Reflection on class Reading Survey results (for the R.P.I. Course)

 Today I gave my year 10 Humanities class a reading profile survey. Of the 16 responses only 6 students said they like reading at school which is of course of great concern:

The results were similar for the second prompt:

The results for the next prompt were even more concerning:

Prompt 4 showed similar results:

44% of the students think think reading texts in their own time can help them (e.g. make them smarter or more relaxed) which is in stark contrast to the above results.

There was an interesting array of book titles listed as their 3 favourite books.

56% of students said that In the past year none of their teachers have suggested further reading to them. I found this very alarming. I must admit that in the 6 weeks I have had this class I have not suggested further reading to al of the class, just individual students in passing conversation.

The question, 'Is there anything else you want your teacher to know about your feelings toward reading?' was a good reminder to survey students at the start of each semester with this question as there were a variety of answers. 

43% of the students think they are not good at reading which would help to explain why many of them don't like to read.  

The responses to the question, ' Why is it important to be a good reader?' were very heartening and show that there is huge potential for increasing the percentage of students who find reading enjoyable.

With the strategies I have learned during the R.P.I. I am confident a greater percentage of my students will start to enjoy reading and as a result their comprehension and writing skills will improve. 

'Creating in Reading' R.P.I. 08/08/2025

 'Creating in Reading' R.P.I. 08/08/2025

Kaupapa and Shared Pedagogy

Dorothy explored the importance of creativity and how it can be expressed in a variety of forms. Of course, 'Create' is a foundation goal of the Manaiakalani programme:

Here is an excellent acronym to remember when planning/using creativity in the classroom:

I'm very keen to incorporate more project-based learning into the classroom as this will enable students to be more creative.

Explore

Next, we each created a slide, including a sound link to our recitation of a text:

It was great to see such a variety of creativity from everyone and this exercise was a good reminder of how such a simple creative task can produce effective results. 

Why is creativity so important?

Kiri then talked about the importance of creativity as a response to reading. This graphic is a great summary of the different creative modes and this is important to remember in order that every student has the opportunity to express themselves in a way that suits them.

And of course, let's not forget the value that digital tools have in the world of creativity!

Create to show learning

Next, Naomi took us through 'Using create to show learning from reading texts. This graphic has excellent information re planning such activities:

We then got shown many resources such as stencils and graphic organizers which will certainly come in handy for lessons.

We then created a short activity:

A one shot film approach

Next, I made this video (but couldn't upload it to the shared drive):

Metamorphosis

Longer create-to-learn teaching

We then looked at different ways to plan for longer texts. There was much valuable information in this session:

The three activities I learned to do today that I'm keen to use a.s.a.p. are:

• using a slide with a background and text and a sound icon of the student reading the text
• using a slide with a background and a video of a student doing a movie review
• the short slide activity

Today had a phenomenal number of fabulous lesson and planning ideas and we moved at a fast pace so I'll have to revisit the slides. 

Thinking-RPI-18/07/2025

 Thinking-RPI-18/07/2025

We began the day by going into our breakout groups and sharing how our 'vocab' activities went. We all agreed that it was great we had time during day 6 of this course to prepare our vocab activities/lessons as this meant we could get straight into the teaching without losing momentum. 

Dorothy then introduced us to the topic of: 'Smart thinking for smart learners: Kaupapa and Shared Pedagogy'. She pointed out that  of The Four C’s: Critical Thinking, Communication, Creativity, Collaboration, critical thinking is the most important skill to have in the 21st century, and this thinking needs to relate to the following: 

We then looked at AI and how pervasive it is. Of course, AI can be a great aid but it is vital to teach our students to be able to use AI as a positive learning experience and to be able to recognise when AI is creating fake content. I have found AI to be a fantastic tool for lesson planning. It certainly still needs much adapting to make lessons  relevant but is an excellent, time-saving tool.

Kiri then introduced us to higher order thinking. We looked back on levels of thinking:

Here are the levels of higher order thinking:

We then went into our breakout group and did 3 activities on literal, interpretative and evaluative thinking. They were simple yet effective activities that I'll be able to use with my year 9's:

Kiri then focused on analysing text as a basis for unlocking higher order levels of thinking and did a useful activity that involved highlighting parts of a pdf. I didn't even know that tool was available for pdfs! We then looked at 'zooming in (what word does the author use to show us...) and zooming out (what other evidence connects to the big idea of…)' at word levels. 

