FOR-PD Update

Latest FOR-PD Numbers

• 12,683 students
• 907 sections
• 67 participating districts
• 7 participating universities
• 5 participating community colleges

 

Dear Colleagues:

The FOR-PD project continues to serve educators across the state of Florida. Just recently, districts started both 10- and 12-week sections of the FOR-PD course. WOW, we are currently running 120 sections! We appreciate your ongoing support of FOR-PD and always welcome your feedback.

In this update you will find information on:

• Upcoming registration dates for summer and fall 2006. Please share these dates with teachers in your districts and with other offices such as Alternative Certification Programs.
• The 8th Annual Literacy Symposium. We hope that teachers from your district can attend.
• The March edition of the FOR-PD Literacy Newsletter.
• FOR-PD’s Reading Strategy of the Month.
• The March edition of the Facilitating with Felicity e-Newsletter.
• Facilitator Professional Development efforts.
• Facilitator responses to an Edutopia article “Why Johnny (Still) Can’t Read.”
• And information on the FOR-PD Help Desk.

We will continue to inform you of our successes, challenges, and solutions to online professional development. We thank you for your ongoing collaboration with the FOR-PD project.

Best Wishes,
Catherine Glass
Director, FOR-PD
cc@orion.itrc.ucf.edu

 

Upcoming District Registration Dates

Districts wishing to register sections for summer and fall must complete the district registration file and send it to Richard Scott (Richard@orion.itrc.ucf.edu). We request that you adhere to the dates provided.

Summer 2006
6/26/06	Registration file must be received in the FOR-PD office
7/10/06	District courses begin
10/09/06	District courses end

 

Fall 2006
8/14/06	Registration file must be received in the FOR-PD office
8/28/06	District courses begin
12/11/06	District courses end

 

Upcoming Open Enrollment Dates

Teachers wishing to register during open enrollment must do so by registering on our website. Please advertise these dates to those teachers who will need to take the FOR-PD course.

Summer 2006
5/8/06	Open enrollment registration for summer begins
6/26/06	Open enrollment registration for summer ends
7/10/06	Summer courses begin
10/2/06	Summer courses end

 

Fall 2006
7/10/06	Open enrollment registration for fall begins
8/7/06	Open enrollment registration for fall ends
8/21/06	Fall courses begin
12/4/06	Fall courses end

 

The UCF College of Education - 8th Annual Literacy Symposium

Please share this information with teachers in your district.

Come join us for a day of learning how to engage readers, motivate students, and connect children with books! This is a free professional day for all elementary and secondary educators, including literacy coaches, library media specialists, reading specialists, and administrators. The Symposium will take place in the College of Education Gymnasium April 7, 2006 from 8:30 AM to 3:30 PM.

This year's keynote speakers include ReLeah Lent, a national educational consultant and Enrigue Puig, director of the Florida Literacy and Reading Excellence Project. ReLeah Lent's increasing awareness of students' disengagement and disinterest in school lead her to write her third book, Engaging Adolescent Learners: A Guide for Content Area Teachers. Enrique Puig's current interests include the concepts of pedagogy and andragogy from a Vygotskian perspective involving literacy coaching to increase student learning. His new book, The Literacy Coach, will be published June 2006.

All Literacy Symposium information can be accessed at http://www.itrc.ucf.edu/LitSym/. The UCF College of Education 8th Annual Literacy Symposium is sponsored by FOR-PD,  FLaRE, and UCF's College of Education.

 

FOR-PD Literacy e-Newsletter

Please read the March issue of the Literacy Newsletter. 

What types of reading should be included in a comprehensive reading program? Since January, we have taken a look at guided reading and shared reading. This month, the In Focus section is on independent reading. Studies done with middle and high school students indicate that students do not participate in a great deal of independent or self selected reading. Yet research shows that reading connected text results in improved reading achievement. The Center for the Study of Reading at the University of Illinois has found that students who do a great deal of reading on their own become better readers because independent reading enhances their reading comprehension; provides them with a wide range of background knowledge; accounts for one-third or more of their vocabulary growth; and promotes reading as a life long activity. Time for independent reading should be a part of every reading program and content area classroom. Giving students time to explore, through text, the concepts they are learning about in the classroom builds content knowledge. Independent reading also allows students to read further on topics they are curious about. Check out this month's In Focus section.

