Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
Just like all other aspects of a healthy lifestyle our educational life should be balanced.
It is important that our students are engaged in the learning process and thriving during their
time with us. Balanced Literacy is an incredible toolbox waiting to be unlocked in our
classrooms. It is crucial that the education our students receive will encourage them to grow
leaps and bounds in reading and writing with a strong leadership role in their own education.
While my current teaching position might not be exactly what I would find in an ideal
world or dream situation, I feel it is important for me to use the Commitment to Balanced
Literacy as a reflection on my current teaching position. I am hoping that through my Balanced
Literacy Action Plan from EDU 640 and this document that I will be able to make some solid
changes in my Literacy plan for the upcoming school year. I know that not everything will take
effect immediately, but I am hoping for a number of changes right off the bat this year and have
a few tricks up my sleeve that I will just slowly add to the mixing pot. While keeping my focus on
the Balanced Literacy aspect of my ELA and Geography curriculum I am hoping to also add in
the six Ts of effective literacy instruction.
Balanced Literacy according to the Edmonds School District1 has a number of essential
elements. The district describes in detail for the reader the aspects that they assume the
teacher will include in their balanced literacy program. Although this is a K-6 document these
elements are deemed essential by Edmonds: Modeled, Shared, Guided and Independent
Reading, Modeled, Shared, Guided and Independent Writing, Inquiry Circles, Investigation or
Writing to learn, and Listening and Speaking. These are certainly elements that should be
infused into all grade levels not necessarily just from K-6th grade. When researching these
above mentioned skills it is clear the positive impact that these techniques will have on student
learning.
1 "K-6 Literacy A Balanced Literacy Program - ICSDELF." 2012. 3 Jul. 2014 (page 5)
<http://icsdelf.wikispaces.com/file/view/Edmonds%20BalancedLit.pdf/309516428/Edmonds
%20BalancedLit.pdf>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
Reading has always played a huge role in my life, I am an avid reader. I would be elated if my
students depart my classroom with a joy for reading after the year of English Language Arts
instruction with me. I work to instill that joy with Modeled Reading through read alouds and
interactive discussion that helps to engage the students in the book as well.2 By choosing high
interest level text for both the students and myself I am helping to ensure that we are all
involved in this reading process. I am aware that not every read aloud fits everyone and I am
willing to find error in my selection by abandoning a book if necessary. Often I have found in my
end of the year surveys that this can be one of the most memorable activities for the students.
Listening to another read I feel is reminiscent of our past when we were read to as a child
however, I do not feel that it is something we can ever grow out of.
Shared reading might be one of the more elementary skills3 but that doesnt mean it
couldnt be used with my teen and preteen students4. Shared reading uses a text that both the
teacher and the students are able to see. Shared reading could be done as a whole group,
small group, or on an individual basis. The way that I could see my students benefiting from this
type of an activity could be using text that they arent as familiar with such as poems or nonfiction texts. There are an incredible amount of text features that need to be discussed in nonfiction texts which are often overlooked by our overzealous readers anxious to get onto the next
step. Using this shared reading strategy could benefit all of the readers in my classroom to
ensure that they are getting the most out of the text, a gentle reminder will help to refresh past
lessons and create stronger readers.
2 "Teacher Read-Aloud That Models Reading for Deep ..." 2011. 3 Jul. 2014
<http://www.readwritethink.org/professional-development/strategy-guides/teacher-read-aloud-that30799.html>

3 "Shared Reading A Critical Component of Balanced ..." 2010. 3 Jul. 2014

<http://www.k12reader.com/shared-reading-%E2%80%93-a-critical-component-of-balanced-literacyinstruction/>

4 "Strategies that Work: The Benefits of Shared Reading." 2004. 3 Jul. 2014
<http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/strategy/strategy008.shtml>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
Using a smaller group setting will help to create a successful guided reading lesson5. I
will work to improve this aspect in my classroom this year. The teacher uses the lesson to meet
the needs of the students, it could be a planned lesson or it could be something that happens to
come up during the time together that is a teachable moment. The video that is cited here is an
excellent example of guided reading working in the classroom. The teacher Jenna Ogier is
incredibly organized and gives an outstanding example of how to make this work in a real
classroom setting. This process would take an incredible amount of management on the
teacher's part and also an incredible amount of modeling in order to have the procedures flow.
This video will be an incredible reminder for me if I need a good reminder the procedures that I
must follow as the teacher to have a successful guided reading time.
We are lucky in our school district to have a built in time for D.E.A.R. (Drop Everything
And Read) once weekly in our Morning Meeting time. The students are allowed to read any sort
of reading material that they wish during this time (as long as it is school appropriate.) My
personal favorite is that all staff members are also required to DEAR during this 30 minutes on
Thursday mornings. That is all staff from the Secretaries on up to the Principal. The students
think that it is amazing when other staff members travel to our room to read their book and
share in the reading experience together. Million Words states the case for independent reading
in this brief article6 stating increasing the students volume of reading is one of the most
important levers in increasing their achievement. All classrooms at the Ashland Middle School
are working together to create more time for students to enjoy reading.
In the past few years I have noticed a significant growth in my students writing abilities
from the time that they have entered the door to their transition to the eighth grade. I always
5 "Guided Reading with Jenna Complete Lesson - Teaching ..." 2012. 3 Jul. 2014
<https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/guided-reading-differentiation-system>

