Focus on Reading and Super Six Strategies

I have to admit that I'm finding it difficult to think pedagogically at the moment. What I mean by that is that I'm usually trying to think and plan ahead into the next term or two. I always want to backward map as much as possible, to frontload students so that when they get to the tricky part of their learning they feel as prepared as possible. It also helps diminish my own anxiety and gives me a clear roadmap to work to - everything is transparent and students know exactly what's coming up throughout each term. Assessment tasks can be given to students far in advance of due dates, and it usually frees up my spare periods to concentrate on head teacher responsibilities, or welfare troubleshooting, helping students 1:1, or any other long projects I might be working on. 

In the age of COVID-19 it just feels impossible trying to plan for anything. Our goalposts are getting moved almost daily... and it isn't anyone's fault, it's just kind of how it is. Being able to plan far ahead has become a privilege rather than a necessity. 

I hate it.

Whenever I get stuck like this I tend to favour a back-to-basics approach. When times are complicated then the work should be simpler. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs (pictured above) makes it pretty clear that students are less likely to be able to engage with curriculum if their basic needs aren't being met and, as this pandemic provokes and fertilises a seemingly neverending range of issues straight out of a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel, I don't blame them. A lot of students are going to find it difficult to take complicated course content on board in order to "become the most that one can be" if they feel that their safety needs are being threatened by a pandemic.

I always come back to the Super Six Literacy strategies. 

Some time in the past, I think it might have been 2013 or 2014, my school undertook the Focus on Reading professional development modules. Others will be able to tell you about this literacy initiative more than me... what I will say instead is that this particular professional learning galvanised my appreciation for teaching literacy skills. The Focus on Reading modules just felt so wonderfully practical and I'm glad to see that the Department of Education is currently working on a new version of it.

I replicate some of the Super Six-related strategies below in the absence of their current availability. 

Here's an example, from Page 8 of Module 1, drawing upon Teaching for Comprehending and Fluency by I. Fountas and G. Pinnell (2006, pp.463-464). This demonstrates some ways in which students can practice independent writing in relation to their reading:

Writing and Drawing About Reading

Using words, phrases or sketches on stick-on notes or in the notebook to note:

• Place where you made a personal prediction
• Predictions
• Place where you found out something about a character
• Wonderings
• Place where you learned new information
• Place that you found confusing
• Place that you found interesting
• Memorable language
• Place that reminded you of another book

Short writing activities - a few sentences or paragraphs produced quickly in a notebook or a long stick-on note that is placed in a notebook:

• Reaction to the writer's style
• A prediction
• Response to a selected quote
• Response to a peer's thinking
• Reaction to a character
• Thoughts about the writer's craft
• Thoughts about the writer's message
• Comments on the writer's point of view
• Thoughts about how the text reveals life issues
• New understandings or insights
• Using knowledge of the genre to think about character, plot, theme, setting
• Links to other texts
• Story map

Graphic organisers - words, phrases, sketches, or sentences on graphic organisers or drawn in a notebook:

• Web
• Time sequence chain
• Comparison/contrast chart
• Cause/effect chart
• Problem/solution chart
• Grid for comparing elements or taking notes
• Outline
• Letter to the teacher with reply (ongoing dialogue about texts)

Longer responses in the notebook elaborating on thinking about one or several texts

• Double-column entry (two-column responses with material from the text, a category or questions on the left and response or comments on the right)
• Expansion of thinking from the notes, sketches, short writing, or graphic organisers
• Letter to author or illustrator study
• Book recommendation
• Book review 

Published work - more formal responses to texts that are shared publicly

• Poem related to a text
• Picture book on a topic or subject (EG. Biography)
• Opinion essay
• Report of an author or illustrator study
• Examination of a particular theme across texts
• A character analysis or companion
• A book critique  

This particular Focus on Reading module notes go on to discuss the interrelated nature of reading and writing - the way in which learning to write should take place alongside learning to read, as one strengthens the other and vice versa.

I came to realise in light of all this that the explicit teaching of reading and writing right up to the end of Year 12 it is a fundamental part of our ongoing ability to understand complex and sustained text. Indeed, even adults need to make these processes explicit to themselves if they are to develop their own critical faculties in relation to the wider world. Learning never stops.

Super Six Literacy Strategies

The strategies mentioned above can be categorised as examples of the Super Six - to be honest, all comprehension essentially fits into this paradigm. The Super Six, in brief, are the following:

Questioning: Learners formulate and respond to questions that clarify meaning. This allows for greater depth of understanding when drilling down into texts.

Visualising: Learners create a mental image from a text. Visualising isn't necessarily a natural skill for everyone and is something that needs to be developed so that imaginative skills are engaged.

Making Connections: Learners make personal connections with the text by linking it to themselves, another text, or the wider world. This process makes use of our ability to recall information from our broader understanding of things - building pathways between different kinds of knowledge and prompting development of our ability to synthesise information.

Monitoring: Learners interrupt the reading process by stopping to check their understanding. This is an important part of comprehension as it forces the learner to develop strategies to cope with obstacles or disrupted meaning during the reading process.

Summarising: Learners identify and gather together the most significant parts of a text, restating this information in their own words. This is another valuable part of the comprehension process as it helps develop our ability to synthesise information, sort and categorise ideas, and discard irrelevant details.

Predicting: Learners use information from one part of the text to construct an idea of what will happen later in the same text. This is a valuable part of our critical thinking in that it makes explicit the way in which we adjust expectations based on the available information.

I always find myself assured that I'm doing something useful by falling back on the above six domains of comprehension while designing learning activities. Students never fail to be able to engage with these strategies and it's almost always useful in a wide range of contexts.

Food for thought :)