[MOSAIC] comp. strategies with teachers

[cathymillr at aol.com]

Well said. 


-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Roberts <krober15 at tampabay.rr.com>
To: Mosaic: A Reading Comprehension Strategies Email Group <mosaic at literacyworkshop.org>
Sent: Sun, 30 Sep 2007 7:58 pm
Subject: Re: [MOSAIC] comp. strategies with teachers



I think the biggest thing we can teach teachers at our schools is this:

Everything boils down to COMPREHENSION.

If you lose sight of that, you are missing the point.  My kids (6th, 7th, & 
8th) could identify the parts of a story map, but couldn't tell me what each 
part was all about.  They can answer any questions from the book, but they 
can't tell me what the story was about.  They can identify all the parts of 
a sentence, but if you write one on the board, they can't tell you what it 
means.  All these things have been taught without a focus on comprehension. 
Many of them had good reading teachers last year who taught them about 
predictions, inferences, and makiing connections, but instead of doing those 
things, many can tell me what they mean.

Plus, they've been taught to analyze for every detail so much that they have 
forgotten how to feel.  A couple read THE FAITHFUL ELEPHANTS and told me it 
was okay.  They felt sorry for the elephants, but they didn't really FEEL 
the story.  Same for "Dog of Pompeii" which is a SAAAD story, but few FELT 
anything.  Have we trained them to think so much for testing skills that we 
have taken the empathy from them?

Bill 


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