Learning with Ms RileyLanyon High School English

Starring the hands of students in Year 9 English Level 2

Pedagogical Approaches to English Year 9

• Cooperative Learning Groups

• Cooperative Reading (4 resources model)

• Essay Scaffold & CQ Rubric

• Placemat

• Functional Grammar Retrieval & Poetry

From this…

to this…

My ClassroomCooperative Learning Groups

• The year 9 English classroom is set up in cooperative learning groups. (4/6 classes in

this space)

• Gen Y likes collegiate support but planned pairing of students supports nervous

learners and facilitates ‘New Learning’

• Most learners appreciate a helping hand but instructions about degree of help need to

be explicit to avoid ‘free loaders’.

• All learners learn well but gives an

opportunity of leadership or ‘coaching’ to

more capable students

• Weaknesses – encourages social interaction

– strong classroom management needed.

• Works in all situations except where

individual assessment is required.

Year 9 English Classroom in cooperative table groups

Cooperative Reading4 Resources Model - Allan Luke & Peter Freebody

• Cooperative Reading is a strategy used in the school from Yr7 to Yr10 and helps students to think critically about a text from 4 different perspectives by using the 4 roles. • Reciprocal teaching gives students agency.

Text Participant – how do I participate in this text?Text Analyst – what does this text do to me?

Code Breaker – how do I make sense of this text?Text User – how do I use this text?

• Students formulate their own ‘fat’ questionsand write a reflection about their shared learning.

• Strengths are the same as for cooperative learning.

• Weaknesses – some students need to be encouraged to write more than ‘token’ questions.

• Senior students all reflected that they learnt more deeply about the text.

• This kind of strategy works best with practice- teachers need to really understand the rolesand the kind of questions generated by each- professional development recommended.

Cooperative Reading of ‘The Outsiders’ by S.E. Hinton

Essay Scaffold & CQ RubricPEC Paragraphs (Point, Evidence/Elaboration/Explanation, Concluding sentence)

Criteria Quality Rubric

• The Essay Scaffold explicitly reminds students about the structural

expectations of essays.

• Strategies like the ‘5 Whys’ aid students in gathering ideas for the elaboration.

• Paragraph boxes remind students to stick to one idea per paragraph and the

amount of space sets the expectation for paragraph length.

• A great way to get students to draft their work.

• Purpose is to break the essay into steps

a strategy highly recommended for students

with special needs eg. Autism

• Strengths - are the expectations of structure

are explicit – everyone on the same ‘page’.

• Weaknesses – some students become

overly reliant on the ‘look’ of the scaffold.

• Senior students all reflected that they

appreciated knowing exactly what was

expected - CQ is even more explicit!

• This kind of strategy just really works!Students using Essay Scaffolds to write essays on ‘The Outsiders’

Placemat

• The Placemat is a collaborative thinking tool.

• It values the individual first by allowing everyone space to record what they

know or think.

• Collaboration begins when negotiation about the ‘main idea’ happens and is

recorded in the central oval of the worksheet – a synthesis or distilling of ideas

– sometimes just ‘in common’.

• Purpose is to value everyone and then

encourage collaboration.

• Strengths - everyone feels valued.

• Weaknesses – some students rely solely on

what their neighbour wrote – need to

encourage students to work ‘alone’ first.

• Everyone can do this one – achievable

learning for everyone.

• This kind of strategy works well for initial

impressions of a topic or to reflect at the

end of a unit or any kind of brainstorm.

The Placemat at work…

Functional Grammar RetrievalPoetry and the ‘WHY’ factor

• The 3 aspects of Functional Grammar are:

Mode (What is it?), Field (Where is it?) & Tenor

(Impact)

• Explicitly teaches the ‘rules’ of creating texts.

• Helps students to understand how they are being positioned by a text.

• Retrieval chart is simply a neat way to record their findings.

• Strengths – students engage in higher

order thinking – the step beyond

‘what is it?’

• Weaknesses – is there a downside to

higher order thinking and deep knowledge?

• Instead of just giving students the criteria

to construct a text they go on the journey

of investigation themselves – much more

meaningful, memorable and powerful!

Functional Grammar Retrieval of Literary Devices in Sonnets