Topic: Research Abstracts

10-second reviews: National Writing Project, free writing, unfamiliar forms of writing, writing collaboratively.

Abstracts: 

Assessing a National Writing Project summer session: helped teachers become comfortable in writing process instruction. But finds that the teachers were less successful in developing criteria for judging student writing and teaching revision. S Bratcher and EJ Struble, 1994, 142. ………. Finds that although engaging in free writing decreased college students’ apprehension about writing…it id not result in general improvement in writing. ME Sorenson, 1994, 430. ………. Examines the impact on a sampling of college students and composition instructors of five procedures for teaching an unfamiliar form of writing: just describing the form; giving only a model of the form; giving a description and a model; giving a model and an explanation of how it suits the description; and giving a description, a model and an explication. Finds the last procedure was associated with most successful learning of the form…. EA Stolarek, 1994, 430. ………. Examines the efforts of four pairs of faculty colleagues to collaborate on scholarly papers. Considers the question of “authority” within groups, differences in collaborators’ views of research, differences in preferred research methods, and differences in their ways of drafting text. RE Burnett and HR Ewald, 1994, p. 431.

Source: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” Research in the Teaching of English (December 1994), 418-436.

Topic: Research Abstracts

10-second reviews: Images of reading and writing in children’s books, biblical literature, process writing.

Abstracts:

Literacy images in books: ALA Notable Children’s books. Finds significant increases over the period examined of incidents of reading and writing factors, with the writing factor showing the strongest increase. L O Hoffmann,1993, 425. ………. Utilizing surveys, interviews and observations, finds that 1) while 81% of high school English teachers reported it important to teach some Bible literature, only 10% actually do so; 2) high school textbooks averaged 261 literary readings, but only one-fourth of one percent were from the Bible; and 3) no state post-secondary school and only 38% of private post-secondary schools surveyed required Bible literature. MG Wachlin, 1993, 426. ………. Following extensive instruction in process writing—its philosophical, theoretical and implementation factors—finds that 1) student teachers were able to establish the model in their classrooms; 2) teacher changed their attitudes toward writing and writing instruction; and 3) students’ quality of writing improved 30% on holistic assessments. RK Menk, 1993, 427-428.

Source: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” Research in the Teaching of English (December 1994), 418-436.

Topic: Research Abstracts

10-second reviews: reading expository vs. narrative text; homes that fostered literacy, reading problems, college listening course, responding to literature.

Abstracts:

Finds that good and poor readers (7^th and 8^th grade) exhibited more difficulty comprehending expository text than narrative text. MM Ballantyne, 1993, p. 419. ………. Homes that fostered literacy by valuing reading and writing produced more successful readers and writers than did homes that did not (as determined by traditional academic standards). DC Greene, 1993, p. 420. ………. 7 of 8 principals believed factors outside of school cause children’s reading problems. AA Lanning, 1993, p. 421. ………. Taking a listening course at the college level had no effect on students’ academic performance. CW Maugham, 1993, p. 421. ………. Finds rich content of literary talk when children were afforded opportunities to relate their prior knowledge and life experiences to books being read. KJ Wells, 1993, p. 424.

Source: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” Research in the Teaching of English (December 1994), 418-436.

Topic: Phonics--Basal and Whole Language

10-second review: 6 children learned the alphabet beginning in kindergarten through first grade. 3 children learned the alphabet with a basal program. 3 children learned the alphabet in a whole language setting. Which instructional setting was better for learning phonics?

Title: “A comparison of Children’s Development of Alphabetic Knowledge in a skills-based and a  Whole Language classrooms.” E McIntyre and PA Freppon. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1994), 341-417.

Summary: The six children had in common, although in different instructional settings, self-selected reading, some writing and explicit phonic instruction. All the children learned the alphabet although the instructional setting differed.

Comment: The authors say that the results of this study cannot be generalized because other, unknown factors could have contributed to the students’ success in learning the alphabet. Still, it’s comforting to have some evidence that phonics can be developed in a whole language setting.

And, of course, there’s another issue—making sure that students are able to apply the phonics knowledge to decoding words, not simply memorizing the phonics principles. The authors imply that that approach was used in the whole language setting, but not necessarily in the Basal setting.

The study also shows that similar activities can be found in both basal and whole language settings, i.e., self-selected reading and writing, which seem always to be solely attributed to the whole language setting. RayS.

Topic: Educational Criticism

Topic: Educational Criticism

10-second review: One purpose of educational criticism is to observe excellent teachers at work, to describe what they do: “The achievements of skilled teachers are made most visible through informed accounts of their work.”