Additional information you will find in this month’s Literacy Newsletter:

• Women’s History Month
• Upcoming Conferences
• Websites for Teachers
• Books for Students
• Professional Development Books for Teachers
• FOR-PD’s Completion Schedule for 10- and 12-week Courses
• Upcoming Chat Events

 

FOR-PD's Reading Strategy of the Month

March's Reading Strategy of the Month examines the use of Inquiry Charts (I-Charts). The I-Chart was developed by Hoffman (1992) as an instructional procedure that nurtures critical thinking and reading. Based upon work done by Ogle with the KWL and McKenzie with data charts, this graphic tool helps students use more than one piece of text or source of information (Randall, 1996). It is extremely useful when the different sources do not agree because it allows students the opportunity to recognize those differences and reconcile them through critical thinking (Blachowicz & Ogle, 2001). Through use of the I-Chart, students are able to analyze, evaluate, and think divergently about information to attain a deeper understanding about the topic at hand.

We invite you to take a look at our current reading strategy and the examples provided from elementary and secondary levels. Try this strategy in your classroom and then email us and tell us how it worked (forpd@mail.ucf.edu). Also, don't forget to share the strategy with your colleagues. Each month we feature an effective reading strategy, explain the rationale behind the strategy, give directions on how to use the strategy with students, present ideas for adapting the strategy to different content areas, present ideas for assessing the strategy, and, of course, provide a printable PDF version of the strategy. Check out our Reading Strategy Archive to see past Reading Strategies of the Month.

 

Facilitator Newsletter

Please also read our March Facilitator Newsletter. 

In our "Facilitation with Felicity" e-Newsletter, we continue to address the issues of facilitator professional development, facilitation, communication, and teacher participation. Facilitators continue to work with many teachers across the state on the completion of the FOR-PD course. Below are some core tips we have shared with facilitators this month. 

• Be responsive to teachers in your section--give timely, short, direct, substantive feedback.
• Keep in mind individual learning and group discussion styles.
• Be aware of group dynamics.
• Help teachers stay focused.
• Referee-try to reduce negative group conditions (negative remarks or comments).
• Link discussions to the lesson assignment(s).
• Ask questions and raise issues as needed.
• Synthesize key points and major discussion themes as needed.

March's Facilitation Resource of the Month is a guide entitled, Effective Online Facilitation [http://pre2005.flexiblelearning.net.au/guides/facilitation.html]. This guide is based on the knowledge generated from the Australian Flexible Learning Framework and selected external literature. The guide provides an introduction to key issues related to online facilitation.

As a facilitator you must call upon the following facilitation skills:

• engage the learner in the learning process, particularly at the beginning;
• use appropriate questioning, listening, and feedback skills;
• provide direction and support to learners;
• manage online discussion;
• build online community;
• build relationships between with participants;
• use motivational skills to keep students progressing.

The role of the facilitator is challenging and constantly changing to fit the needs of the participant. 

 

Facilitator Professional Development

Each semester, FOR-PD facilitators participate in ongoing professional development related to the FOR-PD course and/or their roles as facilitators. Our facilitators must be knowledgeable of the reading content in the course and be kept up to date on new information and research that becomes available in the field of reading. In an effort to build reading content knowledge of our facilitators, we have spent the past month focusing on fluency assessment and instruction. Those participating have shared many ideas and resources for addressing fluency in the classroom. Below are some comments from our book study:

"I like the example the article uses - fluency serves as a bridge between word recognition and comprehension. I agree that fluent readers comprehend more - or at least have an easier time comprehending because they are automatically reading the words and thus have more time to think, make connections, and understand." -J. Snyder

"I am no longer in the classroom; however, I use to read aloud to my ninth graders each day to model fluent reading. One of their favorite books was "The Rest of the Story" by Paul Harvey." -D. Kirkpatrick

"Measuring a student's fluency level is very significant because teachers need to implement strategies for remediation. When teachers assess using more than one instrument, there is a degree of validity as opposed to using just one assessment." - N. Tondreault

"Text plays a very important part in fluency development because texts can be user friendly or not so much. If students have time to read and reread a passage of interest that they can read with success, they will want to read more which helps develop fluency. Some texts just don't lend themselves to students being interested or motivated to read." - J. Salamon

This month, the Facilitator Professional Development will focus on vocabulary. Facilitators will be using the following materials to complete this book study.

While the materials we are using focus on the elementary to beginning middle school levels, we are encouraging facilitators to think beyond those levels to how this information can be applied with secondary students.  

A Focus on Vocabulary [PDF 1.85MB] by Jean Osborn, MEd; Fran Lehr, MA (2004)

This document explores vocabulary development as a component of reading comprehension. The text examines research results on students' vocabulary acquisition and instruction that helps them develop the kind of vocabulary knowledge that will contribute to their reading success.

