Could I Have Some Fries With That? Serving Up Novels in Social Studies

“How many are in your dinner party?”

“Three.”

“We have a lovely seat with a view for you. Right this way..…”

“.....Are you ready to order?”

“Um, yes. I’d like to try some Iqbal.”

Introducing books to students takes on a whole different feel when doing so in an unexpected way.  

In our geography classes, we read books to help bring the story of geography and people to the students. The story presented in a novel helps students to be empathetic and to bring the world more to life.  They become exposed to different experiences in the world and better realize the advantages in their own lives.

To hook the students and start them off on the right foot in their reading, I present the books to the students in the form of a book buffet. I transform my classroom into Restaurant 144.

The students are greeted at the door by the Restaurant 144 sign and are asked how many in their dining party. As soft jazz music greets their ears, they are escorted across the room to a table adorned with a tablecloth and tea lights. They take their seats, menus are distributed, and the diners are told that a server will be over shortly to take their orders.

The menus have photos of certain books with a brief introduction to each book. Students look through the menu to make a choice. When the server returns, orders are taken, and the books are served - on plates, of course. The server informs the diners that they can return their choice to the “kitchen” if it is not to their liking and they can make another selection. (Our assistant principal was even able to come in as a guest server.)

To further develop the atmosphere, when a student asked if he could go get some water, I broke out a pitcher of water and cups and served water to those students in need of a drink.

The restaurant ambiance heightened students’ interest. Behavior was also enhanced, as students acted more formally with courtesy, pleases, and thank yous, just as if they were in a restaurant. As the day proceeded and different classes came to the doorway, I could see that word of mouth had already amplified other students' anticipation.

And reading.

All students were engaged in reading the book of their choice. Even reluctant readers became absorbed with their choice. The unique environment and their ability to choose worked together to hook the students.

After all the students chose a book and had read several pages to confirm the book as the right choice for themselves, I organized students into groups that had chosen the same book. Together they looked over the guiding questions and made a reading schedule for themselves based on the three discussion dates that I set. On these dates, each group would hold their own Socratic seminar-like discussion which focused on the guiding questions and other questions or thoughts any of the readers wanted to bring forth to the group.

Most students, even reluctant readers, were very engaged in reading their books and involved on the discussion dates. The effort to pull off this hook was minimal, but the results impressive.  The students had fun being introduced to a variety of books. They had the opportunity to choose, try, and choose a different book if necessary. And I had fun as well, interacting with students in a different way, and seeing them highly engaged in reading.

Restaurant 144 was a great success.

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If you have had success creating an unexpected hook for students or transforming your classroom to engage students, or if this post has generated some thoughts of your own, please share in the comments. I would appreciate hearing from you.

Meeting the Needs of ELL and Non-ELL Students

Meeting the needs of students whose primary language is not English can be challenging.  To encourage the students’ mastery of English, as well as content, classroom teachers should address the language domains of reading, writing, speaking, and listening.  By giving students opportunities to use language in these ways, English language learners (ELLs) will become more competent in English while developing content knowledge.

During a sheltered English instruction course, I was exposed to a variety of strategies.  Some of the strategies jumped out as me as having a big bang for the buck for both ELL students and others.

Partner Reading

I was first exposed to partner reading through Larry Ferlazzo (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/).  Simply, students read aloud in pairs.  They alternate reading paragraphs and can do a variety of things to process the information after each paragraph, all involving discussion:  one sentence summary, circle key terms, draw the main point, question the paragraph makes you think about, etc.

This process slows the students down and makes them think more deeply about what they are reading.  All the students have multiple opportunities to manipulate the information.  I continually go back to this strategy, as it benefits each student.  In addition, if the reading were assigned for home, a percentage of students, especially those who struggle with reading, would not engage.  This strategy makes a difficult task far more engaging and productive.

Vocabulary/Idea Carousel

This strategy proved great as both a review and a prewriting activity.  Students are put into groups of four to five with one sheet of paper.  They are given a focus and need to write one thing associated with it before passing it to the next person in the group who would then add another item.  The paper keeps going around the group for a minute.  When a minute is up, each group shares their list to the class.  They are given a few minutes to review their materials: reading, notes, handouts, etc.  They then follow the procedure for another minute but cannot repeat anything their group wrote in the first round.

The students are exposed to a variety of ideas while reviewing or  prior to writing.  Instead of having students brainstorm individually, this collective means of brainstorming, complete with the sharing aloud, exposes students to far more ideas.  Students often stumble out of the gate trying to come up with ideas about which to write.  Instead, this strategy allows the student to start strong with a ready made list of key ideas and vocabulary which they can use to focus their writing. It also broadens their understanding as they review information.

Write Around

Students sometimes balk at writing.  The write around gets them to write in a more social setting and allows them to review ideas as they write.  The students each start with a piece of paper and a prompt or sentence starter.  They each write a sentence on the paper they have and, when done, pass it to the person to their right.  They then read what is written on the paper and add another sentence to the new paper.  They keep reading, writing a new sentence, and passing the paper to the right until the teacher asks them to stop.

Content is continually reread and the task of writing does not seem as daunting (compare it to asking the students to write a summary on a topic by themselves).  By blending the writing talents of several writers, there is exposure to a variety of understanding.  Write around has been a both a great review and writing activity.

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These three strategies are highly engaging for all students.  They also engage the ELL student in reading, writing, listening, and speaking while offering enriching opportunities to gain mastery of content.
  If you have any positive experiences with these strategies or others, please leave a comment. I would love to hear about them.