Next we went into breakout groups-I was in the secondary students group. Naomi and Janet focused on reading and interpreting academic language of text(s). We looked closely at nominalization and at how the use of such words can make it difficult for students to make sense of the text. This can be overcome by teaching students how to break down words and focus on the base word of the nominalization to make sense of the text. 

Naomi then introduced 'Critical Analysis to Read Critically'. We looked at the use of provocation in research and discussion. These role prompts will be useful to use in class discussions. We then looked at quality learner reflection. Next, we went into our breakout groups to have a discussion about the idea of 'Climate change is a hoax', while we took on different roles in the discussion. This was fun and I found it highlighted how a person's viewpoint can change your perception of them. 

Kiri then took us through key approaches to critically reading and challenging text(s). We looked at positioning and the importance of including this in one's teaching:

We were reminded of how planned unit and teaching moments can weave together. The importance of providing opportunities for students to challenge and resist was also covered. We then went onto Canva to create an outline of a lesson we'll teach in regards to this. here is my lesson outline:

I'll be using The Stuntman and the Geologist as the text for this lesson.

This will be my focus for reading  the next 3 weeks:

The highlight of today's session for me was the idea of using provocation as a catalyst for higher level thinking. Not only is it a valuable tool but it can be easily implemented into a variety of lessons.

 

13/06/2025 Vocabulary (and decoding)

13/06/2025  Vocabulary (and decoding) 

We started in our breakout group and it was great to hear others' vocab lessons went. Kiri shared a spreadsheet for people to add their lessons to and this will be a great resource.

I was not aware that by the time children start school, those from high decile families have heard 30 million more words than those in lower decile families. Of course all teachers are well aware of this disparity but to see it as such a disturbing statistic is shocking.

Dorothy then talked about ways to use Google doc tools to help with teaching vocab. I didn't realise there were so many options in the 'insert' tab on docs. I had a quick explore and will certainly explore this in more depth. 

I only scored 2/5 on the following check so need to incorporate pre-reading activities, independent follow up and making target words visible:

Naomi then talked about various methods of robust vocab instruction. The 'Spotlight' activity looks particularly useful. I'm going to have to go back to the slideshow as we sped through it and there is much valuable information there including some great activities. 

This is a good reminder of, 'use it or lose it':

As teachers we needs to continually reinforce the learning that has taken place if the knowledge is to be retained. 

We then went back to our breakout groups and practised initiating a discussion/lesson and arriving at a consensus which was a great success (this was based on how we develop all 4 elements of vocabulary instruction in our classrooms.)

Janet then discussed in depth the concept of word consciousness. The following slide is an excellent reminder/summary  of ways to enact word consciousness:

We went back to our breakout groups to do a fun word play activity. I'll be using these as brain breaks in class.

This link has 600 such puzzles! (I've bookmarked this). 

Naomi then went into detail about robust vocab knowledge. Here are 5 important principles of this:

In our groups we then did a tier 2 word activity. This was very useful as it showed how much text could be explored in even a short piece of text. 

Nick and I were then a breakout group and did an  interactive robust vocab activity which will be useful in the classroom.

Kiri then took a deep dive into teaching questioning. I really liked this slide as it's a good reminder of  the importance of teaching students to question:

Janet then guided us through a close examination of teaching morphology. I'll need to go back and look at these slides again as there is a lot of information, and there are many great teaching resources, but obviously teaching morphology is a valuable tool in the teaching of reading. I like this format for an activity and of course this could be used to teach prefixes as well:

It's been another full on day with much valuable information. It's been a good chance to reflect on strategies I currently use and to look at new strategies that I can add to my teaching tools kete.  

 

23/05/2025 Planning Reading For The Wider Programme Of Learning

 23/05/2025 Planning Reading For The Wider Programme Of Learning

We began the day with going into our breakout groups where we discussed how how reading groups went. it was good to hear of others' experiences with this. We then posted examples of our planning for this and it was helpful to see different ways to approach this. Nicole's post was particularly helpful:

Dorothy then spoke about Class Sites and the concept of ubiquitous learning. I work at Ōtaki College and we already have an excellent set up where students can easily access our school portal and from there can access our class sites which take the students to their daily learning.  

