Mallory Garthwaite

Spring 2014: 325 Final Exam

1. Go to the following website: remember that this video is probably best
watched in the library or PC/Apple labs.
http://www.learner.org/resources/series162.html?pop=yes&pid=1729#
2. Scroll down to #8: Promoting Readers as Leaders
3. Click on the VOD button and the video will load. (You may have to click
twice)
Use your professional and technically correct vocabulary!! Clear sentences are
advised. References to the research or researcher are welcomemake
connections.
Background Information
For Valerie Kostandos, a first-grade teacher at the Decius Beebe School in
Melrose, Massachusetts, a good teacher knows when to teach and when not to
teach. In her student-centered classroom, stepping back and allowing her
students to lead the class -- and their own learning -- is essential to fostering
independence, self-awareness, and good reading and writing skills.
Ms. Kostandos believes that the goals and expectations of classroom activities
and lessons should be made clear to students. "I think it's important that kids
have a purpose to what they're learning -- a reason why they're learning it. We
talk about that a lot: 'why are we spending time on this?'" Explicit teaching,
according to Ms. Kostandos, helps students to reflect on their own learning
process, and to develop good judgment about when they can work on their own
and when they need help.
Ms. Kostandos says she tries to keep up with the latest techniques in teaching
literacy. "It's important as a teacher to pick and choose what feels really right -because there is so much out there." She uses explicit phonics instruction and
informal assessment to monitor the progress of her students. She is also
influenced by the literacy program adopted by her district, which stresses
explicit instruction and the release of responsibility to students.

Mallory Garthwaite
The Case Study Questions Follow:
While viewing the video note the following: the use of physical space, materials
and tools, techniques and management, and tone and atmosphere.
Little boy reading: Find this at 1:54
1. How does she match the book to the child? Why is this crucial to literacy
development? What kinds of information do you think that she is recording
as she listens to the little boy read?
a. Mrs. Kostandos listens to her students read and simultaneously
evaluates the level of difficulty the book is for them, easy,
independent or frustration. She is also receptive to the childs
opinion of what they think of the book. She does not only ask the
students if they like the book or not, but she asks for rational behind
their opinion. This is important. Mrs. Kostandos wants her students
to enjoy literacy and even more so, she wants them to know why
they like reading. Assuring that her students are reading at the
appropriate level at home is crucial to literacy development because
if they are reading at a frustration level, this will only turn them
away from reading and they will not be able to work on fluency. If
the book is too easy, they will not be challenged and will not learn
new vocabulary. When a child is at an independent reading level,
then they may build on their fluency, working only to decode a small
percentage of the words and will enjoy reading because they
comprehend the story. When she listens to him read she is more
than likely taking note of the words read correctly compared to the
words misread and the words he struggles with. She is paying
attention to his accuracy in decoding, and the intonation and overall
prosody in his voice. When there is appropriate use of intonation, it
is more likely that the reader is reading fluently and comprehending
the text.

Mallory Garthwaite
Shared reading segment: Find this segment 4 minutes after the beginning of
the video. Watch for about 6 minutes and 42 seconds.

In this shared

reading activity, Ms. Kostandos introduces a story from the Basal Reading
anthology, prompting students to recall another story by the same author.
Following this text-to-text connection, she leads the class through a series of
steps -- a focused picture walk, making predictions, discussing how illustrations
convey mood -- to prepare them for reading independently or in a small group
with her.
2. How does Ms. Kostandos guide her students to interact with the text and
with each other? Include in your discussion the benefits of this to oral
language development (particularly pragmatic social language).
a. Ms. Kostandos guides her students to interact with the text by
guiding them to think about specific things in the text, for instance,
the characters faces and their feelings that may correlate to their
facial expressions. She then allows her students, once interested, to
share with a partner and then hear a few observations from the
class. It is a great idea that Ms. Kostandos allows her students to
self select whether they can read independently or if they need to
stay and read with her. When she has the few students stay with
her, she thinks aloud the process of reading the book with proper
pragmatics. She does not just read the book to her students, but
she tells them why they should read the words in a particular way.
Then when the whole class comes back together to repeat the
reading, she double checks for understanding for the students she
may not have been able to assess for their understanding.