6 "Why Independent Reading? | Million Words Campaign." 2013. 3 Jul. 2014

<http://millionwords.org/why-independent-reading/>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
work to incorporate an ample amount of writing time in every class session. This ranges from
independent journal writing time to assigned writings. I have enjoyed modeled writing with my
students since often they are able to see the real process behind the writing.7 There are times
when I cant figure out an excellent way to begin or conclude my example and it helps them to
realize that these hurdles that we sometimes face in writing are not only a burden that they face.
One side effect that I havent enjoyed from this modeled writing is often it becomes a cookie
cutter for the paragraphs or documents written by the students. Some ways that I could work to
remedy this would be to turn off the SMARTboard after our mini lesson, use a different prompt
for my writing, or encourage the students to be imaginative with their own writing and stray away
from the mold. I am not sure how successful those methods would be, I guess it isnt that
painful to read 75 well written paragraphs even if they do have a lot of similarities. That is much
better than reading 75 poorly written paragraphs any day! I have found that modeled writing
has helped some very valuable mini lessons to pop up in my classroom that have made positive
impacts on student writing.
By using shared writing students have much more of a say as to what is happening
during the writing session. This article has an excellent idea of Write with Me8 a quick
brainstorming, discussion and writing session that crams everything into a 20 minute chunk of
time. Now this might not necessarily work for all shared writing however for a quick session or
refresher this would be ideal. Shared writing gets the students ideas down on both the
teachers SMARTboard and students paper. It is a great way for them to look back and
remember the process that needs to take place in order to submit great writing assignments.

7 "Shared / Modeled Writing." 2006. 3 Jul. 2014

<http://www.sachem.edu/dept/curriculum/languagearts/sharedmodeledwriting.html>

8 Simmons, J. "Writing Instruction in the Secondary Classroom: Surviving ..." 2011.

<http://www.nwaea.k12.ia.us/documents/filelibrary/90_90_90/Simmons_Secondary_Writers_B3B7E38339
A8D.pdf>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
Guided writing will be new to me this year. I feel that I have done this in a more one on
one type of situation but I feel it would help me to grow as an educator to expand this practice.
Guided writing is similar to Guided reading in that groups are formed that have certain skill sets
that the students need to work on. For example, if I am reading over journal entries and I am
seeing lousy vocabulary that could be a mini lesson that I work on with a small group. We could
talk about skills and strategies to improve their vocabulary. I am very excited about the apps
section in Google I will spend some time monkeying with them this summer to introduce some
to my students. It is important for them to realize what an asset technology can be to help them
to perfect their writing skills. Guided writing will not only help me to become a better teacher of
writing but also to help my students to have a better grasp on their strengths as a writer.
When my students arent directed in which way they should go with their writing I often
see some very nice results. When students are working on independent writing there are times
when I give them a prompt that they have the option of using. I have students that will use the
prompt virtually every time and I have others that would rather write about something going on
in their life. I normally give the option to share since this will often give us a good learning
experience. We can hear how others formulate their thoughts into sentences and often the
students are able to self correct as they are reading aloud to the class. These are both valuable
activities to help promote better writing for my students.
Inquiry Circles are another new activity for my classroom this year. I feel that this will be
a perfect pairing for some of the read alouds that I have planned for this upcoming year. Inquiry
circles can be a quick research activity or a more drawn out task with a final product. Open
classroom discussion must take place and successful group work should be modeled in order to
have productive inquiry circles. It is critical that the students are able to work within their circle
group with the same research interests. I am truly looking forward to exploring this process
more to figure out what sort of questions the students come up with and how they are able to

