Monday, March 16, 2009
DR-TA Reflections
Reflect on the teaching of your DR-TA. Write about (1) at least 3 +'s (what you did well, kids learned, what generally went well), (2) one wish (one thing you wish had gone better and what you might do better next time to make that happen), and (3) one question you have about any aspect of the lesson, the kids' response, your planning of the lesson, etc.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
Today I did my DR-TA lesson with my class. I thought this went very well. I slowed down this time and took more time with the story instead of rushing through it like I did for my read-aloud. Also, the kids listened well and I did not have anyone talking out of turn or disturbing other students. This is one of the best kindergarten classes I have ever seen. They all listen and pay attention so well! All of the students participated and were eager to make predictions. However, I do wish that I would have had a big book or the book on an overhead projector so that the students could sit at their tables and talk among themselves while making predictions. My teacher has the students sit together on the floor everytime she reads. One question I have is how do you get students involved in the story if they refuse to participate?
ReplyDeleteHeather Johnson
For my DRTA lesson I read "Ruby the Copycat". I first found it hard for Kindergartners to understand what predictions were and how they changed. For the things that I did well: I think that I did a good job trying to explain what a prediction is (it is what you think the book is going to be about). I also kept the students involved, not only asking them questions when it was time for a new prediction but talking to them about what they thought and liked after like every other page. Lastly I think I did a good job telling the story because the students were really interested and paid attention very well. After reading the story my wish for the next time I do a DRTA lesson is to pick a more predictible easier book especially when teaching such a lower grade level. When books are harder like this how do you help student predict what is next or better understand the book?
ReplyDeleteFor my DRTA lesson I read the story "Max and the Chocolate Chicken". After looking at the cover for a few minutes I asked some of the students what their predictions for the story was going to be. I go a variety of answers such as "he's gonna eat it", to "it's his friend". The kindergarten class did a great job of sitting still and listening while I read the story. I also paused to give them all time to see the pictures. Another thing that went well was that when I asked questions about what they thought was going to happen next I always had some different responses which was nice. One thing that I wish could have gone better was when I asked a question and asked the students to raise their hands one student repeatedly yelled out an answer which often made the other kids put their hands down thinking they were wrong. My one question is how do you keep a student from shouting out the answers even when you ask the group to raise their hands? Do you simply ignore what they say or do you acknowledge that they have the right answer?
ReplyDeleteFor my DRTA lesson I read the story "Max and the Chocolate Chicken". After looking at the cover for a few minutes I asked some of the students what their predictions for the story was going to be. I go a variety of answers such as "he's gonna eat it", to "it's his friend". The kindergarten class did a great job of sitting still and listening while I read the story. I also paused to give them all time to see the pictures. Another thing that went well was that when I asked questions about what they thought was going to happen next I always had some different responses which was nice. One thing that I wish could have gone better was when I asked a question and asked the students to raise their hands one student repeatedly yelled out an answer which often made the other kids put their hands down thinking they were wrong. My one question is how do you keep a student from shouting out the answers even when you ask the group to raise their hands? Do you simply ignore what they say or do you acknowledge that they have the right answer?
ReplyDeleteKatie West
Last Wednesday the 25th I did my DR-TA lesson. I read the story, "What Would you do With a Tail Like This?" by Robin Page. The book was a great success to my kindergarten classroom. The cover of the book was a spiraled lizard's tail that held the title within the spiral. There wasn't much else on the cover besides the tail so it left their minds wondering. Each page was filled with different animals feet, hands, ears, eyes, etc... so it left a lot of room for predictions. I know we were only supposed to have one prediction for the kindergarten aged students, however, after every page that had a body part it left room for a prediction. I would point to a random foot and ask what animal they thought it was and they were so excited to respond and guess what they thought it might be. The following page would confirm the animal and add an interesting fact to go with it. All the children seemed to like the book and I would recommend it to any kindergarten teacher.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing that didn't go so well is that they all shouted the answers and it got a little chaotic at first. I wish I would have laid down the ground rules prior to reading the book so that it wouldn't have been so loud.
My question is a book like this with so many chances to make a prediction, is it good to read to a large group of kindergarten students or should I just make better rules for talking? Even though I repeatedly told kids to raise their hands it was still a little chaotic.
