Vocabulary And Reciprocal Teaching

The last week of class discussions and various readings has helped me greatly to better understand the importance f vocabulary. I personally never understand vocabulary and always thought it was just another busy activity my teachers gave out as homework, however this is from from the truth. I do think there are better ways to go about teaching vocabulary and actually teaching it. After learning all the various methods and activities such as Word Wizard. Students on average can learn 8-10 words a week. Teachers can further this instruction by choosing words from a class novel so that students are able to determine meaning using context clues and morphology on top of dictionaries. Students having stronger vocabularies and skill will be able to comprehend and understand what they are reading more readily. Although it was a large amount of work and required a great deal of time the activities in the unit that correspond with The Capture were much better than the vocabulary activities that I grew up doing of writing the words 5-10 times each, writing the definition multiple times and then writing sentences with them. These methods I think students would not only enjoy but learn more than those methods I grew up with. Reciprocal Teaching sounds similar to Literacy Circles and what we discussed in class of assigning students different jobs such as discussion generator, etc.  However in Reciprocal Teaching the positions are summarizer, questioner, predictor, and clarifying. Before assign students these positions it would be good to make sure students clearly understand each position. A good way to insure understanding as with anything is to do an example of each with the students.

Glog: Soren Poster

Vocabulary

The article Breaking Down Words to Build Meaning: Morphology, Vocabulary, and Reading Comprehension in the Urban Classroom discusses how reading and vocabulary are linked together. Vocabulary stems and improves with reading. The more someone reads and comprehends the greater their vocabulary. Another important aspect of this is morphology. Students however are not just born with these skills. Teachers need to teach these skills by having vocabulary lessons demonstrating how to effectively break words down into prefixes/suffixes and root words, along with how to use context clues to determine the meaning of the words. In order for a student to actually know the word they need to know not jus the word but the meaning as well as its connection to other words. These are all important learning aspects however they mean nothing if students are not given the opportunity to put these practices into use, therefore teachers need to also make sure they are given as many opportunities as possible to practice these skills. These skills are important for all levels of learners including ELL. As the article suggests many words are similar between languages and you have students make these connections that givens then one more boost in gaining more vocabulary and another skill. I like the chart idea of showcasing the prefixes/suffixes along with the root word and spelling. This would be good for the more difficult words and students and refer back to this as an example for other words as well. I have seen as well having a cupcake that the cake part is the word and then the icing is the prefix or visa versa if there is a prefix added. The Capture vocabulary unit relates to all this by students having to refer back to the text to find hard vocabulary and use the context clues to determine the meaning of the words. Students also have to list connections to themselves, which relates the words to them helping to better understand the words.

Owl Questions

1. List the barn owl’s scientific name.

- Tyto Alba

 

2. What does a barn owl look like? (color, size, etc.) What kind of sounds does it make?

- Barn Owls are a brownish white color with primarily white underneath and more brown on top. They also have a heart shaped face. The females are actually slightly larger than the males and on average have a wing span of about 37cm with males hanging on average a wingspan of 35cm. Barn Owls instead of making a “hoot” sound make more of a screeching sound.

 

3. Describe the habitat of a barn owl: Where do they live? What kind of shelter do they need? 

-Barn Owls can be found all over the world. Many times they live in barns, attics, hollow trees, and rock crevices. Barn Owl will normally nest in one spot but will sometimes have more than one roosting spot.

 

4. How is the barn owl especially equipped to catch its prey? (Describe its camouflage and other adaptations.) 

- Barn Owls light brown color is extremely beneficial to them in that they primarily hunt at night and in grasslands so they are able to be camouflaged easier. They also have amazing sight and hearing. Their ears are slightly off level to increase their hearing range and are located about their eyes.

 

5. What do barn owls eat? Where do they find their food?  

- Barn Owls beging their hunt for prey by flying over land searching for small mammals normally mice, moles, etc. then go to the ground and use their sharp talons to capture their prey.

 

6. Describe any “special talents” of the barn owl.

-Because of the way the Barn Owls feathers are tethered they are able to fly silently. Their excellent hearing capabilities allow them to hunt for prey in the dark. Their hunting skills also help to keep many farms free of pests and small small mammals or rodents.

 

7. Describe the life cycle of a barn owl. (including reproduction)

-The reproduction process starts by the male screeching for a mate. When the female is ready to lay eggs she will find a spot suitable and lay 3-10 eggs on average. The hatching process takes about a month, this entire time the female owl stays with them. After this hatching and growing period the owls learn to hunt prey and fly.

8. What are some cool “WOW” facts that you learned?

- On average Barn Owls live 1-2 years, this was really shocking considering they spend a goo portion of this time mating and reproducing.

Internet Workshop

This was an interesting article. Technology is always changing and so not only do I need to keep up with the changes. As part of being a teacher I have to incorporate technology into my everyday lessons. This can sometimes seem rough but Internet workshops help to make this easier. I had never heard of an Internet workshop until now, it seems like it is a great idea and a great method to add another method for students to learn not only the given lesson but also how to use the given technology. As a teacher during this growing technological savvy world we also have to create barriers for the students, such as certain websites that can be visited. There is a way to create a specific Google site to send students to that allows them to still search but only bring up certain websites that you approve as a teacher. This is important to place a variety of websites for the students to explore to learn to decipher what is correct and what is not. This could easily be made into a group activity and have the students either one divide into groups and have a topic then teach their topic to the class. Another option would be to have the student’s research the same topic then have a class discussion about it. We have discussed a great deal about classroom blogging this semester, of which I was still unaware of all the potential uses that it could be used for. I really like the idea of students posting to the blog responses to different assignments such as Internet workshops giving them a double dose of technology interaction. Classroom blogs and posts creates a special “ump” into students in that since it will be posted online they are more likely to put forth more effort and try harder so they are likely to improve more in both reading and writing.

I really enjoyed all the kid friendly websites. I love owls and so I enjoyed exploring all the sites and information. They were easy to navigate which is a benefit because this is how all kid friendly sites should be. IT should be easy for kids to navigate throughout the site as well as find information and be age appropriate. I like how there were games that correlated to the information, which was another method for students to explore through the sites.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the live webcams of the owls!!!!! I couldn’t see the live webcam of the baby owls however I could see one was eating it appeared in the box. It was amazing. I want one. J

 

“Said”

An alternative to the graveyard for “said”. 

Contraction Surgery

This is such a cute idea to teach students about contractions and what they mean. – Contraction Surgery

“Blends” Visual for students

This is an awesome idea to showcase “blends” to students as well as create a visual for students.

Blends How-To