Literacy to Enhance Learning and Achievement Gerard Bossard

Literacy to Enhance Learning and Achievement Gerard Bossard bossardg@yahoo. com

Outcomes • Attendees will be able to apply fundamental principles of literacy to individual lessons, unit -plans and assessments for all disciplines. Furthermore, administrators and curriculum supervisors will gain a deeper understanding of how literacy not only can be applied across disciplines, but also how it relates to the Common Core Curriculum.

Rationale • In our internet and electronic age, information on any and all subjects can be found instantaneously, with the click of a mouse. Information gathering, then, is not growing as the focus of education - literacy is. These presentations will make literacy across disciplines (and applied to multiple educational contexts) understandable, relevant and applicable.

ACTIVITIES • Problem-based learning, team-building activities, and the demonstration of literacy scaffolding will all be employed. Additionally, fundamentals of reading and writing will be presented in a unique and student-relevant way. Attendees will leave the presentations will a firm grasp of how literacy is created, scaffolded and applied to multiple educational contexts.

Description • "Literacy to Enhance Learning and Achievement" is a hands-on, activitybased workshop that applies to all educational contexts. Attendees will leave the presentations will a firm grasp of how literacy is created, scaffolded and applied. ”

Bio • Through this work, school districts have seen tremendous gains in student achievement and student-empowering through literacy. The literacy concepts that will be explained here jhave led to tremendous gains on all of the following standardized tests: Grade Eight Proficiency Assessment (GEPA), NK ASK (4 th through 8 th grade)for Math, Science and English, Advanced Placement, SAT and ACT.

Why are test scores important?

1) Student self-esteem: When it comes to any test, children feel good about themselves … when they pass.

2) It is good to know that students possess vital academic content knowledge, and can perform at or above National standards.

3) Reputation for being a good school: Effects school budgets and real estate prices.

Federal Law: “NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND” ACT of 2001 (NCLB) “This new law represents some of the most significant changes to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) since it was enacted in 1965” (NJ State Dept. Power Point), and is STILL IN EFFECT under PARCC and other accountability measures.

“So where is our school? ”

2006 4 th Grade Lang. Arts Total 91. 5 (DFG 85. 9) GE 94. 6 SE 72. 7 Adv Pro 6. 7 (DFG 3. 5) 4 th Grade Math Total 87. 7 (DFG 86. 7) GE 90. 2 SE 81. 8 Adv Pro 41 (DFG 43. 8) 4 th Grade Science Total 86. 7 (DFG 89) GE 89. 1 SE 63. 6 Adv Pro 24 (DFG 25. 4) 2005 Total 86. 2 (DFG 86. 6) GE 93. 6 SE 57. 1 Adv Pro 6. 3 (DFG 4. 1) Total GE SE Adv Pro 82. 1 (DFG 85. 4) 88 64. 2 29. 5 (DFG 34. 8) Total 91. 7 (DFG 88. 5) GE 93. 6 SE 80 Adv Pro 31. 4 (DFG 31. 8)

2006 8 th Grade Lang. Arts Total GE SE Adv Pro 8 th Grade Math Total 78. 8 (DFG 72. 1) GE 89. 6 SE 53. 3 Adv Pro 19. 7 (DFG 20. 8) 8 th Grade Science Total GE SE Adv Pro 84. 8 (DFG 80. 6 ) 95. 9 60 12. 1 (DFG 7. 7) 90. 9 (DFG 87. 2) 100 73. 3 37. 9 (DFG 23. 1) 2005 Total GE SE Adv Pro 79. 4 (DFG 79. 4) 93. 1 38. 1 9. 3 (DFG 7. 7) 70. 1 (DFG 70. 6) 80. 8 38. 1 16. 5 (DFG 19. 9) Total 86. 6 (DFG 87. 2) GE 97. 3 SE 57. 2 Adv Pro 30. 9 (DFG 23. 5) 2004 Total 81. 4 GE 96. 9 SE 37. 5 Adv Pro 2. 3 Total GE SE Adv Pro 66. 6 83. 1 11. 8 19. 5 Total 83. 9 GE 93. 9 SE 70. 6 Adv Pro 20. 7

2004 /2005 – Neighboring Schools Comparison 4 th Grade LA A 86. 2 B 88 C 84. 4 D 61. 6 4 th Grade Math A 82. 1 B 83. 7 C 87. 1 D 70 8 th Grade LA A 79. 4 A 70. 1 B 81. 1 C 72. 2 8 th Grade Math C 57. 9 D 63. 6 D 46. 7 In ’ 04/’ 05, School A had NO instances of the highest score, in ANY category, at ANY grade level.