3. Describe how Ms. Kostandos combines explicit modeling, guided practice,

questioning, and scaffolding as students in the small and large group work

Mallory Garthwaite
towards achieving fluent reading. Elaborate and evaluate if Ms. Kostandos is
providing high quality instruction as defined in the 3 rd RTI module.
Word Study: Find this segment at 12:47.
She provides high quality instruction beginning with how she places her
students on the carpet. She assures that those struggling to pay attention are
close to her, and that a high performing student is paired with a low performing
student. Ms. Kostandos models rhymes and the long e sound with the book she
presents, and checks for student understanding throughout the book by asking
her students questions. During her questioning she has the opportunity to see
what they know and then fill in any learning gaps that may be present. As Ms.
Kostandos teaches this lesson, she is scaffolding their learning by beginning with
things the students already know. Then as a whole group they add new words to
the word wall as they practice all together and talk about the word, the spelling
pattern, the sounds it creates. The word is discussed amongst the class,
repeated time and time again, and the partners discuss the word as well. The
next step in the scaffolding is to take what they know and learn something new
with it, which is also discussed as a whole group and emphasized in their
partner sharing. This process helps achieve fluency because the class works and
Ms. Kostandos models how to take what they know and decode text they may
not know.
3. Describe why this is a great phonics lesson. How is she teaching and
assessing the word study lesson?

Describe the multisensory aspects of

this word study lesson.

a. This is a good phonics lesson because Ms. Kostandos begins by
teaching the lesson by reading a book and gaining the students
interest. She reads the book with prosody and engages the students
by asking them questions throughout. As she asks her students
questions, she is checking for understanding. Then, when she begins
adding the new words to the word wall, she repeats the spelling (or
the different graphemes found in the word), the sound (different

Mallory Garthwaite
morphemes found in the word) and assures that the students do the
same. It is a multisensory lesson because the students listen to the
different rhyming words and long e sound, they speak the words
themselves, and they see the words written on the board; it is a
haptic lesson.
Guided reading segment: Find this segment 19 minutes and 3 seconds after
the beginning of the video. Watch for 4 minutes and 7 seconds.

In this video

segment, Ms. Kostandos conducts two guided-reading groups at different levels.

The first group reads The Carrot Seed, a book carefully selected because of the
students' work in science. After listening to a brief introduction, the second
guided-reading group begins reading another book in quiet voices, clearly
familiar with the routine, as Ms. Kostandos listens to individual students,
occasionally providing a strategic prompt.
5. What kinds of questions and prompts does she use to elicit students'
comprehension and to build their vocabulary and awareness of their own
reading strategies?
She asks what the students think about the reading and then asks
clarifying questions to see if the child comprehended the book. She affirms their
thoughts on the book and creates a text to self relation in order to help the child
relate the book to an experience of their own. When questioning the students in
group one, she checks for vocabulary by asking about the use of the vocabulary
word, and in this case, a wheelbarrow. Ms. Kostandos affirms students
corrections when she conducts the reading assessment, which helps the children
build their reading strategies.
6. Why is using a book related to science as a guided reading book beneficial to
a struggling reader or a child who is an English language learner?
When teachers can bring vocabulary into cross curriculum, this repetition
will benefit the struggling reader or the ELL student. The more ways the student

Mallory Garthwaite
is able to relate to new vocabulary throughout the day and create text to self
relationships, the more vocabulary will be gained. When background information
can be learned then the child will have more gateways to building new
information. This scaffolding process is limited when there is little background
knowledge, which may often be the case for ELLs.
7. Why does she assess each student's reading process using a running record?
Describe the kinds of information that can be gained from a running record.
Ms. Kostandos assesses students reading level at the beginning of the
semester to find a base line of their reading ability. This type of assessment is
helpful because it can be used with whatever text the student is currently
reading and needs no preparation. It is important for her to continue to gage
their progress as the school year goes on. She states herself that students can
often jump two reading levels in a short period of time. When she conducts
running records, she is able to check for decoding skills, how children attempt to
use reading strategies, fluency, and comprehension.
8. Describe how she addresses the following elements of literacy development.
a. Oral language: Ms. Kostandos is constantly asking her students
questions and allowing them time to speak with one another. As they
speak in different social contexts, they are able to practice their social
language (pragmatics). Not only do her student have the opportunity
to speak often, but she is also constantly modeling appropriate prosody
and pragmatics. Her students are able to further their oral language
when they take role, and take orders for school lunch. Not only does
this help develop their oral language, but it helps them practice being
leaders, become more confident in themselves which in the long run
will elicit more opportunities to even further develop their oral
language.
b. Phonological Awareness: This is practiced when the students have
many opportunities to provide rhyming examples during the book Ms.
Kostandos reads. Phonological awareness is also rehearsed when Ms.

