CCIRA- Franki Sibberson

Last weekend, I promised myself that I really was going to post my notes from CCIRA. I'm doing it for two reasons. First, I know that research shows that only about 5% of what we learn at "sit and get conferences" actually gets implemented in our classrooms. I'm trying to review my notes, then, so that a little more than five percent will stick. I'm also posting them so that friends who didn't get to go, will get to do a little vicarious learning.

On Friday afternoon, I went and saw one of my heroes, Franki Sibberson. I'm trying to remember how I met Franki-- either it was through mutual friends, or it was through the world of blogging. Franki was the wise woman who encouraged me to join Facebook and Twitter two years ago; I still remember her saying, "Carol, Facebook and Twitter are the tools all of the younger teachers use. If we want to communicate with them, we have to at least try to live in their world." I went home that morning and signed up for both tools right away. And while I'm not that excited about Facebook (I HATE having my picture taken, I don't feel like the whole world needs to know my business, and I hate the zillions of posts updating me on everyone's status on games I have no interest in playing), I totally love Twitter-- it actually has become one of my most important sources of professional development. Over the course of the last two years, Franki's posts on 21st century literacy have continually inspired and amazed me. If you have any doubt, check out today's post on using Ignite with fourth graders!

Franki posted her presentations from CCIRA on slideshare, so you can go there and get the read deal, but here are a few of the highlights I'm still thinking about…

Franki started her presentation by reminding us that the conversation about digital reading is not an either print or technology conversation, but rather, it's simply about opening ourselves up to additional possibilities as readers, writers, and thinkers. She compared her pre-technology reading life to her current life, saying, "I still read lots of kids’ books, read some professional books, read an occasional adult book, and read lots of magazines, but now I also read lots of blogs and read on my Kindle. Franki also reminded us that she no longer has only one or two definitive sources for information, reminding us that we are now capable of synthesizing from a much larger pool of information, “Horn Book might say a book is really good, but if five teachers I know say that they didn’t like it, I'm just as likely to listen to them." So true!

Franki encouraged us to ask ourselves, "What kinds of literacies do students need to be able to work, innovate, and communicate in the modern world?" Franki's answer, "Whatever literacies enable them to "write"the media they "read" so they can be active media creators rather than passive media consumers. Literacy has always meant being able to consume and produce the media forms of the day, whatever they may be" made perfect sense to me.

· Franki shared a variety of electronic tools and resources. Most weren't tools that were totally new to me, but over and over again, I found myself thinking, "I have got to get serious about learning to use some of these tools!" Some of the ones I really, really want to add to my every day repertoire include Evernote, Diigo, Glogster, and Tagxedo. I also want to learn to use www.jogtheweb.com. and figure out how to integrate QR codes into my teaching.

Franki also reminded us that kids are coming to us with a much "larger" sense of story. She shared several ebook websites, e.g. Duck, Duck Moose, Mo Willems' Pigeon, Scaredy Squirrel, and also the work of Patrick Carman, who integrates print books with technology, through books like SKELETON CREEK. I have not read any of Carman's books yet, but have definitely added them to my TBR pile. Franki encouraged teachers to explore tracking their reading through tools like Goodreads or Shelfari. I'm already using Goodreads, but want to make it a more consistent part of my reading life.

Franki finished her presentation with a couple of quotes that I have been thinking about ever since…

If you are in education and you’re not feeling challenged by how these technologies affect teaching and learning, you’re not paying attention—this tectonic shift of connections has huge significance for the way we think about our roles as educators, our classrooms and most important, our own personal learning. It’s becoming more and more obvious that the longer we wait to embrace these shifts, the less prepared our children will be for their future. Will Richardson, Summer 2009

That quote is profoundly disturbing to me as an urban teacher whose students simply don't have access to computers and the internet on a regular basis.

And then, as I'm feeling totally, totally overwhelmed by what I'm NOT doing, Franki brings out a 150 year old quote from Abraham Lincoln, "The best thing about the future is that it only comes one day at a time."