Naomi then explored planning a reading programme including sustaining and maintaining. I'll keep returning to this chart to ensure I'm on track and to give me ideas:

This statement is also a great reminder of where reading focus should be:

I was relieved to hear from Kiri's presentation that I'm only expected to implement reading apprenticeship groups based on a long text 3+ times a term with my year 9's, as I was struggling with the concept of doing this weekly as well as trying to teach everything I need to teach:

Kiri then gave us some great ideas about timetabling, and tracking students' work. I started using a student mahi tracker recently and it has proven to keep the students accountable for the work they've done. I need to make sure I work this into my daily/weekly routine. 

Naomi then introduced us to independent activities including Digital Reading Apps. At Ōtaki College for year 9 and up we are using Education Perfect and Writer's Toolbox. I'm very keen to explore 'ReadWorks' more and at this stage could see myself using the question sets (also good to use for relief lessons), human voice audio, assignments, reading mindset, snapshots, boost and challenge articles and  paired texts.

In a breakout group Janet guided us through the idea of  Read-Like-Writers, Write-Like-Readers and various techniques to enable this. One of the most important of these techniques is reading for inference. I have been focussing on this in class as my PAT reading results showed this was a major weakness in my students' reading. Multi-choice questions are also another excellent technique, and especially good practise for the CAA Reading exam. 

Kiri then gave us an example of professional reading and we then looked for examples of techniques used. I found identifying the techniques quite difficult but feel reasonably confident using the metacognitive techniques listed in the bookmark:

Janet then took us through building strategies for inferencing. This chart provides an excellent overview teaching reading comprehension

We then practised planning some think aloud strategies on a text of our choice. I chose Apirana Taylor's poem, 'Sad Joke on a Marae'. This text will actually be too short for a full reading session but would be excellent to use as an introduction to read aloud texts with the students. I'll certainly be able to use this as a part of the 'Tūrangawaewae' unit that I'm currently doing with my year 9 students. 

  

                                                        

02/05/2025 Day 4 Guided reading (and comprehension)

We began the day in our breakout groups, discussing our progress with our reading activities. Most of us are in the same boat with being pushed for time. Our discussion had a few interesting ideas such as Liam using the letter his Great-Grandfather wrote after his first day on the front line of WW1, as a resource.

Our next topic was 'Reading Apprenticeships', (formerly known as 'Guided Reading'), with the focus on small groups of readers. I have already sorted my class into reading groups based on their literacy abilities.

 
This model will be of great help:

We then looked at examples of a Digital Modelling Book and Teaching Slides to be used for reading activities. I'll be using the Teaching slides.

I'll be using these excellent prompts in my reading lessons:

Next, we went into breakout groups but I joined the wrong one and couldn't return to the group I was meant to be in. However, I learnt bout a very effective observation form to use when students are reading aloud and this can certainly be used with my year 9's.

Our next focus was on fluency. We did an activity based on the fluency rubric. This was a helpful activity which helped me to focus on the different aspects of fluency. 

Next we focussed on the 'after reading teacher process'. The aim is to be conversational but focussed on the purpose of reading. Using a range of questions is vital. These should be a mix of the following type of questions:

• Literal 
• Vocabulary
• Reorganisation 
• Inference 
• Evaluation
• Opinion

I need to make sure I use a variety of questions instead of only using two or three different types.

My next task was to start filling in the teaching slides that I'll be using for my small group reading activity. I'll be using Janet Frame's poem 'Tūrangawaewae' as my text. 

We then went into small breakout groups to practice reading and questioning, using bookmarked questions. We all found this a bit awkward as hadn't met each other before but conversation soon freely flowed with many valuable questions and answers happening. I'll certainly keep the bookmarked questions handy for such activities. 

Again, todays session had much valuable information and many valuable techniques that I'll be attempting to incorporate into my teaching and lessons. 

Reflection on my text coverage with my year 9 Humanities (TW) class

 

I'm currently running behind schedule with my year 9 Humanities class so am using the novel 'Falling into Rarohenga' as my primary text for reading activities so that we don't get further behind schedule. Having said that, I've incorporated 'Kiwi Kids News' into my weekly reading activities to add more breadth to the students' reading material and am also using some ARP reading activities for my students who are struggling at CL4.

I've created a Hapara Workspace for differentiated reading activities. At this stage stage I'm focussing on inference in reading due to the fact that the PAT reading for comprehension results showed that a majority of students are struggling with this. The students have responded enthusiastically and are progressing well.  

I will not be using text sets as we are already pushed for time getting through our novel study, but will be including some extra activities based on a variety of texts such as the song 'In the Neighbourhood' by Sisters Underground and the poem 'Tūrangawaewae' by Janet Frame.