Sarah Jacobs ELD 307 Professor Rich Oral Language Function

Within a classroom there are many diverse assessments a teacher can conduct. Each assessment varies in topic, approach, and results. With each assessment revealing different things about the class or a particular student, each is to be looked at with equal importance. Recently conducted within my third grade classroom was the Oral Language Assessment. The Oral Language Assessment serves multiple purposes such as allowing the teacher to reflect on their communication with the class as well as how students talk to one another. Throughout each school day many different types of talk occur in the classroom. This assessment helps teachers to break down all of the distinct types of talk and show how they are each used in the classroom. The Oral Language Assessment also shows which talk is motivating for children's literacy and in what areas they can improve their usage of language with their students. The purpose of the oral language observation is to gain a vast understanding of the class as a whole as well as one particular students early literacy development, to identify specific strengths and needs, and to see if there is any progression along the way. While observing the whole class and the same student each visit I focused on literacy skills such as, the ability to share stories, retell events, express feelings, and others that can apply to other subject areas as well. I am currently placed in a third grade classroom at Wicoff Elementary School. There are about twenty-two students in the classroom who are eager to learn. The structure of the classroom revolves around the students having

collaborative relationships with their peers. The students are constantly working in pairs and larger groups during each subject. The students have a book club where each of the members in their group are reading the same book and are sharing their thoughts and findings each class. While working in this book club each of the students are describing the characters feelings, expressing their point of view, and reporting information by using their post-its. The post-its are also used as a tool for asking questions and requesting information that they might have been unsure about. The students are being taught to think outside of the box and to make real life connections, which helps the students in sharing stories and retelling events which may have taken place in their life or another story. The class as a whole shows several significant oral language function, and they are able to apply them in more than one area. When focusing on observing one particular student, I chose a young boy named Joseph. He is in third grade and eight years old. I chose to observe Joseph due to his positive energy in the classroom. He is very interested and happy to be in school. He always walks into the classroom with a smile and ready to be involved. He uses an applied behavior analysis tool to help him stay on track throughout the day. Joseph will use a post-it which has each subject area listed to record his data. Throughout the day Miss Belmonte will have a timer go off every five minutes. Joseph is responsible to record his own data on how he is doing using the post-it. He will give himself a check plus if he is on task. Miss Belmontes classroom is designed to enforce teamwork. The students desks are set up into even number groups, which promote student-to-student

communication and interaction. Joseph sits closest to the front of the room next to one person and across from an empty desk to help him stay on task. Also located in the classroom is a rug where Miss Belmonte performs morning meeting, read-alouds, and mini- lessons. Throughout the day Miss Belmontes students engage in numerous activities and lessons in which many types of communication and languages occur. While observing Joseph I noticed that he consistently makes connections to help him retain the information displayed in several different subjects. For example, during his book club meeting with his group members he would relate the story, Yang the Youngest and his Terrible Ear, to his own interest. He is consistently making self-connections with the main character in the story. Joseph stated to his group members, I have a connection, I wish I could be him he has so many miracles. Having this skill also allows Joseph to share stories of his own. Some of Josephs strengths were shown in this area when the students were assigned to write their own realistic fiction story. He would constantly share stories of him and his younger brother and make connections from one of the books he was reading. Joseph uses his skills in making connections to stay engaged and to better understand the character in the story. Miss Belmonte is reading Winn-Dixie to the class and each day she will call upon students to summarize what has happened so far. Joseph is always raising his hand eager to share and was given the opportunity to summarize the pervious chapter from Winn-Dixie. He was able to share some information but was not clearly in the sequence of events. Also while reading Winn- Dixie, Joseph also showed the ability to think outside the box. The students were asked to turn and talk with their

partner on what they think the tree in Winn-Dixie reminded them of. Joseph right away had a thought. He immediately shared with his partner and then raised his hand to share with the class. He stated, The tree in Winn-Dixie reminds me of the tree in The Lion King because it was a symbol in both storys. I was extremely impressed by this statement and saw that Joseph has the knowledge to think outside the box and again make connections not only with his own interest but also with prior knowledge. Joseph did display the use of other oral language functions such as, expresses feelings, enjoys language for its aesthetic value, and takes leadership. The following functions were not shown as often when observing him. Although Joseph showed the use of expressing feelings he did have trouble describing how the main character in his book was feeling. Joseph used his connection skills to understand the feeling of the character in the book by relating himself to the character and explaining how he would feel. He displayed enjoyment for poetry when working on his personal anthology. He wrote his own poems and chose a poem from a book, which related to him and his interest. For example, the poem he chose was about sports. Lastly, Joseph is constantly raising his hand and wants to be involved by leading morning meetings and his book group. Miss Belmonte implements equality and teamwork throughout each lesson. She has the students use a tool known as, tower talk, to make sure each student is taking turns and everyone is participating. Tower talk is when each student in the group has a different color block and when a student wants to share they put down their block, the next person to share will attach their block and so on.

By analyzing the use of language within a classroom as well as in one particular student, the teachers can edit and implement different teaching strategies incorporating different types of language use. All students learn differently, and by using various types of oral communication many all-learning types will benefit the students. For example, the teacher can have the students incorporate different language functions during book club meetings, creative writing, and morning meetings. Overall, when it comes to the use of oral language within the classroom, all types positively influence the learning environment of the classroom