Planning Around Essential Questions

After working with teachers last week on a curricular plan developed around genres and units around essential questions, one of the teachers emailed me some concerns. Because they are connected to my previous posting, I thought I should respond to these concerns in a public manner.

In his email, the teacher said he was reading Strategies that Work (Harvey, S. & Goudvis, A., 2^nd ed. 2007) where he came across something that made him wonder about a few things. He quoted Harvey and Goudvis work

“…when students practice comprehension strategies in short text of varying genres, they are far better prepared to construct meaning from longer chapter books later."

It seems that this statement seemed to conflict with the planning we did based on genres. These conflicts led my friend to three questions. I am going to address the three questions posed as I go along.

Question #1

Because of what he views as conflicting information he asked:

"Are these authors suggesting that a unit of study should be around a strategy and several genres will be explored in that unit? If so, doesn’t that lead to a skill-based classroom where the knowledge of various subjects is neglected?"

I think the authors are saying that students learn to use strategies with more dexterity when they are given opportunity to apply and practice them across genres. That is different than they are “suggesting that a unit of study should be around a strategy.” I do not believe that Harvey and Goudvis are saying that all units must be focused on skills. Let’s look closer.

While working with the curricular team, I suggested to several teachers to include several genres in their lessons. (Obviously I did not make my “instruction” explicit enough! Sorry.) Although we centered our curriculum plans on specific genres, it is necessary to bring in different genres around the same “essential question”. It IS important for students to compare and contrast the genres and to compare and contrast the use of strategies with different genres. For example, let’s say we are studying “What makes a hero, a hero?” in the context of biographies and autobiographies. In this unit, we might instruct students to question and make inferences while reading about the main “character” of biographies and autobiographies. However, while looking at the narrative nonfiction texts wouldn’t it be enlightening for students to compare the real life characteristics of real life heroes as presented in biographies/autobiographies to Henry Fleming in Red Badge of Courage (Crane, S.) or Paul Revere in Longfellow’s “Paul Revere’s Ride” Students could still ask questions and make inferences about these characters. The class could compare if asking questions about a character in a poem was different than in a piece of nonfiction. They could discuss if heroes are presented differently in biographies, autobiographies, fiction texts, and poetry.

You might ask: “If we are reading all these different genres of texts, then why do we say the unit is focused on biographies and autobiographies?” That is a great question! It really depends on what we are going to assess. If we are going to focus our assessment on determining if students can identify if a text is a biography or autobiography then the unit IS focused on biographies or autobiographies. Also, the main texts of this unit are biographies and/or autobiographies.

Question #2

My deep thinking teacher also asked:

"Should I remove "longer chapter books" from my library early in the year? How much should I restrict independent reading across genres since early units only deal with a limited number of genres?"

I do not think that longer chapter books should be removed from classroom libraries or that we should limit what students read because of our instructional focus on genres. Because it is our goal for students to use strategies across genres, their varying choices of independent reading books will only reinforce this concept. Let’s go back to our hero unit as an example.

Let’s say that in this classroom the teacher is reading The Lost Garden (Yep, L.) aloud to the class as part of the essential question. In small group instruction students are reading: The Rescuers: Kids who risked everything to save others (Zullo, A.); Snowbound: The tragic story of the Donner party (Lavender, D. S.); The Secret Soldier: The story of Deborah Sampson (McGovern, A.); and Vision of Beauty: The story of Sarah Breedlove Walker (Lasky, K). Remember discussions and guided activities are focused on questioning, making inferences, and characters. Now let’s say that a student is reading Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing (Blume, J.) during independent reading. This student could still be asked to write questions and make inferences about the character. Another student in the class might be reading Amazing but True Sport Stories (Hollander, P.). Although this student might not be able to look at specific characters, he could still raise questions and identify when he had to make inferences. What shouldn't happen is to ask these students to identify the genre (with text evidence) of their independent reading book.

Question #3

Lastly, the teacher asked a question that insinuated that he had already come to the same conclusions that I have suggested. He queried:

"Would it be reasonable to reconcile our current curriculum plans with Harvey and Goudvis' "across genres" refrain by saying, stick with the genre, but pull in material outside the genre when it is beneficial to compare/contrast, to point out the use of a strategy or skill in different genres, or to enhance kids' knowledge related to our essential questions or common themes?"