Hannah Hobson
For my DR-Ta, I started reading "The Mystery of Biltmore House." We read the first two chapters. I read Chapter one, and the students took turns reading Chapter two. They did a very good job reading. I liked the way the children were engaged and very interested in the book. I was not planning to let them read so it would not take longer, but they wanted to read and I liked that. They had very good predictions and were anxious to share with the group. I think that next time when I do a DR-TA, I am going to try and talk about what we read. I did go over what was going on in the book so far at the end, but it would be a good idea if I did it too while reading the first chapter. I would also change the location of the lesson.....the hall is not the best place to do a DR-TA (too many interruptions!). My question is what is the best way to do a DR-TA with a chapter book since it is longer than the other books in the lower grades?
ReplyDeleteSiomara Castillo
I read the story "The Case of the Flying-Saucer People" for my DR-TA to my 5th grade class. These are the three things that went well: (1) For the vocabulary warm-up, I explained the terms well and I got the student's input on the hand motions they would like to do for each word as it came up in the story; (2) I had good classroom management and I would ask them to be quiet if they were getting too loud or when they were being rude while another classmate was talking; and (3) I allowed the kids the opportunity to learn from each other through their shared predictions and partner reading. I wish that I had explained the types of reading we were going to do a little better. I had them read the first page alone, then read the next 2 pages with a partner, and then I read the rest of the story. I just didn't tell the groups to stop after each partner had read so I had to walk around to each group and tell them individually. How should I prepare a reading lesson like this that includes silent, partner, and teacher reading for a hard of hearing student? I didn't even think about this student in my class when I prepared the lesson, so when I had students read with a partner, he was going to opt to read alone until Shelby decided to be his partner. What kind of reading activities can I do so that the hard of hearing student doesn't always have to read alone?
ReplyDelete-Amanda Jackson
I did my DR-TA lesson this past week and i think it went very well. I am lucky to have a great class where every student wants to participate. I read a book about colors and it tied into an activity we were doing after reading this book. I think i did a great job getting the kids involved, and i asked several questions and at the end the kids seems very excited to do the activity and i felt like i helped with that. However, the one thing i would have changed is perhaps the book. I would next time like to do a book that is more predictable so the children can get it. But i really enjoyed doing this lesson and especially loved when the kids would read a certain part of the book with me (it repeated one line throughout the book) My question is how do you make sure each child has put there input in? I had to constantly tell children "ill call on you next time", i think it is great that all the kids wanted to get involved but how do you polietly tell them/ let them know that you have to move on and finish the story?
ReplyDelete-Molly Maness
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI did my DRTA on Wednesday April 1st. I read "The Story of Ruby Bridges" to a small group of fourth graders. I think it went pretty well. The positives: 1) All the students were eager to participate, even ones that do not participate well in larger groups. 2) The students lead a well-rounded conversation about the book and the historical aspects of the story (it was about segregation). 3) At first I did not know how well a picture book would go with fourth graders, but they loved it. There were a few things that I wished had been different. I wish I had a chance to do it with the entire class to see how that would go, but I know I will probably not get a chance. I really did not have any clue as to what the students were doing in reading or what their reading levels were so it made it hard to choose a story. It went well in the end, but I had no clue as to how well I was prepared. I also wish that my students had not been so vague on their first prediction. On their initial prediction, most of the students gave me one sentence that did not really describe what they thought the story would be about. How do you get students to make more elaborate predictions?
ReplyDeleteMegan Cockrum
I did my DR-TA with a group of nine fourth graders with the book "The Mystery of Biltmore House." I showed the class the cover of the book and read the title to them so they could make their predictions. Then, I read the first two chapters to the class and stopped at the end of each chapter to let them update their predictions. The teacher loved that I did this with her students because it got them really interested in reading the book when they come back from Easter break. Other positive outcomes of this exercise were they the students were excited about sharing their predictions, and the reading sparked a lot of interesting questions about the Biltmore House which lead to a discussion on the Biltmore House. One thing that I would have done differently would be bringing the students closer together. I think they were getting a little distracted being so far apart from each other. My question about this exercise is how do you keep the students interested the whole chapter book? Will they stay excited about making or changing their predictions?
