Partner Connection, September 25, 2007
UIC students and CPS partners
introduce themselves to each other
in their groups.
The Fall 2007 Partner Connection was held on Sept 25, 2007. UIC students and Chicago Public Schools special educators (STEP=UP partners) gathered for the first time for this academic year to meet and begin to form relationships. UIC students and CPS teachers brought personal artifacts chosen to help them share something about themselves.
After these personal introductions, CPS Partners shared literacy artifacts from their classrooms. There were several discussions, questions and opinions related to the artifacts. The theme for the field advisories this semester is looking at pre-reading strategies to help understand content-area text. Partners shared a variety of pre-reading strategies that they use with their students.
We feature a few here.
Toni Gonzales, who works with high school students who have a range of abilities and learn in varied instructional models, discussed her use of context clues to help the students figure out meanings of words. This is a part of what she does during pre-reading.She follows this with making up sentences with an obvious definition in the sentence so the students will have success and confidence with this method.She also uses work that is similar to an ACT test so the students will be familiar with the exercises and more ready for the test since the school she works at is a college prep school.
David Rench. who works with elementary-aged students with autism, shared with his group worksheets with several pictures that he uses with kids who are visual learners. He uses this as a strategy to help them to understand abstract concepts. The group discussed about how graphic organizers were such an invaluable tool for children. The discussion highlighted the importance of maps for safety and traveling, pictures of foods to buy from grocery stores etc. as other things that visual learners could adapt in their learning and what is practical to them in their day-to-day living.
Alex Horn Litchenfeld, who works with middle school students in a resource room setting who have a range of abilities, shared transparency overheads of a particular workbook, that she uses with her students. The overhead sheets are colorful and have different cues to help students read the page. It highlights aspects of the text (like titles, quotes, captions of pictures) so that students do not miss reading these. Aaron talked about how he introduced a different version of graphing paper to help students graph instead of the ones commercially. He mentioned that students who were unable to graph on commercially available graphing paper were able to graph on a sheet with larger grid size. He highlighted that sometimes it need not be the content or concept that is difficult, but the materials that are available that make it cumbersome for students to understand mathematical concepts.
Jennifer Schaefer brought in materials to teach high school students with autism about measurement units by using food labels like ounces and grams. She also shared how she uses a reading sheet (a sheet that is fully opaque, except for a 1 inch strip of transparent window) with her students successfully to help them focus on the text. Students sometimes get distracted by the amount of text on a page, so this sheet blocks out all the text on the sheet except for what is visible in the window and helps them focus and read the text.
Alex Horn shows how she highlights parts of the text
to help with content area reading.
UIC students and CPS partners discuss artifacts in their groups.
Dave Rench shares the visual materials that he uses with his children
for understanding expository text.
STEP=UP Staff share some library materials with students.