As you see, embedded in this question are suggestions of what I have said previously. He has already answered his own question. Oh, I love that I work with such smart teachers!

From Benchmarks to Pacing Guide

Recently I worked with several schools on a long term curricular plan. Among other things, we unpacked the state’s performance benchmarks (…grade-level expectations…or whatever your state calls them), organized the benchmarks around instructional strands, aligned reading and writing, and created a pacing guide. While unpacking the benchmarks, we discovered the state had given direction around genres for reading and writing.

Organizing

We realized as we studied the state’s benchmarks they were not organized neatly. When the Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning (McREL) wrote Language Arts standards they divided them into the usual writing, reading, and listening/speaking. But within each of those categories there were other useful divisions. For example in reading, McREL has a standard that includes benchmarks around general skills and strategies of the reading process. These benchmarks include previewing text, setting a purpose, making predictions, decoding, vocabulary, etc. There is also a standard that focuses on benchmarks for literary text and one for informational text.

Besides those divisions we thought about typical areas of instruction that should be taught in a reading or writing class. For example, we listed word study (which included phonemic awareness, phonics, word analysis, vocabulary, and spelling), fluency, and comprehension as important elements to be taught in reading. We broke comprehension down into comprehension skills (e.g., cause and effect) and literary analysis (e.g., character development). We talked about how comprehension skills could be used in literary or informational text but the literary analysis benchmarks would only be used when studying narrative text.

In writing, we divided the benchmarks into the writing process (and strategies). Besides teaching students that writing is a process, we wanted to include benchmarks that referred to strategies that might be taught to help writers use the process more efficiently. For example, a teacher might teach students to brainstorm as a pre-writing strategy. To teach students to organize their thoughts for a narrative story, the teacher might teach students to use a story map. In addition to the writing process, we made a category for writer’s craft (e.g., voice, organization, sentence fluency, etc.) and conventions (e.g., capitalization, punctuation, grammar usage, etc.)

As the old adage says, there was method to the madness. I have visited hundreds of classrooms across the country and in many of them I see important parts of the reading and writing process being left out. I can’t tell you how many teachers have shared that their students’ fluency skills are holding them back, yet in these same teachers’ classes I have seen no evidence of fluency instruction. Therefore, while studying the benchmarks I wanted teachers to see that it is imperative to teach word study, fluency, reading strategies, comprehension skills, and literary analysis. As we all know, kids don’t learn what we don’t teach them. In the same vein, I also believe that teachers don’t teach what they haven’t planned and haven't created a way of assessing. (If you are a reading teacher, do you intentionally collect data/grades for word study, fluency, and comprehension? If you teach writing, do you collect data/grades for writing process, conventions, and writer's craft?)

Discoveries

We discovered while analyzing the benchmarks that the state had said a lot about which genres students should be able to read and write in different grade levels. We thought this was a good jumping off point to align the reading and writing curriculum. For example, if students were studying informational text, it would be a good idea for them to learn to write a “how-to” or an expository piece. We discussed how text from the reading curriculum could also be used in the writing class. In addition, we talked about how teachers could be intentional about other aspects of instruction. For example, when teaching students about the structures of informational texts in a reading class, teachers need to intentionally connect this instruction in the writing class - writing instruction that is focused on organizing information.

Pacing Guides

The work we did with genres turned out to be a good starting point to put together our pacing guide (We determined that a pacing guide is a list of the benchmarks that would be covered before and between the schools' benchmark assessments.) We had a conversation that certain benchmarks went better with specific genres. Therefore, we could start with a genre and align naturally fitting benchmarks. For example, if a class is studying historical fiction, the study of setting is really important. When teaching narrative writing, dialogue and the mechanics around dialogue should be included. In the end teacher put together a list of benchmarks aligned to genres for each portion of time before and between benchmark assessments. However because of our analysis, teachers were sure to include benchmarks from each strand for reading (word study, fluency, reading strategies, comprehension skills, and literary analysis) and writing (word study, writing process, writer’s craft, and conventions). Let me hear your comments.

