Teaching Strategies
The primary purpose of teaching strategies is to help us as teachers effectively deliver educational content, engage diverse learners, and improve student outcomes. Teaching strategy's structure instruction so students can better understand, apply, and retain new information.
When doing a novel study, one important strategy is the pre-reading strategy. Students should be introduced to the themes in the book before actually reading the book. More importantly, students relate these themes to themselves. The objective of this strategy is so that students can explore their own definitions and experiences of home before encountering Esperanza’s journey in The House on Mango Street.
A prereading strategy that works well with students is when you ask them to do a silent reflection. This silent reflection is guided with prompts:
What is the first image that comes to mind when you think of home?
What does home feel like? What sounds, smells, or sensations do you associate with home?
When do you feel most at home?
What makes a place feel like home?
Offering students prompts and giving them wait time before formulating a response is helpful because students need time to process what is being asked and how they want to answer. From the silent reflection, students move to a written response. This gives the students the opportunity to record their thoughts using a low-stakes strategy because only they are seeing what they are writing. It is important to lower the affective filter *when asking students to open up and share themes that are personal to them.
In education, the affective filter is a psychological barrier that prevents learners from absorbing and processing new information. Formulated by linguist Stephen Krashen, it dictates that when a student experiences high anxiety, embarrassment, or low motivation, this "filter" goes up, blocking cognition. Conversely, when students feel safe, this barrier drops.12
For some of our struggling students, I like to give them the opportunity to draw their responses to the prompts. Once students are done, I follow up with the pair-share strategy. I make it optional because early in a lesson, some students may not feel comfortable sharing out.
Once students do a personal reflection related to what home means to them, we can move on to the novel. Students will utilize the core text to create a “Four Walls Interactive Map”. They will create a collaborative anchor chart representing the house on Mango Street. The students will use information from the book and visually represent what the house on Mango Street looks like to Esperanza. Students will then go on to contrast and represent how she describes her ideal space. The connection through mapping is that students will map her journey from shame to desire for independence, showing how we view home is tied to self-determination.
Essential questions are always beneficial when introducing a novel. This strategy is important in the English language arts classroom. An essential question is formulated as an opinion inquiry. There is no correct answer, but students are guided to support their answers with reasons that support their thinking. Providing students with multiple essential questions benefits students of all levels because their answers will vary depending on their skill set. It also provides the opportunity to address questions, ideas, and concepts as they appear in real time.
A strategy that will be helpful when addressing the theme of migration is creating a timeline. This can help students connect the theme of migration in the novel to any personal experiences of migration. Students will use the vignette “Geraldo No Last Name” to analyze the emotions and hard work of moving to a new country. Students will discuss how Geraldo is viewed as an invisible migrant worker with no home to return to. They will then research and or interview a family member to create a visual timeline of why people leave and migrate. The students will gain a deeper understanding of why people migrate and what are some of the more serious reasons behind these moves.
Anticipation guides are useful when actually introducing the novel. By utilizing the anticipatory guide, teachers can introduce the thematic concepts and students take a stance before reading. This strategy allows students to ponder a real situation. It challenges students to think and commit to an idea because there is never a “maybe” or “depends”. Students begin to understand that not many situations are black or white, right or wrong.
Once we are reading a novel, one teaching strategy I use is guided exploration. This strategy allows students to read independently, as a group, utilize audio, or teacher-led readings. Students can engage in any of the reading options being practiced for the day. Students are then guided to record any initial reactions or questions. As a class, close readings are another beneficial strategy. A close reading involves a multi-step process. Students first observe literal meaning and basic structure, then move to deeper interpretations of the text. During a close reading, students note specific textual evidence, patterns, and anomalies.
As work on the novel continues, I like to use the “fishbowl” method. This method allows a targeted discussion about some themes in the novel. While a group of students are in the middle of the room, discussing a question, concept, or observation, the students surrounding them are taking notes, annotating clarifying questions, and formulating counter arguments. The observing students are not allowed to join the discussion until the students in the center of the circle are done. It basically forces students to really listen in order to formulate solid arguments. This strategy promotes meaningful student discourse.
Graphic organizers are always helpful, especially as a differentiation tool when conducting a novel study. They act as visual roadmaps. They make abstract reading concepts concrete. They help readers track complex plots, characters, and themes. They prevent students from getting lost in a long book. 13
As the novel study concludes, the strategies that I use are creating an alternative ending or an epilogue. An epilogue is a concluding section added to the book that takes place after the end of the novel. I choose these two strategies over an essay because these strategies allow students to show what they have learned. It also allows students to imagine what happens to the characters after the story concludes based on inferences. Some differentiation strategies that I employ for the final writing piece are letter writing. Students who find writing more challenging can choose to write a letter to the main character. They can either ask the character questions or give their opinion about anything in the book. This is helpful for some students because it promotes inquiry and further discussion about the novel. Other students can choose to create a collage where they include a favorite quote, themes, and drawings to summarize what they have learned and how they connected to the novel.
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