How Can I Improve How I Teach Reading Comprehension to My Third Graders

HOW CAN I IMPROVE HOW I TEACH READING COMPREHENSION TO MY THIRD GRADERS

A Master's Project Presented for the Master of Arts in Teaching Degree The University of Memphis Kenneth Fay Miller

December, 2011 Under the direction of Dr. John M. Johnston Table of Contents

Research Question..page 4Context and Rationalepage 4Who I am as a professional...page 4

Context and setting of my work....page 5

Research questions relation to work contextpage 7Professional Knowledge page 9

Professional points of view..page 10

How do children develop reading comprehension...page 12

Research about reading comprehension instruction.page 12

How is reading assessed...page 13

Standards..page 13

Theories of learning.page 15

Best practices...page 19

Research that supports my action plan.page 20

Summary..page 21Action Plan..page 21

Week 1..page 22

Week 2..page 26

Week 3..page 27

Week 4..page 29

Week 5..page 32

Week 6..page 34Data collection.....page 36Analysis and findings..page 38Conclusions..page 40Next Steps.page 41Referencespage 43AbstractThe purpose of my action research professional development plan was to improve on the way I teach reading comprehension to my third graders. I needed to change the way I teach reading comprehension so that my youngsters can earn better grades, but more important, to understand and comprehend what they read. I created an action plan to improve upon my teaching of reading comprehension to my third graders. Research reported by the National Reading Panel (2000) indicates that teaching children how to coordinate the use of a set or package of comprehension strategies as they read and discuss what they learned with peers and with teacher supports yields particularly strong results for improving childrens reading comprehension. The Tennessee state standards for third grade reading include three major expectations that support my action plan. The National council of Teachers of English and the International Reading Association expect children to apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. The National Board of Professional Teacher Standards state that accomplished literacy reading teachers should know and understand current literature and theories about reading-language arts. Vgotsky explains that students go through three stages of internalization, observing others, mimics others, and eventually independent practice (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008).

My action plan included teaching students multiple strategies to use when reading text. I gathered baseline data prior to teaching my students reading strategies. I taught reading strategies, and then modeled the strategy through think-alouds, read-alouds and graphic organizers. I observed students use of strategies taught and monitored students comprehension via oral assessments and written reading comprehension test. I compared each weeks results of test scores and the number of correct responses students gave from an oral assessment of the text read by the kids. I taught vocabulary that was necessary for passage comprehension.

I gathered the evidence of my actions I took by keeping a research journal of my teaching and documented observations of my children using reading strategies. I wrote lesson plans targeting reading comprehension strategies. I collected and analyzed written formative assessments each week. I kept track of how the kids were doing through tally marks in my research journal.

After analyzing the data I found that students were scoring higher on reading comprehension assessments. I also found that more kids understood the main idea and details of their reading text. I also found students use of reading strategies had increased and the kids could summarize their reading better. At the end of the six weeks, grades moved upward, and the kids seem to understand more use rereading, using context clues, using graphic organizers and talking with peers.

I plan to continue to implement and continually to model to my kids multiple reading comprehension strategies. I plan on sharing the results of my action research plan to my colleagues and principal. I plan on sharing out this research action plan at an ESL workshop. As a result of this action research developmental plan I would like to do an action research to find out if more outside reading material would better support teaching of reading comprehension. I would like to collaborate with other educators to draft a letter to the Board of Education to ask for approval to deviate from the weekly instructional maps in order to better teach reading comprehension using other reading media other than the districts basal reader series. Research QuestionHow can I improve how I teach reading comprehension to my third graders?Context and RationaleWho I Am as a Professional

In 2010, I graduated with a Bachelors degree in Organizational Management. I crossed over into education because I wanted to make an impact in the lives of people. I worked in management for twenty five years and changed careers to enter nursing. I found out in my clinical setting at the hospital that I was not happy. I had always had the desire to work with children. I decided to pursue a dream I had several years ago, and that was being a teacher or a professor. I decide after some experience with children and settings that I wanted to be an elementary teacher. I have always thought children need those basics before they can move on and this gives me away to give back to my community.

I hold a Tennessee teaching license with an endorsement to teach ESL (English as a second language) in grades pre-kindergarten to 12th grade. I am currently working on my action research project and will graduate in December 2011 with a Master of Arts in Teaching. I am employed by a local school district with over 200 schools and 7,500 teachers. I am currently working on my action research project and after completion I will have satisfied all the requirements to be awarded the Master of Arts in Teaching from the University of Memphis.

I pull children out of their mainstream classes and work with them in order to bridge the gap between what they know from the 1st language and apply it to the 2nd language. In order to be successful in their classroom they need to become more and more proficient in listening, speaking, reading and writing in English, so that they can continue to keep pace with the learning in the classroom. I have two classes this year were I go in and teach with another teacher to help those youngster who are served in the ESL program. Each morning as students are dismissed from breakfast, I am responsible for making sure all 3rd, 4th and 5th graders go upstairs in a safe and efficient manner and that they adhere to rules set by the school. In the afternoon I am responsible for making sure that students get across the street safely by working as a crossing guard.

The experience I received while doing my student teaching was split between a Kindergarten ESL classroom and a regular 11th grade English language arts classroom. I also worked this past year as an ESL teacher for Memphis City Schools Summer School, referred to as Camp Can Do, where I taught 4th and 5th graders in the same classroom. I had an advanced class of students and had to push them to higher levels of learning which I found real rewarding.

Each school setting helped me to decide what grade levels were more appealing to me, when it came time to find a job. My current position did not come easy. I quit a job that paid well and accepted the risk that I might not land a job in teaching right away. I had to call every school during the summer to find an ESL teacher position that was open. I finally secured a job two days before school started, just to find out on the first day of job that the MCS board had terminated me because they did not have a need for another teacher at the school. After spending a week a home with no job and wondering if I would actually secure a job now that school was in session. One week later I was called to return to the school to pick up my key because they had decided they did have enough ESL children to warrant another teacher. I had the job. This was great news for me, because I would have joined the unemployed.The Context and Setting of My Work

I work in a small urban elementary school which is a Title I school. According to the U.S. Department of education, Title I funds typically support supplemental instruction in reading and math. The type of students that might be served by these funds include migrant students, students with limited English proficiency, homeless students, students with disabilities, neglected students, delinquent students, at-risk students or any student in need. My school has all of these students. In order to understand more about my setting I need to mention that students can be classified as at-risk for numerous reasons. A few reasons they might be classified as at-risk students include, high number of absences, single-parent home, low academic performance or low-income family. My school is a Title I school because the U. S. Department of education states that if at least 40% of students enroll in free and reduced lunch program. The school I teach has 80% of the students who qualify for free or reduced lunch.

Last year my school did not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), so students are allowed to transfer to a school that is in better standing. The school I teach has 700 students, 15% are students who have limited English proficiency, and 85 % of the student body is African American. The school offers support classes each day for our students. They attend physical education, library, music and computer classes. I pull my kids out of their regular classroom, where I teach the subject the student misses while they are out of the regular classroom. I find it difficult at time differentiating the material because it is not aligned to an ESL learners background knowledge. For example, in my third grade class I have students who are not on the same reading level as all third graders. I am expected this year to follow the regular reading curriculum. I scaffold the learning through various means, such as reading aloud questions and answer choices for some of my students, which helps differentiate how they receive their input. I feel students should be given the option of reading text they can comprehend but slightly above their reading level. Since I am using the same materials and same assessment as the regular mainstream teachers, then I differentiate the way I present the material so all my students can learn.

