Travis: Hello! So good to have you with us again for another installment of Popcast Reboot. It's Travis and Whitney; we're back again. And today, we are going to be extending the conversation around Patterns of Revision, taking a look at the revision strategy of adding. So adding is our focus in today's episode.
Whitney: So when we teach students to add, one thing that I have found is students feel that adding is their only go to. It's often their only go-to when it comes to revision, and they will often add to make it longer. And what we want is for students to have this understanding that when writers add information, whether it's words, sentences, paragraphs, or paragraphs, to their text, it's not to make it longer. There's actually a purpose behind it.
With these sets of lessons, we want to teach students that we're selecting sentences that connect ideas sequentially or clarifies information while still maintaining a focus of the paragraph. In our Add chart, those free charts that we have online, both in English and Spanish, and then there's the chart at the beginning of the Add chapter in your book as well, in that chart, remember, we break it into what does this look like at the sentence level, what types of words could we add to our sentences to help clarify and connect. As well as at the paragraph level, what sentences or paragraphs could we add to our text to clarify and connect?
I'm going to focus on that bottom part of the chart where we're adding at the paragraph level because that's what these lessons really are focused on in this chapter. The chart says we're going to add a sentence or even a paragraph or more to the beginning of a paragraph to introduce the new main idea or to transition to a new idea.
We may choose to add a sentence to transition from one idea to the next. Or to add important information to the sentence before, as well as to move a reader through time. So these are the purposes of why we would add information to our text. And that's what our lessons here really focus on, is giving our students a purpose for adding.
Travis: Yes, and we'll talk a little bit more after this example, as we get into the combination lessons, the adding at the sentence level. We can highlight that a little bit more as well as some resources that we've created that we have available for you to support that. But let's go into talking about the examples. I can start with the middle school example.
Whitney: Definitely.
Travis: I'm going to highlight from the eighth grade resource. We are sticking with that content that's so intriguing for adolescents. This is taken from the text Wow, in the World: The How and Wow of the Human Body by Mindy Thomas and Guy Raz.
And in this lesson, we are focusing on the armpits. Yes, of course. I'll read aloud to set the context in this lesson. I'm gonna read it for us:
"While your armpits can't speak, if they do, you should consult your doctor. They can tell you how well you're doing. Each armpit contains a bunch of little lymph nodes. Most of the time, you can't see or feel them, but if you do feel them, it's most likely because they're swollen. And swollen lymph nodes could be your armpit's way of telling you You've got an infection."
So, in this example, what we are looking at is there's a specific space where we would look to add some content, add a sentence that in this case, in this specific lesson, we're looking at adding content that helps clarify. In this example, when we after the sentence after we talk about the lymph nodes, we have space for students to think about what information would help clarify for a reader if they didn't know what the lymph nodes were. So there are some examples that we'll talk about in a minute.
If you want to highlight your example from one of the elementary resources, though, first, I'd love to hear what you've got.
Whitney: Sure. And so just keep in mind behind the scenes, what we have done is we've taken this text and we've removed a sentence from it, that will eventually add in. So as we're doing the read-aloud with our students, we're setting that context. We're giving them the content that this paragraph is about and the majority of the information, but it may also because this lesson for both of us is really focusing on clarifying information, and they might also leave some readers with questions and wondering. They feel a little lost and they need more information to really understand what's happening in that paragraph.
So we have purposely removed to something but we're not going to tell our students that we're going to do that part of the read-aloud. with the deletion in place to where that sentence is not there and then we say something like writers when we revise another thing we can do is we can go back to our writing and think is there any place where I need to give more information so my reader will not have as many questions or is there something that I need to clarify where maybe they don't know the content here as well as I do and I need to add in some information to help them understand it better. So that's how we set them up for this work.
The book that I'm using for my example comes from a fourth grade lesson. It uses the Leaf Detective by Heather Lang. It's how Margaret Lohman uncovered secrets in the rain forest. And I love this book so much. It's a narrative nonfiction.