Teaching Reading Workshop
This is a video workshop provided through Annenburg Media. We will be using the Workshop 2: Fluency and Word Study. This session focuses on how students in the middle grades develop vocabulary and reading fluency. Literacy expert Richard Allington discusses specific teaching strategies that help build fluency and vocabulary, illustrated by classroom examples. (We will be using the last 12-minutes of this workshop video.). You will need to fill out the Annenburg registration form in order to view the video workshop.

Additionally, there is a second video, Classroom Program 9 - Investigating Word Meaning, in which you can look in on a mini-lesson designed to teach students how to use context clues to discover the meaning of unfamiliar words.

We look forward to our continued discussions on vocabulary.

 

Why Johnny (Still) Can’t Read

This month's Edutopia forum focuses on the topic of adolescent literacy. "Why Johnny (Still) Can't Read" (Guensburg, 2006) discusses the dilemma of limited literacy skills of older students and offers suggestions to help schools get back on track in helping these students read. Although gaining necessary literacy skills is generally targeted in the younger elementary years, practicing these skills with older readers is just as crucial. Adolescent reading programs can be extremely beneficial. Effective programs encourage instructional improvement and change within the school system to really focus upon the advancement of adolescent literacy. Every teacher should be held accountable for the literacy progress of the students, a difficult and often exhausting task. This is where literacy coaches play a key role. School literacy coaches can aid teachers in improving instruction techniques and offering suggestions about the implementation of new techniques in the classroom. No matter what venue schools choose to go through, a literacy plan for secondary students is essential.

Plenty of facilitators had comments about the article content. Many facilitators noted that Florida was taking a step in the right direction by placing a heavy influence upon the importance of hiring a literacy coach. Facilitators also reiterated the importance of exposing older struggling readers to strategic literacy skills. Most agreed that literacy coaches made a great addition to the classroom circuit and were very effective in terms of offering positive suggestions for dealing with readers, modeling instructional techniques, and keeping teachers in-the-know about current research trends. Literacy coaches were viewed as valuable assets who were able to come into the classroom, discuss strategy implementation, and then assess the impact on student learning.

Several aspects of literacy promotion in the schools were discussed by many of the facilitators. Modeling (via the literacy coach) instructional strategies and showing teachers how to implement them was indicated as an effective way for teachers to understand how to foster literacy growth in the classroom. Facilitators also mentioned the importance of reading programs that engage teachers and promote the use of beneficial instructional tools and techniques to develop literacy skills among older students. Key elements of an effective literacy plan from the article included strong leadership and extensive literacy education. Facilitators recognized the value of such programs and the impact that literacy education has on their students as well as their own professional development.

The article can be accessed at http://www.edutopia.org/magazine/feb06.php.

 

 

FOR-PD Help Desk Hours

Our Technical Team continues to improve the services they offer. They have added a Live Chat feature that is available on the Help Desk Web page.  In order to use this feature you must follow these directions. First, make sure that you are online. The button below will tell you whether you are online or offline. Next, click on Set Screen Name and type your name. Then, click in the light blue box below to type your message. Press Enter to send it. This requires you have Macromedia Flash installed on your computer.

The Technical Team has also been busy updating the course Tutorials and Troubleshooting Guide. Both of these resources provide a wealth of information on the tools used in the course and specific technology problems past participants have had along with solutions to these problems. They have made these resources more interactive by using Captivate to create short movies. These movies visually show participants, in a step by step manner, exactly what to do and click as they attempt to solve their problems.

The Technical Support Site lists the most up-to-date Help Desk hours. Our hours are as follows:
Monday through Friday 9:00am - 4:00pm EST and 6:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Saturday 10:00am- 3:00pm EST

The phone number is 1-866-863-READ (7323) toll free, Florida calls only. Out of the state of Florida, please call 407-249-4702. Technical support is also available through the Tech Help form our Help Desk Web page. Additionally, technical support is available through AOL Instant Messenger, screen name "forpdhelp."

 

FOR-PD Notable Quotables

"Not keeping abreast with research chains us to committing the same mistakes our teachers made with us. Fortunately, this course allows us to break the chains of ignorance and hopefully pass on greater knowledge and success to a future generation." Participant-Spring 2005

"I would like to give you a big HUG ( ) email style. Thank you for the wonderful book marks with the five finger rule. I have been able to get into many classrooms and distribute them with a lesson on the five finger rule." The five finger rule is a way of helping students select appropriate books. You can order the bookmark from our eStore.

"A couple of weeks into this course I began feeling like a leader within my school, not just within my department." Participant - Fall 2005

 

Do you have comments about the course? Have you received any comments from people in your district? We are always looking for feedback so send it our way. Email forpd@mail.ucf.edu.