Sample Focus Lesson, Intermediate
Focus Lesson Topic |
Monitoring for Meaning: Pause-Think-Share |
Materials |
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Connection Set the tone. Link the new teaching to ongoing work and NAME THE TEACHING POINT. “Today I want to teach you…” |
A funny thing happened to me last night. I met a friend of mine for coffee and dessert at the café in town. It had been such a long day for me and I was so tired, but we hadn’t seen each other in a while so I didn’t want to cancel our plans. At one point in the evening, she started to tell me a story about something that she had done with her family over vacation. It was a long story and I was just so tired, I must have started to zone out a little bit because all of a sudden she stopped her story and just said, “Hello…Lily…are you paying ANY attention at all to what I’m saying?” And at that point I realized that I had NO IDEA what she had been talking about. I could hear her talking, but I guess I wasn’t really paying attention. I wasn’t really listening. I felt terrible and of course apologized for being a terrible listener. That made me think about how sometimes, the same thing happens to me when I’m reading. My mind starts wandering, and I get to the end of the page and realize that I have no idea what I just read! It happens to everyone at one time or another. The difference between a successful reader and an unsuccessful reader is how they handle this breakdown in meaning-making. Today I want to teach you that when readers find that their mind has wandered, that they’ve finished a few pages but have no idea what it is that they have just read, when this happens, successful readers stop and do something about their confusion. |
Explicit Instruction Show them exactly how to do what is being taught. |
One thing that strong readers do is they make sure that they are paying attention to and making sense of what they are reading. A helpful strategy for this is something that we can call Pause-Think-Share. What that means is as we are reading, at certain points we can pause, think about what it is that we have read, and then share our thinking. We can share our thinking by talking to other readers or by jotting down notes on a Post-It or in our reading response journal. Let me show you how this works. Model by reading from a short story or picture book and every few pages pausing, thinking aloud, and then sharing your thinking with the class. |
Guided Practice Ask them to try out what has been taught, either independently or collaboratively. Coach into the work. |
Now you will all have a chance to try! I’m going to read on, and then when I pause again, you will have a chance to stop and think and then share your ideas with your partner. Listen in as students try this work, voicing over examples of students who are trying and using the strategy successfully. |
Send Off Transition students from the lesson to independent work. |
Remember, the wandering mind happens to the best readers from time to time. What is important though is that when you realize that you have zoned out and you have no idea what you’ve just read, you stop and do something about it! The Pause-Think-Share strategy can help you check yourself, make sure that you are paying attention to your book. Make sure that you have some Post-Its nearby when you are reading today so you can give this strategy a try! |