My typical day consists of teaching in one hour blocks of time. I teach 1 hour of math to 4th and 5th grade limited English proficient learners. I teach 1 hour of reading and grammar to 3rd grade ESL learners. I teach one hour of writing and grammar to 2nd grade limited English proficient learners. I teach 3 classes where I pull boys and girls out of their regular class and bring them to my room. I teach 2 classes of inclusion in which I co-teach with another teacher in their classroom. By team teaching I learn from other teachers and they learn from me. I was given the leeway this year to use two modes of ESL delivery, inclusion and pullout. The last three years I have been confined to just pulling learners from their regular classroom.I normally group my students by reading levels based on end of the year English Language Development Assessment administered by the Tennessee Dept of Education when I teach language arts. The last two years have been more difficult because 1/2 of my day is spent on teaching math, and yes their math scores are up, but I am responsible for showing progress on a test that measures improvement in listening, speaking, reading, writing and comprehension using the English language. The other 1/2 of my day is spent on language arts, reading, writing, science or social studies. This brings me to why this action research project is important to me.As a teacher, I understand the amount of planning that goes into teaching. I write lesson plans for four grades and six subjects. I follow my school districts instructional maps which direct teachers to teach certain skills within a week and this is done week by week in every subject area. I try to teach my ESL learners using a lot of scaffolding techniques in reading and manipulative when teaching math. My research will be conducted in a classroom of 16 students. Seven of my students are low in reading words and understanding what they read. The other 9 are almost but not quite able to compete with their English speaking peers in their main classroom. I will implement my action plan twice a week for an hour. I have five girls and 11 boys, the girls score better on reading comprehension than the boys, but all need improvement in reading comprehension. The 3rd grade class comes to my room for instruction and learning. Most of my ESL students in this class are motivated and have parents that are concerned about their education. On parent/teacher conference night most of the parents who attend are parents of children who speak two languages and very few African American parents show up on parent/teacher conference night even though 85% of the student body are African American children.How My Research Question Relates to my Work Context

As a teacher and a life time learner I can understand how reading is important in everything we do. My father was not able to read past 4th grade level and I watched as it appeared in his life, for example, when he received letters from a business or a personal letter. My father was so frustrated because he could not read. I became an avid reader because my dad always told me to get your education. I found out that reading is the key to life. I have kids who can read words and read fluently, yet cant tell you about any of the details or they get the details or the characters mixed up. I stress rereading at home, but it appears they are not rereading text at home. I know that by the time the 3rd grader gets to the fourth grade, they are expected to be able to independently read for all their subjects.

I have seen this trend over the last two years where students were fluent readers but could not comprehend, draw inferences, state the main idea or draw conclusions. If students can be taught reading comprehension strategies or introduced to different ways of organizing their thoughts or ideas then their reading might possible improve. I am expected this year to follow the regular reading curriculum as the regular classroom teacher. I am considered a support teacher because I support the students learning by providing ESL services. The ESL department has its own ESL curriculum but I have been told for the last two years to follow and mirror what is being taught. I start out on Mondays with guiding questions to guide my 3rd grade readers into their weekly story. I try to connect something they know with something they are getting ready to read. As a class, we talk about each story vocabulary word, then we pronounce the word, I give students two example of each word used in a sentence that is not from their story of the week. Afterwards students read the story independently, and then we discuss some of the story. I also read the weekly story aloud to my third grade boys and girls.

The next day, I assess them on the vocabulary words and reading comprehension by using the same worksheet that accompanies the textbook. Each week the kids have a different genre to read and be assessed. I would prefer to use books other than their regular reading textbook. I am confined currently to same written assessment as all third grade instructors use. I only teach of the amount of reading and grammar instruction that these third graders receive each day. I teach my third graders one hour of reading and grammar and their main classroom teacher gives them one more hour of English language arts instruction.Each six week period, third graders are given an assessment to measure if they met benchmark standards for English language arts, which include reading; it is obvious there are some low scores across the entire third grade. Reading without understanding relates to low scores. I need to improve how I teach reading comprehension to my third graders because currently some of them are not meeting benchmark standards which are tested standards set my Tennessee Department of education.

I know how I am teaching reading comprehension to my third graders is not working because they score low on the reading assessments and not all the students can retell the events in the stories they read. After reading the story, some kids tell a different scenario that what really happen in a story. When it comes time for my children to use their reading vocabulary in context they misinterpret how the word is used. The children miss the questions on the reading assessment that measure whether they can use and understand how their reading vocabulary word is used in context. I talked with other teachers and they have told me they spend more time on role playing how to use the vocabulary words. Those same teachers recommended that I spend more time discussing the details of their weekly reading story.

I need to change the way I teach reading comprehension so that my youngsters can earn better grades, but more important, to understand and comprehend what they read. I want to improve how I teach reading comprehension because these same skills could be transferred over into other subject areas such as science, math, and social studies, for example, if I can teach my students some reading strategies and they can be applied across all academic disciplines then there is a good chance my students will succeed more in school.

Professional Knowledge

As a person who enjoys reading, I understand reading early in life opens many windows to the outside world and many opportunities in the future for children as well as adults. I have talked to other third grade teachers about the fact that our kids dont do well on the assessments given after each reading story, for example in the past two weeks the average score on vocabulary and reading comprehension was only 45%, which is way to low. Most of the teachers have admitted to me that children arrive to the third grade not able to comprehend what they are reading. This makes my action research project even more intriguing, for example, how do I move my class forward, so they can read not only their reading story of the week, but read and make sense of their assignments or answer questions. Reading seems to be an issue my district and across the U.S. according to school data.

I believe reading comprehension is important in every subject. A person can not read a question or get information from a test item without being able to understand and make meaning from their reading. For example, if a child can not read and understand what is going on in a text, obviously the details from the reading will show a low assessment score when measuring comprehension. I try to use scaffolding techniques to build up my learners knowledge and skills. Reading becomes more and more important as children transition into high school and college, which are more dependent on the students ability to read independently and make meaning from the reading. I think it is important to address issues that children are having with reading as early possible.

If more children can be taught reading comprehension strategies, maybe children can develop a means of organizing their thoughts. Science, social studies, math and English language arts are built from foundations of reading and reading comprehension. It is important to me as a professional, to find out how I can improve my teaching of reading comprehension to my third graders, so they can make better grades on performances, and assessments meant to measure knowledge. It is a duty of me as a professional to seek out and find answers to what are the best practices for improving reading comprehension of my third graders. For example, is teaching word recognition more helpful to comprehension that writing words within context. One of my biggest responsibilities is prepare my kids for academic success in all the subject areas.

It is important to know what research says about reading and reading comprehension. My challenge is working with a one hour time frame each day and having to follow the district instructional maps for reading and grammar. Another challenge is working with English Language Learners whose parents speak a language other than English. This results in parents not being able to contribute to their childrens reading. The textbooks are written in English. The school district does not translate the textbooks to other languages. As an educator, we need to be abreast of the most recent research and findings in our field. What worked in education 20 years ago might not be applicable to how we teach today. Children in Tennessee need to know how to read fluently and be able to comprehend what they read as part of the curriculum standards (TN Department of Education, 2009). This is another reason for me wanting to improve reading comprehension in my classroom. It is a teachers job to teach children how to read because children will be assessed on how well they read and get information on the TCAP each year. It is our job, as professionals, to provide opportunities and best practices to help children become better readers every year, so that they are prepared for the next grade and into college level.

