Context
Literature Circles are used in many schools to provide instruction
to various reading levels without making students feel left out and different.
Literature circles are curriculum based units used in reading that divide
up students based on reading ability. Each groups read a different
novel written on the appropriate reading level, however all the books are
novels and corresponds with the other novels that the rest of the groups
are reading in some way. Each group reads a novel written on their
reading level and the teacher assigns each student to do a certain job
that goes along with different sections of the novel. Some of the
different jobs are passage picker, discussion director, word wizard, character
sketcher, and investigator. We created this project in Spring 2002.
It was created using Netscape Composer to create web pages that were divided
into four grade levels:3rd, 4th, 5th, and sixth. Our unit focuses
on different grade levels, however my two books were on upper fifth grade
and sixth grade.
Impact
This literature Circle Unit can be used in both the language Arts and the Social Studies Curriculum since we used novels that were in the historical fiction genre. Students are given different sections to read and are responsible for reading the material and doing each job, which are interchangeable from section to section. This Literature Circle, “World War II” can be used as an example for other teachers to help them get started in this Literature Circle Unit. It is written out completely section by section to show how each job should be completed and this is shown by specific examples of each job.
Alignment
This artifact aligns with II-A because it shows the use of technology
in a lesson that deals with the needs of diverse learners by providing
reading lessons for different levels of reading. It also aligns with
V-C because it shows a lesson in a very easy and accessible way by using
technology. Teachers can access the entire literature circle on the
web instead of having to do all the jobs himself or herself before teaching
it to the class. The simply go to the web and pull the sections and
jobs off to print and use. This artifact also corresponds with the
INTASC Principle #3 because Literature Circles are a way to teach reading
instruction to many different levels of readers and learners. By
completing this project I have shown that I know how to create a unit for
all different levels of learners. This project also shows that I
know how to create a learning environment on the web for many teachers
as well as myself to use.