Case Study of Content Literacy Strategies

Student Being Analyzed: L

Language Arts Student Work Example:

Language Function For this assignment, students had a discussion with their
literature circle book groups and then came back to
independently answer questions about it. The first question
is to attach two post-it notes, which had been talked about in
class. They were to be written about things that made the
students think deeply while reading their book. The next
question is simply to track how many times they spoke
during their group meeting and then to write down their
“big question” about this chunk of the book. The big
question could be anything that made them wonder during
this section of the book. L wrote a meaningful question that
related to her book and may be something that will be
answered by the end of her book. The last questions asked
the student to write down three insights that they gained
from their group discussion. She succeeded in writing new
thoughts that she discovered and she included who thought
of them. L did an above average job of completing this
worksheet and thoughtfully answering the questions.

Vocabulary and Symbols In this assignment, there were some areas of prior
knowledge that students needed to utilize in order to be
successful. The first being what to write on their post-it
notes. Students had worked in literature circles two times
previous to this, therefore they were aware of the
expectations for their thoughtful post-its. They also needed
to know what to write for a “big question”. This is something
they had been working on and they knew that it needed to
be thoughtful and not something that could be answered
simply. Lastly, it was important that they knew what an
insight was. This was something that the students actually
didn’t understand very easily. L did answer the question
correctly but many other students did not understand what
they needed to write for this answer despite going over the
meaning of this new word in class.

Discourse For this assignment, students were not required to use

conventions of the discourse such as complete sentences or
proper punctuation. When they had their lit. circle meeting,
however, students were expected to follow proper
discussion edicate. Before the class got into their small
groups, we discussed the expectations for the meeting.
Everyone should be able to talk at some point, there
shouldn’t be interrupting, and everyone should be listening
to whoever is speaking.
Syntax For the purpose of this assignment, students were not
expected to follow the rules and conventions of most
assignments. The goal here was that the main points get
across because the priority was the discussion that students
were having about their book, not this worksheet that they
filled out afterwards.

Phase 1: For this lit circle activity, I think it would be great to

Activating & Connecting provide students with guided imagery before their
(BLL CH. 7) discussion. This would need to be specific to each
book/group but I think it could initiate some great
conversations related to their books. For example, these lit
circle books are all set during WWII in different parts of the
world. It would be great for the students to have some
visuals of what the characters in their book may have been
seeing, in order for them to gain a deeper understanding of
the situation they were in.

Phase 2: I think a great addition to this lit circle reading could be

Monitoring & Checking assigning roles to each student. This would happen with the
(BLL CH. 8) reciprocal teaching method. I like this method because it
doesn’t put too much pressure on individuals but it would
add to the comprehension of the text as a group. Another
great activity for reading comprehension could be a
semantic feature analysis. I think this would work great for
the students because they are reading about WWII which
they don’t have much previous knowledge about, therefore
there could be unfamiliar vocabulary and concepts. This
would need to be specific to each group if it was
teacher-created. I think it would be best to have this
activity be teacher created with the concepts/vocab so that
students don’t get confused about what is most important
to focus on.

Phase 3: A good general activity for any lit circle book would be the
Consolidating & “Somebody Wanted But So” approach. This could be
Reconnecting applied to any book and probably a many different
(BLL CH. 9) characters or situations in each book. I think this would be
a great activity for students to work on individually during
the last lit circle chunk (last third of the book) and then
share with their group during the last meeting. This could
generate some interest discussions and new insights for
 students, which was the last question they needed to
answer on the worksheet.

Phase 4: I think a great way to wrap up lit circles would be with a

Extending & Reflecting
(BLL CH. 10)
whole group discussion such as a socratic circle. It would
be organized in a way that gave at least half of the group
the opportunity to be on the inner and outer circle at any
given time. I think it would be beneficial for students to
compare their texts to deepen their understanding of WWII
and it would hold them accountable for the knowledge of
their lit circle book.

Summary
L completed the assignment as expected, meeting all of the standards addressed in this
activity. She wrote thoughtful notes on her post-its while reading her lit circle book and
made a meaningful connection to a previous in-class activity. It is clear that L participated
in her lit circle discussion a good amount. She understood each question and gave proper
answers for each one.
Social Studies Student Work Example:
Language Function For this assignment, students responded to the prompt:
“Decide if the New Deal was an abuse of government power”.
They were expected to include a topic sentence, evidence and
explanation, a conclusion, and proper conventions of language.

Vocabulary and Students needed to know many content specific vocabulary

Symbols terms for this assignment. To begin, it was necessary to know
what The New Deal was. It also seems important that the
students know the difference between conservative and liberal
approaches, and can identify where FDR stood in his politics.
They need to know about The Great Depression including why
it began and how it ended. It was apparent that student L was
knowledgeable in all of the vocabulary and prior knowledge
necessary to answer this question.

Discourse Students were required to write a paragraph for this

assignment.

Syntax For this assignment, students were expected to use

conventional rules of the English language. They needed to
write in complete sentences, use capitalization, punctuation,
proper spelling, and transitions. The student received full
credit on this part of the assignment but I would argue that she
had some sentences that weren’t exactly proper. She did have
great thoughts and explanation about the question though.

Phase 1: A great way to activate prior knowledge for this assignment

Activating & Connecting could be to use exploratory questions. I’m honestly not very
(BLL CH. 7) familiar with The New Deal but I think it would be good to
begin the class with a question to generate student interest.
This could be something that connects The New Deal to
current events today or an analogy that the students could
relate to.

Phase 2: I think that the most useful activity prior to this assignment
Monitoring & Checking would be to read with annotations. Since the assignment
(BLL CH. 8) requires specific content knowledge, it would be beneficial for
students be comfortable with the content. L proved to be
well-informed about the content and i’m not sure how the
students received this information.

Phase 3: Since this assignment was on a historical concept, I think a

 Consolidating & concept map would be a useful activity for L to complete. This
Reconnecting would help her with the vocabulary needed to answer the
(BLL CH. 9) question about The New Deal and other things were going on
during this time period.

Phase 4: In order to reinforce the content, I think a collaborative

Extending & Reflecting reasoning activity could be beneficial for students. This would
(BLL CH. 10) allow student L to further understand the reasoning for her
opinion by bouncing her ideas off of her peers. This activity
would also help student L come up with more evidence for
answering the question about The New Deal.

Summary
L was close to meeting the standards with this activity. I think she did a great job of proving
that she does have a good understanding of the content surrounding The New Deal. She
didn’t quite have enough evidence to meet the standard with this written assignment. I’m
not sure about what the students received for directions, but I would assume that it was
clearly stated that they needed to take a liberal or conservative stance on the topic and L
did not state her position. L shows great potential with her ability to succeed with these
standards, I think she just didn’t provide enough information with this assignment to show
her knowledge.