Professional Points of View and Issues around This Topic

Teachers in third grade at my school have complained that when the kids start third grade, they lack the skills they should have been taught in second grade. Third graders learning is grounded in the foundations from 2nd grade learning. We pay so much attention to decoding and fluency in the early years (understandably so that children sometimes come to believe that flawless and rapid word recognition is the point). As texts get more demanding or unfamiliar, some of the good readers in my third grade class begin to struggle, because they are not sufficiently engaged in constructing meaning. All readers comprehend text by recognizing words and thinking about them as they read. But this does not ensure that we know word meanings, even when we do know the meaning of each word, it may not be enough to ensure comprehension. Comprehending is not passive. Rather it requires interaction with the text and active construction of meaning. Comprehension involves intentionally using specific, purposeful strategies to understand text (Lipson, 2007).

Although comprehension instruction has always been an important part of reading research and teaching, it has been somewhat overlooked in the last few decades in favor of issues related to beginning reading, phonics and decoding. What about students who can read fluently but dont understand what they are reading? What can I do to support my struggling reader? Despite all the research interest, and despite the many reports advocating the importance of reading comprehension and its instruction, many teachers are still not sure about how to teach comprehension. According to Liang & Dole (2006), comprehension instruction is typically divided into two major categories, for example, instruction that focuses on helping students understand the content of a particular text, and instruction that focuses on comprehension strategies to help students understand all texts.

Krashen (2009), states that those who receive only intensive instruction in decoding words do not do as well on tests of reading comprehension, but those who learn to read by readingby understanding what is on the pagedo well on both decoding and reading comprehension. Assessing or observing reading is difficult since the process associated with reading takes place in the brain. Reading demands a certain level of accuracy in decoding words correctly in order to comprehend the meaning of the text successfully. A fluent reader is considered to have automatic decoding, expression, attention to conventions, and 96-100% reading accuracy so the focus can be on making connections among the ideas in a text and between these ideas and background knowledge (Rasinski, 2003). A less fluent reader must focus attention on decoding. Consequently, there is little attention left for comprehension.

Early literacy instruction today consists of at least two basic approaches. There is decodingthe skill of being able to see a squiggly line, immediately identifying it as the letter S, hear its sound in your head (sss), and blend or attach it to the sound made by the next squiggly line. There is also comprehension, often understood as using words and pictures in a text to help you grasp what a sentence, chapter, or book is trying to tell you, if you can decode and comprehend, the wisdom goes; youre on your way (Guernsey, 2010). Reports from research and the larger educational community demonstrate that too many children have limited ability to comprehend texts. Given that comprehension is such as complex cognitive endeavor and is affected by, at least, the reader, the text, and the context, comprehension research has considered many features as contributing to student outcomes (McKeown, Beck, & Blake, 2009).

According to McKeown, Beck, & Blake (2009), two approaches are needed for comprehension instruction: strategies approach and content approach. A major distinction between the two approaches is that strategy instruction encourages students to think about their mental processes and, on that basis, to execute specific strategies with which to interact with text. In contrast, content instruction attempts to engage students in the process of attending to text ideas and building a mental representation of the ideas, with no direction to consider specific mental processes. According to findings and determinations by the National Reading Panel (2006), comprehension is critically important to the development of childrens reading skills and therefore to the ability to obtain an education. How Do Children Develop Reading Comprehension?

Reading comprehension begins with lower processes focused at word level-word recognition (phonics, sight words), fluency (rate, accuracy, and expression), and vocabulary (word meanings). The second stage of reading comprehension development, according to Reutzel & Cooter (2008), focuses on higher-order processing-activating and relating prior knowledge to text content, and consciously learning, selecting, and controlling the use of several cognitive strategies to assure remembering and learning from text. One of the most important findings from the past three decades of comprehension research, from our point of view, is that readers can remember a text without learning from it. For instance, a reader might remember learning about the definition of photosynthesis in a biology class and be able to recite the definition, but have no understanding of a related concept, semipermeable membrane, which is important to a full understanding of photosynthesis. When readers successfully comprehend what they read, they construct meaning that is interrelated, establishing a logical, integrated understanding that they can draw from memory in the future to help them understand and learn from reading new texts (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008). What Does Research Say About Reading Comprehension Instruction?

Teachers are increasingly aware that they need to explicitly teach comprehension strategies to children. From the work of the National Reading Panel, (2000), the evidence base supports the effectiveness of teaching the following reading comprehension strategies: (1) graphic organizers, (2) comprehension monitoring, (3) answering questions, (4) generating questions, (5) story structure, and (6) summarization. The NRP also found that comprehension instruction is most effective when there is a great deal of text-focused talk set in vibrantly interactive and collaborative classroom contexts. Research as reported by the National Reading Panel (2000) indicates that teaching children how to coordinate the use of a set or package of comprehension strategies as they read and discuss what they have learned with peers and with teacher supports yields particularly strong results for improving childrens reading comprehension. How is Reading Comprehension Assessed?

Reading comprehension is composed of several essential components: the reader, the text, the activity, and the social context. Because reading comprehension is multifaceted, it can not be adequately measured with any single approach, process, or test (Paris & Stahl, 2005). One of the most effective processes for finding out if children understand what they read is to ask them to retell what they have read. Oral story retellings may be elicited from children in a number of ways. One way involves the use of pictures or verbal prompts related to the story. A second way to elicit oral story retellings from children is to use unaided recall, in which students retell the story as if he or she were telling the story to someone who had never heard or read the story before begins an unaided oral story retelling. The information gleaned from an oral story retelling may be used to help me, the teacher, to focus future instruction on enhancing students understanding of narrative parts or story structure (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008).Standards That Support My Action Plan

It is important that teachers know and understand the minimum expected outcomes, or benchmark standards, for comprehension development at each grade level, especially in the early years. This information becomes an essential roadmap for teachers to use in assessing each childs level of comprehension development. The Tennessee state standards for third grade reading include three major expectations that support my action plan. Content standard one states that the student will develop the reading and listening skills necessary for word recognition, comprehension, interpretation, analysis, evaluation, and appreciation of print and non-print text. One expectation that my children must be able to do is to develop and extend reading vocabulary. Another expectation is for my children to use active comprehension strategies to derive meaning while reading and for checking their understanding after reading text. Another grade level expectation that my children will need is to develop and use pre-reading strategies. All of these expectations are dependent on the expectation that they understand the sentence structure of Standard English. There are a total 14 learning expectations that third graders are to accomplish under the reading content standards from the state of TN (TN Department of Education, 2011).

The National Council of Teachers of English is a professional association of educators in English Studies, Literacy, and Language Arts. The NCTE and International Reading Association expect children to read a wide range of print and non-print texts to build an understanding of texts, to acquire new information; to read for personal fulfillment in different genres (NCTE, 2011). They also expect children to apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. Standards for English language arts stress, that all students must be capable readers and writers. As children grow as readers, children must learn and develop effective reading strategies for tackling challenging materials. They must organize their ideas logically. NCTE suggests that children read often, interpreting and evaluating a broad range of classic and contemporary literature. As children answer questions and explore issues, children must be able to find many sources of information. Students should know how to evaluate information, summarize it, and communicate their conclusions clearly to others. As a teacher, I want my third graders to succeed.

Accomplished teachers know and can evaluate current literature on reading, including theories of reading and pedagogies that support learning of reading. Teachers are able to discriminate between evidence-based research and unsubstantiated trends and between effective and ineffective strategies for their students, and they can articulate their knowledge and the rationale for their decisions. Accomplished teachers know how children learn to read and the reading process is developmental in nature. Teachers know that readers, from pre-emergent to sophisticated, use their knowledge about his world along with a variety of cueing systems, including graphophonic, pragmatic, semantic, and syntactic, as they construct meaning from text (NBPTS, 2011). According to National Board of Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS), accomplished teachers recognize that their students will be at various points in their reading development. Teachers should know the skills and strategies to help students comprehend a variety of texts. For example, teachers need to know comprehension strategies to support student learning before students read selections, and in activities that follow reading. The NBPTS states that accomplished Early childhood literacy reading language arts teachers know and understand current literature and theories about reading-language arts. Teachers should evaluate this knowledge and use it in their instructional practice.

