I liked Gallagher's suggestions on pg 100 about teachers showing that they too get confused, and also "thinking outloud" so that the students can see his thought process. I think that you can relate to students on a more human level when they see that you have to think about texts just like they do. My criticism of his "large chunk reading" is time. I wonder if with all the mandated material we are suppose to teach: Would I even have time to try all this with one piece of literature? When talking about close reading, Gallagher says that you should always read with a pencil in hand and that is something that I learned along time ago! It is absolutely necessary to annotate, make notes, underline (when possible) as you read or points that you think are important enough to remember may get lost in the text. I like adding post it notes to the book so that you are not writing on the book and also so that you can remove them when preparing to write and place them all over your desk as if you had "brainstormed" them.
The last point I want to discuss is the way he talks about a lesson he would do in his class. (pg 108) To walk around the class and see where his students had highlighted and then if he had a common question he could address it as a class, seems like an easy, active, and engaging way to talk about a text. I wouldn't mind trying it with my class.
I like your post it idea. I found myself jotting down page numbers and key ideas on paper when I was reading my book study book and thankfully I didn't have to write a paper about it but I could see how doing that with either post its or note cards would be helpful, especially if you were asked later on to write about something. Good idea.
ReplyDeleteI too use the post-it notes, sticky tabs and highlighting tools as I read. I suppose that is something we maybe should encourage our students to do-if your not already doing so.
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