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This strategy is particularly useful for older students in the emerging phase of literacy but simplified versions of charts listing problem-solving strategies could be developed for younger learners as well.







































Make extra bookmarks for the use of reading buddies, parents, and mentors!

Visual Aids for Remembering Problem-solving Strategies: Making Charts and Bookmarks

Materials
  • Experience charts
  • Coloured markers, paper, pencils, and crayons
  • Bristol board
  • Collection of simple pictures or those generated by graphics software
  • Laminator.
Procedures
  1. Each time you involve children in a reading activity, draw their attention to one or two of the strategies outlined in the two previous charts.
  2. At the beginning of a language arts period, tell children they are going to help you make a chart that will help them solve reading problems by themselves. Discuss with them all the things that they know how to do when stuck on a word. Tell them you are going to give them one idea about an important thing to figure out first. You might want to start with the idea of context or topic and focus on "What is the text about?" Write "1. What is the text about?" OR "1. Find out the topic." and discuss some ways to do this. Use lots of examples.

    1. What is the text about?

    Things to find out:

    • Who said it or wrote it? (Does it sound like someone is talking?)
    • Why was it written? (Is it in the form of a list, a letter, a poem or rhyme, a set of instructions, a recipe, a label or sign, a story?)
    • Where did the text come from? (If it is not a whole book, did it come from a fiction or nonfiction book?)
    • What is the topic? How could I find out? (Are there picture clues? Does it have a title that would tell me the topic? Can I tell by the location? For example, if it is over the fish tank, might it be about feeding the fish? Can I guess the topic by finding and reading all the words in the text that I already know? For example, if I recognize the words farm and barn in it, might it be about farming?)

  3. Following the presentation of this strategy, encourage students' ideas. Support this discussion as necessary with examples and reminders. Record their ideas. The list might include ideas such as the following.

    1. Find out the topic by looking for picture clues, reading all the words you know, looking at the format to see if it looks like a list, a letter, a story, or a poem.
    2. Read ahead. Read all the words you know, leaving out unfamiliar words
    3. Reread it and think about what might make sense in the sentence.
    4. Try to "sound out" the unfamiliar words.
    5. Double check. Reread the sentence and see if your word makes sense in the sentence.
    6. Look for parts of words. See if any of the words you cannot read look like words you already know. Do they have some spelling patterns you know such as "ake" or "ing"?
    7. Does the punctuation help you to read it?
    8. Look around the room for words that might help you figure out words you do not know.

  4. Develop a shortened form of this chart. Ask students for their ideas about how to illustrate each point to help beginning readers remember what the chart says. For example, the chart without illustrations might look like the one below.

    I Can Read by Myself
    1. I look at the pictures.
    2. I look at the format (e.g., list, letter, story, poem).
    3. I read ahead. (I read all the words I know.)
    4. I try to predict.
    5. I go back and reread.
    6. I look for parts of words that I know.
    7. I try to sound out.
    8. I ask, "What might make sense?"
    9. I double check. What sound does the word start with? End with? Does my word make sense?
    10. I look at the punctuation.
    11. I look around the room for clues. (I use our Word Wall, labels, and charts.)
    12. I ask someone else.

  5. Duplicate a copy of the chart for each student. Have students work in pairs to illustrate each point on their copy. Pair strong readers with students in an earlier phase of literacy development.
  6. Have pairs share their ideas with the whole class. Select illustrations for the class chart.
  7. Make a smaller version of the chart in a bookmark size and shape. Duplicate it. Have students paste their copies on bristol board or manilla tag and laminate them for students to use as book marks.

Teacher Demonstrations of Reading Strategies

Materials Procedures
  1. Choose a piece of text that children have not seen previously. The selection can be a page or paragraph from a fiction or nonfiction book that is at the reading level of most of the children in the class. However, it should contain two or three words that are not yet in children's sight vocabularies. Some of these words may incorporate familiar spelling patterns. Others need not. An example of text from Mama, do you Love Me? (Joosse, 1991), a children's story based in the Inuit culture, follows.

    Example of Text

    I love you more than the raven loves his treasure, more than the dog loves his tail, more than the whale loves his spout.

  2. Print the text selected onto an overhead transparency, chart paper, or chalkboard.
  3. Tell the children that you are going to help them figure out what all of this text says using some of the problem-solving strategies that they are learning. Ask, "What do we need to know first that would help us read this?" Refer them to the classroom "I Can Read by Myself" chart or their personal bookmarks.
  4. Demonstrate how you would approach this text by thinking aloud. You might begin by saying, "Well, the first suggestion on our chart says to look at the pictures. That is to help us figure out the topic or about what the text is. There aren't any pictures and I don't know where this text came from. It might be from a storybook. It doesn't look like a poem or a list or a letter. What do you think I should do now that would help me read this?"
  5. Respond to children's suggestions to read all the words you know, to read ahead, try to sound out, etc. by finding words that you know that many of them can read. "I think I'll look for words we know how to read. Let's see. I see the word 'love' and 'loves' (point to these words). This could be from a story about love. What other words do we know? Let's read ahead together."
  6. Allow the children to read from the beginning while you frame what they read. Draw a line under words that were not known. In our example they might include more, than, raven, treasure, tail, whale, and spout. Ask, "Which word would you like to work on first?" Have children spell or point to a word. Using whichever word is suggested, think aloud about strategies to use for decoding it (sounding it out, looking for word families or familiar spelling patterns, etc.). Ask, "Who would like to predict what the word is now?"
  7. Remind children that whenever they predict a word they need to double check their prediction by rereading the sentence with the word in it to see if it makes sense in the sentence. Perhaps they have worked out the word more based on your pointing out the smaller word or that it contains, blending the m and or, and talking about the pattern of silent e at the end of a word. Double check by rereading or reading back, "I love you more …"
  8. Demonstrate the use of syntactic knowledge by saying, "Now that we know this says 'more', I think I can figure out the next word. I know the sound that 'th' makes and I know what might make sense here. Sometimes people say things like, 'I love you more than the sun and stars' or 'I love you more than anybody in the world'. This word looks like the word 'than' and sounds right in the sentence."
  9. Continue demonstrating how you would solve the other unknown words and encouraging the children to make suggestions, and give you advice. Always reread from the beginning and double check for meaning.
  10. When most or all of the words are decoded tell students, "Actually, this sentence comes from a good story that I know. Before I show it to you, would you like to guess what the story is called? What might the title be if it is a story about love?" Show appreciation of all the students' ideas. Show students the book and invite them to read it with you. Suggest that they watch for the page or pages that contain the text that you just read.
  11. Read the book. Encourage children to point out any of the words that they were decoding during your demonstration.

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