Asking Big Questions:

Using Rich Mentor Texts to Communicate about Social Justice

Charlottetown, PEI

Presented by:

Vera C. Teschow, O.C.T., M.Ed., M.O.T.

About Vera

Vera C. Teschow is a Certified Ontario Teacher who has experience in a variety of contexts. She has worked in Peel for over a decade, first as a classroom teacher (Primary, Junior, Intermediate, Music, ESL & Special Education), then a program resource consultant, and finally as acting vice principal before returning to the classroom to teach a 3/4 class with that Board. She has also participated on Board and Ministry Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat research and writing teams, developed and instructed courses with the Peel Summer Academy (PSA), Soul Drums and the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) Summer Club for Kids, and was for 5 years the Director of Discover Toronto: A Multiple Intelligences Approach to the City, a summer program for Gifted learners. Vera acts as a prenatal consultant for families expecting twins, triplets or more, and teaches an online course at

Vera holds a B.Ed., and an Honours B.A. from the University of Toronto. In addition, she is certified in Music, Primary Instruction, Special Education and ESL, and holds Masters Degree in Education at OISE in Toronto and her Principals Qualifications from OPC and OISE. She is currently working towards her Private Pilot License (PPL) with Transport Canada – Civil Aviation.

Over the past several years, Vera has worked extensively with Tyndale University’s Dept of Education, developing and teaching courses in Classroom Management, the Arts and ESL. In 2011/2012, she worked at Tyndale full time as an Assistant Professor of Education with pre-service teacher candidates in the primary-junior and junior-intermediate divisions, teaching courses in Classroom Management, Differentiated Instruction, Teaching English Language Learners, and various seminar topics. But the pull of the classroom was too strong, and in September 2011, Vera returned to Peel full time to teach Grade 3 at Dixie, a socio-economically needy and culturally diverse public school in the city’s south west end.She is currently finishing up a school-based math and technology project with the Ministry of Education before heading off to Argentina next year.

For the past five years, Vera has spent her summers on the Island, on the north shore. In her spare time (of which there seems to be precious little!) Vera enjoys making music, designing websites, volunteering with refugees and immigrants in Toronto and embarking on various adventures with her 9-year-old twin boys.

Contact:

Vera C. Teschow .

416-992-8372

Agenda

Minds On:

  • Welcome & Introductions, Objectives
  • Shoe and tell
  • Purpose & Definitions:
  • Communication, Big Questions, Rich Mentor Texts, Social Justice
  • Who’s in the Room?
  • A Few Tales from Ms. Teschow’s Classroom:
  • How I Discovered “Grand Conversations”
  • Mr Lincoln’s Way and the N-word
  • Letters to Ms. Teschow

Action:

  • “Say Something” – Grand Conversations Monograph reading with partner
  • Encounter book - questioning handouts; develop rich questions and/or anticipation guide to use with this or another favourite book
  • One stay the rest stray, come back and share
  • Approaches to social justice template activity

Consolidate:

  • revisit Encounter questions/activities – which quadrant does your group’s work fall into? How can you bump it up a bit?
  • Revisit monographs: What work will you need to do with your class to prepare them for this sort of dialogue?

Debrief:

  • Snowball
  • The Last Word (from a former student)

Communication:

Assumption:

Reading, Writing, Listening & Speaking support and inform one another

Four Agreements Framework:
Stay engaged
Speak your truth
Experience discomfort
Expect & accept non-disclosure / Class norms for group
discussion ...
  • Make sure only one person talks
at a time.
  • Give others a chance to share
their ideas.
  • If you don’t agree ... say so,
but be polite!
  • Listen carefully! What is the speaker
really saying? Has the speaker
finished speaking?
(Sipe, 2006, p.290)

Social Justice: Who’s in the Room?

•age
•ancestry
•citizenship/nationality
•colour
•creed/faith/religion (or not)
•(dis)ability
•ethnicity/culture/linguistic origin
•family status
•gender/sex / •gender identity
•marital status
•place of origin
•race
•sexual orientation
•socio-economic status
•same-sex partnership status
Think about yourself, then think about your students….

Social Considerations for Selecting Texts to Use with Students

Learning resources should

•reflect sensitivity to gender and sexual orientation, the perspective of

aboriginal people, and cultural and ethnic heritage

•promote equality by enhancing students’ understanding of a multicultural and

diverse society

•be chosen to help students understand the many important contributions made

to our civilization by minority groups and people/groups with a variety of

ethnic backgrounds

•be designed to motivate students and staff to examine their attitudes and

behaviors, and to comprehend their duties, responsibilities, rights, and

privileges as participating citizens in our society

•support/promote students’ self-esteem and respect for the self-esteem of others

•recognize the integration of students with special needs (as part of the class)

•portray positive role models

(From PEI’s Evaluation and Selection of Learning Resources: A Guide, 2008. )

RICH QUESTIONING:

The 3 R's Framework & Bloom's Taxonomy

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LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT:

SUPPORTING AND CHALLENGING LEARNERS THROUGH SCAFFOLDED QUESTIONS

/ Linguistic Complexity / Question/
Answer Types / COGNITIVE COMPLEXITY
.
Fact/Literal Level
(What is "right there"
for me to see?) / Inferential Level
(What do I think it means? Search "between the lines"
for evidence.) / Interpretation/Opinion; Evaluative Level
(What do I think of it?
What do I wonder about it?)
Step 3*
Language for these answers is not available in the question itself, so learners have to retrieve the vocabulary independently.
. / Open-Ended:What? When? Where? Who? Why? How? Etc.
Step 2
Because the words are in the question, this scaffolding provides support to learners who still require support in retrieving new vocabulary.
. / Either/Or
Step 1
These types of questions are good for beginners who are still struggling to understand new language; it allows them to find their voice in a larger group.
. / Yes/No

* Proficiency in "Step 3" is that EQAO-type questions demand.

The “Q” Chart

IS / DID / CAN / WOULD / WILL / MIGHT
WHAT
WHERE
WHEN
WHICH
WHO
WHY
HOW

A Few Resources

Vera’s Bookshop – includes the titles and links to many of the books we talked about today, and more!

Social Justice Begins with Me – Literacy-based resource, K-8, from the Elementary Teacher’s Federation of Ontario (ETFO)

PEI Public Education Outreach 2011/2012 Links – this is the work of Thomas Hilton et al, and includes links from various curricular areas K-9, which link with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and/or the PEI Human Rights Act.

Grand Conversations in the Primary Classroom – Ontario Literacy & Numeracy Secretariat research monograph which I used as the foundation for my “rich talk” moves

Same as above, but for slightly OLDER students

Toronto Board’s Equity & Inclusive Curriculum – LGBTQ Resource

A Teaching Resource for Dealing with Sensitive and Controversial Issues – Includes demonstration lesson plans

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