Hi Diane,
I'll start with a simple idea: Try scrolling a short novel that the students
have read, and post the scroll on the wall somewhere in the room. Do a
quick walk-through summary -- literally, by walking along the scroll and
saying what happens. As you walk and talk, make marks or use sticky notes
along the scroll. You'll come back to these later. Encourage your students
to interrupt you as you are doing this. They may want to mention something
that you missed -- for example, an observation about the plot or the
characters, or some detail. Others may want to weigh in, as well.
Encourage conversation. Post sticky notes to record student observations.
Have them tell you where the notes should go. If a student needs to find a
particular event so that a note can be posted there, have the other students
help -- tell them that their job is to be detectives. If, for instance, one
student finds an event that happened before the one in question, that's a
useful clue as to where to look. Help your students be strategic about
bracketing and homing in on specific parts. These are useful searching
skills that are even more important in bound books.
If you let the students engage and share their thoughts, you will likely not
make it through your summary. I'd consider that a success! Student
engagement in the conversation is the real goal. You're walk-through is
just a conversation-starter. The scroll will help your students remember
the story. It will help them generate questions and inferences. I will
help them determine importance. It will help them with sequencing,
recalling details, and putting it all together for a much richer
comprehension.
There are significant differences between the process of doing this by
paging through a bound book and doing this on a scroll. The spatial
diimension -- the physical sense of the scroll's length and of where
different observations tie to the text (the scatter-plot trail of sticky
notes -- is very powerful. The fact that you and your students can see it
all at once is very powerful.
You can do a lot with scrolls. If this sounds like it might work for you,
then save it and use it. Contact me if you want to talk through the lesson
in more detail. Or if this doesn't sound right for you, tell me what you
might be starting off with next Fall and I'll suggest a way that scrolls can
help improve the lesson.
I hope that this is helpful. Thanks for your interest!
- Dave
Dave Middlebrook
The Textmapping Project
A resource for teachers improving reading comprehension skills instruction.
www.textmapping.org | Please share this site with your colleagues!
USA: (609) 771-1781
[email protected]
----- Original Message -----
From: "Diane Smith" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Thursday, June 04, 2009 9:24 PM
Subject: [MOSAIC] Textmapping for beginners
Hi!
I am going to be teaching fourth graders next fall and just heard about
the idea of textmapping. I find it intriquing. No one I know has heard of
this concept at my school, so my students will not have any previous
experience with it. Can you give suggestions on how to begin and types of
text to use?
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