California State Universities Expository Reading and Writing Course Assignment Template

The first thing that struck me while reading through this rather broad overview of the ELA classroom was that right at the beginning of the document was a section about prereading. I think that prereading is one of the keys to a successful reading experience in the classroom. It is the time when we can set our students up for success even before they delve into the complexities of whatever text they are working with. This especially caught my attention because prereading is an essential activity when working with English Language Learners. The more we are able to prep ELLs for their text and provide them with the needed tools to successfully navigate a text in English, the more successful the ELLs will be and thus, the more inclined they will be to continue to strive for mastery in English. 

One of the prereading activities that I particularity liked in this document was that of making the connection between the students' lives and the text. I think that this is so important because, why would a student work so hard to read a text if they feel that it has no relevance to them and their lives? Students need to feel as if what they are doing in school isn't just what the teacher wants but is something that is personal to them and is to help them succeed in life. Another prereading activity that I think is particularly useful (though they all are) is that of making predictions and asking questions before reading a text. I think that not only does this require the students to think beyond what they are being told and create meaning themselves but it can also be a motivator for students (especially when working with an interesting narrative). 

The other part of the document that stood out to me was the section involving summarizing and responding. Summarizing as a classroom strategy has been shown in multiple studies to improve and increase student comprehension of text. I think that it is crucial to include some sort of summarizing activity when working with a text because it requires the students to again create meaning themselves, to focus their thoughts on the text, and to comprehend the text in order to write or speak in an organized manner about the main points of the text. One activity in the document suggested having the students work in groups, with each group summarizing a section of the text that they are working with and then having the entire class come together to make one whole summary. Again, I think this activity particularly lends itself to ELLs because it breaks the difficult task into manageable sections and allows students to use one another for help. I think that this particular task would lend itself well to using a platform like google doc/google classroom and thus, encourage 21st century skills.