Percentage Passing 4 th grade Language Arts, ’ 05’ 06 A 91. 5 B 76. 6 C 84 th 5 Grade Language Arts D 80 87. 2 90. 4 6 th Grade Language Arts 76. 4 86. 7 79. 2 93. 4 79. 1 96. 3 7 th Grade Language Arts 67. 7 85. 2 Grade Language Arts 71. 5 8 th 84. . 8 85. 5 75 Percentage Passing Grade Math, ’ 05/’ 06 60. 2 4 th 87. 7 76. 6 80 86. 3 5 th Grade Math 85. 4 82. 4 83. 8 Grade Math 69. 2 7 th Grade Math 74. 1 8 th Grade Math 74. 1 6 th 74. 5 58. 4 75. 3 74. 4 78. 8 69. 1 50 65. 2 65. 6 47. 4 School A in ’ 05/’ 06: FIRST in 7 of 10 categories; FIRST or SECOND in 9 of 10

Literacy Defined “Literacy is the ability to think, as well as know how to acquire knowledge for thinking and communicating. Literacy is more than the acquisition of a specific, predetermined set of skills in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and viewing. It is also recognizing one’s own purposes for thinking and communicating (through print or nonprint, verbal or nonverbal means) and being able to use one’s own resources to achieve those purposes. “( New Jersey Core Curriculum Content Standards 3 -1)

Being a fan of simplicity, let me propose the following definition: Literacy is the ability to understand, to communicate that understanding to others, and to be fully aware of how you did these two things so you can do them again, any time you want, for the rest of your life.

The two most prominent manifestations of literacy are, and likely always will be, reading and writing; therefore, these two aspects of literacy will receive the bulk of the attention here. It is important to remember, however, that we, and the students we teach, do far more all day than reading and writing. We do indeed view and listen and speak, as the Common Core suggests, and many are the correlations between reading/writing and the interpretation/creation of art and of non-artistic information, but we also formulate, and extend, and probe, and synthesize, and evaluate, and infer, and question, and so on. And we do these things in all school subjects, and in life, for that matter. So, when we teach, if we want to be deeply effective in a life-long way, we must teach these cognitive skills along with all the regular content of our disciplines.

And it just so happens, in an interesting paradox, that the best way to teach something as abstract as cognitive skills is to make them concrete. This can only happen when we are fully aware, in a highly specific way, of how we, as individuals, “cognate, ” so that we may teach this process back to our students. What I am suggesting, then, is that you use this presentation in concert with an investigation of how you, yourself, learn: investigate, in a detailed and reflective way, the processes that you go through when you read and write. Teach these processes to your students; these are what they will take with them into a standardized testing situation, and, in fact, into every situation that calls for literacy skills (i. e. , into every situation in life).

Reading Becomes Writing When we stop and think about which happened first when we were very little, an investigation of reading or an investigation of writing, most of us would recall that an adult reading to us was the first contact we had with literacy; we did not do any writing until a few years later. When we stop and consider this order, reading then writing, it makes sense: it helps to be familiar with the symbols (letters) that, when put together, form ideas, before we start to write such symbols ourselves, and it helps to be familiar with the organizational structure of literature so that we can later see the same structure in the notions of “beginning/middle/end, ” “introduction/ development/conclusion, ” “introduction/inciting action/rising action/climax/falling action/resolution-denouement. ” So, let’s begin this present investigation in the same order, with a discussion of what it means to be able to “read” and, then, what it means to be able to “write. ”

It seems that two answers arise in relation to the initial question. The first definition of reading that was implied to us when we were small children was that it was to be able to assign certain sounds to symbols (that we learned were called letters) and to be able to put these sounds together to form what we learned were called “words. ” It was then told to us that these words, when strung together, were called “sentences, ” that these sentences strung together were called “paragraphs, ” and that these paragraphs when strung together were called “stories. ” Reading at this level essentially meant reading aloud and interpreting symbols phonetically. It did not, necessarily, mean understanding what you read. Later, when we started to engage in “reading comprehension” activities, it started to become clear that our teachers wanted us to figure out what someone was telling us; essentially, reading became thinking – deducing, inferring, analyzing, synthesizing, evaluating, extrapolating and more. All of these terms of cognition were essentially to lead to one goal - understanding.

