Making Words - Update

This week i started Evan on a programme called "Making Words" (see previous post). Evan was able to spell most of the 3 letter words but once the words started to increase in size he needed help. I gave him 'hints' to guide him but never gave him the answer. He enjoyed finding rhyming words and commented on how many words he could make with only 5 letters!

I thought that he may get upset once he couldn't spell a word on his own as this is what generally happens during writing tasks but because the programme is very specific he felt confident that he would be able to complete the task. 

Each lesson has a 'secret' word using all of the letters provided. Throughout the activity he was excited to find out what the secret word was. He was so motivated that he asked me what secret word he is going to spell next week. I love his enthusiasm for learning. 

Visible Learning in Special Education

I have been in special education for 6 years. I have always been told to minimise spoken language so that our students can process what is being said. 

While this is important for providing instructions and especially important for students with communication difficulties I also believe it is important to provide a vocabulary rich environment. 

Many teachers in special education believe their students wont understand if we share their learning goals with them or it will confuse them further. 

This year i made it my personal goal to ensure that every lesson had a learning intention which i could share with my students. Almost 1 year later i have started to notice my students talking about their learning goals or what they have achieved, even students using only keywords to communicate are able to express what they are learning. It is so powerful watching my students have ownership and control over their own learning. This week Evan said, "oo what am i learning today? I like learning about vowels." 

In special education it is so important to assume the best in our students because every day my students surprise me. 

I have shared a template for sharing learning intentions in a previous post which you can see here.

Making Words - Mini Lessons

I have a student in my class (Evan) who is a very confident reader but when it comes to writing tasks or attempting to spell words he shuts down and refuses to complete his work.
This term i have been reading a book called "Making Words" which entails a very specific phonemic awareness and spelling programme.
This week i am going to implement a mini-lesson after each guided reading session for Evan to practice making words. The book breaks down each step with small tasks which doesn't require Evan to write but uses his letter-sound awareness to make words.
The book has set lessons however i am going to split one lesson across the week so that Evan has time to process what he has done and doesn't get overwhelmed with the workload.

Ending Sounds

Many of the students in my classroom have communication or speech difficulties. This makes reading and writing difficult for them as they are unable to pronounce or hear all of the sounds in the word. It takes a lot longer for my students to learn their initial word sounds as they are unable to verbalise many sounds. It is important to take this into consideration when teaching students who have speech difficulties.
Two of my students can now identify the initial sound at the start of an unfamiliar word. This is evident in their reading and writing as they will use beginning sound cues to guess what the word might be or write the first letter down when writing a story. These two students are now working on identifying the middle and ending sounds and they are also learning to make CVC words. While the student in this video isn't one of my target students, i have been using similar activities with James. Both students have speech difficulties.
 In this video this student has to identify if he can hear the "n" sound at the beginning or the end of the word. I decided to use these activities to introduce him to sounds at the end of the word. I felt that teaching them the sound at the end would be the best next step rather than middle sounds. Medial sounds are often vowels which my students struggle to identify as they sound similar. 

Where to from here?

This week I attended our CoL Hui where all of the teachers in our CoL displayed our inquires. It was a great opportunity to share my journey with other professionals and see how other teachers were progressing with their inquiries. What a wonderful experience to reflect on my practice and my inquiry as many of the visitors to my display asked me some interesting and valid questions; the main question?

My students are improving and moving up reading levels (2/3 students). If they haven't shifted reading levels then they have increased their sight word knowledge and gaining confidence in reading. The strategies that i have implemented to improve the Key Competency - Managing Self are working. My students can work for longer periods of time and are more willing to take risks with their reading. Below is an outline of what i am wanting to achieve by the end of the term with my students reading and behavior management. As each student is so different there is not a "one size fits all" approach.
I will update my blog on the success of the following:

• James : attempt to sound out a word he doesn't know. I am going to try Elkonin boxes with him as seen on another colleagues blog. James will say "i don't know" and ask "whats this" when coming across a unfamiliar word. 
• Evan : Attend 2x mainstream classes a week for reading. At the moment Evan goes once a week. He is allowed to return to class whenever he is ready as sometimes he doesn't cope. I will implement some form of communication symbol that he can show to the support person to indicate that he wants to leave the class. 
• Toby : implement a programme suggested by my schools SLT to teach Toby comprehension. At the moment Toby can point to symbols to answer questions but often repeats your question rather than answering the question. He has to be taught how to answer a question. Currently he can answer "who" questions with support. 

Morning Message

Each day I write a message to my students. They help to choose a greeting at the start of the message , they use words from the word wall to help to spell words and assist with sounding unfamiliar words out. Once the message has been written the students read the message back. Sometimes we read the message in a funny voice.
My students are always engaged during morning message as they enjoy helping me to write the message and finding out what my message will say.
Some students with learning difficulties associate writing with specific writing tasks, the morning message shows them a functional writing task that has purpose as it conveys an important message. They can also see the link between writing and reading.

High Frequency Words - Results

I have always had a word wall in my classroom however last year i felt that my students never used it or even recognized the words on the wall. This year I have worked on using the word wall effectively in order to recognise their high frequency words. At Sommerville we have our own list of high frequency words that we use to test the students on their word recognition.
As part of my inquiry i set out to implement different games that we played every day that would include all of the students with their different skills. Some students work on recalling the word and putting it under the correct letter and other students are using their chosen word in a sentence, finding words that rhyme or finding out how many syllables in the word. This way i can include all of my students in the same game.
Here are the results of using the word wall daily for two of my students who I have selected as part of my inquiry.
* Please note that Evan's results are not shown as he can already recall all words in word list 1-4.