So thankful for this, because I have a ton to learn!

o

CCIRA- Dick Allington

Every year after CCIRA, or actually every time I go to a conference or hear a speaker, I promise myself that I am going to summarize each session, so that I can think about the content some more, and so that my friends who didn't get to go can have access to the information. I envision some big, gigantic, high quality task that people will really love and use. And then because I am a perfectionist and a procrastinator, it never happens. I decided this year, then, that I am going to simply post the notes, or at least a cleaned up version of the notes, of each session I attended, or maybe just my favorite sessions.

Richard Allington, yes, the Richard Allington who is in the IRA Hall of Fame, and who has long been one of my favorite thinkers and speakers, opened the conference on Thursday morning. Allington talked about the components of an ideal literacy program. He said that in such a program, every day every child will:

• Read something they have self-selected
• Read something accurately
• Read something they understand
• Write something that is meaningful
• Talk to peers about their reading and writing
• Listen to an adult read aloud

He then went on to talk about each of these points in further detail.

Read something they have self-selected.

o Adults typically read texts they choose, not texts that were assigned

o When will kids learn to how to choose books if we always choose for them?

o Access to large and multi-level classroom libraries are critical

o All classrooms K-12 need libraries of 500 to 1000 titles in order to provide easy access to lots of books.

o In far too many schools, there is no budget for building classroom libraries.

o There usually is a budget for workbooks, photocopying and computers, none of which have evidence of improving kids' reading abilities

Read something accurately and smoothly.

o High success reading is essential to developing oral reading fluency

o If kid can’t read the book, we have them in the wrong book

Read something they understand

o If you are reading and you don’t understand, you are not reading, you are just barking at print.

o Barking at print produces no reading growth

o Understanding is different from remembering.

o Recall of textual information is easier than understanding text information

o Do our reading lessons assess recall or understanding????

· Write about something meaningful to them

o Worksheets are not writing

o Writing involves composing (thus the term composition), or creating a text

o Few of us can write well on topics we don’t care about or know very little about

o When we write in the real world, we write about things we know and care about

o Why has so much school writing been about topics we don’t care about or know about?

· Kids need time to talk to peers about their reading and writing

o In the real world, we talk about what we are reading and writing

o In school we turn in our papers and get a grade

o Research shows the power of conversation with peers. Kids that got to talk to their neighbor scored substantially higher Mystrand (2005)

o Even a small amount of literate conversation, ten minutes a day, improves standardized test comprehension outcomes

· Listens to a fluent adult read aloud

Kids should hear 4-5 books a day, 20-25 books a week, 100 books a month)

o Read aloud develops:

§ Vocabulary

§ World knowledge

§ Sense of story

§ Awareness of genres

§ How many teachers are making sure every kid leaves the classroom every day with at least one book they can read?

§ Only 1 out of 24 fifth grade teachers regularly do read alouds

o Where to find the time for these components

§ Eliminate worksheets

§ Replace worksheet time with:

· Literate conversations

· Read aloud

· Self selected reading

· Self selected writing

I came away from Allington's keynote really convicted of two things. First, I need to trust myself that I really do know what I am doing when I devote time to reading and writing and talking and thinking. I need to remember that the decisions I am making for kids really are based in sound, educational practice. And second, I need to shut up and let kids talk more!

ONCE UPON A COOL MOTORCYCLE DUDE- Kevin O'Malley, illustrations by O'Malley, Carol Heyer and Scott Goto

Summer is just around the corner. The boys want to go to at least three football camps each. There will be combines. They will need new cleats and gloves and ankle braces. Everything costs lots of money. So I tried to exercise restraint at CCIRA. But I had to pick up at least a couple of new books to bring back to my kids.

