Re-reading to discover author choices — more notes on transitional readers

In a couple earlier posts I tracked how some third grade transitional readers interacted with the text of a poem by Ted Kooser and with an early chapter book called The Blue Ghost. I’ve been strongly influenced by Vicki Vinton’s suggestion that teachers teach the reader, not the text. I take that to mean we need to listen closely to what students are doing with text and to plan our teaching to address the needs of the students, rather than offer students explicit questions designed to direct their attention to specific parts of the text. (For more on this, check out Vinton’s recent post on grouping.) My primary goal is to help readers build their own capacity to create meaning from texts so they will be able to make meaning on their own, not rely on me to lead them toward the meaning in texts through ever more direct questions.

frameWhile this framing seems like a subtle difference, since understanding is the result of both methods (hopefully!), the difference has immense implications for how readers engage with texts.

I’m writing to report what happened as a small reading group — Cal and Alice — finished an early chapter book.

Earlier, I reported that these two readers were having difficulty determining what information was important in the text. I could see this because they picked out details, sometimes simply from an illustration, and wove a “logical” story from that information without much regard to information they had read already. Often the story they told was stitched to the written story by a single observation (the face of two characters as shown in an illustration), or a single detail. To compound this difficulty, the story they told themselves became more real than the written story.

Through observing and questioning the children, I came to believe they were not holding a coherent story together if it required using several details from the written text to create that rough draft understanding. These students were noticing details in abundance, but were not able to assign importance to them, or to weave them together into a more coherent whole. As a result, these two readers abandoned details that might have been important to their developing draft. Their understanding often included only a) the most recent details without regard to others they had noticed earlier; or b) a particularly compelling detail (in this case illustrations); or c) details that fit the “logical” story they told themselves, forgetting about the textual details that didn’t fit that story.

How to move beyond that?

One suggestion offered by Vinton was to continue the story to the end (or until it was clear what was happening) and then go back and re-read the text to find clues the author planted early in the story, clues that we didn’t think were important when we read the first time. By doing this, the readers would be able to develop two things: 1) an understanding that authors plant layers of details throughout the story to help their reader build meaning, and that these layers are often redundant; and 2) by seeing how authors do this, these readers would develop their abilities to do this kind of detail sorting on their own. If the readers came to see how authors built a story, then perhaps they would be able to hold a larger number of details in mind as they created their draft understanding.

We finished the story The Blue Ghost and came to understand that Liz was, as was alluded to throughout the story, a “guardian angel” because of her willingness to help Elizabeth (and her grandmother); we saw the importance of the past and grandmother’s place in it; and how sometimes the kind things we do have a lasting importance even though we don’t realize it at the time.

I told the kids that I wanted us to re-read the first chapter of the book again. Now that we knew more about the story, I wanted them to notice details, clues, or hints the author might have been giving us in that first chapter so we might see what we didn’t recognize earlier.

I was fascinated to see how the kids were both completely engaged in this activity and picked out key details that they had missed in their first reading.

Blue Ghost1

First, they noticed the way the author made the distinction between the ghost calling out Elizabeth and the main character’s name, Liz. When they first read that, they didn’t know what to make of it. They realized that Liz was short for Elizabeth, but they didn’t know that it might be an important clue. Reading backwards, they realized that this was a much bigger clue about what was going to happen, and who Liz would meet as the story went along.

Second, they noticed all the space the author spent on the ghost hovering over the trunk, the way the ghost circled the trunk and sank down in front of it. When we first read this, the kids didn’t notice these details at all. They were focused on the ghost, trying to figure out if she was someone to be scared of or not. That’s understandable, but more experienced readers would also be paying attention to the way the author had the ghost hover over the trunk. During their re-reading, the kids saw how much time the author spent on the trunk. They knew the trunk contained Elizabeth’s mother’s Booke of Remedies, which would be crucial to the story later on. The kids were surprised that they hadn’t noticed that before, but clearly saw how the author was signalling something important.

blue ghost2

Next, the kids noticed details that placed the ghost in the distant past. Words like “the long, old-fashioned dress”, and “hair pulled back in a bun” indicated that the ghost was from a time long ago. Early in the story, the kids had focused on the illustration to the right, noticing the similarity in the faces between Liz and the ghost. This was an important detail, since the ghost was a long-distant relative of Liz’s. However, the children had earlier created a “logical” story about how the ghost was Liz’s mother, who had not appeared in the story yet. They carried this confusion into the story quite a ways, despite other evidence that Liz’s mother was not dead, just not present.

As they looked back, the kids could see more clearly how the author was showing them that the ghost was from a time long, long ago. She could not be Liz’s mother.

blue ghost3

Finally, on the re-reading the children noticed the words toward the end of the chapter:

“‘Elizabeth,’ she whispered again. She sounded sad.” and also,

“She motioned, as if for Liz to follow.” and, finally,

“Her fingers touched the place where the figure had disappeared. There was only wall. Solid wall.”