Title: “Educational Criticism as a Form of Qualitative Inquiry.” DJ Flinders and EW Eisner. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1994), 341 – 357.

Comment: One of the possible negative outcomes of rewarding excellent teachers is the unwillingness of these excellent teachers to give away their secrets.

I supervised the English/language arts in a K-12 district, Treddyfrin-Easttown, in Berwyn, Pa. It continues to be one of the most respected school districts in Pennsylvania, and maybe, in the country. One of its secrets of success was the willingness of all the teachers to share their ideas in resolving problems in teaching. That “culture” of sharing is at risk with awards to excellent teachers.

Just before I retired, I saw some signs of this reluctance to share ideas during a workshop to construct a  writing curriculum for primary grades. This reluctance produced a sub-standard product. The curriculum was revised when several participant in the workshop said they would not put their names on the initial document.

Think carefully before pinning the label “excellent” on individual teachers. The entire staff needs to work together to succeed with the district’s children. If teachers labeled “excellent” will not help others to improve their performance, a majority of children will not be affected by the few “excellent” teachers.

Topic: Change in Blog's Direction

Beginning with the next blog, I will be featuring summaries of research in English in, I hope, intelligible English. After the summaries, I will try to explore how the conclusions of the research can be applied—how I would apply them if I were still teaching. Rays.

Topic: Background Knowledge and the Textbook

10-second review: “The apparent discrepancy between the language and ideas in the text and the prior knowledge and language of the students creates major instructional problems for the teacher and major learning problems for the students.” “Because of life’s experiences, every learner can make some link with a new topic of study.”

Title: “Facilitating Text Processing: The Elaboration of Prior Knowledge.” JA Langer, pp. 149 -162. Reader Meets Author/Bridging the Gap. Ed. JA Langer and MT Smith-Burke. IRA. 1982,

Comment: The more you know about the topic, the more you will understand what you read about a topic. If the topic is remote from the students’ experience, then the teacher needs to build students’ background knowledge leading to their anticipating what they will learn from their reading. This background information can be stimulated by pictures, by quotes, by questions eliciting related experiences and conclude by surveying the chapter: title, sub-title, bold-face headings, first paragraph, first sentence of each intermediate paragraph, last paragraph and formulating question to answer when reading.

The teacher needs to begin by learning what students know about the topic. One time I taught a science class on the circulatory system as a demonstration for a 7^th-grade science teacher. When I asked the students what they already knew about the topic, both the science teacher and I were amazed at what they had already learned about it from previous classes in the elementary schools. They knew so much that there was almost no need for reading the chapter. After surveying, they formulated four questions and quickly found the answers. All you have to do is ask in order to determine how much background students have about the topic. RayS.

Topic: Problems Learning to Read

10-second review: Why do children from non-mainstream homes have difficulty learning to read? Reading is based on oral language. When that differs from the language in school, there will be a problem. “It is our thesis that oral language is directly linked to a child’s cognitive and emotional experience at school and thereby affects the learning to read experience.” Now what do we do about it?

Title: “Situational Differences in the Use of Language.” WS Hall and LF Guthrie. pp. 132-146. In Reader Meets Author/Bridging the Gap. Ed. JA Langer and MT Smith-Burke. IRA. 1982,

Summary: “Despite the efforts of federal and state agencies, countless educators, researchers and social workers, non-mainstream children in America continue to fail. Obviously, a different approach is called for, but exactly what that approach should be is unclear.”

Comment: According to this article, the mismatch between oral language at home and school is the essential problem with Latinos and African-American children learning to read. How can we overcome this problem? And how explain the Orientals, many of whom are quite successful? I suspect the problem of problem readers is more complex than simply a problem of oral language mismatch between home and school. But I agree. That mismatch is part of the problem. RayS.

Topic: Reading and Writing and Young Children

10-second review: Reading and writing need to develop together with young children. “Durkin (1963) found that early readers tend to be early scribblers.” Writing develops naturally.

Title: “Children’s Language and World: Initial Encounters with Print.” JC Harste, et al. p. 105-131. In Reader Meets Author/Bridging the Gap. Ed. JA Langer and MT Smith-Burke. IRA. 1982.

Summary: “Data collected and presented in this paper suggest that preschool children have discovered much about print prior to formal language instruction.”

“Our role as teachers is best thought of as assisting children to discover the predictability of written language in a variety of real world, whole language contexts.”

Comment: OK, this article is theoretical, but it points up the need to develop reading and writing at the same time in the early grades. A reminder? RayS.

Topic: How to Become Involved in Reading an Information Book

10-second review: Two interesting methods for becoming involved in reading an information book you don’t necessarily want to read: Gibbon’s way (author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire), and Daniel Webster’s way.

