2023 - Oral Language Focus

 Speaking vs Talking

This year I have decided to return my focus to oral language. (jt was my 2021 focus).  This is due to the challenges faced by my students in both speech, and language. 

In the area of speech - articulation, fluency, and the way the voice is used are all areas that require support. 

When I focus of the ‘Language’ of Oral Language, I can see that knowing what words mean and putting words together correctly are two vital areas to develop. 

A member of our NE/YR 1 team, Deb Shirley, created a wonderful resource during her year of study with MIT (Manaiakalani Innovative Teachers). It's an assessment of four areas of oral language: Conversational Style, Grammar and Articulation (my focus), Vocabulary and Expressive Language, and Receptive Language and Meaning Making. This resource allows the teacher (me) to gather data to assess a child's oral language capability, and then re-test at a later date to assess growth over time.

At this stage I’m not sure if I’ll work on both speech and language, or just focus on one area.  However, the question I have for my Teacher Inquiry is:  Will focus on the ‘speech’ of oral language help students to confidently express themselves in the ‘language’ of oral language?

I'm eager to begin testing and finding ways to 'grow' the oral language of the wonderful students in my space.

Focus - That's the challenge.

In my class of five year olds, the ability to focus on either the teacher, during whole class instruction, during group Reading, or on follow-up tasks is something that many children struggle with.   My inquiry is around finding out how to encourage all my students to focus, in order for them to 

A. attain new learning; 

B. know what they're supposed to be doing, and 

C. ensure time (which is precious) is not wasted re-telling what has just been said one, two, three (or more) times.

I chose to base my efforts on three students whose focus was particularly challenging.  I spent time working with this focus group, with things like positioning them to make sure their focus on me was easier.  I was continually reminding them to "Focus!"  "Look at me.  Don't look over there."  "Keep your eyes on your book (work)".  There wasn't a lot of change, to be honest.  Unfortunately, one child moved to Australia, and one moved out of our area.  So, with only one child left in the group, I decided to make this a more 'whole class' inquiry.

I looked on-line for inspiration, and read about the part role playing has with children, and how they respond to watching and practising, really anything, with positive outcomes.  So I decided to give this a go with my class.

I began with focussing on completing tasks - follow up iPad work, Worksheets, Completing

puzzles etc.  I asked the class to shut their eyes and imagine that they'd finished everything they had to do.  'How does that feel' I asked them.  'Happy' was the reply.  And what happens when you've finished a task? I asked.  'You get to play' they answered.  'Yes' I said.  And we shut our eyes and imagined finishing the tasks, and getting to play.  They felt happy, as I sent them off with a task in hand.

Has this worked?  Well, it's early days yet, but I have seen an increase in completed tasks.  I'm going to keep monitoring this strategy for the remainder of the year, and I'll be able to tell if it's something I should be using each year.  My gut instinct is that I should.

Data

When I began my inquiry, our team had identified three areas to focus on to increase reading. They were phonetic knowledge, oral language, and working memory.

 

Phonetic knowledge is something I’ve been teaching as a whole class activity, as well as through Word Work with all my Reading Groups.  It has not been something I’ve spent time on with my Teaching group, and so I think gathering data that identifies a positive outcome through specific activities/interactions will be challenging, as all students took part in the same activities, and the majority of students have made progress.

That being said….here is the data I have on phonetic knowledge, and you can see that all children are making progress.

T= Teaching Group. C= Control Group

Teaching or Control Group	Student	Ethni-city	First day of School	Letter Sound Knowledge Feb ‘21	Letter Sound Knowledge May ‘21
T	A	Tongagn	May 2020	29	42
T	B	Maori	Sept 2020	5	24
T	C	Tongan	Oct 2020	3	23
T	D	Maori	Feb 2021	5	22
C	AA	CIM	Nov 2020	0	32
C	BB	Tongan	Aug 2020	12	52
C	CC	Other Pacific	Aug 2020	42	52
C	DD	Samoan	Dec 2020	0	12

Oral language is also being developed through whole class discussions, and one-to-one as needs arise.

I have recently decided to focus purely on increasing working memory.  I believe I’ll be able to gather data that compares students I’ve ‘worked’ with against those that are just left to themselves.

 

What I did:

Each child had three chances to copy a coloured block arrangement using three or four out of seven blocks. Each child had a practise go before I took score.  The scores show how many they got correct in mid June. 

Rc, Wo = Right colours, wrong order.                 

	Student	3 colours JUNE	4 colours JUNE
T	A	1/3 1 - Rc, Wo
T	B	2/3	O/1
T	C	0/3
T	D	3/3	0/3 2 - Rc. Wo
C	AA	0/3		Thought she was ready, but she really wasn’t.
C	BB	2/3	0/2
C	CC	2/3	0/2
C	DD	0/3		Even when she said ‘black, yellow, green, (the correct colour and order) she put black, white, green.

After gathering this data the teaching group (T) were given 10 minutes daily to play a 16 block memory game https://www.helpfulgames.com/subjects/brain-training/memory.html to hopefully improve their memory.

Problems:  Children A, C, D did not get to have many chances to play the game, as they had a number of absences.  While 3/4 of the group enjoyed playing the game, child B did not enjoy it (unless they were in the mood), and consequently did not focus well during their ten minutes. 

Child BB, accidentally got to have a few chances at playing the memory games, before I realised he wasn’t ‘supposed to’.

These are the results after the two-week trial.  (I know two weeks isn’t long enough, but it’s all I’ve got for now).  Again I began with a ‘practise’ test before the ‘real thing’.

Rc, Wo = Right colours, wrong order.         

	Student	3 colours	4 colours	Improved or not?
T	A	3/3	1/2	Yes	This student spent a lot of time saying the colours before being asked to repeat the pattern.
T	B	3/3	1/2	Yes
T	C	3/3	0/2	No	Practise try he was really quick, and wrong.  After that he slowed down, and really thought.
T	D	3/3	2/3 1 - Rc, Wo	Yes	Says ‘Ready’ too quickly, so I reminded him to look again, before copying the pattern.
C	AA	1/3		Not really	Says 'Ready' too quickly.  Got the 1st one right, so felt really confident for the others.
C	BB	3/3	1/2 1 - Rc, Wo	Yes
C	CC
C	DD

What do these results tell me?   Well firstly, it’s only been two weeks, so the data does not give the best possible information.  I will continue the inquiry over term 3, and will hopefully have better data then.

I do question whether personality impacts this particular test, as the ‘rushers’ (Students C & D) would be very quick to say ‘I’m ready’ and when I’d ask them if they were sure, they’d say ‘Yes’.  Inevitably they’d make a mistake.  Whereas the ‘plodders’ (Student A) would look and look and look, and I’d have to tell them it was time to start, and these students were quite good at getting them correct.

Things I would do differently:

*  I’d decide beforehand the colour patterns I’d use, so that each child had exactly the same chance to improve.  I think this because I wonder if some colour combinations are easier to remember.  For example, red, white, blue might be easier than orange, yellow, red. (it’s just a thought).   

*. I’d ensure each child had the same amount of time to commit the colours to memory.  (I had simply let the child decide when they were ready).  

*. I’d plan to have another ‘test’ - the ability to follow a set of four instructions.  I’ve got this already in my head to implement in term 3, so that could be quite interesting (or maybe not.  I don’t know).

*  As students played the memory game on the iMacs, I would monitor the number of moves it took for them to complete the levels.  They would need to complete Level 1

I also plan to add the twin of student DD, and bring one of them into my teaching group.

I’m hoping that the next update I will have some obvious and concrete trends in the data.