Field Observation Evidence Report #5

TC NAME: Ashley Guile
RICA DOMAIN: 4:Vocabulary, Academic Language, and Background Language.
RICA COMPETENCY: 10-5.a: a. recognizing that not all words should be given equal emphasis (e.g., the importance of evaluating the usefulness of a word and the frequency with which students will have opportunities to read it and apply it)
GRADE LEVEL: 1st.

INSTRUCTION:
I observed Mrs. Burrows introducing a story, "Frog is Hungry," to the students.  She asked the students to demonstrate how they think that a frog would sound if it was going to talk.  After the students demonstrated their frog voices, she introduced them to quotation marks.  She informed the students that when the see quotation marks in story, that it means that someone else is talking and that it should be expressed in a different voice.  She then asked the students if they were to see quotation marks and the words "frog said," if they should read the story in their voice, or in the voice that they believe a frog would sound like.  By asking the students to come up with their own idea of how a frog would sound and asking them when it would be appropriate within a story to use that voice, she was making connections to the text and applying knowledge and understanding about academic language and grammar symbols.  When the students told her that they should speak in a frog voice when the quotation marks appear in the text, she used an example from the book and read it aloud for the student's to hear the emphasis and stress on the words she was saying.

As she was reading the passage from the book, she asked the students if they noticed anything else that was different while she was reading.  One of the students told her that she sounded happier and more excited when she said certain words.  She explained to them that when she says a word in a different tone, she is placing emphasis on certain words to make the story more exciting.  She then asked the students to identify markings that would tell her to use emphasis on a word.  The students had learned previously that exclamation marks tell readers that the character is mad, or excited, or sad; exclamation marks add emotion.  By checking for the understanding and use of exclamation marks, she was activating their background knowledge.

She then told the students that they were going to read the story out loud together and instructed them to use their frog voices whenever they saw quotation marks, and to use emphasis when they see exclamation marks.  The students read the story with her and used their frog voices and emotion to bring the story to life and give it excitement.

INSTRUCTIONAL SETTING:
The students were in a self contained classroom during Team Time.  There are 31 students in the Team Time group.  The students were seated on the carpet in one large group and were reading along to the story with Mrs. Burrows.  They were looking at the story on the large projection screen.  The story was projected from the computer onto the projection screen using the docucam.

Field Observation Evidence Report #4

TC NAME: Ashley Guile
RICA DOMAIN: 3: Fluency
RICA COMPETENCY: 9 : Instruction and Assessment, 1A: Instructional Strategies that will improve all components of fluency: Accuracy, Rate, and Prosody
GRADE LEVEL: 1st.

INSTRUCTION:
I observed Mrs. Burrows start the lesson by introducing the short story, The Big Hit.  She then read the story aloud to the students, which modeled accuracy, rate, and expression.  After she finished the story, she began to make lecture notes with the students to help their comprehension and understanding.  After the lecture notes were finished, she informed the students that they were going to work in their reading rotation groups.  As each small group came to the back table where she was sitting, she read the story again with them, having the students use their tracking fingers to read aloud at their own pace.  By allowing the students to re read the story out loud on their own, she was demonstrating student practice.  As the students were reading, she would help them sound out any words they were having trouble pronouncing.

Another reading rotation that I observed was the listening center in the room.  As students came to this center in their rotation, they would open the book on the table to the story, The Big Hit, and would listen to the story being read on an audio CD.  The students use wireless headphones to listen as the story is read to them, which is an example of tape assisted reading.  Students may read aloud quietly with the audio, or may listen to it quietly as it is played.

INSTRUCTIONAL SETTING
Students are in groups of 5 or 6 and are placed throughout the room in 5 different reading rotation centers.  The students in the reading aloud group meet at the back "U" shaped table with Mrs. Burrows and work independently and in small groups on reading the story out loud.  Students in the listening center are at a table with a CD player, wireless headphones, and a copy of the story to follow along with.  Other students are in the phonics center working on phonics site word games, while some are in the learning leap pad center reading other short stories and books on the leap frog system.  There is also a group of students at their seats reading library books quietly and independently.  Students rotate through each of the centers before the lesson is complete.