Intermediate CAFE in the Classroom

This summer I read about and was intrigued by the possibilities of using The CAFE Menu in my classroom. I started the year working out a plan to be able to build my menu board by introducing strategies one at a time throughout the year. I had to think of a way to be able to flip the signs so that they could reflect the language of the week in my immersion setting (link to see my writing menu with the same concept). As the year evolved I decided that my older students needs were mainly comprehension and ended up taking down the other three sections of my menu in order to save wall space. I have been trying to experiment and decide exactly what adaptations I need to make when using the CAFE menu concept in my 6th and 7th grade language arts classes.

Luckily, the instructional coach at my school was able to order the DVD, Intermediate CAFE in the Classroom: Helping Readers Thrive in Grades 3-6. The DVD came at a perfect time after I have already gotten my feet wet with the concept. It served as a good way to focus my reflections and reevaluate how I have been using it and how I can use it more effectively. The 117 minute video shows a wide variety of lessons. For example, it represents the different grade levels, different lesson configurations (whole group, small group, one on one), and different reading levels. I appreciated that through their examples I could see types of students. Through the needs of their students and the decisions they made based on individual needs, I could imagine how the same concepts would work with my own students.

I was also able to reflect on how the one on one conferences fit with the ideas of others that I have been reading lately, especially Patrick Allen's Conferring and Donalyn Miller's The Book Whisperer. I especially loved seeing how "The Sisters" guided students from different reading levels in selecting goals and setting up plans. The students left with a sense of ownership in the process.

I always love to see ideas that I read about in action. I took pages of notes while viewing the video. I will immediately be implementing some changes, as well as reflecting on the big picture, what I will start to do different in future years with the introduction and set-up. For example, I love that they do not necessarily build the board from scratch with older students. This would work so well in my classroom. There were many points in the video such as this that made me pause and wonder if they had not mentioned that in the book or if I did read it and just was not at the right stage in the process to have that idea register. I am planning on taking a day during winter break to reflect about reading, and the notes I took during the video will be a key component in my considerations.

Workshop Reflections: Assessments

This year has been going by so quickly and I have spent a lot of energy trying to get my workshop to run smoothly and the way I imagine it should be based on resources about workshops. It has been fun getting different components to work for me, as well as challenging to work through so many different pieces. I always want my classroom to be the way it "should" be from the start, but getting some major new components, such as workshops, in place takes time. Lately I have been starting to see glimpses of what is to come in the future, and that is what keeps me going, knowing that I am making progress. I will be reflecting about what I have been learning this year about workshop, starting with assessment.

ASSESSMENTS
Assessments was one of my biggest challenges first quarter. Students were required to hand in four published pieces for the first quarter (two in English and two in Spanish) that I assessed using our state writing rubric, and I felt comfortable with that. However, I was not as pleased with other grades that I was putting in the grade book. At the start of the year I knew that I wanted a system that would allow for flexibility since students would not always be at the same place at the same time. I came up with a rubric outlining the expectations for workshop and different grades according to how they performed in workshop. From the beginning I was not 100% sure about this being the best way to go, but I did not have any better ideas. Over time it seemed like the grades did not necessarily demonstrate what I wanted them to. Improving in this area moved to the forefront of my reflections.

With the start of second quarter I am much more comfortable with the direction I am moving with assessment in workshop. Toward the end of last quarter I finally started implementing status of the class. It has been great to have a written record of students' reading and writing behaviors. Reading Mark Overmeyer's What Student Writing Teaches Us and reading his responses to some of my questions got the gears turning to start looking at assessment from new angles. Being exposed to his thoughts came at a perfect time. I was ready for the information since I had already worked through some of the start-up challenges with workshop in general.

From the time I read Overmeyer's book, I knew that I wanted my gradebook to be more standards based, rather than a huge chunk of the grades reflecting effort/participation that my workshop grade ended up being. I just needed time to process and consider how to make this happen. I knew right away that the grade for the published pieces based on the state writing rubric needed to carry more weight in their grades.

In his Q&A with me Overmeyer mentioned that he gives points for generating ideas for personal narratives. A couple of weeks after I first read this, the way I could implement his comments finally sunk in. I realized how I want to set up my gradebook this quarter. Now, rather than trying to assign workshop grade, I will give grades based on completing specific steps in the workshop process that are directly related to the standard that we are focusing on at the time. I have the same expectations for workshop that I previously watched for in order to evaluate and assign a workshop grades, but now I have more specific requirements that I will assess. For example, we are focusing on Ideas and Content right now because I observed that it was an area that many of my students need to continue developing. In a two week block of time students are required to complete a high/low chart that we did together, gather ideas about two of the events from their charts, and then write two rough drafts. If they finish everything, then they will continue gathering ideas or writing drafts. They can either work on more personal narratives or they can write slice of life stories or articles, the two genres that we have already worked on this year. Expectations such as these will make it clearer for the students of the minimum of what they should accomplish during a time frame.

I am still processing how I can improve in the way that I am assessing in reading workshop, and I am still considering ideas from Donalyn Miller's book when thinking about that area. Her reply to my questions on her book discussion were also very helpful. I also noticed another reply that she did to a teacher stating that she only uses status of the class at the beginning, and I can see how I may move in that direction as well. In writing I think that I am almost to the point where I can make that transition.

I am excited for the way that my workshop practices are improving and know that I still have many more discoveries awaiting me the rest of this year. Every year I will always be looking for some other way to improve, but I feel like I will have so much more figured out by the start of next year that I will be fine-tuning rather than figuring out the basic design.

The Book Whisperer

I heard a lot about Donalyn Miller's The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child earlier this year when it was released. When I saw that there would be a discussion with Miller about the book on EC Ning, I went straight to Amazon to order it. Miller has been leading a great discussion, inspiring feedback from a large group of educators.

The whole book emphasizes the goal of reading programs as inspiring students to be life-long readers and her personal journey to reaching a set-up for "awakening" all of a passion for reading in all of her students. There were many comments that I underlined and starred for various reasons, such as they perfectly aligned with my philosophy or they shared a perspective that I would want to remember later to defend authentic reading programs.

One quote that resonated with me was, "Even with her extensive knowledge of reading and writing practices, Susie was always searching for methods to improve the literacy instruction in her classroom and still struggling to get it 'right'" (14). I extensively read about literacy. However, as soon as I start to feel like I am smoothly implementing one idea in a general sense, I start to investigate multiple questions that pop into mind about different components.

I enjoyed that the book gave me a lot to consider. In some areas it supported what I already do and in other areas such as reading logs, it caused me to revisit yet again whether or not I really want to continue that practice. (I even commented about this on the discussion, 4th comment down).

Above all, I appreciated this book in the same way that I appreciated Readicide. Miller has a well-developed rationale for best practices in literacy instruction. It inspires me to continue working through the bumps along the way as I am finding out what will work best for my students. It also reaffirms why I chose to teach in a school where I am able to have a workshop approach in my classroom, rather than being restricted to a canned program.