Title of Video Segment: Into the Book: Behind the Lesson, Making Connections
Running time: 9 minutes, 31 seconds
Synopsis of Segment: Making Connections … Students learn to think like successful adult readers and make connections among books, their own lives, and the larger world.

DR. MICHAEL P. FORD: How do students use making connections to get into the book? Let's go Behind the Lesson and see how teachers make this happen.
     
STUDENT: Lots and lots of chicken pox.

GALE CHARTIER: And I know somebody recommended this book. Do you know who recommended it?

STUDENT: Maddy.

GALE CHARTIER: How come she recommended this book?
     
STUDENT: Because I like dogs.
     
GALE CHARTIER: What do you find interesting about this book?
     
STUDENT: I find a connection. When I say sit, my dog sits. I've got the doggie trained.
     
GALE CHARTIER: And the same thing happens in the story? All right. Before we start, I would like someone to tell something about what they read when they were doing their quiet reading. Andrew?
     
STUDENT: The Carrot...

GALE CHARTIER: Oh, I love that book. Tell your classmates why you'd like them to read it.
     
STUDENT: Because his brother and his mom and his dad keep telling him it won't come up. But then, at the end, they're all wrong and he is right. Because then the plant comes up and there's a big carrot.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Do you know what the message was that the author was telling you? What is it?     

STUDENT: That you shouldn't give up.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Very good. I know you guys have a lot of questions. Make sure if you've read a book today that you recommend it on our chart in the reading area when you have time. You guys are doing such a great job of making connections to things that happened in the story. You've also made connections with me about things that happened out in the world. And we've charted all those. And about other books we've read. Today, I want you to listen very carefully. And I want you to watch what I do. What do you notice that I have sticking out of my book? Desiree? What are these?
     
STUDENT: Post-Its.
     
GALE CHARTIER: What's "Big Cheese"?

I wrote "Big Cheese" on one. What do you think I'm doing with my Post-It notes?
     
STUDENT: Asking questions.
     
GALE CHARTIER: I could be asking questions. What else, Andrew?
     
STUDENT: Making connections. Text-to-self.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Yes, text-to-self, obviously. What else?

DR. FORD: What was your focus for the day? What were you really trying to accomplish?
     
GALE CHARTIER: My focus today was basically to get the message of the story. And how they could use the message of the story to make a deeper connection, to make them understand the text or relate it to some old information they had. And bring new information up front.

I jotted down my thinking, so I could help you do the same thing when you go back to your reading in reading groups. The first thing I put on here was "big cheese."So, I had a text-to-self connection. When I taught kindergarten, we had what was called a "big cheese." It wasn't the star of the week, like they have now in kindergarten. It was called the "big cheese." It was the same thing.
     
"'I know today would be better.' said Stanley's mom, as he left for school the next morning." And I thought of another book. And this one was, "Timothy Goes to School," by Rosemary Wells. Do you remember the part about Timothy trying to figure out what he wanted to wear to school? And every time he wore something or his mother made something, Claude said he shouldn't be doing this and made Timothy feel so bad. So, I'm understanding how Stanley is feeling.
     
DR. FORD: What would you say to teachers of primary children who think strategy instruction is beyond the kids that they're working with, and that they really need to focus more on learning the sounds, the letters, the words, and leave the strategy instruction for later?
     
GALE CHARTIER: Thinking is most important. A lot of kids can read words, but if they're not thinking, it's really not reading. So, I try to send that message. So, I start from day one, and I take something that's familiar, that they can make that connection to and get really excited about. They're seeing what I'm doing when I read a book, and they can also do the same.

"He wished he could disappear." How many of you have felt like that?

Tell me. We've been working with a lot of connections. How do connections help you? Lauren, do you remember what you said earlier today?

STUDENT: They may help you understand the book, and how the characters
feel.
     
GALE CHARTIER: All right. Today, this is what I would like you to do. You were doing your quiet reading, and I had gone around to a few of you. It looked like you were trying to use your Post-It notes. I want you to think really way down deep today, and think about what the message is in your story, and make your connections today. See if you can do that. Do you remember the coding system we used? Text-to-self. Text-to-text. Text-to-"W", text-to-world. So that will help, you don't have to write all that out. So, what I can do now with my Post-It notes with my story is I can take my Post-It notes and I can see where my thinking is at the time, so I can do some more thinking.

What are you thinking? Do you have any connections?

STUDENT: Yeah, how did he get a chicken pox?

GALE CHARTIER: That's a question. Did you have any connections to that?
Have you ever been sick?
     
STUDENT: Yeah.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Could you make a connection between you and the character? You could do that, sure. Put your title up here. Good job.
     
DR. FORD: What have done to foster that sort of level of independence with very young children, so that you can get at small groups and individuals, because the other kids are so well engaged?
     
GALE CHARTIER: Well, it takes a lot of practice. You know, I start at the beginning of the year. And I think the first six weeks, we practice routine. And I'm the model, this is what it looks like. This is what it sounds like. And we come back and we share what went well, what didn't go well. Until finally, I see that their understanding is much higher and I can let go of a little bit of that responsibility.

Boys and girls, will you stop, even if you're not finished and bring your notebooks to the carpet, quickly.

You know, I went around today and I saw a lot of you making good connections. Some of you were even writing questions. And some of you even chose non-fiction books to write about today. Great job. Let's see, who would like to share?

STUDENT: When Amanda could not wait to go to school, it reminded me of when I was little and I couldn't wait to go to school.

GALE CHARTIER: Oh, I'm glad you couldn't wait, because you love school. You love to learn. Good job. All right, good connection. What kind of connection was that? Can you tell me?

STUDENT: A text-to-self.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Peter, would you like to share?
     
STUDENT: The part about them having a tree house reminds me of Arthur, because they both have tree houses.
     
GALE CHARTIER: And what kind of connection is that?
     
STUDENT: Text-to-world.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Tell me more about that. Why do you think that?

STUDENT: Because they made a show about someone with a tree house. Oh, and I have another connection.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Go ahead.
     
STUDENT: The part about them seeing frogs reminds me of when I saw a dead frog.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Ooh!

STUDENT: It's a text-to-self connection.

DR. FORD: It's obvious from the way that your kids talk that they've internalized a lot of this strategy language and their ability to use it. What else have you done to kind of move them from where they were at the beginning of the year to this point of the year?
     
GALE CHARTIER: I think at the beginning, we were acting out their thinking. We were doing a lot of role playing, what it might look like. We had kids participate in what their thinking was and presenting it to other kids in the group. And as I moved forward and added more of the strategies, I tried to not add too many at one time.
     
STUDENT: That part reminds me about real people or astronauts.

GALE CHARTIER: Oh, that's wonderful. What kind of connection would that
be?
     
STUDENT: Um, a text-to-world.
     
GALE CHARTIER: Do you know anything about astronauts? Where do you think astronauts go?
     
STUDENT: Up into space.

GALE CHARTIER: Into space, so you know something. I bet when you finish reading this book, you'll be able to add some new information to your thinking.
     
STUDENT: I already have.
     
GALE CHARTIER: I think you made a good choice today.
     
DR. FORD: I would say, as a former first-grade teacher, that it's always fun to come into a first-grade classroom again, especially one in which there's so much going on, like there is in your classroom. So, thank you for inviting us in.

GALE CHARTIER: Thank you for coming.