ReplyDelete-Heather Heath
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI did my DR-TA with my entire kindergarten class on a big book, "Stuck in the Mud." I began by discussing what a prediction was and then we moved on to make three predictions as a class based on the cover. I read the book aloud to the students but had them echo read the title of the story. We stopped two times during the story to check our predictions and make new predictions. One thing I think went really well was that I was able to manage the class well. They knew that they needed to raise their hands and I was able to call on each student by name. Another thing that went well was that the students were very eager to participate and give their predictions. I let them know ahead of time that I would take three predictions so I took three and then moved on. The third thing that I think went really well was that book choice was really great. It was a big book so the kids could see everything that was going on. It also had a great story line in that the kids were able to predict what was going to happen. It also offered good material to build off of if I was going to continue to use this book in the classroom. One thing that I thought could have gone better was how much time I spent reading the story. I took time on several pages to explain what was going on and have the children talk about what they knew but I should have done it more often. At times the students were confused about what was going on and I had to explain, but stopping more often and taking a little more time would have been helpful. My question about guided reading would be, how do you get students who never raise their hand to participate without putting them on the spot and making them nervous? I noticed that I just called on those who were raising their hand and had answers ready, but I want ALL of my students to be engaged in the story and making predictions.
ReplyDeleteLeslie Sheppard
Today Kayla and I did our DRTA lesson with the whole class. We split up pages in the book and took turns reading. Three positives aspects of the lesson were the students paid attention really well, they followed along as we read, and finally they really gave it some thought when making perdictions about what would happen in the book. One thing I wish I could change would be the book perhaps or maybe the layout of the lesson.The book we read was a math book that was perfect for circumference and it told a great story that really got the students attention, but it covered some topics the students had not covered yet. I would have taken more time to talk to the teacher and make sure that they had covered the topic of circumference throughly before reading the book, however on that note the class that we read to is an AG class which helped because they had some concept of circumference. One question I have is: what do you do when you realize that the students needed more time to cover the subject when you are teaching the lesson plan you have already prepared?
ReplyDeleteJoy Cooper
Joy and I did our DRTA lesson using the book Sir Cumference and the Great Knight of Angleland as part of a math lesson. We only had the one book, so we each guided the class through half of the book. Three things that went well were, the students enjoyed making their predictions, the students picked up on all of the vocabulary words involving math that were in the book and wrote those down, knowing the definitions for each term. Also, we were able to review material (such as angle measurement) that students were already very familiar with, which was the central theme of the book. The teacher also asked us to introduce a new concept, circumference, which was related to the pun in the title of the book. One thing I would change is I would have more than one copy of the book so students would be able to see the pictures better. My question is what are some other ideas of integrating DRTA into a math lesson when you don't necessarily have a book that corresponds with your lesson?
ReplyDeleteKayla Rash
For my DRTA I read "Oliver All Alone" to a group of third graders. It went okay overall. Three things that went really well were 1) The students were really excited about making predictions and really into the book. 2) I made a special sheet for them to fill out for their predictions and I think this really helped them to focus. 3) Overall the students liked the book that I chose. Even though the students liked the book, I think that I might should have picked a different book. It's hard to explain, but the end of my book was not what you would expect. They were trying to figure out (along with a dog in the story) what was making a thump-thump-thump noise. Near the end of the book, you think it is a person, but on the last page, you find out it is the dog's tail. All of the kids got the final prediction wrong because they all put the person. So, I guess my question would be, does the final prediction need to be a little more obvious or is it okay if it's a little tricky?
ReplyDeleteI combined my DRTA and my read aloud because of time. I started off by talking about the cover of the book. Then I asked them to predict what they thought would happen. They started talking about the little girl on the cover going to school. They didn't want to predict the whole story at first. I reexplained the question and they started predicting the whole book. I stopped 2 times during the story and asked what they thought would happen next, and if their predictions were right. At the end of the story, I asked them if their predictions were right from the beginning or if they had to change them. I think one thing I could improve on would be to specify what I want them to answer. I didn't explain the question well enough the first time so they didn't answer the question like I wanted. I was impressed how most of the kids wanted to talk about the book every time I stopped. I had to tell them to wait til the end of the book because they wanted to talk about it so much. I was able to keep everyone on task as well. I didn't have to wait for them to be quiet to keep reading. They wanted to hear what happened next. The book I chose was a difficult book to predict, but none of them got the prediction, even at the end. If I were to continue reading books and doing DRTAs, how could I help the kids better predict the story? If they kept predicting them and they were consistently wrong, how would I help them better their predicting skills?
