Once again, the Secondary Reading League sponsored its SRL Strand at this October’s Illinois Reading Council Conference. Each year, the Secondary Reading League selects a set of conference sessions, led by SRL members, that appeal to adolescent literacy needs. Judging by the reaction of session participants, the SRL Strand sessions strongly appealed to this year’s conference attendees.
The SRL Strand was kicked off on Thursday morning by SRL President Mark Levine (Lukancic MS, Romeoville, IL) who offered thoughts on how to Awaken the Adolescent Reader Using Standards. Mark addressed using standards-based rubrics as checkpoints for students while reading and responding to text. Attendees learned first-hand how students are given daily opportunities to reflect on their progress towards mastering specific standards and measuring their own growth using rubrics.
SRL membership Chair Angelica Kalat and SRL member Stephanie Moore (CUSD #203, Naperville) shared their work during Shift Happens: Small Changes, Big Difference. A noticeable shift in student learning happens when we slow down and study text deeply. Students learn more from what they read. Strategies for close reading, using textual evidence and developing text dependent questions to actively engage students and promote their comprehension of complex text were shared.
The importance of text selection in planning instruction is often overlooked. SRL member Christy Rush-Levine (Lukancic MS, Romeoville, IL) shared a variety of texts and paired texts to inspire middle and high school students to think and talk, in her session Teaching with Texts that Generate Talk. The texts shared generate talk about the basics, deeper meaning, craft, and facts. Discussion evaluation tools and rubrics were also shared to drive classroom talk to the next level.
To close out day one of the conference, Liz Strejcek (Downers Grove, IL) enthralled attendees with Vicariously Volumizing Vocabulary in the Classroom, a presentation of a wide array of vocabulary strategies intended to both engage students and promote wider vocabularies.
The strand resumed Friday morning with another powerful set of conference sessions.
SRL Past-president and IRC Professional Development Chair Gail Huizinga (Tallula, IL) explored higher order questioning strategies in her session, H.O.T. Questions to Set off and Explosion of Student Thinking The session focused on questioning characteristics and effective techniques, as well as ways to empower learners to take on more leadership and ownership of their own questioning while engaging with text and content.
In So Many Gurus, So Little Time SRL members and colleagues Erik Borne and Lindsey Jensen (Dwight Township HS, Dwight, IL) shared how IRC 2016, specifically presentations by Steven Layne, Kelly Gallagher, Jeffrey Wilhelm, and local IL Social Studies and English teachers, inspired them to rethink their curriculum and start from scratch. Erik and Lindsey shared the revitalizing journey of building a curriculum aligned with the “best” recent research beginning with determining 10 priority skills, creating essential questions relevant to students today, and choosing to deliberately teach with a focus on active reading, critical thinking, and authentic writing.
IRC Region 10 Director and SRL member Cindi Koudleka (Fieldcrest CUSD 6, Wenona, IL) shared out her ongoing work in Teaching for Humanity: Using Young Adult Literature to Promote Social Justice and Student Agency. Cindi demonstrated how she engages her students with a variety of current literature, collaborative experiences, and authentic projects while empowering them to think critically, practice tolerance, and become upstanders in our global society.
SRL members Kimberly Hollis and Brenda Englehardt (Geneva School District 304, Geneva, IL) brought a renewed focus to academic vocabulary in their session Words Matter: Teaching Academic Vocabulary Their session provided an engaging mix of current research and hands-on participation to strengthen attendees knowledge of vocabulary tiers while building their vocabulary strategy tool box.
Across both days, the SRL Strand offered wonderful professional learning and opportunities for networking with others that share an interest in adolescent literacy.
Want to be a part of the SRL strand at next year’s IRC, simply submit an IRC conference program proposal. As part of the proposal indicate a secondary focus (grade 6-12). Members of the SRL Executive Board work with IRC staff and Conference Chairs in selecting presenters to include in the strand. While you don’t have to be an SRL member to attend strand sessions, we do look for program proposals in which at least one presenter is a current SRL member.
Of course, you can always visit the SRL web site for additional information. Visit us at
www.secondaryreadingleague.org.