Tennessee Standards for English Language Learners (ELL) states that Ells will listen speak, read, and write in English throughout all content areas to help ensure that children who are limited English proficient, including immigrant children an you, achieve at high levels in the core academic subjects so that those children meet the same challenging State academic content and student academic achievement standards as all children are expected to meet (TN Dept of Education, 2010). One of those expectations is for children in third grade to demonstrate pre/early reading skills. Third graders are expected to comprehend key vocabulary phrases. English language learners determine main idea and purpose of what they read. These children also must draw inferences; supporting details predict and draw conclusions from their text. Relevant Theories and Developmental Characteristics of the Learners

There are many relevant and developmental characteristics of learners. During the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, reading comprehension was largely taught by asking students questions following reading, or by assigning skill sheets as practice for reading comprehension skills such as getting the main idea, determining the sequence, following directions, noting details, and recognizing cause and effect relationships. Past early literacy research has been directed toward the issues of word identification, particularly phonemic awareness and phonics instruction (National Reading Panel, 2000; Rand Reading Study Group Report, 2001). More recently, leading reading authorities, corporately sponsored study groups (RAND Reading Study Group), and federal government agencies have concluded that young children can and should be taught reading comprehension strategies from the onset of reading (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008). As a result of this research, teachers are increasingly aware that they need to explicitly teach comprehension strategies to children (Pressley, 2000).

Learning what past theorists have contribute to the language and reading development allows me to understand past trends as well as apply viable information to current education endeavors. Teaching and learning are highly social activities. Psychologists such as Vygotsky, Bandura, and Dewey have theorized that social interaction is a key mechanism in the process of learning and development. Social learning theories focus on learning that happens within a social environment and emphasizes the premise that people learn from one another by means of observations. John Dewey and L.S. Vygotsky are two theorists that are far apart in their conception of the relationship between process and goals in education. The difference revolves around the question of how educators view the process of activity in relation to the consequence of activities. The differences between the two theorists are easily recognizable when one compares Vygotskys conception of the zone of proximal development and Dewey-inspired model of long term projects (Glassman, 2001).

Vygotsky thinks the development of mind is originated from interaction of the person with society. He points out that development can be classified into two levels. One is the real level of development, on which children can solve problems independently; the other is potential level of development, on which children can solve problems under the guidance of adult people or in corporation with peers with higher capability (Wang, 2009). Two key points in Piagets constructivists theory are children move through cognitive stages at fairly predictable times and external influences, such as schooling, have very little effect on their evolution. In other words, children progress through these stages according to a biological determined timetable, and external influences (e.g., parents and teachers) have very little effect on the pace of growth. Vygotsky demonstrated that adult interactions with children could not only assist in language development, but could also change the pace of language learning. Learning what other theorists have concluded on how children develop, it is important for me to know which children will be successful at independent work and which students need more guidance, scaffolding, and specific skill building which will allow these young readers to move forward in comprehending what text they are reading.

Vygotsky assessed cognitive development in terms of how a child could perform a specific task in collaboration with others. Vygotsky explained that learners internalize language activities, like reading and writing by going through a three-stage process. Internalization as Vygotsky called it, begins with the learner observing others as they perform a language task (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008). For example, a child who continually asks for the same book to read aloud again and again by an experience reader is studying what the reader is doing and learning some of the readings most basic structures. The next stage of internalization begins when the learner mimics the language task, like a child pretending to read a book aloud when the child is really looking at the pictures and repeating what was read aloud to the child on a previous occasion. In teaching we refer to this as guided practice. According to Reutzel and Cooter (2008), the third stage of internalization comes when a learner, after benefiting from a great deal of skillful instruction and guided practice, is able to perform a specific reading task without further help. I can appreciate and understand out my students could benefit from collaborating with others, for example, it would be helpful when discussing text if the children paused and reflected more often. As part of my action research of improving how I teach reading comprehension to children, knowing how to skillful instruct my youngsters would mean more success for the kids as they progress through the school year and beyond. I will need to provide more guided practice as suggested by Vgotsky and others and understand how the Zone of Proximal Development could play out in my classroom. For example, keywords posted around the room, graphic organizers that are completed as the kids read at text, and other forms of differentiated instruction could bring my lower level readers from working collaboratively now to independent practice at a later time.

In reviewing recent research on vocabulary learning and its role in reading, one conclusion becomes clear: reading and writing activities are dependent on words. Reading and being read to also increase vocabulary learning. Reading involves cognitive skill development that in some ways mirrors physical skill development. As with physical skills, the more one practices reading, the more his or her reading ability increases. Reading comprehension begins with lower processes focused at the word level-word recognition, fluency, and vocabulary. The second stage of reading comprehension development focuses on higher-order-processing-activating and relating prior knowledge to text content, and consciously learning, selecting, and controlling the use of several cognitive strategies to assure remembering and learning from the text (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). As a teacher, I want to know where words stand in terms of how they affect reading. Reading aloud to my students will also contribute to their vocabulary learning and reading gets better with practice. It is hard not to talk about reading without understanding that reading is recognizing print and listening involves hearing the word sound individually and the word sound embedded in text. The literature suggests that writing and reading should be taught simultaneously because they are connected. In order to write you need to be able to recognize words and what they mean in different contexts. There are many ways to improve reading but some experts believe more time should be spend on teaching vocabulary and others say that not knowing a lot of words does not prevent some one from getting the gist of a story.

Reading instruction is quite complex, and all the more so because children use multiple cognitive processes in reading. Over the years, the focus of reading instruction has varied, shifting from decoding, to fluency, and, recently to comprehension and word meaning. Reading entails more than decoding or fluency or comprehension. It make use of multiple skills: oral language proficiency, phonological processing, working memory, word-level skills (decoding, spelling), and text-level skills, such as scanning, skimming, summarizing, and making inferences (Calderon, Slavin, & Sanchez, 2011). According to the National Reading Panel, children need to read extensively and receive expert and explicit reading comprehension instruction from teachers that is focused on vocabulary and comprehension strategy instruction (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). According to Ruetzel & Cooter, within this environment of extensive reading of a variety of texts, children must be taught to activate their relevant background knowledge to understand and remember texts. As a teacher, I can only suggest and offer books for my youngsters to take home to read, but not all kids like to read at home. My ESL children have parents that read very little English and most of my books are not bilingual because the school funds only books in English.

Ruetzel and Cooter (2008), suggest that simply asking children to respond to a worksheet or to answer a list of comprehension questions is not teaching and does nothing to develop comprehension strategies, concepts or skills. Childrens ability to decode unfamiliar words and recognize a core group of words by sight in the primary grades predicts good comprehension in the later elementary grades. Children should be taught word meaning (vocabulary) if we are serious about improving their reading comprehension. Children need to receive teacher-guided practice and feedback in using comprehension strategies to process a variety of text. The classroom should include rich interactions and collaborations among teachers and children around a variety of interesting texts (National Reading Panel, 2000; Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). As a professional educator, understanding that children need to be taught specific reading strategies to process a variety of text, will correlate into planned activities that I will incorporate into my lesson plans. In my classroom my children already work collaboratively, but when it comes to retelling the story or taking an assessment, they fail to accurately answer 50% of the questions in either verbal or written assessment. The written assessment is even lower for my lowest struggling readers. The knowledge base of the children seems low in comprehending what they read from their reading textbook.Professional Consensus on Best Teaching Practices

One of the best teaching practices I will employ into my action plan is to teach comprehension strategies. One of the chief comprehension activities to improve my third graders ability to comprehend text is learning how to use comprehension strategies to improve their understanding and memory for text. Questions are an integral part of life both in and out of school. From birth, we learn about our world by asking and answering questions. Asking children to search out answers to these questions encourages them to actively engage with the ideas of the text. It is important that why questions be asked about the text in such a way as to orient children to search prior knowledge for supporting the facts they need to learn-otherwise such questions will not enhance comprehension and memory for text.