ReplyDeleteEmily Towery
For my DRTA I read the book "Everything on Olvera Street" by Evelyn Coleman. I had about 5 students from different reading levels with me to participate. Three things I thought I did good on were 1) starting off with the cover and asking predictions of what may happen. They did so good on this part because they definitely took the clues and put them into words for the class to hear. 2) Read the book with good expressions and voices because the class was very into the book 3) I think I did a good job with asking questions to the students for them to understand no matter what reading level they were on. I asked what all their opinions were and they felt like they could share them. One thing I wish was different was this book included some spanish words that were more tough, and although that is a good thing sometime i had to stop more often and tell them things they did not know. One question i have is for those who are more quiet is it ok if I call on them to answer the question or make a prediction if they dont raise their hand?
ReplyDeleteMeggie Colhoun
My DRTA lesson went ok but I did have one problem and that most of the class had already read the book. I know I should have asked the teacher first but she had told us to pick any book we wanted for the lesson and I really didn't think they would have read "Officer Buckle and Gloria" but I was wrong. I did my best to work around it though and I believe I introduced the book very well and I made sure every student in my group knew what a prediction was. I pretty much did my lesson the way I would have done it if they hadn't read the book. They all loved the book and pretty much all participated in answering the questions I asked them. I could tell a few of the students didn't remember the book very well so it was interesting to hear their predictions. I had to call on one students to participate because he was just sitting there quiet, is that ok? I also had a hard time finding a book for this lesson. What should I look for in a book so it will make a good DRTA lesson?
ReplyDelete-Sarah Purrell
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMy DRTA went pretty good. I read a book that the teacher gave me out of his classroom library. It was called Thundercake. It was a cute story. The 3 things that went well was that 1. The kids were very enthused to participate. (I'm guessing the change of activity made them excited)2.I prepared the students they all had paper and pencil to write their predictions and 3.Our discussion flowed very well. One thing that I wish I would have done differently was used a book that wasn't so predictable. Pretty much all the kids knew what was going to happen just by looking at the cover. However, I did have one kid who let his imagination go wild and his prediction was totally off the wall and very creative, which helped to feed a good conversation about their predictions. The kids really liked doing this activity, but I think that was mostly due to the fact that they don't normally get to do anything like that. From what I have observed their reading lessons consist of reading a chapter then going back to your desk and answering questions. A question that I had after doing this activity would be what is a good way to control the amount of talking they did without discouraging them from talking? I had kids who wanted to sit there and talk all day about the book and about things that reminded them of their lives from the book. I didn't really want to cut them off and not allow them to share but we didn't really have that much time.
ReplyDeleteKayla Sizemore
I did my DR-TA lesson today with half of the class. I read the book "The Lily Cupboard." Three things that went well: (1) I think my lesson went well because I picked good stopping points. At one point, the students were making predictions and a student said I was keeping them on the edge of their seat waiting to see what happened. (2) The students did a good job at paying attention and writing good predictions. They were really eager to share what they wrote. (3) I think the lesson went well because there was a good amount of discussion and the students seemed to enjoy the story. One thing I wish for next time is that everyone gives at least one of their predictions. I felt like I called on the same few students over and over again. My question would be how do you get students motivated to share their prediction with the group?
ReplyDeleteI taught the DR-TA lesson on a story entitled "Satchmo's Blues." This lesson went really well. Before I started the story, I went over a few vocab words that were in the story. I discussed the words with students and they came up with hand motions to represent each word. I called on a boy who is hearing impaired and asked him to show us the sign for a couple of the words. He seemed to enjoy being incorporated into the lesson. I also think I did a good job of being interested in students' predictions of the story. I read the first few pages of the story and then asked students to check their predictions. At this point, I felt that I did a good job calling on people to share who hadn't already spoken. One thing that I wished that I had done better was to keep more control over students shouting out. There were a few students who constantly shouted out their thoughts and I wish that I would have asked them to please raise their hand before they spoke.
