Brown's article

Brown’s article was not only entertaining to read, but made me understand the optimal learning model that was stated in Routman, a bit more. I especially was thrilled to see examples of Brenda and Linda’s work with Travis, Shamika, and Patrick. As I was reading each description of each child I could easily imagine a student from both my main placement and dyad. With each student I will share an observation or interaction between that student and my master teacher or myself.

Travis: Linda began using simple predictable books during small group time in which Travis was in. Before Linda reads the book she has them look through the book and make predictions, then explains to them that they will encounter several important high-frequency words. Than she reads the book aloud and models how to track the print and stopping to ask student what they had learned. Than she had the students to share the readings as she demonstrated and lastly, working on their own time with reading. What Linda had done in this case reminds me of what I will be doing for my observation. I will be reading with a small group of students (who have learning disabilities), and first I will start reading, then take turns with another student, than finally have the students read to each other with myself as the facilitator and asking questions to assess comprehension, then work independently in by either reading the story again silently or working in their packets if they feel that they understand the story. I have also observed my dyad teacher perform the same technique.

Shamika: I have a student like her in my main placement, one that seems far advance for her age, and since she is new to the school it is hard to find records of files of her growth and notes from last year. Although I don’t remember my master teaching “breaking the code” for this student I do remember my master teacher teaching some of her students on blending sounds, and once she proved that she had mastered that stage she moved to chucking and identifying spelling patterns when reading unfamiliar words, as Brown calls it, decoding by analogy. One day the class was learning words in the –in family. One of the examples on the board was the word chin, many of the students assumed that it was pronounced, /c/ /h/ /in/ sounding out the first two letters, however the student similar to Shamika, knew better she knew that ch made a /ch/ sound therefore she came up with the correct answer. When she was asked how she knew that she indicated that she just broke the word, or chucked it.

Patrick: Patrick actually reminds me of a girl in my dyad placement, the one that loves to do everything but read, however she above the line of an average reader. I was surprised that when it came to choice time, all her of her friends would choose to silent read while she would rather draw or paint by herself. I always wondered how to reel the students that seemed uninterested in reading to realize their potential to develop to become better students. It wasn’t that this student know what she was reading, she just did not have the desire to read. So my master teacher looked for books that could be characterized as easy reader texts, specifically the Arthur books, challenging as it has more texts than others but at the same time engages the student with sight words that students are assumed to know.

Travis, Shamika, and Patrick are obviously not on the same page when it comes to reading and text, but it is through Brenda and Linda’s scaffolding procedures they are able to learn how to read at their own pace, not face, not slow, just right. In the past weeks I was unsure if I had seen the Optimal Model in use during my class periods, but after reading Brown's examples I have concluded that not only have I noticed it in class, I will be doing the same thing concept in my dyad observation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCvyl_Sb2Z0