Understanding what, someone might ask. Well, simply put: what someone is telling us, in writing. That’s it, and that’s all. Someone is telling us something, and our job is to figure out what that something is, and all of the subsets of reading, all of the little clues are all to lead back to the same point: What, specifically, is this person trying to tell me, whether it’s Peggy Parish in Amelia Bedelia for Mayor or Immanuel Kant in Critique of Pure Reason. And the beauty of “Language Arts Literacy” is that, in terms of writing, the student who attempts to understand, quite simply, becomes that one who attempts to be understood. So, the simplest (and therefore easiest and clearest) definition of writing is that it is communicating. Now, as we know, there are seemingly myriad subsets of what it means to be able to write well, and some of these will be broached later. For now, however, let us consider simplicity to be beauty: Writing is communicating; reading understanding what has been communicated. is

"Mama Is a Sunrise, “ by Evelyn Tooley Hunt When she comes slip-footing through the door, she kindles us like lump coal lighted, and we wake up glowing. She puts a spark even in Papa's eyes and turns out all our darkness. When she comes sweet-talking in the room, she warms us like grits and gravy, and we rise up shining. Even at nighttime Mama is a sunrise that promises tomorrow and tomorrow.

“Mama Is a Sunrise” notes Extended metaphor w/many elements of A. C. A)metaphor B) parallel structure C) simile D) alliteration E) irony F) diction and imagery to CONNOTATION G) allusion H) POV – 1 st person Main idea – Mama is a warm, loving, care-giving, inspiring provider of life, happiness and safety. • metaphor: “sunrise” extended throughout the poem, diction linked to connotations of life, love, care-taking, energy, happiness, protection, renewal • parallel structure in TWO ways: 1) in the physical structure of one long, three short, then two long lines (for each stanza) and 2) in the traditional manner of parallel structure, i. e. , keeping parts of speech the same and in the same order. A. P. of the A. C. – shows STABILITY and SAFETY in CONSISTENCY of structure C) simile: IMAGERY to connotation of WARMTH, PROVIDER, SUSTAINENCE D) alliteration: L sound happy, W like water (clean, lifegiving), G for “grounded” E) irony: “turns out…darkness” – gets RID of darkness (could have chosen “lights up darkness”) – “at night-time…a sunrise” – darkness to light, sadness to joy, death to life F) diction and imagery to connotation to tone and attitude: “slip-footing, kindles, lump coal lighted, wake up glowing, spark even, turns out darkness, sweet-talking, warms, grits and gravy, rise up shining, sunrise, promises tomorrow and tomorrow” G) allusion: “tomorrow and tomorrow” – FLIP of Mac Beth’s existential crisis – not even death can dampen the spirit of “Mama” and the life she gives her children H) POV – 1 st person, “we” makes it personal - warm, familial tone.

Reading Becomes Writing, across Disciplines All reading, regardless of the discipline, can be summed up in one concept: author’s purpose/author’s craft, that is to say, discerning everything an author is trying to tell you (so the term author’s purpose, in this handbook, is broad, referring to all of the manifestations of the notion of “main idea”) and figuring out how the many elements that comprise the literature are creating that message. Let us examine this notion through the prism of one, simple example, from mathematics.

Bob goes on a 40 -mile bike ride every day; he completes the distance in 5 hours. At this rate, how many miles can Bob pedal in 4 hours? If Albert Einstein misunderstands a math question, Albert Einstein is getting it wrong! Find the author’s purpose of each question !!! *** ALL TESTS ARE AT FIRST READING TESTS: IF YOU MISUNDERSTAND A QUESTION, THERE IS NO WAY YOU’RE GETTING IT RIGHT. *** Since standardized math test questions are essentially riddles, wordmazes that entail only some math and mostly reading, thinking and logic, the most important strategy is to RE-WRITE THE QUESTION TO ENSURE THAT YOU UNDERSTAND EVERYTHING. This is the mathematical equivalent of PARAPHRASING when you read in other classes.

