sources of information. Their blogs acts as a digital archive, preserving their written work and showcasing their reading and other interests.

Teachers play a pivotal role in the blogging process. They should actively engage with and co-read blogs alongside their students. By doing so, they formatively assess students' progress and provide valuable feedback. Student blogs serve as records of their reading journey, including learning intentions, personal responses to texts, and evidence of comprehension. This information is particularly useful for new learners at the beginning of the school year.

Moreover, sharing on blogs transcends the linear process of learning, creating a dynamic cycle of learn, create, and share. It emphasizes that both the process and the product of learning are equally important. When students share their finished work, they reinforce the feeling of accomplishment. Additionally, sharing stimulates new thinking, often triggered by comments and questions from readers.

While class sites and class blogs are primary online spaces for learners, teachers also use them to share their reading program designs with other educators. This sharing process enables the visibility of program routines and innovations, allowing teachers to learn from one another. It's like having a set of favorite teachers to "stalk" regularly for inspiration and ideas.

Planning for Share

The success of sharing in reading education requires careful planning. To ensure its effectiveness, teachers must consider several factors, including :

• Encouraging spontaneity without stifling enthusiasm.
• Inspiring students to share items of their own interest.
• Creating an easily recognizable icon that prompts students to blog.
• Monitoring the completion of sharing activities.
• Defining priority reading-related learning that learners should post to their blogs weekly.
• Setting clear learning goals and aligning posting schedules with students' availability.
• Promoting audience engagement through comments and discussions.
• Prioritizing content quality over quantity.
• Allowing time for reflection and revision.
• Establishing a feedback loop for constructive feedback on posts.
• Encouraging diverse content formats and topics to keep blogs engaging.

Providing effective feedback is crucial for growth in reading education. Feedback can be evaluative (summative), descriptive (formative), or generative (formative). Research shows that descriptive feedback with generative elements is more effective than evaluative feedback.

Teachers should plan and scaffold peer-to-peer feedback, helping students understand what they need to learn, where they stand in their learning journey, and what their next steps should be. Effective descriptive feedback should focus on the learning intentions or goals of the task.

To create a holistic reading experience, it's essential to involve students' families. Deliberate efforts should be made to connect with families and engage them in reading activities. Some strategies include:

• Reinforcing ways for students to take books home and involve their families.
• Encouraging families to participate in reading challenges.
• Soliciting recommendations for texts from families.
• Creating spaces for family feedback and involvement in reading activities.

Sharing is not just an activity; it's a way of building connections, fostering growth, and enriching the reading experience. I feel that today's session was a fitting end to the 9 sessions we've had for RPI this year.  I am very thankful to the RPI team for the work they put into designing and facilitating our programme.  I have come away from each session with so much new knowledge and many ideas I am always excited to implement.  Thank you to the RPI team, my RPI mentor and my school for signing me up to participate in this year's RPI course.  Ngā mihi nui.

Planning a Reading Programme - RPI

Day 5 of the Manaiakalani Reading Practice Intensive saw us delve into the intricacies of planning a reading programme.  

Mrs Burt started us off by discussing how “ubiquitous learning” is the idea that students should be able to access their learning.  She led into how our web page for reading should adopt the key design affordances of any other learning area, including : 

• Organisational efficiencies
• Navigational ease (user friendly)
• Multi modal engagement factors
• Visible learning
• Rewindable instructional design

Key features in reading site design should include :

• Groups
• Engages interest (the hook)
• Multimodal
• Learner and whanau friendly
• Instructions
• Current learning on top
• Historic learning accessible
• Teacher notes

Then the actual learn create task part should include : 

• Learning intention
• Texts 
• Learning activities
• Reference material

Some of the key things we went over today were teacher timetabling (‘rules of thumb’), timetabling to empower learners, digital reading apps, reading like writers (and other high expectation activities.)

Here is an image of my current reading timetable.  I will be working to adjust my timetable to encompass what I have learnt in my RPI sessions so far.

Reasons to timetable : 

• Management of your space while you are teaching
• Enables learners to have choice
• Enables learners to collaborate
• Fits in all the other important ‘bang for buck’ learning experiences
• Empowers learners to be active participants in the learning process

One of my highlights from the session was when Naomi discussed the powerful connection between reading and writing. We learned how reading can be leveraged to improve writing skills and ignite our students' passion for written expression.  Naomi introduced us to the concept of "writing like readers" and emphasised the importance of exposing students to exemplary writing to inspire their own creativity and style.

During the session, Naomi introduced a technique using a 'writing frame.' We were encouraged to imitate a part of the story we had just read, tapping into the stylistic features of the author's work.

Above is an image of what my end result was from the activity.  This is a task I am looking forward to introducing to my learners.  At the moment, I have different students for reading and writing and I feel that I have been using this as a reason not to integrate my reading and writing programme.  As Jesson and Hawthorne put it, "Texts are woven from other sources... Therefore, teachers need to support students to use their reading as a resource for writing."

I also appreciated the skill builder session where the focus was on inference and how we can teach it to our learners. This is a big work on my students have this term and is also something I discuss lots with my mentor teacher.  What I learnt from this session that I will be taking forward with me : 

• Explain inference for learners in a student-friendly way and model examples (e.g. default inference vs reasoned inference)
• Use the metalanguage (e.g. implied, implicit, inferred; local; global; reasoned)
• Explain why authors and thinkers use inference
• Balance direct instruction and authentic encounters
• Well crafted question-answer practice has been found to be as beneficial.

A small gem I also found today was "the learning pit." We quickly discussed how it may be beneficial to teach students that it is a very normal thing.  

Today has also given me a very clear next step.  I am now working towards consistently tracking and monitoring how far my learners get in their independent activities.  Thank you to the RPI team for today - I am excited to implement what I have learnt today especially in terms of integrating reading and writing, as well as making use of the extensive features of digital apps like Epic and Literacy Planet.