ReplyDeleteI think that DR-TA lessons are great lessons and are very efficient. I do have one question - in older grades, should you always mix up the reading between teacher reading and student reading?
Shelby Johnson
Today I taught my DR-TA lesson with the book "Verdi" by Janell Cannon to half a class of third graders. I felt as though the children had a strong connection with the book and they enjoyed making predictions. Before I started the story I had them look at the front cover and make a few predictions of what they thought the story was going to be about. I feel as though I did a good job of allowing them to make several predictions and get a feel for the book. I then read the first page and asked them to tell me what they think will happen to the snakes skin. I feel as though I did a good job listening to the responses and responding without giving the story away. Half way through I stopped and had them change their predictions. Many of them were right to begin with and I felt as though I did a good job of keeping the story going and keeping it alive. One thing I wished I could of done better was have the students that have read the book not to give away the story. I feel as though this ruined the prediction part of the lesson. To go along with this, as a teacher what do I do when a students gives the story away because they have already read it and how do you keep those kids still engaged with the story?
ReplyDeleteChristin Jones
Today we did our DR-TA lesson. It is late in the game, but I'm glad that we waited to really learn about our students and their learning styles. For this lesson, I chose to read the story "The Fortune Tellers" by Lloyd Alexander. This story is written for a level that is probably younger than our 5th graders, however, it included some humor in it that only older kids would understand. This book gave perfect opportunities to make predictions, because the entire book was about predicting! The story takes place in Cameroon, West Africa, so before the story, I gave a brief overview of the country. I showed the students pictures of traditional dress, marketplaces, and a map of the country. During the reading, I played traditional African drumming music too so that the students could get the feel of the book. I think the kids really enjoyed this. One student in particular (who has autism) really perked up about African countries because of his love for animals. Throughout the story, I had about 4 stops for students to predict what would happen next. They also got to act like they were the fortune teller and literally write out a fortune for the character in the story. The students were very in tune and I think this was a great way to keep their attention. This lesson also fell at a perfect time because just the day before, their classroom teacher had spoken about inferences, so I used that terminology when speaking of predicting. In my lesson plan, I planned to talk more about their culture's religious beliefs and I got so caught up that I forgot that part. It would have tied the fortune telling into the culture better, but other than that the lesson went really well! My favorite thing about this lesson was that we integrated Social Studies and reading. What are some other ways to integrate reading with other subjects?
ReplyDeleteEmily Fox
I read the story "The Little Island" to the whole class for the DR-TA activity. This was a story Mrs. Wilson picked out for me to read becuase they were studying landforms and the story was about an island. 1)I asked the children to make a prediction of the book just by looking at the cover. They noticed the tiny cat on the boat and guessed that he came to the island to run from dogs, or to have a picnic. 2) I stopped 2 more times and had them make a prediction. I had them tell me their predictions and then the second time I had them tell their neighbor. I thought they did a really good job with this and their predictions changed during the course of the story. 3) At the end of the story I asked them what is an island and they told me it is land that is surrounded by water and that it touches land deep under the ocean. I thought this was great for 2nd graders! I wish I could have handled them shouting out better. They would start shouting their predictions and I reminded them to raise their hand but on the 3rd predictions they started shouting again. One question that I have is how to get the attention of a student who is just sitting there and you can't tell they just aren't paying attention?
ReplyDeleteI did my DRTA lesson on monday with half of the class. I read "The Lily Cupboard" to my fourth grade students. I feel that my students did a great job with the lesson and that I also did a good job teaching the lesson. Three things that went well with the lesson were 1) The students were very eager to read the book because they could tell that it was about WWII. Most of the children loved talking about WWII and telling me what they knew about it, so the topic of the book was very interesting with them, which helped them keep focus. 2) The students did really good with their predicitions. Most of them liked to share their predicitions and couldn't wait to find out what was going to happen next in the book. 3)I feel that I picked really good stopping points because the students kept their interest. I have seem them get bored before in some of their lessons and this was not one of them so I feel that by picking these spots to stop in, it helped them to keep their focus on the book. One thing that I wish would have been better is that some of the students would listen to my directions better. I feel that I had to keep repeating myself, and this could have been that I wasn't explaining myself well enough. My question is what to do with students that are shy and don't want to share their predictions with the rest of the class?