Anyone that has had training with me knows how much I love this book because I do read it aloud in my trainings. What I love besides the story of Margaret and how she became this rainforest scientist and discovered how to get up into the canopy layer of the rainforest is the craft of this book. So you have your narrative section, which tells the story of Margaret, you have actual quotes from Margaret embedded into that. And then you also have these features on each page that are in the shape of leaves. Okay, like rainforest leaves. Well, on each leaf on the page gives you informational text about the rainforest or about Margaret. So you have your narrative text, but then you also have informational text structures to all within the same book.
And at the end of the book, there is a beautiful illustrated diagram of the rainforest and its layers. So I always start with that to provide that background information about the layers of the rainforest to gain a better understanding of Margaret; of her accomplishments and what she did to reach that canopy level of the rainforest.
So the part for this lesson that is going to be read aloud is actually the informational side where I'm reading off of one of the leaves. So this is what it says and keep in mind the part that I'm reading aloud has a sentence deleted from it. Okay. So you're not going to hear right now, the entire paragraph, but your students wouldn't know that because we wouldn't tell them that ahead of time.
So this is what it says: "Plant chemicals can be used as medicines for humans. We have learned how to use only a very small number of the world's medicinal plants."
That's the paragraph. When we're leading our students in conversations, the first thing, of course, what we do in every lesson is talk about, okay, what is this paragraph mainly about? What is the reader wanting us to understand from this paragraph? And from there, we can move into do we have some questions? Are we, do we feel lost at all? Let's talk about that.
Travis: Going back to the middle school example, that would be a great question to pose for students. Do we look at the lymph nodes in this example by the author who, in the same vein, we've pulled a sentence that has clarifying information out of the author's original for students to think about.
So that, that same question. Do we have any questions about this? If students say, Oh, no, we're good. Do we know what lymph nodes are? And some students are going to uh, not quite sure. Okay. So if the author wanted to ensure that everyone didn't get tripped up here, how might we take a look at that clarifying information?
If you are looking at the teacher facing content in each lesson in the modeling section, we offer some questions to guide conversation between you and students. So in this lesson. Some questions that we pose here. What are the authors saying in this sentence before the blank? In the example that we would put up we would have the paragraph from the read aloud along with a blank space of hey, let's add some information. So what are the authors saying before and after this blank? What do you notice about the writing before and after it and what are the authors, again to affirm what you were saying, what is the author's overall message?
So that would help students as they are taking a look at the examples for ideas that they could add or that the author might have added to be able to be thinking about adding information that makes sense in the context of that specific paragraph.
Whitney: Yeah, so the way that the modeling is set up for this lesson is we have that paragraph and we have a blank space within it to where the information or the sentence will be added in.
Then we have three options, three sentences the students can look at to decide which one would be most effective to add into the paragraph. And I know at the elementary level, and I'm not sure if you did this too at the middle school level, Travis, but at the elementary level, all three sentences come from the book.
None of those are made up by me. They all come from the book and one is the actual sentence that belongs in the paragraph. The other two are still going to be around the same content because it comes from the same book. But they're not necessarily going to be as effective, or maybe they just might not make sense at all.
Travis: Same. So we have added an extra example. So there are four options, taken from that specific text, some from paragraphs close by and some from maybe some writing a little bit further down. So again, it would make sense in a different context, but definitely not within the context of the paragraph that we're looking at.
We're gonna model putting each example into that blank space, talk about it with our students, and then ultimately they're going to make a decision either separately or all of us together on which one we feel like is the most effective choice to put into this paragraph to add clarifying information for that specific purpose. We highlight the author's original and we have that same reflective conversation that we've had in other hold on a second my dog, she's got things to do.
Whitney: She's busy, she says I'm done listening to you.
Travis: Yep she's like okay i got it i know how to do this.
From there, after we show the author's original, we do some comparative analysis. Our choice versus the author's original choice. Why do we think the author chose this sentence? Do any of the other options work? Why or why not? and why do you think our choice was different from or the same as the authors?
