The Habit of Kidwatching
By Timothy O’Keefe, Center for Inquiry, Richland District
#2, Columbia, SC
Prior to this class, ‘kidwatching’ was a new term for
me. Although the term is new, I have
been informally using the kidwatching habit in my own way for a few years. The author of this article talked about how
some strategies in teaching work some years and don’t in other years. I have found that this is true on a daily
basis for my classroom. There are some
strategies that work for some students on a given day that do not work for
other students. By closely watching my
students, it is easier for me to determine if the strategy is not working or if
there is something else that is hindering the student from learning a new
skill. I would imagine that this is much
easier in my small groups as it would be in a large classroom setting.
I have students read aloud to me very frequently as I progress
monitor. Unfortunately, we have a
specialized curriculum that include reading materials that do not allow
students to make a selection based on their interests. The reading materials are written to include
phonics skill and high frequency words we have covered in each week and/or
unit. As a teacher, I find these
selections to more difficult to comprehend because of the word choices the
author of the curriculum uses to include certain skills. During coaching sessions, I reteach skills we
have learned that I notice students have not mastered. I would be curious to see how students
generalized these skills to reading selections they choose based on their
individual interests.
The author included several questions that he asks students
during coaching sessions. I have tried
to incorporate these questions in my coaching sessions but have found that my
students have a very difficult time answering these questions. I have many students who have difficulties
with expressive language, processing, and answering questions. It is hard for me to get an idea as to how my
students think they are reading due to difficulties other than their reading
disabilities.
I believe that kidwatching is a valuable tool. It allows for teachers to gain insight as to
how their students learn and comprehend what they read. After reading this article, I want to
challenge myself to kind a good way to effectively use kidwatching in my
classroom.
In your position you are constantly kidwatching. It's evident since you are aware of how your children interact with the mandated curriculum as well as how they respond to coaching questions during small group work. I liked that you pointed out your curiosity about whether students learning reading skills within the given curriculum are able to generalize these skills to their personal reading. I would be interested to find that out as well. How effective is this program at growing readers? I think you're on the right track with kidwatching. After reading your other blog posts, I can tell that you're considering ways to integrate different reading opportunities into your classroom. I'd love to hear how that goes!
ReplyDeleteHi Katie,
ReplyDeleteI loved reading how this article validated the ways that you have already been kidwatching in your classroom and how you use your observations of students to help determine which strategies work and which don't and how to best adjust your instruction to meet their needs. You mentioned how you are not currently able to provide students with much choice in your reading block but how you do utilize coaching sessions with students. I share Heather's wondering in wanting to know if students are able to apply the skills learned in the small group work to their own individual reading. I want to encourage you to consider thinking about how you can implement what you are learning about into your practice. Thanks, Dawn