Language+Arts+Standards


 * Standard One****: All teachers must know a broad range of literacy techniques and strategies for every aspect of communication and must be able to develop each student's ability to read, write, speak, and listen to his or her potential within the demands of the discipline.**
 * 1A. Understands and can articulate the needs for literacy development in general and in specific disciplines or at specific grade levels.
 * 1C. Knows strategies and techniques for teaching communication skills to those students' whose first language is not English.
 * 1G. Uses a variety of "text" and research resources with students in an attempt to enhance student learning from reading, learning from writing and learning from oral communication.
 * Artifact:** ReadAlouds Website


 * Reflective Statement:** For many students, particularly reluctant readers or English Language Learners, traditional books can be unappealing or too difficult. As such, it is important to offer exciting alternatives that allow for development of literacy skills and a love of reading. For this website created for my Literacy, Reading & Readers course, I examine multiple forms of read alouds, including audiobooks, storytimes, traditional readalouds and poetry slams. Most librarians and teachers agree on the importance of reading aloud and other forms of oral reading for young children. So why, then, do we curtail this process after students leave elementary school? I use this website to make a case for oral reading when working with teens and adults in order to help individuals develop literacy skills and learn communication skills through a somewhat nontraditional format. By embracing a wider variety of resources than just books, I believe that I can reach more students and help them learn to read and think critically.

**Standard Two:** **All teachers should model effective reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills during their direct and indirect instructional activities. The most important communicator in the classroom is the teacher, who should model English language arts skills.**
 * 2A. Knows and understands the rules of English grammar, spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and syntax for both written and oral contexts.
 * 2B. Understands how to communicate ideas in writing to accomplish a variety of purposes.
 * 2E. Writes and speaks in a well-organized and coherent manner that adapts to the individual needs of readers/listeners.

Reflective Statement: **This artifact not only demonstrates my ability to produce well-written and grammatically correct work, but also exemplifies my ability to pose questions and synthesize information from the answers. For my Reference class, I posed three different inquiries to reference librarians via instant message, telephone and in person and analyzed the answers I received and the overall experience. My professor asked to use this paper as an example for future classes due to my unique organization and my mastery of the assignment's objectives. This assignment opened my eyes to the tremendous impact a librarian can have on a student or a patron. As the perceived "keepers of information," it is important to be approachable and friendly, but also accurate. To that end, this paper demonstrates my ability to understand a patron's needs and help him or her meet those needs, while remaining well-organized, coherent and direct.
 * Artifact: **@Reference Interview Analysis

**Standard Three:** **All teachers should give constructive instruction and feedback to students in both written and oral contexts while being aware of diverse learners' needs. Teachers should effectively provide a variety of instructional strategies, constructive feedback, criticism, and improvement strategies.**
 * 3A. Understands how to analyze an audience to determine culturally appropriate communication strategies to share ideas effectively in both written and oral formats with students and their families, other faculty and administrators, and the community and business in general.
 * 3B. Understands how to use diverse instructional strategies and assessments that include an appropriate balance of lecture, discussion, activity, and written and oral work.
 * 3E. Conducts effective classroom discussions by managing groups, asking questions, eliciting and probing responses, and summarizing for comprehension.


 * Artifacts: ** [[file:Questioning Lesson.docx]]


 * Reflective Statement: ** At my elementary student teaching placement at Olive Mary-Stitt Elementary School, I co-planned with first grade teachers to develop a readaloud with comprehension strategies. The first grade classes were learning about questioning as a sense-making activity. To enforce this skill, I began the lesson in the LMC by discussing how good readers continuously ask themselves questions as they read. I then showed them the cover of The Wednesday Surprise by Eve Bunting and had the students generate a list of questions. Once we had about five to six questions written on the whiteboard, I began to read. As the story progressed, students raised their hands whenever they found an answer or thought of another question to write on the board. The wonderful thing about this activity was the instant feedback and assessment I was able to provide students. As I solicited questions, I was able to analyze and informally assess how well students understood both the story and the questioning strategy. When one student said "I think the surprise is going to be that her dad comes home!" I was able to respond "That's a great prediction! Since we're working on questioning, how can we turn that into a question that we might ask ourselves to help us understand?" In this way, I was able to analyze my audience and refocus my communication strategies as I went.

This lesson demonstrates my ability to conduct effective classroom discussions while simultaneously assessing and evaluating the group's progress. Many people consider the act of reading aloud to be purely a leisure activity. While it certainly is pleasurable, it can go beyond merely functioning as a way to increase a student's love of reading. This lesson plan demonstrates my ability to bring the readaloud beyond just the story and to instead incorporate comprehension strategies and effective classroom discussions. Through this, I provide a variety of instructional strategies as well as constructive feedback and suggestions for improvement.