E-book Assignment

My e-book was created for students in first or second grade who are at the full alphabetic

stage of their learning. I was hopeful that I could use this for my class, but think it is a little too

hard for the reading level of my students. I will share this with my second and third grade

teachers to use in their class.

The topic that I chose was to teach about how flowers grow from seeds to flowers. My

book teaches the growing process of a flower. It extends to teach about the parts of a flower and

how people use flowers. I chose this topic because in our district we teach about growing plants

and animals. I thought it would be a good fit with our current curriculum.

I was able to include many of the common core state standards that were addressed in this

book. I feel that the main one is RI.2.6, Identify the main purpose of a text, including what the

author wants to answer, explain, or describe. The rest are just standards that are also addressed.

Just like with other subject areas, this book hits many standards. Here are the ones that I

included.

Reading Informational Text 2.3:

Describe the connection between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or

steps in technical procedures in a text.

Reading Informational Text 2.7:

Explain how specific images (e.g., a diagram showing how a machine works) contribute to and clarify a text.

Reading Informational Text 2.6:

Identify the main purpose of a text, including what the author wants to answer, explain, or describe.

Key Ideas and Details

1. Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key

details in a text.

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3. Describe the connection between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or steps in technical

procedures in a text.

Integration of Knowledge and Ideas

7. Explain how specific images (e.g., a diagram showing how a machine works) contribute to and clarify a text.

I included fluency standards as well because that is an important component of my book. Fluency 4. Read with

sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.

a. Read on-level text with purpose and understanding.

b. Read on-level text orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression on successive readings.

c. Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition and understanding, rereading as necessary.

The print features that I used in this book were very basic. I tried as hard as I could to model

it off of the ideas that Yokota and Teales suggested in their article. The text appearance in my

book utilized standard fonts and made them a reasonable size. As fun as some of the fonts were, I

felt that it was important to keep it basic and straightforward. I also used one of Yokota and

Teales suggestion of using highlighting in my book. I felt that I did a pretty good job of also

having the page layout of the text matching the illustrations. I think this is a strong feature of my

book as I enhanced this feature with using labels in my pictures. All of my pictures came from

pixabay.com, which allowed me to use the images free of copyright under Creative Commons. I

also felt that I included a multimedia comprehension and composition component that Yokota

and Teales suggest. I used sound and coaches to help in both areas.

For the area of word recognition, I referenced Ehri and McCormicks article, Phases of

Word Learning, to guide the level of instruction for my book. While children are reading my

book, they should have a working knowledge of the alphabet and phonemes. The students should

be able to focus on individual sounds if they need to sound out words. Decoding is beginning and

students are becoming successful decoders. My students have a majority of the sound-symbol

relationship figured out. Usually, my students use the initial and final letters as their decoding

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cues while reading. Students at this level also should be using meaning or semantic cues and

structure cues to help them if they are stuck on a word. For my students, sight words should be

fluent; this should allow my students to fluently read the book.

For the fluency component in my book, I used what I learned in the article, Putting Fluency

on a Fitness Plan, the authors talked about using other assessment measures with the fluency

passages to understand more where the child is at. Because of that, I thought it was important to

use questioning that required higher order of thinking. I tried to incorporate a few of these higher

level thinking questioning. I used the coach feature to check in with students and ask them to use

some strategies when reading. I questioned if they read with expression or to go back and reread

if needed. This was kind of a strategy to pretend that I was listening to them. It made the

children feel like I was aware of what they were doing. For an extension activity, my students

would echo read this book together with partners. I would also have students record themselves

reading the story. With one-to-one ipads, students can easily complete this task and then use it

for future reading.

For vocabulary in my book, I used tier 2 and tier 3 words to explicitly teach in my book.

One of the trends that the National Reading Panel Findings was that vocabulary should be taught

directly and indirectly. I tried to incorporate both versions into the book. Another finding was

that repetition and multiple exposures to vocabulary are essential to learning new word

meanings. I repeated many of the vocabulary words in context and then in the glossary. For

example, I repeatedly used root to encourage multiple exposures for the word.

I also used the research that the National Reading Panel shared on comprehension strategies

in my book via the coaching feature. Some of the comprehension strategies were activating prior

knowledge of what students have seen flowers used for, another strategy that I used was

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questioning. From the softchalk module, I learned how to incorporate questioning throughout the

book. The coach feature was very beneficial for this. I also included some graphic organizers

that supported instruction. I placed questioning before, during, and after reading of the book. I

tried to vary the intensity of my questions and to make sure that they did not yield a yes or no

answer. For the comprehension component as an extension, I would have the students break into

differentiated informational circles. This will allow for each groups instruction to be

differentiated for their needs.

References

Ehri, L. C., & McCormick, S. (1998). Phases of word learning: Implications for instruction with

delayed and disabled readers. Reading & Writing Quarterly: Overcoming Learning

Difficulties, 14(2), 135-163

English Language Arts Standards Reading: Literature Grade 2. (n.d.). Retrieved December 5,

2015, from http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/RL/2/

Free Images - Pixabay. (n.d.). Retrieved December 1, 2015, from https://pixabay.com/

National Reading Panel Findings (NICHD, 2000)

Marcell, B. (2011). Putting fluency on a fitness plan: Building fluencys meaning-making

muscles.The Reading Teacher, 65(4), 242-249.

Yokota, J., Teale, W. H. (2014). Picture books and the digital world: Educators making informed

choices. The Reading Teacher, 67(8), 577-585.

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