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This is a page to add notes for the research paper Digital Literacy.

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Digital Literacy for Struggling Readers (work in progress)

Every school year and every day during the year, a wide range of children come together in classrooms to learn. These students represent rich cultural, linguistic, racial, ethnic, and economic diversity. Some of them come to our classroom and they have special needs that have resulting from sources such as speech, visual, or hearing impairments, emotional disturbances, autism, developmental delays, or giftedness.For some of these children, reading literacy will be easy, and for others it will be very difficult.

The unique individuals within each classroom together create a unique learning community. It is the needs of all children in the community that ultimately influence the teaching and learning of literacy in the classroom. Therefore, the role of the teacher is critical in ensuring that all children are successful readers. So, we find ourselves asking the question, how do teachers design instruction to meet the needs of all students? First and for most, teachers must believe that all children can learn to read. If we do not believe this, then we will allow our attitudes and expectations cloud our judgment, therefore, interfering with our instruction. Believing that all children can become readers is the first step in creating an effective literacy program which can then develop a community that respects the unique qualities of each child.When we as teachers, communicate high expectations the children in our classrooms, we therefore enhance their potential for success.

It is equally important for teachers to be knowledgeable about effective instructional practices that in turn can meet the diverse needs of all students and we must take into account prior knowledge, experiences, and home languages each child brings to the classroom. We must create learning environments that support cognitive, language, and social development through authentic learning activities relevant to children’s lives. However, even if we do create an optimal classroom environment, some of our students will continue to experience great difficulty with accurate, fluent, thoughtful reading. So, the questions is, What would really make a difference for these students? What really matters for struggling readers? What tools can they use in the classroom to help with reading literacy? We will attempt to answer some of these questions and provide research to the following questions; Research that can prove that digital Literacy for the Struggling reader may be a positive in the classroom setting.

We will also attempt to find tools that teachers can use in their classroom to help with literacy and the struggling reader.

More information to add: This section might go under Literacy Tools  Teaching Reading in Every classroom and the Read In Foundation provide resources for teachers that have classes that include readers who are working slightly below grade level or struggling to find books that match their interests. Of course, these are only two of the many teacher resources out there. As the Web continues to grow, there a lot of educators who are finding ways to share ideas, Web sites, and educational resources that will ultimately help us do a better job at teaching our students. Perhaps one of the main things that teachers need to do is change their class schedule to allow more reading in their classrooms.

Richard Allington, Ph.D Professor of Education at the University of Tennessee recommends a minimum of 90 minutes in-school reading per day. At first, this may seem impossible to realize. Besides, there is already not enough time to teach everything! Allington (1998) suggests, taking a careful look at how much of the school day is spent on non-instructional activities; such as, opening and ending procedures, intercom announcements, and paperwork.

With some improvements in organizational efficiency, it may be possible to find 30 to 50 minutes for reading every day. Allington. (1998) suggest that, once the volume of reading has increased, it is important to make sure children are reading books that are “just right.” for them. Allington States that, in many school districts, it is common for teachers to be provided with a single basal, textbook, or trade book for reading instruction, regardless of her students’ diverse reading levels and interests.

This practice increases the likelihood of many children reading material that is too difficult and that consequently fail to promote reading development and positive attitudes toward reading.

According to Allington (1998) in order to optimize learning, we must provide children with texts that are just right — in other words, books that match students’ reading levels and interests.

Allington (1998) states, when you provide children with lots of books at the appropriate levels, it can be overwhelming. Therefore, how does a teacher determine each child’s appropriate reading level? It is important that a teacher takes the time to look around his or her classroom during Silent Reading time. Allington (1998)suggest, looking for signs of frustrations such as, wandering, book closed, fingers jabbing at the words, are some students turning the page less often than others?

All these could be signs that the book that they are reading is too difficult. Another way to be sure that students are or are not having difficulties in reading is by close observation with a technique called running records. One simple way to ascertain how well a child is reading is through observation. While the child reads aloud, the teacher places a check mark over each word read correctly; when the child makes an error, he jots down what the child actually said above the words on the printed page.

Dividing the number of words in the text by the number of miscues yields an accuracy percentage. The text is considered easy for the child if she read with 95 to 100 percent accuracy, instructional if read with 90 to 94 percent accuracy, and hard if read with 80 to 89 percent accuracy. Allington (1998) suggest using an accuracy percentage http://www.Assessment Calculator at the ReadWriteSite. That can determine a child’s percentage.

While the child reads aloud, the teacher places a check mark over each word read correctly; when the child makes an error, the teacher jots down what the child actually said above the words on the printed page. You then Divide the number of words in the text by the number of miscues yields an accuracy percentage. The text is considered easy for the child if she read with 95 to 100 percent accuracy, instructional if read with 90 to 94 percent accuracy, and hard if read with 80 to 89 percent accuracy.

(Allington,1998) shows us that this unique feature is an online resource. The teacher can enter the number of running words in the text, the number of errors made by the child, and the number of self-corrections. With a click of a button, the error rate, accuracy rate, and self-correction rate are instantly calculated. There is also a place to enter the child’s name, grade level, title of the story, assessor’s name, and comments, all of which can be printed along with the calculated information for documentation.

Allington(1998) also suggest the ReadWriteSite. You can access the Level Estimator. With this tool, the assessor selects the child’s grade level from a pull-down menu. A display of short passage with a picture is there for the child to read and view. Messages advise the assessor to print the page so that errors can be marked as the child reads from the screen. A scale for determination of the child’s level of comprehension is also provided.

After the child has finished reading, the assessor enters the number of errors and an accuracy percentage is calculated, along with information as to what the rate means. If the rate is 95 percent or above and the comprehension level is good, it is recommended that the child read a more difficult passage. If it is within an instructional range, then, with a click of a button, a list of level-appropriate books is displayed. If the accuracy rate is below 90 percent, the assessor is advised to have the child read a less difficult passage.

Allington Richard L. Ed. (1998). Teaching Struggling Readers: Articles From “The Reading Teacher” Ed438505 Retrieved July 27, 2007

Eric Education Resources Information Center

Research Links

http://www.districtadministration.com/viewarticle.aspx?articleid=927

http://books.heinemann.com/shared/onlineresources/E00369/reproducibles.pdf

http://www.readingonline.org/electronic/webwatch/struggling/index.html

http://www.peterpappas.com/blogs/turned-off-web.pdf

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