Mallory Garthwaite
Kostandos has the three children that stay behind to read the book
with her. She has the students read along with her (coral reading). In a
more direct way, this written to spoken meaning is demonstrated when
she teaches her class the word he.
c. Vocabulary: Vocabulary is taught by adding words to the word wall,
reading cross-curricular text, asking comprehensive questions about
books to further understand meaning and create text to self
relationships. Ms. Kostandos incorporates vocabulary into the
conversation she uses with her students, if she uses a higher level
word, she will define the word in the following words.
d. Alphabetic knowledge: phonics: During the phonics lesson, Ms.
Kostnados models how to substitute different letters with the long
vowel (e). She teaches her class by cloze procedure; by covering a
letter and asking them to substitute with a new letter in order to create
a new word. By doing this she is teaching them reflective thinking
e. Fluency/automaticity: Throughout the school year, Ms. Kostandos takes
running records of her students reading to check reading progress and
achievement. During this assessment she is able to listen for reading
automaticity and fluency. She is also able to check for automaticity and
fluency when any students stay behind with her to read the class text.
f. Comprehension: Ms. Kostandos checks for reading comprehension
when she breaks her class down into small groups. She asks her
students detailed questions about the book they have read.
g. Written language: Ms. Kostandos has written text ALL OVER her
classroom. She writes on her white board, she has signs and bulletins,
books and text after text after text. She reads to begin lessons, she
reads with her students in whole class instruction, she encourages
them to pick up new and interesting books. She creates an atmosphere
where reading is fun and exciting. She makes sure her students have
the proper tools to be successful reader, so that they have positive
feelings towards written text.

Mallory Garthwaite
Review the elements of a classroom environment that encouraged students to
gain independence as readers and writers.
10. Classroom environment: What did you notice about how Ms. Kostandos's
management and instructional techniques help students see themselves as
contributing members of the class? How are students encouraged to take
responsibility, work together, and model for each other?
One way in which students are encouraged to take responsibility is by
taking role and asking the class for the lunch order. When the class reads a book
together, she instructs students to take the book and read it themselves or with
a partner if they have the ability to do so. If students need the extra assistance
she asks them to stay behind with her and read along with her to better their
fluency and reading strategies. She asks her students at this young age to begin
to think whether they need help, whether they dont, and that they can begin to
reflect on how to choose a book that they can read independently. Students
model for each other when they pair up on the carpet to discuss new concepts
being taught during whole group instruction.
11. Literacy development: How does the self-management of taking
attendance and lunch support the emergent literacy of the young child. (Be sure
to define the literacy terminology and describe what you see. Vukelich et al. text
can help you out here.) When Ms. Kostandoss observes the students reading
the calendar, taking lunch orders, and other activities in the opening minutes of
the video, what kinds of information can she gather about a childs knowledge of
print? Why would this classroom environment have benefited Donny in Other
Peoples Words?
Ms. Kostandos models for the students how to take attendance and lunch
and then she allows her students, very much so emergent readers, the
responsibility to do so themselves. Her students are surrounded by text in her
classroom, and have been surrounded by text since the day they were born.
They have become proficient in oral language and are beginning to understand

Mallory Garthwaite
text to sound meaning and relationships (phonological awareness) and are now
attempting to decode new words from blends and onsets they have not yet
added to their repertoire. When she watches her students approach the
calendar, taking the lunch order and other activities at the beginning, students
will quickly reveal if they have been surrounded by these activities at home or if
they have become accustomed to them some way at all. This classroom would
have benefited Donny because it would have demanded that he become
immediately emerged in literacy. He would be completely surrounded by text,
would have began to make literacy apart of his every day experiences, which he
so desperately needed.