The ability to plan, check, monitor, revise, and evaluate ones unfolding comprehension is of particular importance in reading. If a reader fails to detect comprehension breakdowns, the she or he will take no action to correct misinterpretations of the text. Although the ability to detect when comprehension breaks down is important, it is equally important to know which strategies to select in repairing broken comprehension and when to use them (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). To help students develop a sense for when to select these strategies, teachers may consider using a think-aloud modeling procedure. I will model think-aloud comprehension strategies to my third graders as part of my action plan.

Struggling readers which describe my third graders could benefit from scaffolds to support comprehension development. It is now accepted as nearly axiomatic that effective reading teachers must have knowledge specific to effective reading instruction and the young children they teach and actively apply this knowledge in their classroom instruction. Research suggests, then, that teachers influence childrens academic growth more than any single factor, including families, neighborhoods, and the schools the students attend. Comprehension is the very heart and soul of reading. The National Reading Panel (2000), reported that lively discussion about a text in the company of others seems to be the optimal situational context to enhance students reading comprehension. Classroom discussion, then, seems to provide the best context for children to improve their reading comprehension (Kuetzel & Cooter, 2008. As part of my action plan, my children will learn to comprehend more because discussions will connect the reader to a peer, text and the teacher to enhance understanding.

As part of my action plan, text structure instruction will be taught that focus on the physical features that will help my third graders understand the way that an author has organized a text including the table of contents, chapter headings and subheadings, paragraph organization such as topic sentence location and signal words, typographic and spacing features and visual insets or aids. Effective text structure instruction requires that teachers provide short, frequent review opportunities for application of the text structure strategies taught. The National Reading Panel (2000) found conditions that support effective comprehension instruction. First, when teachers provide explicit comprehension instruction by explaining, modeling, guiding, and scaffolding, students are helped toward independence and self-regulated use of comprehension strategies (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008).Research and Theories That Provide Support for My Action Plan

Piaget, Vygotsky, and Dewey focused on the interactions of people with their environment. My action plan will emphasize interactions with their environments as well as interaction with their text and other readers. Constructivists theories of oral language development emerged from the work of Jean Piaget. Piaget believed that language development is linked to cognitive ability (i.e., thought processes and abilities). The two key points in Piagets constructivist theory are children mover through cognitive stages at fairly predictable times and external influences (e.g., parents and teachers) have very little effect on the pace of growth. These notions are very much at odds with the social interactions perspective.

Social interactionist theory assumes that language development is greatly influenced by physical, social, and, of course linguistic factors. Vgotsky assessed cognitive development in terms of how well a child could perform a task in collaboration with others. The difference between what a child can do alone and in collaboration with others is what Vgotsky called the zone of proximal development (ZPD). Vgotsky explained that learners internalize language activites, like reading and writing, by going through a three stage process (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). Internalization, as Vygotsky called it, begins with the learner observing others as they perform a language task. The next stage of internalization is guided practice where child receives scaffolds to support the learning. The third stage of internalization is independent practice. I intend to help my students in this internalization process by thinking aloud, modeling, and discussing texts that the children read as part of my action plan. Summary

I have used the relevant theories and developmental characteristics of my learners and how they learn best. I have also explored the professional consensus on best teaching practices used when teaching children in elementary school how to comprehend what they read. After reviewing the literature, I have decided to implement the best practice of teaching text structure to my third graders. I have learned from reading the literature on best practices for teaching reading comprehension and found that explicitly teaching reading comprehension strategies to my third graders can help them understand more of what they read. I found that best practices of teaching reading comprehension is for readers to connect with each other and the text by discussing and talking about the text. I plan on engaging my third graders into more lively discussion of what they read to build background knowledge and to connect prior experience with new experience. Action PlanThe major focus of my research was on improving how I taught reading comprehension to my third graders. I have a goal of explicitly teaching reading strategies to my youngsters. I want to implement what research says are best practices for teaching reading comprehension. Another goal is build students reading vocabulary as a means of helping them understand their reading textbook. For example, when my students become more familiar with their reading vocabulary then there is a better chance they will comprehend more of the text they read. Another goal I want to accomplish is to raise scores in reading comprehension and vocabulary so that my students can see that reading strategies and vocabulary strategies if used will aid their comprehension of text.

I gathered baseline data from all my students from previous scores on reading comprehension assessments. I need to mention that the reading comprehension assessment also has a vocabulary in context embedded into to the assessment. As a result of those findings a pattern emerged, seven students scored low on reading assessments given after reading and discussing a story text in class. I compared the results and found that they were directly correlated to their ELDA scores from the previous year. This test measures language proficiency from one year to the next. Those students who scored low on their reading assessment also scored low on the English language development assessment. The ELDA is meant to measure use of the language proficiency in five domains-listening, speaking, reading, writing and comprehension. The other nine students scored higher on both reading assessments and the English language proficiency assessment. ELDA is a statewide assessment that is given at the to measure language proficiency of children whose moms and dads speak a language other than English, or where one of the parents is non-English speaking.Week 1In week one of my action research, I gave my students a lecture on what the data from previous reading assessments told me about how well each third graders did over a four week span. I asked the students if they wanted to get better grades on their reading test and they all agreed. I informed the students it will take more energy and effort on part of the teacher and all the children in class.

I instituted a Reading Vocabulary Journal for my lower level kids. I intended for the kids to locate and write sentences using their vocabulary story words from their reading textbook. I customarily dont assign homework because the kids are assigned several pages of practice work to do at home already by their mainstream teacher. I found that 40% of the students failed to turn in homework for me and for their main teacher. The students either forgot or did not have the time. I stressed to them, this should only take an hour to complete and the homework is helpful in helping them come prepared for class.

I advocated to my boys and girls about how important it is to read constantly and not just for information, but to enjoy reading. This worked fine with my higher level readers, but the lower level students were taxied with trying to figure out what a word meant, in order to read on and comprehend the text. I am confined to the same reading curriculum and materials as the mainstream teacher even though there is an ESL curriculum. The administrations concerns are that if a child is pulled out for support, how does the child make up for work that was missed in their mainstream class. My task as an ESL support teacher then is to scaffold and use different strategies to help my students improve in reading comprehension.I asked my lower level students to have their older sibling read to them. I advocated for more bilingual books in the library. I spoke with the librarian at my school and she informed me that grant money was available to purchase some new books for the library. I have several books that I acquired over the last three years in different genres. When students get free time for reading, they usually go for the picture books. The youngsters wont to take the time to read the text. I can see in the first week that the higher level readers are reliant on me to interpret a picture, when they could just as well read the text located near the pictures or illustrations in the book. I flipped the questions around on the youngsters and they have to read the text aloud to me. I instituted a Classroom Library this first week, so my children would have something to read at home. During the first week of my lesson plan I taught four reading strategies that my kids could use to help them comprehend more in their reading. Rereading, use of graphic organizers, previewing vocabulary and the reading process are important to comprehension. For example, what the kids should do when they encounter a new word in their reading that causes them confusion. I taught to my kids to use graphic organizers to help them construct meaning of what they are reading. Another strategy modeled for my youngsters was rereading confusing parts of text in order to improve what they comprehend about the reading. And last I modeled to my kids through think-aloud, the reading process. I instructed and modeled what a reader should do when they are not sure or get confused when reading. Understanding word meanings are essential to reading success. Indeed, unless students are able to understand the meanings of words as they read, the process of reading is reduced to mindless decoding. Vocabulary can be learned incidentally in the context of storybook reading or in listening to others read. Learning words before reading a text is also helpful. Most vocabulary is learned indirectly, but some vocabulary must be taught directly. As part of my plan, my kids looked at specific vocabulary words and at how they were used in context. Vocabulary is learned best through explicit, systematic instruction. Context helps readers choose the correct meaning for multiple-meaning words. According to Ruetzel and Cooter (2008), teachers should offer both definitions and context during vocabulary instruction. Specific word instruction can deepen kids knowledge of word meanings and, in turn help them understand what they are hearing or reading. Three ways of providing specific word instruction have been drawn from research evidence: preteaching vocabulary, extended instruction, and repeated exposures. In Week One the vocabulary words that are stressed in their weekly reader were discussed in detail in different contexts. Students during week one had to do homework which gave them practice with recognizing the vocabulary words and how the reading story vocabulary was used in the context of the story.