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
work as a group to find a meaningful answer. In my eyes, inquiry circles are an excellent
opportunity for the students to take their learning into their own hands and select something that
they personally (or as a small group) would like to know more about. This particular document
seems to be talking a bit more like an group led guided reading group instead of a teacher led
guided reading group. 9 This youtube video is a quick version of what we observed in our class
session. 10 I would really like to get the book that I feel would lead me through a bit better of a
step by step process regarding the inquiry circles so I am not feeling in the dark (I plan to call
the company to see if they would donate a copy to the Ashland Middle School.)11 Overall, I feel
that this inquiry based process is an excellent tool from our literary toolkit.
Writing to learn or investigation is one step that I feel has improved for me over the past
three years. I have been working year by year to improve and tweak the research process to
allow the students to become more involved in the procedure and to ensure that they are getting
more educational benefit out of the process. The students, as discussed in the Edmonds
School District document12, use reading and writing skills as tools for learning. How exciting
that they are getting lifelong learning skills in a quick middle school project. Then students need
to get their research, compile the research, and have a format ready for what their project will
look like. These steps will take modeling and guidance to alleviate any confusion. Our students
can get lost in the wealth of knowledge on the web just as we are able to as adults. It is
important to have mini lessons to touch on these skills. I plan to set up mini conferences to
9 "Inquiry Circles - ohiotesolmoodle.org." 2011. 4 Jul. 2014
<http://ohiotesolmoodle.org/2011/handouts/d/d41_inquiry%20circles%20ohio%20TESOL.pdf>

10 Heinemann Publishing. "Teaching Elementary Reading with Inquiry Circles - YouTube." 2010. 4 Jul.
2014 <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klVPk7q6Kww>

11 "Comprehension & Collaboration: Inquiry Circles in Action ..." 2008. 4 Jul. 2014
<http://www.amazon.com/Comprehension-Collaboration-Inquiry-Circles-Action/dp/032501230X>

12 "K-6 Literacy A Balanced Literacy Program - ICSDELF." 2012. 4 Jul. 2014

<http://icsdelf.wikispaces.com/file/view/Edmonds%20BalancedLit.pdf/309516428/Edmonds
%20BalancedLit.pdf>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
discuss with students their strengths and weaknesses on the project to make sure that is
changed and help them to become more successful in future projects. This will be a very
memorable learning experience for the students since they are working on finding answers to
their own questions.
Listening and speaking have always been a struggle in my middle school classroom.
Seventh grade students are just becoming aware of differences and seem to become more and
more self conscious. By starting out the year right with activities included in every class period
where students are communicating with their peers this will help to relieve some of those
anxieties. It could be a simple discussion on their favorite school supply to start the year off or
what questions they have regarding the novel that we are reading. I have a number of
resources in my classroom that are designed to take some of the pressure off of the students
life and more into their ideas. When talking about their life it is very easy to see the haves
from the have nots. I try to steer clear of the more personal questions to help to give everyone
a more equal playing field. If the students are taught great listening and speaking techniques
this will help to create much more meaningful presentations later on in the year. It is a life skill
for the students to be able to focus on a peer and connect with what they are presenting on.
These skills will help them to become more marketable in the job force and join into
conversations with gusto.
During the course of this essay I have spent time reflecting on the article by Richard
Allington, it would be neglectful not to comment on his article, What Ive learned about effective
reading instruction from a decade of studying exemplary elementary classroom teachers.13
There are countless articles stemming off of his ideas and I enjoy this summarized version

13 "Allington What Learn.. - Arizona State University." 2012. 5 Jul. 2014

<http://www.public.asu.edu/~diann/Resources/Readings/Allington%20What%20Learned%20RDG
%2052578.pdf>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
helping to keep the ideas a bit on the simple side14 this version by Susan Close combines the
ideas of Allington with other scholars to create a more succinct description for the reader. The
six Ts of effective literacy instruction as stated by Allington must be incorporated into the
classroom; Time, Texts, Teach, Talk, Tasks, and Test. In order to create a successful balanced
literacy environment in my classroom it is crucial that these six Ts are integrated.
Time is the first T in Allingtons article, stressing that getting rid of the stuff and sticking
to good reading and writing is integral to the success of our students. Currently in our school
we have a ninety minute block set up for our core classes. I am hoping to during this upcoming
school year convince all teachers to include more reading and writing into their curriculum. I
know that having all subject areas work to infuse more reading and writing into their curriculum
will show us great results. I feel that many of my colleagues would be able to relate to this article
15

written by David Gooblar that has a bit of a sarcastic tone to begin and discusses with the

reader, The Obvious Benefits of In-Class writing Assignments.

