In my classroom...

So now that we have looked at my collection of key understandings surrounding literacy, what am I going to do with all of them? What will literacy look like in my classroom.
Everytime I am asked this question, I never give the same answer. Literacy excites me, interests me, engages me, and so I would like my students to feel the same way.
The most important understanding I have collected about literacy is that all teachers are teachers of literacy. When I 'don' my art teacher hat, I am still a teacher of literacy. When I 'don' my maths teacher hat, I am still a teacher of literacy.
Included in this blog, is a lesson plan with a focus on reading comprhension.
My lesson plan uses one of the strategies listed in the reading comprehension blog post: coding the text. This task assists students in making connections, understandings, and helps students to think in a broad manner about the content of the text. This task also helps students to critically analyse the chosen text piece. The information gained from coding the text activities can be used for a range of activities, like persuasive essays about characters or events from the novel, posters or discussions about key characters.

LESSON PLAN

Unit/Lesson Title:  Detailed coding of ‘Pankration’ novel.		Lesson duration:    1 hour		Stage:3           Year : 6		Class/Group: 6.2
Rationale: Upon completion of the lesson students will have begun developing their understandings and levels of comprehension of the main characters and their influences and impacts on other main characters and the plot of the story.		Outcomes: RS3.5 Reads independently an extensive range of texts with increasing content demands and responds to themes and issues. RS3.6 Critically analyses techniques used by writers to create certain effects, to use language creatively, to position the reader in various ways and to construct different interpretations of experience. RS3.7 Identifies the structure of a wider range of more complex text types and discusses how the characteristic grammatical features work to influence readers’ and viewers’ understanding of texts. RS3.8 Uses a comprehensive range of skills and strategies appropriate to the type of text being read. RS3.8 Identifies the text
Prior Knowledge: Students will have read the novel ‘Pankration’.		Resources: Novel, ‘Pankration’ by Dyan Blacklock, white board markers, students’ writing materials, instructions on coding the text, sticky tabs.
Specific Teaching Target: To broaden the students’ understandings and comprehension of the text, characters and their influences on the plot, and on readers.
Time	Content/Learning Experience		Teaching Strategies		Class Organisation		Assessment Techniques
15-20mins 1-1.5 hours 10-15mins	Introduction: Students are welcomed into the classroom. Students will be directed to open up their books and be ready to start the lesson. Students must also have their copy of the novel with them. Students will be told that they will be undertaking a further study of the novel and the different parts of the text. Students will be given out copies of the coding the text instructions Body: Students will undertake a short brainstorming session surrounding the first chapter of the novel. Students will work through the first few paragraphs of the first chapter. Following the instructions, students will suggest Very important information to the story, questions they have about any information, new information that is presented, predictions that they may have about further events in the story, instances of inference, and words or phrases that helped them to visualise. Students can also code any other key information or interesting sections that help them with their understanding of the text. While students discuss as a whole class, the teacher will model an example of coding the text using information provided by the students. Once students gain an understanding of the task and feel comfortable working on their own, they can move onto individual work. Conclusion: Students can share any finished key points with the class if they choose. Work will be collected to ensure that it is not lost, and for the teacher to assess how they are working and how their level of comprehension has developed. This will help the teacher to adjust the following lessons.		Teacher will be positive and upbeat, enthused about the lesson. Teacher will prompt the students to skim read their book to help them identify key points. Positive feedback will be provided for any positive contribution. Once the students move onto completing their own work, the teacher will move around the class and assist students and provide positive feedback. Modelling on the board will help direct students. Students will be praised and thanked for their participation and good efforts. Areas of the text that students coded in a similar or different fashion can be discussed; students can talk about why they chose to code a piece of text in a particular way.		Students will work as a whole class, when first examining the instructions. However when work commences students will work independently, as this task is about the student’s own level of comprehension.		Work will be collected at the completion of the lesson and reviewed by the teacher to enable adjustment of the following lesson.

 Within my classroom, I hope to have a range of different areas for students to explore literacy. These would include 'stations' around the room designed to stimulate literacy learning and a love for literacy within students. A reading area would contain a wide range of interesting, relevant and multimodal texts for students to explore. Books, magazines, newspapers, dictionaries and other reference materials, novels, posters, comics, ebooks, books made by the whole class and students' own books from home would feature in this type of area. This area would expose students to a range of text types, promoting interest and discussion about different reading materials.
Nature or special interest tables would include interesting items surrounding an area of study, such as the ocean. These items would encourage students to examine and discuss with one another, with their teacher and with their parents. Interesting, 'random' items placed on a table would help stimulate students questioning and enquiry skills. Specific floor space where students and teachers sit together as a close unit will also help to stimulate discussion, listening and sharing skills. 

Writing materials resource areas will feature greeting cards, access to emails and blogs, booklets, instructions on specific writing types and a collection of stimulating materials (these can be from the nature or special interest tables, items bought in by students or items from the reading area of the classroom). Providing students with a range of writing materials allows them to write when they feel the need or desire to write. Providing students with a wide variety of writing items, like greeting cards, and instructions on writing types encourages students to explore a wide range of text types and structures.

Most of all, I hope that students will find my classroom a positive, encouraging and safe environment; one where they feel safe to explore, experiment and take risks.