Source: How to Study in College. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company, 1984, pp. 322, 326.

Summary: Gibbon’s way; “Before starting to read a new book, or before starting to write on any subject, Gibbon would spend hours alone in his study, or take a long walk alone to recall everything that he knew about the subject. As he pondered some major ideas, he was continually surprised how many other ideas and fragments of ideas he would dredge up.”

Comment: The more you know about a topic the more you will understand what you read about it. Now you can’t spend hours preparing yourself, as Gibbon did, to read a book, but you can take some brief time to think about what you know already about the topic. That will help you to raise questions about what you want to know and give yourself a purpose for reading. You will be involved. RayS.

Summary: Daniel Webster’s way was somewhat similar to Gibbon’s method for preparing to read a book: “Before reading a book, he would look at the table of contents, read the preface, and turn some of the pages. Then he would make lists of 1) questions that he expected would be answered in the book; 2) the knowledge he expected to gain from his reading; and 3) where it would take him.

Comment: If you know very little about the topic of the book, start by reading the first and last paragraphs of the information book. The opening paragraph will introduce the topic of the chapter and the final paragraph will summarize the chapter. That technique will build up your background knowledge on the topic and enable you to formulate questions which you will want to answer. RayS.

Topic: Essay Exams

10-second review: 1. Turn the test question into your thesis sentence. No introduction as in the normal composition. Question: “What are the three causes of X War?” Question becomes the thesis, your opening sentence: “The three causes of X War are economic conditions, land expansion and the king’s ambition.” The first set of paragraphs deals with economic conditions leading to war, the next set of paragraphs deals with the need for land expansion and the final set of paragraphs deals with the king’s ambitions. No need for a summary paragraph.

Source: Teaching English, How To…. Raymond Stopper. Xlibris, 2004, pp. 141-143.

Comment; After reading the opening thesis sentence, the instructor knows exactly what the writer is going to say, notes the explanation of each point, and can quickly dispose of the paper. Instructors love students who know how to answer essay questions. They can read or even skim them quickly. RayS.

Topic: Preparing for Exams

One-minute review: Combine lecture and textbook notes into a summary sheet. Find out as much as you can about the exam—types of questions. Try to get copies of last semester’s exam. Anticipate questions that will be asked.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Topic: Purpose of Notes in Textbooks

10-second review: Quick identification of important points. Finish reading the paragraph, section or chapter before making notes. Be concise. Use your own words.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Summary: The author cautions not to underline too much or put rectangles around text too often or put frequent question marks in the margin. If you do, you will, for all intents and purposes, have to re-read the chapter.

Comment: An additional caution: Don’t write lengthy responses to ideas in your textbook. You will find that it will be work to re-read them, and you will sense how shallow they are when you read them at a later time. However, it is not a waste of time to write your reflections on the ideas of the chapter in your learning journal. What do the ideas mean to you? What questions do you have? RayS.

Topic: Studying a Textbook Chapter

One-minute review: Read the first paragraph and then briefly summarize what the paragraph said. Then go on to the next paragraph and do the same. Don’t leave each paragraph until you have satisfactorily summarized briefly what the paragraph said. And so on through the chapter.

Most important! After summarizing each paragraph, and having reviewed your paragraph summaries, spend some time reflecting on what you have read. What questions does the chapter raise about the topic? What do these ideas mean to you? What don’t you understand? You’ll be better able to ask questions if you try to state clearly what you don’t know.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Comment: When you really need to “study” the chapter, then this paragraph-by-paragraph summary will help you follow the chapter’s ideas. RayS.

Topic: Reading the Textbook.

One-minute review: Be sure to read the preface and/or the introduction to the text. The preface is usually a succinct and brief review of how the text was written and organized. The introduction usually reviews some of the major ideas in the text.

Survey each chapter before reading it: title, sub-titles, bold-face headings, first paragraph, first sentence of each intermediate paragraph and the final, summarizing paragraph. Study diagrams, pictures and their captions.

Now that you have surveyed the chapter, what do you want to know when you are reading the chapter? Those questions are your purposes for reading. After you have answered your questions, try the textbook’s questions at the end of the chapter.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Comment: I wish someone had told me about surveying a chapter when I was in school. Like a fool, I tried to read everything as if it were to be memorized. There are times to do that of course, but many times, the survey would have been enough. RayS.

Topic: Cornell System of Note Taking

One-minute review.

Set up page with 2 ½” margin on the left.

6” space for your notes.

2” space at the bottom for a summary.