Teaching new vocabulary prior to the youngsters reading of a text helps students learn new words and comprehend what they read. I choose as part of my action research plan to spend time focusing on story vocabulary and repeated exposure to the story vocabulary. When children see, hear, and work with specific words, they seemed to learn them more. The ultimate task for teachers is to help students become more independent learners. Students must determine the meaning of words that are new to them when these words are discovered in their reading. The teacher must help the kids develop effective word learning strategies such as how to use dictionaries and other reference aids, how to use information about word parts to figure out the meaning of words in text, and how to use context clues to determine word meanings (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008). Students growing up in poverty circumstances and English language learners (ELL) are two key groups who may need special adaptations in vocabulary instruction to ensure learning. Teaching vocabulary can enhance comprehension of text if the kind of instruction provided helps students build meaningful associations to their knowledge base and more than a brief definition is provided (McKeown, Beck, & Blake, 2009). Semantic maps such as KWL charts can be use to activate prior knowledge and preview new vocabulary.

Direct instruction should be used to teach words that are necessary for passage comprehension. Active learning opportunities, such as creation of word webs, playing word games, and discussing new words in reading groups or literature circles, are far more effective in cementing new knowledge and improving comprehension. To know a word well means knowing what it means, how to pronounce it, and how its meaning changes in different contexts. Repeated exposures to the same words in different context are the key to successful learning (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). As a researcher trying to improve how I teach reading comprehension to my third graders, I implemented more ways for my kids to become familiar with their reading vocabulary and how the words are used in different contexts. During Week One, my youngsters filled out a graphic organizer. They included information on the organizer such as dictionary definition of the words, what pages the vocabulary word were located within the text they would be reading later and they also had to write down the sentence which used the particular vocabulary word. My kids had this to do before they could read the story. My goal is to build their vocabulary and background prior to the reading of the text. The kids will see each vocabulary word at least four times, hear the word at least 8 more times and hear and read the word used in two different contexts. According to ELL expectations, English language learners will develop the necessary reading skills necessary for word recognition, comprehension, interpretation and analysis (TN Department of Education, 2011).Another strategy I modeled to my kids was a think aloud as I read text. The goal was to help students think through the reading process. Read-alouds are a time for the kids to listen to someone read a text that is more challenging than what they could do independently. As I read aloud, I would occasionally pause to think-aloud, which verbalized for the class the thoughts that were going through my mind about the text. These think-alouds open a window into the mind of a good reader, helping students see how readers naturally use a variety of reading comprehension strategies to help them understand text (Celic, 2009). All my students practiced the strategy of rereading confusing parts, looking at

specific vocabulary words in the context of a sentence to help understand the word or concept. On Friday the last day of my first week, the students read short passages, while I defined and further explained the meaning of words that were unfamiliar to my kids that was in the passage. I asked students what strategy they used to understand the confusing parts of the passage. Some students later could be observed using rereading and ask another peer for clarification on what they read. I provided free time for the kids to do silent reading of their weekly story. I provided extra time in the classroom to read books that interest the kids. I started requiring students to keep a journal of their reading vocabulary words and two complete sentences using the vocabulary words in context.During week one only three of the seven lower level readers did not bring their homework to class. One student said he did it, but he forgot to bring it. The next day he brought his homework but it was on 30% complete. The remaining two students did not bring anything during the week and told me they either forgot it or did not have time to complete it at home. I discussed with the third grade children on Monday of week one that I typically dont assign homework, however, in order to raise their grades; more effort would be required from each child. I explained to the kids that extra effort and guidance from the teacher will help them understand what text they are reading but also raise their grades in reading. In order for the homework to be consistent, all the youngsters were informed that assigned homework was due on Tuesday. I notified all the parents of the lower level readers and asked them for their help in making sure their child did the assigned work at home each week. They agreed and were also concerned about their low reading scores. All of my students were excited about getting better grades. The higher level students are only in my class twice a week because they are at a higher level and according to the end of year language proficiency assessment (ELDA) they can spend more time in their mainstream classroom rather than be pulled for one hour every day. My lower level students are pulled out for ESL support classes for one hour daily. I set aside time each day where I explicitly teach my youngster reading strategies. According to Lipson, (2007) comprehension involves intentionally using specific, purposeful strategies to understand text. Week 2

During Week Two, I went over the results of the reading comprehension and vocabulary assessment given last Friday of week one with my children. The kids had problems in recognizing some of their weekly vocabulary words in context and correctly identify details of their reading. I gathered homework from the kids and the same kids who had not brought homework from the first week had nothing to show that they attempted the work that was due of them this week. I later called their parents and the parents basically said their child had told them they had no homework. I later visited the mainstream teachers of these children and they confirmed they also were not getting homework back from those students on a consistent basis.

Before asking the children to read their weekly story, I spent the first class period of week two talking about the vocabulary words used in the story, not just those words that they specifically needed to know but other words that the kids might not be familiar with. My goal was to pick out the story vocabulary words from their weekly story and also give two more examples of the word used in another context, for example, in their story for the week, the vocabulary word spring in context of their weekly story, I would give an example of what is spring time like in Tennessee. Understanding word meanings are essential to reading success. Indeed, unless students are able to understand the meanings of words as they read, the process is reduced to mindless decoding. Conversely, children who have small listening, speaking, and reading vocabularieswho are from what could be termed language-deprived backgrounds-must receive attention if they are to have any read chance of reading success.

Vocabulary can be learned incidentally in the context of storybook reading or in listening to others read. Learning words before reading a text is also helpful. The technique of repeated exposure of vocabulary words appears to enhance vocabulary development.

I gave the children two options for homework. The first option would be for the kids to write sentences with the vocabulary words in context of the story and defining the word from the glossary or dictionary. The second option would be to use a story bubble map and write down in their own words what happened on each page of the story prior to coming to class the following Monday. For example, if they read page 215, then the kids would have to be able to explain in writing what was happening at that point in the story. The students chose option two, which meant the youngster would fill out a bubble map with bullet points or sentences about what they understood from reading one page at a time. The purpose for this is so they will be able to discuss things about the story on Tuesday of the third week. This would eliminate the silent reading in class and transfer that time to more discussion in class of the story as it unfolds and to clear up an ambiguity about comprehension and vocabulary words in context.