We move into the collaborating through conversation phase of this lesson set in a similar manner. We put another paragraph in front of students. There is a blank space with a missing sentence. We want to do the same focus here of a sentence that has clarifying information within this lesson. So students then go through this process together in partners or in small groups. They look at the paragraph, they look at the options, and then they try each one out in place of that blank space and make a decision on which is the best choice and why, based on the options that they have available in front of them.
Whitney: And the why is the most important thing here because they may not come up with the same choice as the author. And so it's important that they don't see that as wrong, but as different. And why, why did you choose This sentence, as opposed to the sentence the author chose.
And with every lesson, that's what we want to always come back to is, Oh, let's justify your thinking. Tell me why, what you were thinking there. Why did you think this choice would work better? Because sometimes it's not one that works better than the other. It really, [00:14:00] they're both great. They both work. It's really up to the author.
When our students apply, keep in mind, they might only end up going in and adding a few words as opposed to an entire sentence, even though this is a clarifying information, they may feel that they have enough in there that they don't need clarifying information.
This is a great time for them to use a partner as well, where they read one part of their text to their partner and their partner has questions for them where "Oh, I don't really understand this part. Could you clarify for me?" That would be some great partner work that would help them also see some possibilities for adding clarifying information.
We also provide in our lessons different charts for our students to use to help them connect their ideas. through different phrases or words like transitions that they could use when transitioning from one idea to the next. We provide those as well for the students to help with applying. Just keep in mind during the applying, it's not always an entire sentence or an entire paragraph that they're going to be adding. Sometimes it is just simply a word or a phrase or even a clause that they're adding into an already written sentence.
Travis: Yeah, and as we do some work in that application space, we also at the front end of the Add chapter, we have a connectors chart so that students can see words, phrases and punctuation that might support their work in connecting ideas together.
I know in the classroom sometimes students are going to be very concrete and literal with a lesson that we are doing, and they're going to be looking just to be adding clarifying information. They're going to be other students who write not only in my classroom effectively, but outside of the classroom as well. They might be ready to take their writing to the next step. This connectors chart is going to be a helpful visual representation for them to remind them of other options that exist for adding ideas and connecting those ideas together.
Whitney: Yes. Also in the applying piece a lot of our students are typing, and so any of their revisions that they make, I've been talking with teachers about “How do you approach revision here to where you can also keep track?”
I know that we have revision history. But what can be something visual for students and really thinking about when we're adding information, maybe the information that we add is in a different color so we can visually see, oh, I added this whole paragraph in or added this entire sentence or added a few of these words or if they're deleting, for example, they might use the strikethrough so it's not completely gone, but they can see that they have deleted that rearranging. That might be something where they just retype in a different color down below.
I've also had students to where they just write some additions on sticky notes and then physically put those sticky notes onto the text to show where those would be added as well. So just thinking that as well during the apply piece. You also want to think of a structure for that revision. And our students will not only just be adding now. Even though this lesson is for adding, they've learned how to delete purposefully, how to rearrange purposely. So what we will find is they will start. Um, and then they will start to use those other strategies simultaneously as well that come up as they're re looking at their piece specifically for, information that could be added, they might also see, " If I added this, it would be more effective for me to rearrange the order of these sentences," or "If I added this, or if I deleted this, it would be more effective for me to add this piece to clarify." So this is where it really starts to all come together for students as they move into as we get closer to combining sentences.
Travis: Absolutely. They're going to be doing some of this work just naturally before we get into the combining lessons, based on everything that they are learning and the specific revision strategies that they have some mastery of now, some confidence in doing.
Whitney: Travis, I think we've really got a great overview from our previous episodes with Delete, and then Rearrange, and now Add that I'm excited for our next episode where I believe we're going to talk about combining.
Travis: Yeah, let's do it.
Whitney: I can't wait. Thank you all for joining us!
Travis: We are so excited for you to put this into practice and we hope that this episode has helped you to add some valuable content to your teaching toolbox.
How about that? Boom.
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