Planning Units/Last Minute Planning

I am really excited to begin the discussion about unit planning. I feel this is the crux of great instruction. Far too often, teachers are so overwhelmed that they plan at the last minute. We have to ask ourselves: Does last minute planning lead to effective instruction informed by data, goals, and relevancy? In this entry I want to set the stage for planning a unit together with a 6th grade reading teacher and I would like to offer some reminders of backward planning.

Joey
I am so fortunate to introduce you all to Joey from KIPP: Central City. He is a new teacher. He teaches 6th grade reading. (I only wish I would have been as good of a teacher in my first year as he is in his.) During my last visit at Central City, Joey and I discussed the idea of planning thematic units. (The discussion began because I felt that I had pushed the teachers so hard to teach strategies that interest and relevancy had suffered. I didn't see kids excited about what they were learning because they were learning strategies - not very interesting to young adolescents.) A few weeks ago Joey contacted me about beginning the process together. I asked if we could do it on-line so more people could be involved in the process. He graciously agreed. Thanks, Joey!

School Background
The team at Central City has been given a lot of freedom to expand their horizons in the last quarter of the school year. The state test is over and their supportive and creative leader suggested that they "experiment with a lot of things."

Project Background
When Joey first contacted me about beginning this process, we discussed that he might do a unit with the Social Studies teacher. With that as a backdrop, I asked him to send me the following pieces of information.

1. Talk to the social studies teacher and find out what they will be studying at some point in the future that will give us time to plan together electronically.
2. Create a theme around the social studies topic i.e. civil rights era or holocaust could turn into a justice theme.
   
3. Choose 4 GLEs (Grade Level Expectations) that you have not covered or that the students have not mastered, two for fiction, two for nonfiction.
4. Split your students into three leveled groups. Let me know who is in the groups along with their levels.

When Joey got back to me he told me about the teachers' opportunity to "experiment". He told me that he wanted to do a thematic unit, inject drama into the mix, and try literature circles. He also shared that he would not be doing the theme connected to the Social Studies curriculum. In addition he shared that he had not chosen a theme but would possibly center the theme on the book, Bud, not Buddy. He also shared that these would be the benchmarks that he would like to address through the unit: character development, main idea, theme, and raising questions.

Next Steps
I suggested that if he was to use Bud, not Buddy, he might look at a theme about family or loss. Here is the information still needed to begin planning:

• The theme, preferably written as an essential question. (Example: How do teenagers deal with loss?)
  
• The average reading levels of the literature circle groups that he will form. (Example: Group 1 - F&P level P, Group 2 - F&P level R, Group 3 - F&P level T, Group 4 - F&P level V)
  

Reminders of Backward Planning
When backward planning, it is important to think first about our goals. You'll notice that when I began assisting Joey I asked him what benchmarks he wanted to cover. In addition, you see that I am pushing Joey to think of an essential question as opposed to a topic. If we plan our units with an essential question that is relevant to our students we will most likely see more engagement and motivation. Therefore, when writing an essential question we have to ask ourselves: What really matters to our students?

Let's take the sample essential question into consideration. Is loss something your students are dealing with or have dealt with? If so, that might be an engaging essential question. The question should be the impetus for everything in the unit - assessments will be affected by the question, books will be chosen with this question in mind, and it should "set the purpose" for all of our reading.

If we are going to use the literature circle model, we will need to choose at least 2 books for each level that would help students answer the essential questions. Books might include: Maniac McGee, Alice in April, Abduction, Beyond the Mango Tree, etc.

Warning: I have seen some teachers who use essential questions but the questions are academic oriented. For example: How does asking questions help us become better readers? For most of our students, this questions is not going to sustain interest. However, if our students really want to learn about how teens deal with loss, they will be enthused to read to find out how characters in books deal with it.

But what about those "pesky" benchmarks? How will we get the students to ask questions or identify main ideas? As students try to discover how teens deal with loss, we want to give them strategies to assist them. Therefore, the benchmarks become the tools that help us learn what we want to know.

Up Next
Keep your eyes open as to what Joey decides about his essential question. Our next step will be to look at how students will demonstrate that they can track character development, identify main ideas and themes, and raise questions.