Again the children read the story silently while I monitored to be sure students were focused on the reading. Afterwards, I read the story just like last week but not straight through in one reading then discussing the story. I approached the story in the same way that they would do their homework. As I read each page, I would stop, pause and ask questions randomly to each child to ensure that they would need to keep up in case they were called on to answer my question about the story. Usually, the same students who talk and who have eyes that wonder around the room also dont listen while teacher is reading. One of the main predictors of how well and how fast and individual will learn to read a language is the size of the individuals mental vocabulary in that language. Thus, when teachers work to enhance their ELLs oral proficiency in English, they are expanding that mental lexicon and increasing the likelihood that the ELLs reading comprehension and fluency will also improve (Sousa, 2011).Week Three

Each week on Mondays and Tuesdays all my kids which include 9 higher level readers and 7 lower level readers are pulled out for one hour of ESL support services. Since I have two sets of children, those who have higher level reading skills only receive services from me for two hours weekly and those with lower reading skills, receive services for 5 hours a week. The two groups are not in class but for two days as one big group. The rest of the week I work with the lower level children who have typically not done as well on reading and vocabulary assessments, which are the kids who I am focusing on mainly to help improve their comprehension when they read text.

The 7 lower level readers are my main focus but I also want to raise the scores of all the children. The higher level students are assessed using the same test instrument but the difference being there is less scaffolding and they are assessed in their mainstream classroom. I collect scores from the mainstream teachers for the higher level students and it appears they stay consistent over time. Struggling readers need double or triple the teacher-guided reading instruction that normally developing readers receive. But increasing allocated reading instruction time is not the key factor to success. Rather, spending more time on task during allocated instructional time is the key factor. Struggling readers remain on-task better when they are in small-group or one-to-one teaching situations. Struggling readers need support through instructional scaffolds such as graphic organizers and guided practice (Reutzel & Cooter, 2008). Struggling readers are often well behind in their oral language vocabularies. As a consequence, according to Ruetzel and Cooter, kids need exposure to more opportunities to listen and use language-not fewer. Scaffolding refers to the gradual release of control and responsibility for selecting and using text structure comprehension strategies like graphic organizers, beginning with high teacher control and involvement, moving to shared control and involvement between teachers and students, and finally to students independent control over strategy selection and use.

During Week Three, after collecting the students bubble map of the story to scan what they wrote, it appeared that they might have read the story but a lot of the details from the story were missing. I decided that I would model how to use the bubble map organizer by explaining, thinking aloud as I read their story to them. I used bullet points instead of sentences to encourage students to give more details rather than a sentence or two about one thing from each page. My goal was to get more details written down from their reading. I asked my children midway through my modeling if they understood my way of organizing my thoughts as I read each page of the story. Most of the kids understood that it made more since to write just one or two words for an idea rather than just one sentence. One boy even said he could get more things written down and he would later remember what he wrote down. I asked the children if it made more sense to them to write sentences or keywords/ideas with one or two words. They all agreed to just keywords and key ideas on their graphic organizers as they read their text.

At the end of Week Three, I compared the test results and it appears there is upward movement in test scores. I interpreted those scores to mean that the strategies taught in my third graders class have been somewhat effective in raising reading comprehension scores. I also implemented homework for the first time for my third graders who struggle with reading. I must always be aware however, that sometime my kids dont have anyone at home to read to them or for them to read to because of a language barrier. Most of my kids have parents who only use another language at home. My observation and records in my research journal tend to make me believe that these kids can pronounce most of the words and can read the sentence but have problems connecting with components of some stories because they have no prior background of the context of the story. I personally have thought that the reading story textbook series used in my school district is too boring for struggling readers.

I asked my kids if they would like to check books out from my classroom library to take home to read more often. I informed them that they would be first held accountable for their homework and the other reading was for enjoyment. I was shocked because they all wanted books to take home, so now my kids can read at home for fun. I asked only that if they check a book out, they try to find someone to read it too, even if the person cant understand English. The third grade Reading Content Standard from Tennessee states that one of the learning objectives of third graders is to read independently for a variety of purposes and experience various literary genres. I have leveled readers as well as grade level books from various genres so that my students can read fiction and non-fiction. I discussed with my youngster at the end of week three that I had seen some improvement in grades. In response they asked me if they could get a treat for it. I agreed because they earned the reward.

Week Four

During Week Four, after reading the professional literature on what research says about peer learning, I chose to pair up a one of my higher level readers with my lower level readers Vgotsky explained that learners internalize language activities, like reading and writing, by going through three stages. In the first stage the learner observes others as they perform a language task. For example, when the students want me to read something from a book that they have chosen from the library, they are studying what I am doing as I am reading and learning some of the basic structures. I find that reading aloud to my kids helps them understand more and helps them with knowing when to pause for commas or other punctuation that the author uses to purposely slow down the reader. Modeling via reading- alouds provides guided practice for the kids and can be performed by others who have mastered the desired skill. Guided practice eventually brings children to independent reading which is the third stage. Put into practice, Vgotskys theory, advocates a child centered and activity-oriented reading curriculum, enables children to learn the meaning of the language while also using the language as a tool for exploration (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008).

The National Reading Panel (2000) recommends collaboration for implementation into classroom practice to improve reading comprehension. Collaboration requires that students discuss, interact, and work together with each other and their teachers to construct meaning of texts. Collaboration results in students obtaining greater insights into the thinking processes of others around a text (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). The past three weeks the kids have collaborated with me and we discussed their reading text and worked with understanding their weekly vocabulary in different contexts. This week I implement shared reading where one student reads one page and they discuss what has happened in the story up to that point, then they switch and the other child reads and they discuss. The purpose is to move the students to more independence of reading without teacher guidance.

Again this week one day was spent on vocabulary instruction, for example, after defining and reading aloud words in context and giving examples, I have asked each student to choose a word and come up with their own sentence. Some students thought that this sucked because they could not think of nothing to say. Other students were excited and started spouting out sentences. We finished out this day and I left this up to volunteers to create sentences using their vocabulary words and the other kids would have to write definition and the word in context of the story or passage read in class or out of class. Vocabulary is important to reading comprehension. Readers need to know the meaning of words they are reading in order to comprehend text. Vocabulary is learned both indirectly and directly. Children learn the meanings of most words indirectly, through everyday experiences with oral and written language (National Reading Panel, 2000).

My goal has been each week to engage my kids in oral language by participating in conversations, hearing words repeated, and hearing adults use new and interesting words. Kids according to the NRP need to listen to adults read, have new words explained, have conversations with kids about the reading when finished and help them relate information to prior knowledge. Implementing a classroom library where my youngsters can check out books on their reading level will help them not fill frustrated and yet will help build their vocabulary word base. A practice guide (NCEE 2010-4048) authored by Shanahan, Callison, Carriere & et al, 2010) encourages teachers to teach children a variety of strategies that will help them understand and retain what they read and thus become independent, resourceful readers. For example, I have encouraged by kids to reread parts of a story, predict or make inferences about what they read. I have taught my students to use graphic organizers to organize story structure and for writing down key words and key ideas on each page as they read their weekly story. Discussing the text with students helps to improve reading comprehension. This approach will allow young readers to more deeply explore ideas in the text they are reading. In guiding the discussion, teachers should model ways to think about the text that can help students when they are reading independently.

I discussed the reading assessment results with my 7 lower level readers from the previous week. All the scores had gone upward. I asked my kids what they thought about their scores. They were happy but they knew they needed to do more. I asked them if they thought they would score better this week and they said no. I asked them why they would say that, and they informed me, they did not like the story because it had a lot of hard words in it and it was hard for them to read. I explained to them as we discuss those words more in class and in context of the story, it would make sense to them. I told the kids that I had read stories that were not as good to me as others, so it would be okay to feel that way about stories which are hard to read. One student was able to pronounce all the story vocabulary words and explain what the word meant or could use it in a sentence. Another student told me he understood the story more after we discussed it in class. Another student said knowing what the word means helps when reading the story.

