Kelli Siebers
Week 4 post
In my placement classroom (of kindergarteners), the only time I see discussion of literature is when the reacher reads a book to the whole class. The type of discussion that results from these reading are only recitation or traditional discussions. The teacher uses the initiate-respond-evaluate structure, where she posses a question that usually is about a specific part of the book and has one or two right answers. Then she calls on a child to respond or answer the question. Then the teacher responds to the child in a way that shows if the answer that satisfactory or not. For every question, the answer is viewed as being located in the text. This structure of questioning occurs at the end of every book she reads.
In order for response-centered talk to take place, the teacher would need to ask questions that do not have one “right” answer imbedded in the text. Instead the teacher should select a theme or before reading the book, then pose a question that will get the students thinking about this theme. The teacher should then allow children to comment or respond with their classmates thoughts, viewpoints, questions. The teacher’s job during these discussions is to help the class focus on the question then listen. However, before this type of respond-centered talk can take place, the children will need to be able to talk to each other, give others opportunities to talk, accept that there may be views that are not like theirs, ask questions to others and give reasons for their opinions.
Some resources that are available that might help the children have meaningful discussions are that there are many teachers in the class. This would allow the child to break into smaller groups to be read to and discuss the book. We also have large-open areas that would allow children to sit in a circle so that they can make eye contact.
There are quite a few children in our class that do not participate in full group discussions. I feel that, if the class was split into smaller groups these children may feel more comfortable participating. Also, the teacher could use recitation in effective ways in order to get everyone involved. A few ways to do this include use of response cards, where everyone has time to think then write down their answer, or allowing several children to answer a question. By providing feedback in a way that will not make the child feel “dumb” to all students, the children will feel more comfortable answering questions in front of the class.
I think you had some great ideas for facilitating discussion in your kindergarten classroom. I think that having students sit in a circle is a great way to have body language represent how you want your children to be talking. This way they are talking at eachother and not at you, like they would be during story time, etc. This can be used for discussion of all ages and I think would be helpful for both student and teacher, to realized that the teacher is not the leader, but they are all equal in the discussion.
ReplyDeleteSomething to think about; is providing information to scaffold their discussions. Since kindergarteners have very little practice with discussion I can forsee them needing a lot of assistance in deciding what to talk about. In order to do this it is really important that you model how discussions should go and give students topics and specific questions that can help them to keep a conversation going. I think that role play could be a great way to get your kindergarteners to start talking about characters. Your students could discuss how a certain character feels, then they could act it out in groups.
Finally, I think you could learn from your MT during her read alouds by thinking of questions that you could ask about the book that were more discussion based than recitation questions. For example: What do you think is going to happen next? Instead of: What just happened?
I've experienced the exact same interactions in my field placement as well. All of the questions that the teacher asks are the initiate-respond-evaluate structure so it looks like a recitation as well. It's a shame because it seems like your students would be able to have a very successful discussion. Since you're dealing with kindergarteners, it seems like they would be able to come up with very unique and creative discussion. Although your teachers method evaluates students on their comprehension, I bet it would be really wonderful for you to see a discussion take place.
ReplyDeleteYou made some very good points when it came to your initial post. I agree that if your teacher came up with some questions that didn't have one right or wrong answer the students would get much more out of the conversation. Specifically, I like how you focused on basing the questions off of theme because that is what the author of the literature probably wants the students to recognize the most. An example of a question could be something like "How would you say the characters emotions changed throughout the story and why?" or "Have you ever felt this certain emotion?"
I also think breaking up the discussion into small groups is an excellent idea. It said in the article that discussions are often much more productive this way. It makes the environment much more personable and laid back; therefore, students will be less likely to hold back on any comments or questions they may want to share out with the group. A suggestion I have for your small groups is to consider bringing in an object for each group to have. This object can serve as an item that represents who's turn it is to speak; therefore, you will not have to worry about one student dominating the conversation or one student not talking at all. I also think it might be a good idea for the students to view a successful discussion before having one themselves. This can be done through video, through teachers in the room, etc. If students were able to view a discussion first, they'd have a much better idea of what exactly is expected of them. Moreover, since your students are so young I'd suggest establishing rules before splitting the students up into groups. This could include rules like "Do not talk when another person is talking" or "Although we may not agree with what every student says, it's important that we respect every student's idea"