Video Analysis: Responding To Literature

Before actually watching the video “Responding to Literature, “In writing this paper, I thought this was a good quote from the narrator as he said, “I see my role in two ways. One is as a reader, and second responding just like the kids while having a watchful ear on how their reading and thinking are going and how they are growing through the story and learning. [While] I'm helping kids make connections, at the same time I want to be involved in that reading and thinking process myself in a natural way. I don't want to come up with a 'teacher question'... I want to show my own reactions and my own responses as a reader..." The video started to play showing the children getting happily exiting the school bus greeting Mr. Thompson to enter the classroom. I was very impressed with the level of communication and ongoing dialogue that emphasized higher reasoning and thinking ability in the fourth grade class that I observed. Students were engaged in two literary classic, Sounder and Because of Winn-Dixie. The teacher found that taking a role as an active participant in literature discussions can help students learn some of the important components of good discussions: …show more content…
If read properly, a classic tale draws out a feeling of wholeness or oneness, a carefully drawn character or situation evokes a feeling of recognition, and a poem that speaks to the heart engenders of feeling of tranquility” (Gunning 2008, p. 435). The students took out their journals and talked about the book (as to share how a little girl got a dog not supposed to go places). On page 138 of Creating Literacy Instruction for All Students, Gunning recommends involving students in a shared reading by having them participate in predicting words or sentences from a book they enjoy as the discussion is sharing updated pictures that are drawn as the story is being read