ONCE UPON A COOL MOTORCYCLE DUDE is a classic, collage style, fractured fairy tale. Three kids- two boys and a girl- are supposed to retell a favorite fairy tale. They can't decide what story to tell, so they make up their own. Their story begins with the beautiful Princess Tenderheart. When the story begins, Princess Tenderheart has eight ponies. Each night, despite all of her best efforts, someone comes and steals one of the ponies, until finally, she is left with only her favorite, a pony named Buttercup. Then a cool motorcycle dude steps in to save the day…

The illustrations,done by three different illustrators with three really different styles, are the funnest part of this book. Kevin O'Malley, the author/illustrator, tells his story with the three main characters, talking in comic-like conversation bubbles. Carol Heyer tells the story of Princess Tenderheart, with classic fairy tale illustrations similar to those of KING BIDGOOD'S IN THE BATHTUB. When the Cool Motorcycle Dude roars onto the scene, then Scott Goto takes over.

I'm thinking about teaching a collage class in the spring. This will be a fun book to add to my collection for that class…

CCIRA, Part one

Spring, 1980. I am a junior at the University of Colorado and take a reading methods class from Dr. Donald Carline. Carline is a past president of CCIRA (Colorado Chapter of the International Reading Association) and insists that all of us attend that association's annual conference. I don't remember attending any sessions that year, mostly I think I just wandered the exhibit hall and begged free samples from anyone who would give them.

Now, almost thirty years later, I've attended CCIRA in some capacity (presenter, conference committee, Executive Board, Conference Chair) almost every year. It's always the first weekend in February, right before our state tests, a time when I am really tired and usually more than a little discouraged. The conference revives, reinvigorates, and just gives me the juice to keep going for the last three months. I love the speakers and authors, but probably most of all, I love the time chatting with colleagues and friends I rarely see

Some highlights of this year's conference:

• Linda Hoyt- Linda did an hour-long session on interactive literacy. As a presenter, I was fascinated by the way she used/didn't use powerpoint. Linda's entire presentation was done almost entirely in photographs and images and video clips. Powerful stuff. She shared brain research about how kids can't listen for more than seven minutes without DOING something, but she didn't just share the research, she crafted her whole presentation so that we, the session participants, didn't have to listen for more than seven minutes at a time. Such a great example for teachers and presenters. Linda's research spoke especially loudly to me, not only as a professional, but also as a mom. I've been struck recently by emails I've recieved from teachers about my sons' alleged issues in their classes. So many of these seem to really speak to teaching deficiencies, e.g. when a teacher says to me, "Your son just can't sit still and take notes for 45 minutes," it takes everything I have to not just snap back, "No, my son can't sit for 45 minutes. And even those kids that can, shouldn't have to."

• Patrick Allen- Patrick's a brilliant Colorado teacher and I've followed his work with the PEBC for years. Most recently, I've enjoyed reading his blog, All-en-a day's-work.blogspot.com (His recent entry, "Is it a problem?" about buying books had me laughing so hard I was crying!) . He presented a session on conferring, using material from his newest book, CONFERRING: THE KEYSTONE OF READER'S WORKSHOP. Patrick is a master at talking and listening to kids and I loved learning from him. Especially enjoyed his five "ashlars" (an ashlar, as I understand it, is the stuff that holds a stone masons' work together). Patrick's five ashlars are 1) defining the trust, respect, and tone of the workshop 2) strengthening readers' strength and endurance, 3) discussing purposes and audiences 4) focusing on gradual release and responsibility and 5) focusing on the structure of the reading workshop. I also loved Patrick's format for conferring and can't wait to get to school tomorrow to mess around with it a little bit.

• Ralph Fletcher- Ralph shared information from his newest professional book book, PYROTECHNICS ON THE PAGE: PLAYFUL CRAFT THAT SPARKS WRITING. The book, which will be published in April, focuses on teaching children to delight and play with language. Ralph made one comment that really stuck with me. He said something like, "When we talk about words with kids, we are always so serious. We use phrases like word work and word study. We very rarely talk about teaching children to delight and enjoy and play with language." Fletcher went on to share some great examples, e.g. poetry from J. Patrick Lewis. I've been thinking, ever since, even this week, on the eve of CSAP, about how I can build more playfulness into my work with kids' writing.

Lots, lots, lots more highlights, but this post is getting long and I have to go do laundry so we have clean underwear for this week. More later…