using accountable talk to improve reading outcomes: linking the old with the new

Tamara Bromley, Kingston Primary School, November 2012

Read some/all of your book to your partner. Before you read, select 1/2 questions to ask your “child”.

After you read, reflect on the questions you used, what you achieved with your “child” as a result.


Accountable talk Purposeful talk Shared sustained thinking Sustained or Substantive conversations


Accountable talk = Substantive conversations/ shared sustained thinking around a text.

Serves to scaffold/ extend the child’s deeper meaning making in a community of learning.


Read handout from FS, S and L Resource Book p. 13-16.

As you read, think about how you, as a teacher, can use substantive conversations to get accountable talk around a text.

Complete “t” chart (activity 2) and share with partner.


KEEP THE TEXT IN THE CENTRE JUSTIFY, EVIDENCE FROM THE TEXT, KEEP IT PURPOSEFUL


Learning community Accurate knowledge Rigorous thinking

Di Rees, Balanced Reading Comprehension, August 2012


“No matter what we do with them in terms of basic reading and writing skills, numeracy and literacy skills, unless the activities are somehow connected to the world and unless there is critical intellectual engagement with knowledge – unless there is an educative act going on – we might as well pack up and go home”

Luke, A 2003 Making literacy policy and practice with a difference. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy 26(3) 58 -82


Maturational, developmental, behaviourists, psychologists

Skills, measurable, targetable, “easy”

Emergent and whole languageFirst Steps, Literacy Net, K-2 writing

assessment

Sociocultural views Australian Curriculum, First Steps



Phonological Awareness

Decoding Sight word knowledge

Word Attack Skills

Vocabulary

Fluency

Comprehension

Concepts of Print

General Purposes

for Reading

Strategy InstructionReading- For Specific Purposes for Reading

Meaning derived

from “text”

Background

Knowledge

Vocabulary and Word

Consciousness

Knowledge of

Structure

(McKenna & Stahl, 2003:8; Kibby, 1995:28-29; Clay, 2001:84-85)

These form the core essential knowledge for reading success.

4 essential jigsaw pieces for reading success

The aim of reading

Essential knowledge that supports Reading Performance

STRATEGIES APPROACH CONTENT APPROACH

Models of thinking and learning, developmental psychology approach

Models of text processing, focussed on developing coherent meaning of a text.

Think about mental processes No direction to consider specific processes.

Explicit teaching of strategies, processesChoose and execute specific strategies to comprehend the text.

Attend to text ideasBuild mental imagery of those ideas, relating new information to background knowledge, existing schemas etc.

Specific routines to deal with new information Focus on processing the information, link new with old and get meaning.

National Reading Panel supported this approachFirst Steps Reading Strategies teaching

Meaningful talk about a text; interpretive community that jointly constructs meaningCollaborative discussions, dialogic instruction, instructional conversations, open ended questions; student control of the inquiry, teacher responds to students’ responses.

How strategies should be taught is still under lots of research and discussion – however, see Oakley 2011 re metacognitive knowledge, declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge etc.

Strategies exist but don’t drive the comprehension; unclear as to instructional guidance.


Margaret G. McKeown, Isabel L. Beck, Ronette G.K. Blake (2009) Rethinking Reading Comprehension Instruction: A Comparison of Instruction for Strategies and Content Approaches Reading Research Quarterly , 44(3) , pp. 218–253

Oakley, Grace (2011) The assessment of reading comprehension cognitive strategies: Practices and perceptions of Western Australian teachers. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy 34(3), 279-294

Literal question – right there in the text Inferential as in “why” did things happen, why characters

may feel that way, what happened between the lines that is not actually stated

Reaction – what did they think of the text? What part or character did they particularly react to and why? How did it make them feel?

Think about purpose and audience - Why did the author write it? What is the purpose of the book/ story? (even stories can have a purpose or message within them) What in the book told them this?

Connect characters and events with the student’s experiences. This is a very important part of understanding a story or information.

Extend the students’ knowledge/ experiences, springboarding from the text.

Scull, Janet (2010) Embedding comprehension within reading acquisition processes. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy 33(2) 87-107



HAVE A CONVERSATION!

Persuasive writingTo be accountable, need to justify with evidence from the

text. Newell, G.E., Beach, R., Smith, J. VanDerHeide, J. (2011) Teaching and learning argumentative reading

and writing: A review of the research Reading Research Quarterly 46 (3) 273-304

EAL/ EAD LearnersMetalanguage used, explicitness and think alouds will assist

the EAL/D learnersNassaji, H (2011) Issues in second language reading: Implications for acquisition and instruction.

Reading Research Quarterly 46 (2) 173-184

Early YearsShared sustained thinking and the importance of the early

years. Iram Siraj-Blatchforda*, Brenda Taggarta, Kathy Sylvab, Pamela Sammonsc and Edward Melhuishd

Towards the transformation of practice in early childhood education: the effective provision of pre-school education (EPPE) project (2002) Cambridge Journal of Education 38(1) 23-36 2008


How will accountable talk support learning within the intentions, pedagogy and desired outcomes of the EYLF and AC?

In partners, one read the EYLF document, the other read the Australian Curriculum document with a view to answering this question.

Share your thoughts with your partner and then complete the chart on your table as a whole group.


Read your book again with your partner but this time facilitate a substantive conversation.

Use the sheet to reflect what you did this time and how it differed/ was the same.


Substantive conversations make talk accountable.Need a good book, intellectual challenge,

passion and excitement!Some warnings: Substantive

conversations take time. Kids may get excited and all want to talk at once.

However, that may be a sign of a real conversation!


using accountable talk to improve reading outcomes: linking the old with the new

Documents

kingston primary school

stepstamara bromley

purposefultamara bromley

literacy skills

balanced reading comprehension

literacy net

literacy policy

terms of basic reading