Take notes in the 6” space. As soon as possible after the lecture, use the left margin to write key words or phrases that summarize the notes you have written in the 6” space. Use those key words to help you review. Summarize that part of the lecture in the 2” margin at the bottom.

The key words or brief phrases in the margin should be succinct and will help you to remember the ideas in the notes.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Comment: Best method I ever learned for note taking. RayS.

Topic: Taking Notes

One-minute review:

1. Don’t doodle or knit during a lecture.

2. Write legibly. Will save you time later. [The amount of time I have spent trying to figure out words that I have written is in the hours. If you can’t write in cursive legibly, print. You can print as fast as you can write in cursive. That’s one piece of research I read long ago. And it’s true. RayS.]

3. Leave blanks for words you missed and ask teacher or students to help you fill in the words later.

4. Use abbreviations for common words.

5. Use an asterisk to mark important ideas.

6. Separate your thoughts from the lecturer’s.

7. Record lecturer’s examples. Will clarify complex ideas.

8. Pay close attention at the end of the lecture. With time fast running out, the lecturer might try to cram a lot of information into a short period of time.

9 Review notes as soon as possible after the lecture.

10. Record your own ideas immediately after the lecture.

Comment: Reflection on what you have heard or read is extremely important. Summarize what the speaker has said. What do the ideas mean to you? What questions has he or she raised? Where can you find the answers to your questions? Start with the Internet. RayS.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Topic: Note Taking: Ten Bad Listening Habits

One-minute review: Bad Listening Habits.

1. Calling a subject dull. Listen even to a dull presentation.

2. Criticizing a speaker. Look for ideas, not to criticize.

3. Overreacting. Listen with the mind, not the emotions.

4. Listening for facts only. Facts are important only in relation to principles, ideas and argument.

5. Outlining everything. Note the speaker’s organizational pattern.

6. Faking attention. Opportunity to gain ideas assembled by the speaker. Finding the same information and ideas would take you considerable time.

7. Yielding to distractions. Concentrate on the speaker’s message.

8. Choosing only easy stuff. Don’t be afraid of following complex ideas.

9. Overreacting to emotional words. Note where the speaker’s prejudices lie.

10. Wasting thought speed. Differentiate supporting material from main ideas, make fast summaries and anticipate the lecturer’s next points.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Topic: Thoughts on Remembering

10-second review: Techniques for remembering what you study.

Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Summary: The best time to review is within the first twenty minutes after learning something or after a lecture.

You’ll forget the ideas in lectures unless you take notes.

You must be interested in the subject if you want to remember it.

In remembering, “use the fewest to do the mostest.” [For example, when trying to remember new words, reduce the meaning to one, two or at most three words. You’ll quickly forget long definitions. RayS.]

Learning is based on what you already know. [In reading education, we say that the more you already  know about a topic, the better you will understand what you read about it. RayS. ]

Organize your learning.

Say aloud in your own words what you want to remember from reading or lectures.

Take five-minute breaks in what you are studying; don’t try to do it all at once.

“If you remember with words alone you’re using only half your brain”; add a diagram or picture.

Mnemonics can help: How do you remember the names of the Great Lakes? “Super Machine Heaved Earth Out.” Lakes Superior, Michigan Huron, Erie, Ontario.

Comment: In spelling, Harry Shefter (Six minutes a Day to Perfect Spelling: see Amazon.com to purchase) shows how to remember words most frequently misspelled by using mnemonics. If people misspell “argument,” they will do so as “arguement.” Shefter suggests the following: “ArGUMent: “Never chew GUM in an arGUMent.” He blows up the “trouble spot” (arGUMent) and adds a silly association: “Never chew GUM in an arGUMent.” He points out that usually words are misspelled because of the indefinite vowel, a vowel which could sound like a, e, i, o, or u. It’s not clearly pronounced. Example “cEmEtEry.” His silly association: “EEE!” She screamed when she passed a cEmEtEry.” Many people pronounce the last “e” in “cemetery” as an “a.” RayS.

Topic: Essential and Advantageous Learning

10-second review: “Essential” learning is for exams. “Advantageous” learning is your wanting to know because you want to know.

Source: Title: How to Study in College. Third Edition. Walter Pauk. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

Summary/Quote: “Essential learning is not voluntary learning based on ‘wanting to know’ and it does not have much sticking power. Advantageous learning stems from an intense intellectual curiosity—a burning desire to learn something, to know. Such learning has great sticking power….” pp. 78-79.

Comment: I might agree with the term “essential” for learning motivated by fear of failing exams. However, I would probably call “advantageous” learning “real” learning. You learn because you want to know something. RayS.