While re-reading, the children could see that these details contained many clues about what we would find out later in the story. The sadness, the motioning to follow, the solid wall all indicted some of the direction the story would take as it unfolded.

What did we learn from this activity? I had told them earlier, of course, that the beginning of a story was important, but by re-reading they were able to see for themselves how densely packed the beginning was with details that were important later in the story. Re-reading also helped the children see how an author can convey meaning through details. Crucially, the children were able to recognize and verbalize how the author was able to plant these details from the very beginning of the story. Thus, readers can reliably keep track of details like this and wonder about them over the course of a story. They can go back and build inferences from not just one detail, but from many. As we read more together, I’ll be asking them to put together pieces from more than one place in the story when they make inferences.

I’m eager to think and write more about this journey.

Thanks for reading! If you’ve gotten this far, you are very patient, indeed!

5 thoughts on “Re-reading to discover author choices — more notes on transitional readers

  1. Thank you for posting. For a long time I have pondered how we learned to 1) read -not the words but the ‘story’, and 2) how to unveil and thus teach how to tell our own stories. I am struck with the ideas you raise here about the patience it takes to ‘discover’ and ‘experience’ (and learn) this over time. To read a story-even enjoy it- and then go back to try to discover why that happened. How it was constructed. What clues we were given. How we were swept into the story (or not). What lessons we can take from connecting our reading and engagement with oter people’s stories with our own telling of story.

    Have you tried connecting the writing of your student’s interpretation of another person’s story with with their analysis of their own written stories?

    I once did this in a cultural studies class where we were studying representations if work and class, and I was trying to get folks to think beyond the literal visual images they saw as reportage. So I had them take photos of themselves as ‘workers’ to represent how they imagined themselves as workers and their work. I then had them analyze their own image using the tools we were practicing. I wrote back my own analysis of their images -what I drew from the details and then compared to their analysis with mine to spark a conversation about intentionality. It was massively time consuming assignment, but one of the most fun and engaging I did, and I believe educational experience. We ended the semester class with a slide show ‘exhibit’ of everyone’s image and one paragraph explanation (ala museum quote) including an my own image and analysis that I had to make of myself. Funnest class ever!

    Finally, in my own work I train folks how to give effective stump speeches-telling a gripping story. I want to think of how your insights can inform that work.

    • Erik,
      Your story sounds very interesting. Was that part of that innovative neighborhood programs course through the General College that you taught in St. Paul? Something you did at UMD? What I understand is that you layered a couple of interpretations on top of each other — the “author’s” and an “audience.” This sounds like pretty interesting reader response and I can see how it could be both powerful (for both parties) and very useful, in a metacognitive sort of way, for the author. I haven’t tried that with the kids, although I think a good conversation can help shift a learner’s own ideas, perhaps through a similar process? What is really interesting is to try this with one’s own work and invite the audience to chime in. Did students like the additional voice? Did they welcome it, or did it take some additional time to trust it?

      I’m not sure what this has to say about creating one’s own stories as you are talking about with your Wellstone Action! training programs. I’m curious to hear more about what you think. Are you blogging about this stuff still? Where? Drop me an email to let me know if you are.

      As always, thanks for stopping by. Your support for my thinking (and this teaching gig) means a lot to me, bro.

      All the best!

  2. So here’s a wow right back to you! This is such a powerful illustration of how students can learn how texts are put together in an authentic way! And I have to believe that by letting them make their own meaning the first time round, then returning to see how deliberately the writer laid out the seeds of what they’d come to understand, you’ve helped them become far more attentive, insightful readers than if you’d pushed or prompted them to see more or showed them what you did with those details through a think aloud. Bravo to both you and them!

  3. Vicki,
    Thank you so much for stopping by and offering a comment. Yes, this was a very powerful experience for the children. I think it helped them become more attentive and will, ultimately, help them become even more insightful. As a side note, one of the readers, Alice, is reading EDWARD’S EYES for an additional outside school reading program. (The book is a bit difficult for her..) I checked in with her later in the day, after we’d done our small group, and realized that she wasn’t really sure of what was happening in the story. I suggested that we go back and re-read the beginning and think about it. We’re in the middle of that activity right now. While a bit different than the re-reading noted above, she was convinced enough by it to cause her to readily agree to re-read the beginning to find what might be important. That was very good to hear! Also, I’m following up with another small group with them, this time another ghost story that unfolds in a similar manner as THE BLUE GHOST. They like ghost stories… 🙂 I’m curious to see where this gets us. Also, I’ll be looking in to see how much is transferring to their independent reading.

    As always, your ideas and support mean a lot to me.

    With high regards,

  4. Pingback: Reflection #2, Or, What this Blog Became in its First Year

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