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Design Process

Sociocultural
Informational
Technical
​Educational        
Model & My Capstone

​Sociocultural Context
We need to create an urgency for these students.  My action research and driving question directly supports the sociocultural context for teachers. During the ELL Shadowing process we went through at all elementary schools in my district we learned that many of our students are not getting a lot of opportunity to talk. Many of our students spent much of their time listening to teacher talk with little opportunity to speak in structured ways.  This illustrated the urgency we needed, and set-up the discussions we as teachers wanted to have about how we might support more talking in our classrooms.  These discussion frames provide students another source of feedback on how they can better access complex texts.  

Informational Context 
My target is teachers, and the focus is to strengthen their skills and knowledge when it comes to supporting language around reading complex text. The challenges come mind first, the biggest being how to support 2nd and 3rd grade students in accessing a complex text when they are decoding/reading independently at a 1st grade level. The second is how to support this group of students, while I have a whole other class. What can they be doing, while I support these students. The opportunities of what can be learned...the sky is the limit! But, less is more. I want to provide a little background as to WHY we need students to access complex text, and the importance of language in reading (principles). Then a bank of strategies that teachers can access to support students. 

Technical Context
​A large amount of the technical aspect for my action research and driving question focus lies in man power. It is a difficult job helping students navigate complex text and supporting their language acquisition. Many times we put scaffolds in place, but never take them away. The second goal would be to provide several technology tools that can give additional feedback to students, outside of just the teacher/peer feedback. This would require ipads/chrome books. I am working to find tools that are free that teachers and students can use with not one more step of complication. 

Educational Context
In our district we have a large amount of students who between 2nd and 3rd grade get "stuck" at a CELDT level and miss AMAO 1 (growth of one or more levels on CELDT). Additionally, at the end of 2nd grade they take the Reading Inventory and score below basic, and below grade-level with their Lexile score. Many supports are put in place for these students, reading interventions, designated ELD etc...But, how can we use structured language discussions and teacher/peer feedback to increase their language and comprehension with complex text? How can they understand complex text, and practice using the language with peers and adults?
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The above illustrates my Capstone prototype, I used Lucid which I highly recommend for an electronic prototype.

My Logo and Its Significance 

Research

Support and Next Steps

My logo epitomizes daily what students have to do to access the rigor of the new CASS (California State Standards).  Everyday is a climb, moving those fingers to the next rock, a place to hold and further their knowledge.

I like the analogy of an athlete in training to a reader; you have to vary your workout (light to more strenuous) and similarly you have to vary the light reads with the more rigorous, complex ones. My logo represents this with the levels of books, stepping up as student are ready from the green level (the lighter weight books) to the orange and eventually to the red. Students could spend one part of the day with rigorous heavy weight "red" texts, while the latter part of that day taking a break with some lighter weight "green" texts.  The gray in the middle-level signifies that gray area that many students are stuck within when accessing complex texts.