Chapter Two: Enjoying Literature and Learning from Books

Foundations for emerging literacy emphasized in this chapter are: Developing a love for literature Becoming familiar with the language of fiction and nonfiction books Developing story sense, basic book knowledge, and concepts of print Developing abilities to track print.

Retelling is both a strong instructional strategy and an assessment tool--one that involves students in describing their understanding of a familiar story through retelling it. "… [R]etellings provide far more information about a student's comprehension than do answers to the more common comprehension questions." (Rhodes & Shanklin, 1993, p. 232.)

Assessment Tools and Techniques Retelling As an assessment tool, Retelling has many uses. For example, we can learn: what the child thinks a story is (his/her concept of story) through seeing which aspects of the story the child thinks it is important to retell when sharing a story with others. which story structure elements (characters, setting, events in the plot, etc.) the child uses to make sense of a story. the extent to which the child attends to and internalizes ("picks up" and uses) the vocabulary and language patterns of the story. the general developmental level of a child in relation to conventional English language structures (syntax). about the child's oral language abilities and listening comprehension. how close the match is between the text and what the child chooses to retell. to what extent the child chooses important information to retell as opposed to details that are more irrelevant to the story line. to what extent the child relates the story to her/his own experiences and considers these to be a part of retelling. Procedures Provide demonstrations of Retelling in an instructional setting before using Retelling in the assessment of a child's story sense (see Retelling as an Instructional Strategy, p. 65 for guidance). Select an interesting, short storybook that has a problem and resolution. Fill out an assessment form similar to the checklist on page 52, noting the title, the number of characters in the book, the main episodes in the plot, etc. This will help you to know what to listen for in the children's retellings and give you a standard for assessing the completeness of a retelling. Tell the children you will be inviting a few of them to retell the story to you after you have read it to them. Initially, you might ask them to listen carefully and to try to remember whom the story is about, and what happens to the main characters during the story. Tell students to pay attention to whether someone in the story has a problem (or wish) and how she or he solved (or achieved) it. On other occasions, ask for volunteers to retell the story without previous structuring of their attention. Keep this invitation open and allow students to select those aspects of the story upon which they wish to focus. Read the story to your class using your usual strategies. They might include some of the following: talking about the author, illustrator, and cover encouraging predictions based on the cover and title reading with expression, showing pictures, and commenting on interesting language or ideas as appropriate stopping at a midpoint in the story to confirm or refute initial predictions and to make new predictions discussing predictions again at the conclusion encouraging general responses to the story through questions such as "What did you think was the best part of this story? The funniest? Scariest? Saddest?" Ask children to work on a personal response to the story. They could be asked to do such things as: drawing a picture of their favourite part and writing (or dictating) a sentence about it illustrating a 3-fold story strip by drawing what happened in the beginning, the middle, and the end on the three sections created by the folds. Tell students that you will ask one or two of them to come and retell the story to you while everyone else is working on his/her response. Ask the children you have selected that day to come one at a time with you to a quiet corner to retell the story. Use the checklist on page 52 or one that you have created yourself to record what each child included in the retelling. Check off items included as each child is retelling the story. Assist the children in the retelling only as necessary to get them started. Do not prompt them unless there is a pause of more than 30 seconds. Use questions like the ones below to assist them, but note on your assessment form that it was an "Assisted Retelling".

Remember that any one retelling will not reveal all that the student knows. Children's retellings will vary depending upon their attraction to the story and their circumstances that day. Use retelling with each child more than once in a reporting period if possible and keep your conclusions tentative.

Questions to use in Assisted Retellings How did the story begin? Who is the story about? What happened in the story? Then what happened? OR What happened after that? When the child appears to be finished ask, "Is there anything more you would like to add?" Thank the child and find one thing about her/his retelling to appreciate. For example, "I like the way you started your story with 'Once upon a time' and said 'the end' when you were finished." OR "You really picked out the important things that happened in the story to share with me. That's what a good storyteller does." Complete any additional parts of the checklist and record any anecdotal comments after the child returns to her/his desk or table. You may want to note such things as enthusiasm or frustration, and comments the child made that related the story to personal experiences and/or ones unconnected to the story. If there is time, hear a second child do a retelling. Do not leave too long a stretch between your reading of the story and the individual retelling. You may want to show the book to the child and allow her/him to look through it for a minute to aid her/him in remembering the story. This will not unfairly skew the retelling because you are not testing the child's memory but rather what s/he thinks a story is and what parts of a story are important to retell in order to retain its story form. Instructional Implications Children's difficulty with retelling may be related more to their language development than to their story sense. This is particularly true of students where English is a second language or dialect. Use this assessment in conjunction with other oral language assessment tools to better understand the extent to which language development is playing a role. For those children with language difficulties related to the language or dialect spoken at home or to developmental delays, the use of Structured Play and all the informal language development activities in the previous chapter will be appropriate. As well, they will benefit from lots of language play such as the activities in Exploring Sound Patterns (p. 85). To strengthen children's story sense, the following strategies and activities will be helpful: Reading to Children Daily (p. 57) Book Browsing (p. 61) Read, Talk, Act, Draw, Write (p. 63) Retelling as an Instructional Strategy (p. 65). Sample Checklist for Assessing Retelling in the Emerging Phase