It is also critical to allow students to self select a majority of the text they read. I know
that in some ELA sections at my Middle School the teacher enforces that the student must be
reading at their lexile level. For some students this can be an excellent motivator and for others
it just hardens the fact for them that reading is a struggle and not worth their time. I would like
to seriously talk with teachers at the school to help them realize that having the students self
select a text is an important part of creating lifelong readers. In Allingtons writing regarding the
texts he states that in many cases exemplary teachers too often had to spend both their
personal time and personal funds to locate and/or purchase the texts needed to effectively
teach. This is a sad statement and I hope to write a grant this summer through the Meemic
14 "Six T's of Effective Reading Instruction - Dr. Thao." 2012. 5 Jul. 2014
<http://thao.cmswiki.wikispaces.net/file/view/6Ts+of+Effective+Literacy+Instruction.pdf>

15 "The Obvious Benefits of In-Class Writing Assignments | Vitae." 2014. 5 Jul. 2014
<https://chroniclevitae.com/news/588-the-obvious-benefits-of-in-class-writing-assignments>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
Foundation to help to right that wrong.16 Another hurdle that we have to face this year is a new
textbook series adoption for both Math instruction and ELA. I am hoping that the other
educators will realize that this is not an end all be all for Math and ELA instruction. I know that
we are lucky to have great educators so I hope they will continue to challenge and modify for all
of our students.
The teaching that we do in the classroom is critical for the students to have active
instruction. The teacher needs to create time to model the ways to work on improving reading
and writing skill sets. Modeling of these skills could include mini lessons of different steps to
travel through when stuck on a word, thinking used while reading and summarizing skills to
name a few of Allingtons crucial modeling skills listed.17 Students and teachers must be
engaged in the learning process so that modeled skills infused into the teaching are consumed
by the learner.
The discussions that are held within the walls of our classroom are telling of the
classroom management and the learning that is going on. If the teacher is the only one doing
the talking there is an incredibly good chance that the students are not 100 percent engaged in
their learning. In order to help to create 21st century learners we need to incorporate
educational conversations into our learning environment, whole group discussions, small group
discussions and even partner work with the teacher being a part of all of these conversational
discussions. A great take away from this section for me was, True conversation cannot be
scripted or packaged.
When Allington observed the exemplary teachers in the classrooms he noticed more
time for the tasks. When the class would work on a novel they would actually read the entire
16 "Meemic Foundation - Meemic | Insurance Exclusively for ..." 2014. 5 Jul. 2014
<https://www.meemic.com/the-meemic-foundation.aspx>

17 "Allington What Learn.. - Arizona State University." 5 Jul. Page 744 2014
<http://www.public.asu.edu/~diann/Resources/Readings/Allington%20What%20Learned%20RDG
%2052578.pdf>

Commitment to Balanced Literacy

Education 640
Anna Radke
novel not just snippets to show them what a good book looked like. Some interpretations of the
CCSS seem to say that you should do the opposite, fill the class time with short stories, timed
writings and selections from novels. Allington mentions that often these exemplary teachers
went against the grain and didnt worry about following along page by page in the book and
rejected scripted lessons. The tasks that were selected by these teachers included student
choice projects, engaged students and incredible ownership of their work.
Finally, the assessment piece that seems to drive so many aspects of our districts these
days. When the students were evaluated in these classrooms it was based on effort and
improvement rather than achievement status.18 When students are graded based upon their
abilities many students dont have to put forward as much effort to earn their high grades and
the lower achieving students seem to stay at their norm. Using rubric based grading will help to
create situations where students are able to show where they had started and what growth was
noted as opposed to their shortcomings. Another noteworthy point that Allington makes is the
lack of test preparation activities in these highly successful classrooms.19
Although it is obvious that I have my work cut out for me in the years to come, this
project and the action plan for balanced literacy have given me a renewed sense of where I
need to travel with my teaching. This all boils down to knowing my subject matter, creating
genuine learning experiences for my students, and creating students that are confident and
successful readers and writers. As I work to ensure that the literacy program at my school is
balanced I can reflect back on this document to make sure that we are taking the right steps in
our classroom, school and district.
18 "Allington What Learn.. - Arizona State University." Page 745. 5 Jul. 2014
<http://www.public.asu.edu/~diann/Resources/Readings/Allington%20What%20Learned%20RDG
%2052578.pdf>

19 "Allington What Learn.. - Arizona State University." Page 746. 5 Jul. 2014
<http://www.public.asu.edu/~diann/Resources/Readings/Allington%20What%20Learned%20RDG
%2052578.pdf>

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