In conclusion of Week Four, students were taught specific vocabulary instruction of using the dictionary and glossary to find word meaning. Children were asked to preview what they were about to read, which included looking at illustrations and randomly looking at some text in the story. On Tuesday, children used their graphic organizer as I modeled how to use bullet points to identify key words or key ideas that were on each page as I read aloud. As I read aloud, I thought aloud, so my students could follow my thinking in how I made meaning of the story. On Wednesday, we collaboratively talked about what happened in more detail about the story. On Thursday, the youngster checked out books from the classroom library and took their weekly reading comprehension assessment which includes vocabulary assessment. On Friday, students were allowed to pick a leveled reader from my classroom and read independently. I of course had to make sure it did not turn into just looking at pictures in the books.

Week four was disappointing because I had seen scores advancing upward but at the end of week three scores had declined or stayed the same for two of my kids. I recalled that my students did not like the story that they were assigned to read. The story was about what life was like in the colonial days and the kids had problems relating to the story. I would suspect this because my children come from a culture different from Memphis. I was determined to find out how my how higher level readers did on the assessment at the end of week three. The mainstream teachers all agreed that in general the kids did not care for the story and did not score as well on this assessment.

In collaboration with four mainstream teachers who teach third grade, we decided it might be better to drop the reading text. We all decided that the skill emphasized in the reading textbook needs to be taught but it might work better with another reading text. Over the years the basal reader series that the school district uses, in our opinions, had not lead to the gains we had expected. The mainstream teachers decided that they would set up reading centers that were differentiated based on reading level. I informed the mainstream teachers that I have ESL textbooks in my classroom which are more appropriate for my some of my lower level ESL kids. In collaboration I would give a grade based on an assessment that I created if they decided to abandon the basal reader series. They all agreed that the school districts reading series textbook was not advancing students fluency and reading comprehension.

Week Five

During Week Four I applied reading strategies taught over the last three weeks and did not introduce any new strategy until we changed over to new reading material. My goal for Week Five was to get more free reading in on books that were of interest to the kids. I asked the kids if they would be interested in getting a grade from their ESL textbooks and combine that with outside reading that would be assessed by the teacher as their final grade. I explained to the students that there grade will be based off what they read in class and also what they read outside of class. I continued to teach the skill that the school district emphasizes for each week through instructional maps. The only difference is I used more than one reading text to teach the skill.

This year there as been more push for English language learners to improve in other subject areas that use academic language. Reading Content Standard 1 for reading for third graders, is to develop skills to facilitate reading, and to learn in a variety of content areas (TN Standards, 2011). I purposeful selected some nonfiction books as well as reading from their science books to teach reading strategies that students need to know how to use in order to be successful. The National Board for Professional Teaching states that accomplished teachers understand that reading is a complex process and that successful readers employ a variety of strategies to construct meaning. Teachers instructional decisions are based on the needs of children; sound language, reading and literacy theories; knowledge of childrens literature and other texts; and local, state and national standards for teaching and learning (National Board for Professionals Teaching Standards, 2001).

During Week Five, students read a story from a reading textbook, read a leveled reader that was of interest to them outside of class and read a small passage. In all three reading mediums, I assessed the students and I felt that they genuinely like the leveled readers or books written for kids with varying reading levels. The books were also more interesting according to the kids and they correctly answered the questions about what they read and could retell the story. I observed my kids this week as they selected a book from the class library, and it shows that the youngster were more interested in other books rather than their third grade reading text book. I think kids should be allowed to discover what they like to read for themselves. To offer my students choice may mean choosing two different information books on rocks for example or rock formations. But when children have the sense they can make some choices about what to read and for which purposes, they are more willing to persist and remain intellectually engaged while reading.

According to Reutzel and Cooter, (2008) control is one of six factors associated with increasing students reading comprehension. Children need to feel they have an integral role to play while reading text in order to take sufficient control of their own thinking processes to be successful in reading for comprehension. The children this week were assigned two challenging texts and were given the option of picking a book that they wanted to read. I assessed the children this week by asking questions about what they read.

In Week Five the children were given a choice of two reading textbooks. This week the kids chose another textbook which was in my class. The textbook series was different and I had the assessment instrument that measures reading comprehension. This week all of the third grade teachers decided to read different sources instead of following their normal basal reading series. In collaboration with the third grade teachers we decided to forgo the normal routine of using a story from the basal reader and let students have choice in what they would like to read. Most students like to read what interest them. This week the children were allowed to pick at book, read it, and be assessed by me after reading the story. Most of the books can be read in 15-30 minutes by the students and at lot of the books in my school library I have read. I could hear my kids talking and conversing about what they were reading. I reviewed what plays out when I enter a classroom to gather my kids for coming to my classroom, that there is always silence when they are reading their weekly story from their basal reader. I have pulled my kids out for ESL support, and found that most third grade classrooms are quiet during the time they are reading independently. In contrast, when my kids are allowed to free read, they get so excited; they want to tell each other what they found out. I think in order to build reading comprehension kids have to get excited and motivated to read.

During Week Five I assessed the kids on what they comprehended from the text they read during the week. The assessment this week was teacher made combined with an instrument from the textbook publisher to test for reading comprehension. The students were allowed to read books that interest them but the book had to be at the appropriate level. Students were reminded to look at the chart on the wall for reading strategies to use to help them to understand more of what you read. When students struggled with answering questions about their book, then I allowed student had to reread that part of the story and if still not clear then talk with a peer. If that was not helpful then child had to look up the meaning of words with a dictionary. The last resort is to come to the teacher. My goal was to get students more and more able to be independent readers and thinkers in order to find meaning in what they read. I wanted my students to know the reading strategies that are available and which ones were more appropriate to the genre of a book.

Week Six

In Week Six I selected informational books about a topic that was appropriate for third graders. I required students to read about an academic subject. My class library has leveled non-fiction readers on several academic topics pertinent to third graders. I choose books that provided information about an idea or concept that is taught in the third grade. For example, one girl read a book about thunder and lightening. Afterwards, I asked the child questions about thunder and lightening. Another child read a book about how water goes from the ocean to your faucet. Afterwards the child was assessed on the main idea, details of how water gets from one point to another point. I based my reading comprehension questions on what was developmental appropriate for the individual child.

Although teaching comprehension strategies one at a time explicitly to students has been shown to be effective, children also need to learn how to effectively orchestrate, coordinate, and self-regulate the application of many comprehension strategies to construct meaning when reading a variety of texts (National Reading Panel, 2000). During Week Six, using a text about rocks and minerals, I modeled through think aloud what was worth knowing in a text and how a text might be interpreted. Reading comprehension strategies are essential tools for constructing meaning within a text, checking on ones understanding and prompting one to take certain actions when experiencing difficulty in understanding (Ruetzel & Cooter, 2008). As I read the book aloud, I thought aloud, so my students could for example, see what I did when I read an area that caused me to struggle with understanding. During Week Six, I asked my kids if they knew where the table of contents was located. I asked my kids how readers could use the table to help them with the book. Only a few of the students could locate or describe its purpose. My goal for Week Six was to teach book structure components and use specific academic topics in science or social studies. The reading comprehension assessment at the end of Week Six will be total teacher generated.

Week Six assessment for reading comprehension was generated from the reading of three different genres; students were given the choice of books and also were assigned reading texts. The kids read a nonfiction