A Step-By-Step Guide to Teaching Determining Importance in the Upper Elementary Classroom
02/28/21 • 21 min
Students tend to think that everything they read is important.
But - the problem with trying to remember EVERYTHING you read is that you actually end up remembering very little. Our brains can only retain so much information before it goes into overdrive, so its critical to help little brains, aka our students, develop strategies to strain out the nonessential information from the books that they read.
How do we do this? It should come as no surprise when I say that we need to explicitly teach them how. We need to show students how to separate out the important, must-remember information from the interesting, but not essential details in a text.
Teaching students to determine importance will help set the foundation for students to be able to master other critical reading comprehension strategies like inferring and synthesizing that they will need to pull out from their reading toolbox as well.
In order to infer, students need to be able to pick up on the important details that serve as clues in making inferences. They need to determine importance first.
Synthesizing requires students to collect all the important details from and textual “bread crumbs” left throughout a book in order to come to a much deeper and complete understanding of the story. It starts with determining importance.
For complete show notes, visit: classroomnook.com/podcast/59---------------------------
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE
EPISODE 54: 6 GREAT Reading Activities to Use With Nearly ANY Novel!
Reading Comprehension Strategies:
- EPISODE 41: Teaching Reading Comprehension Strategies
- EPISODE 42: Reading Comprehension Instruction: How to Teach Making Connections
- EPISODE 47: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Visualizing
- EPISODE 51: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Making Predictions
Favorite Books to use for modeling Determining Importance (affiliate links):
- The Important Book by: Margaret Wise Brown (this is a great book to introduce the reading strategy)
- Love Will See You Through by Angela Farris Watkins
- The Stray Dog by Marc Simont
- Grandfather’s Journey by Allen Say
Grab my FREE Determining Importance Bookmark inside the Members Resource Library under “Reading Resources.”
Students tend to think that everything they read is important.
But - the problem with trying to remember EVERYTHING you read is that you actually end up remembering very little. Our brains can only retain so much information before it goes into overdrive, so its critical to help little brains, aka our students, develop strategies to strain out the nonessential information from the books that they read.
How do we do this? It should come as no surprise when I say that we need to explicitly teach them how. We need to show students how to separate out the important, must-remember information from the interesting, but not essential details in a text.
Teaching students to determine importance will help set the foundation for students to be able to master other critical reading comprehension strategies like inferring and synthesizing that they will need to pull out from their reading toolbox as well.
In order to infer, students need to be able to pick up on the important details that serve as clues in making inferences. They need to determine importance first.
Synthesizing requires students to collect all the important details from and textual “bread crumbs” left throughout a book in order to come to a much deeper and complete understanding of the story. It starts with determining importance.
For complete show notes, visit: classroomnook.com/podcast/59---------------------------
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE
EPISODE 54: 6 GREAT Reading Activities to Use With Nearly ANY Novel!
Reading Comprehension Strategies:
- EPISODE 41: Teaching Reading Comprehension Strategies
- EPISODE 42: Reading Comprehension Instruction: How to Teach Making Connections
- EPISODE 47: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Visualizing
- EPISODE 51: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Making Predictions
Favorite Books to use for modeling Determining Importance (affiliate links):
- The Important Book by: Margaret Wise Brown (this is a great book to introduce the reading strategy)
- Love Will See You Through by Angela Farris Watkins
- The Stray Dog by Marc Simont
- Grandfather’s Journey by Allen Say
Grab my FREE Determining Importance Bookmark inside the Members Resource Library under “Reading Resources.”
Previous Episode
Reason's Why Your Reader's Workshop and Writer's Workshop Is Not Working
There are a lot of moving parts in the readers and writers workshop model.
It takes a lot of coordination, planning, and modeling for reading and writing magic to happen.
Reading and writing centers seem chaotic and mismanaged, you’re constantly being interrupted during your small groups, and students still don’t seem to know what they should be doing during independent work time.
Is it really just too hard? Should you just go back to traditional whole-class teaching?
Maybe. OR - you could make a few small tweaks and get back on track.
Chances are, with a few changes to your readers and writers workshop, you could have your workshops running like clockwork - and in return, help your students become strong readers and writers.
Sound like a dream? It’s not! In this week’s podcast episode I’ll share with your 7 common mistakes teachers are making during their literacy block AND how to fix them!
For complete show notes, visit: classroomnook.com/podcast/58
-----------------
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE:
EPISODE 25: It’s time to Fine-Tune Your Instruction with New Teaching Strategies and Best Practices
EPISODE 29: How to Launch Reader's Workshop in Your Classroom
EPISODE 30: How to Launch Writer's Workshop in the Upper Elementary Classroom
EPISODE 49: Pressing the "Restart" Button On the School Year
Reading Comprehension Strategies:
- EPISODE 41: Teaching Reading Comprehension Strategies
- EPISODE 42: Reading Comprehension Instruction: How to Teach Making Connections
- EPISODE 47: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Visualizing
- EPISODE 51: Reading Comprehension Strategies: How to Teach Making Predictions
POST: Setting Up Classroom Routines and Procedures
POST: Back to School Series: Launching Readers Workshop
POST: Back to School Series: Launching Writer's Workshop
RESOURCE:
Getting Started With Reader’s Workshop (printable & digital)
Getting Started With Writer’s Workshop (printable & dgitial)
LINKtivities Interactive Learning Guides
Grab my FREE Routines and Procedures Checklist inside the Members Resource Library under “Classroom Management Resources.”
Next Episode
Easy Calming Strategies for Elementary Students
Students can't learn in crisis mode.
Before we can teach young minds, we must first teach students to tap into their feelings and emotions. Social-emotional health is the foundation for all learning so it is impetrative that we address these needs in our students before we ask them to master academics.
People today are more stressed and worried than ever before due to the pandemic and the impact that it has had on our schools is huge. And if YOU’RE feeling that way, your students are, too.
The difference between the two, however, is that your students likely don't have the coping skills to deal with feelings of worry and overwhelm.
But the problem is, many teachers aren't trained in teaching students coping skills. Teaching strategies of calm wasn’t part of our undergrad work. That’s why I wanted to bring a special guest onto the podcast who is trained and skilled in teaching young minds and hearts to breathe in the calm and breathe out the worry.
In this episode I'm interviewing Victoria from The Mindful Apple. She's a school social worker working with elementary students and has some solid tips and strategies for classroom teachers to help their students grow their calm.
Victoria knows how to take a worried mind and plant seeds of calm there instead.
She's even got a simple strategy for teachers to help them take control of their own emotional command center — and she’s sharing it all with us inside the episode.
For complete show notes, visit: classroomnook.com/podcast/60--------------------------
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE:
Connect with Victoria at The Mindful Apple:
- Check out her Teacher and Student Resources
- Take a peek at her Website
- Follow her on Instagram
FREE Feelings Journal for Students: Grab a week’s worth of writing prompts to use with your students
More resources from The Mindful Apple to help support your students social emotional growth:
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