ReplyDelete-Kala White
I did my DRTA yesterday. I also did the "Fortune Tellers" by Lloyd Alexander. Emily read to our regular homeroom and I read the same story to the other class which, happens to be the AG class. We wanted to compare the classes and see if there was a significant difference between the two. Three things that went really well: !) it included social studies with some focus on another country 2)students really paid attention and was interactive in their predictions 3) students seemed to like the music and the pictures to give them a better idea of how the book really represented the country. One thing that I wish: I wish that we could have done a book that about a place the children were studying but they weren't really studying geography at all which, is unfortunate. With older kids how often would you do a DRTA once a day, once a week, or once a couple of weeks. Is it something that you would try to correlate with what the students are learning or just a good book?
ReplyDeletejoni little
I did a DRTA lesson on my last day of class. It wen really well, and it was a big book about a bear named barney who is getting his cherries stolen from him on his cake. The kids LOVE the book and were really engaged. However, it was hard for them to come up with a correct prediction. They were very engaged, and I feel like I picked a perfect book for them to read. I stopped halfway and talked about which animals have already stolen cherries from the cake and which ones have not. I think DRTA lesson work well with kindergarteners, and I suggest a big book so the kids can see the full print and pictures to pay attention. The Kindergarteners payed great attention, and I am lucky to have had them as my students. How do I teach Kindergarteners about what to predict in a book?
ReplyDeleteMolly Suddes
I did my DRT-A yesterday with my 3rd class. I read Pinduli by Janell Cannon, who also wrote Stellaluna. I think three things that went well were that my half of the class really paid attention to what I was saying, they came up with very creative and thoughtful predictions of what will happen in the story, and I felt that I kept the students interested and engaged by stopping to ask questions and what they think will happen next and if their previous predictions had been right. My half of the class went out into the hallway whereas Christin's group stayed in the classroom. One of my wishes for giving this lesson would have been in a better location so that people walking by weren't as loud and they could hear me better. One question that I have is how do you get other students to voice their opinions? and also, I had one student who had already read it and kept trying to give away what was going to happen while I was reading it.
ReplyDeleteLaura Davis
I did my DRTA lesson with a small group of students. I really enjoyed this lesson. I used one of my favorite books "The Country Mouse and The City Mouse" for this lesson. I think that the kids really enjoyed this book and doing the activity with it. I thought that it would be fun to use a little booklet that I made out of a sentence strip to make their predictions in. I went through it with them and made all the pre-set headings and then asked them question to make their predictions. I think they really enjoyed this because it allowed them to have something that they could go back to a look at as we read the story and see over time how the story and their predictions changed. I think that there was many things that went well including the sentence strip booklet, the fact that the kids were creative with their predictions, and that they understood the meaning of the story and how they should be creative when writing. They also learned that different people have different views and understandings of what they read and see. One thing I would change would be that next time I would ask more questions at the end of the story and better relate the story back to their own lives. I would also have the booklet headings pre-made cause I feel like this took too much time and therefore took away from the time I had to ask questions. One question I have is how can you get the students to be more creative with their predictions rather then copying the one their neighbor said and not going down an inappropriate path for the subject or school setting?
ReplyDeleteDanielle Epley
I completed my DR-TA Lesson with a small group of students, I really enjoyed this lesson and feel like I will use this assignment on a frequent bases in my own classroom. I made a booklet out of a sentence strip for the kids to use, I really feel that this helped keep the predictions together and flowing. I read "The True Story of the Big Bad Wolf," I really liked this book and the kids seemed to enjoy it as well. One thing I would have changed it having the booklet completely made and ready to be used by the students, they can write the headings they just took a long time to finish it. My question is, do they made wider sentence strips so I can make bigger booklets? Also, how can I organize all of the students to help ensure that all of the responses are genuine and thoughtful?
ReplyDelete