Photo Credit: blmiers2 via Compfight

Somehow September has slipped halfway into the past and the sun, no longer high in the sky when I return home from school, slices low through the spreading branches of the oaks. Across the valley the trees have taken on that tired-leaf look of early fall. Senescence, at least in the world of trees, can be beautiful.

Which makes me think of how I spend my time.

Among other things, I sketched out plans this weekend for another week punctured by tests.

And as I plan, I think about how I’ve used my “Reading” time so far this year. We’ve spent a lot of time doing shared and independent reading. Very little group work so far. Weather related early outs, tests, and other sundry disruptions have derailed our schedules. However, I’ve listened to kids read, talked to kids about books, and connected kids with books and with each other around the topic of books. We’re reading a graphic novel, Rust, together on the document camera.

The discussions have been ferocious and fun.

I chose Rust because it was a nearly wordless graphic novel, new to me, and I wanted the kids to immerse themselves in thinking about something kind of complicated yet without a lot of words, to see what they could do. I wanted them to think out loud to me.

Rust starts with a prologue that dumps the reader into the past, right in the middle of a war between humans and machines, then moves us to the “present” (although the kids are not at all certain about that present part…), to a farm somewhere in the sepia-colored Great Plains. Roman Taylor, probably the main character, writes to his absent father about the arrival of Jet Jones, a mysterious jet-packed boy (?) who is very mechanically inclined and also chased relentlessly by a two-story robot bent on Jet’s destruction.

Eventually, Roman saves Jet from the robot, and Jet helps Roman around the farm, which has been faltering because Roman’s dad is somewhere, perhaps another war. Roman’s real passion is building robots, so Jet’s help around the farm is welcome. All seems well with Jet’s arrival, except for the giant robot, disabled and rusting in the field.

But is all well? As Weston, one of the students in our classroom said: “Jet has a secret. And he’s not telling anybody about it.” Nearing the end of book one, we are looking carefully for clues to figure out that secret; we’re wondering whether Jet is as innocent as he looks; we’re wondering where Roman’s father is; and we’re wondering about this war and how it came to the Taylor farm now forty-eight years later.

I’ve toggled back and forth on the screen between reading through the document camera and taking notes about our discussion using a simple Details I notice – Thoughts I have – What I wonder chart ala Vicki Vinton, whose  blog and book, What Readers Really Do have made a big difference in my teaching life. (I’ve altered her What I Know – What I Wonder chart just a bit, probably because of defects in the way I teach, but it makes sense to me!)

But I feel a sense of foreboding, and it’s not just about Jet Jones’ secret, or the sepia world he inhabits.

This will be our first year with a reading series and I got my first, dreaded email this week that we teachers are expected to display “fidelity to the program.” I’ve worried about this in the past. Not that I’m one who habitually lacks “fidelity,” it’s just that programs are not what I feel married to.

I’ve loved the immersion in the graphic novel (some readings-discussions have lasted 30 to as many as 45 minutes), the questions that have come from this depth of immersion — the inferences, the way we’ve identified important parts of the story, and how our understanding of what is important has shifted as we learn more about what is going on. That’s cool. And oh so not “gradual release of responsibility.” More like sudden release. My main role has been to read and make sure I turn the pages very, very slowly. 🙂

The reading program (which is better than some!) teaches one metacognitive skill at a time: questioning, inferring, determining importance, etc. using the “gradual release of responsibility” method. In fact, during our before school training, the instructor warned us that we needed to keep our instruction moving, moving, moving, so our mini-lessons would be short, focused on a clear, single-issue think aloud, so the children could experience that responsibility we were about to release. If this week’s topic was questioning, we had to get them asking questions. We didn’t have time for answers, said she.

So, now that September has slipped halfway into the past and the thirty days allotted to set up our classroom routines (and relative freedom from the skill lessons) is nearing the end, I wonder how I’m going to spend my time next month AFTER the leaves have turned golden then dropped from the trees.

After reading Rust with the kids, where many are already inferring, questioning, determining importance even in this first month of school and at a pretty high level, and the kids are lined up to read the second book in the series, I wonder whether I can be faithful to the practice of teaching a single skill, and completing ALL of my mini-lessons in ten minutes. Some? Sure. All?

And questions without answers?

I hate feeling unfaithful. Really. I do.