Bob goes on a 40 -mile bike ride every Saturday; he completes the distance in 5 hours. At this rate, how many miles can Bob pedal in 4 hours? 40 miles in 5 hours, SO ? miles in 4 hours? Solve in the SIMPLEST way possible and convert using the MOST simple language and math. Proportion (a mathematical ANALOGY): 40 is to 5 as X is to 4. 40 times 4 = 160 ; 160 divided by 5 = 32. In 4 hours, if travelling at the same speed, Bob will go 32 miles.

Finding the Author’s Purpose through the Author’s Craft, primarily DICTION, the WORDS the author uses. Go to DENOTATION and CONNOTATION. Find the PATTERN of denotation and connotation; this pattern WILL BE the main idea of the piece. (*** The same COGNITIVE PROCESS happens in math when “solving for x”: You solve for X by noticing the logic of everything AROUND; in BOTH disciplines you find what is missing by finding the PATTERN of what is there. ) Next example: Social Studies

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers[…]. “ Diction/Language: What is the reason (or reasons) for the frequent use of the upper case? What are we to make of the tone, and what can we infer from the tone about the nature of the document’s creators and their relationship to the document’s audience? Who is the audience? Why do the authors of the document speak in generalities, use broad statements about humanity, ones that sound like philosophical tenets and that evoke a “Creator”? What are the key words in this document, ones that lead the reader to the author’s intention? … I’m sure you see the point. Now, would teaching students how to ask these types of questions help students understand the historical context and, therefore, the historical content of the document that much more deeply? Of course it would.

Glass Menagerie - Mini Essay Demonstration Task: Define “egocentrism” and then demonstrate how it relates to Amanda Wingfield from Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie. Self-centered, unable to see others’ perspectives, constantly concerning oneself solely with one’s own interests: these are the qualities of an egocentric person. Amanda Wingfield, a principal character from Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie, satisfies the criteria for such a person. In scene two, Amanda demonstrates her egocentrism when she refers to her daughter Laura’s affliction as “a little defect — hardly noticeable” (45). Amanda completely fails to realize that to Laura, the crippling attack of pleurosis is hardly a “little defect, ” but rather, one that has caused great emotional pain and shyness in the young woman. Further, the fact that earlier in the play Amanda brags incessantly about her “seventeen gentleman callers” while failing to recognize how sad this is making Laura (the young woman has had NO gentlemen callers), also points to the mother’s self-centeredness (33).

Mini-Essays, or, Demonstrated, Logical Connections Example: Chemistry – Law of Conservation and Calorie The law of conservation of energy states: Energy can be neither created nor destroyed. This law implies, then, that energy changes forms. By examining the concept of calorie in relation to this first law of thermodynamics, the law takes a concrete, more easily discernible form. Calorie is defined as the quality of heat required to raise the temperature of one gram of water by one degree Celsius. The law of conservation can be seen in this definition in that heat is indeed energy, and when it raises the temperature of water by any measure, the quantity of heat put in is the quantity which comes out. To the quantity which results, we designate the name, calorie. Thus, energy, in this case in the form of heat, is neither created nor destroyed: it changes forms.

Examples of Mini-Essay questions for multiple disciplines: Math: Define ratio then explain its relationship to percentage. American History: Explain the origin, purpose and components of the Magna Carta, and then, integrating specific historical examples, show the document’s relationship to the Constitutional concept of checks and balances. World History: In a well-constructed, well-developed essay, explain the analogies to be drawn between the characters in Animal Farm and their counterparts in the former Soviet Union. Include analogous actions taken by both parties. Biology: Explain how the law of conservation of energy applies to the concept of ecosystem. Give what you believe are the ethical implications for each of us. Physics: Demonstrate how the law of conservation can be found in each of Newton’s laws of motion. Psychology: Explain Freud’s concepts of Id, Ego and Super Ego then demonstrate how they are related to various levels of consciousness. Music, Auto Shop, etc. Verbally DEMONSTRATE how concepts are related to each other.