ELA Field Testing

So yesterday afternoon I had a thought--why are we teaching students the types of context clues? Does it really help them? Could that be why students don't apply the context clue skills to other classes. I am an avid reader, and it's truthfully very rare that I stop reading and look up a word--I use context clues. When I do, I simply re-read the sentences around the word...I don't go think, "this is an antonym clue", or " this is a definition clue." Not only that, but most of the examples are confusing. Very often, authors use more than one type of clue in a sentence. It may not be effective to teach students to find "types" of clues. I believe that may be more of a testing strategy, as opposed to a skill.

As a result, today's field-testing looked a little different. I gave the kids a passage using an unknown word. We read it and identified a process for defining unknown words.

1. Identify the clues.

2. Make a logical guess (find a synonym).

3. Plug in the word.

4. Ask ourselves: does this make sense?

I wanted the focus to be on modeling the thought process.

We then practiced those two skills: determining meaning and identifying the clues.

The kids did a WONDERFUL job! In fact one student told me that she enjoyed class today! It definitely made my heart happy.

If I were to do it again, I would include more modeling of the thought process and reviewing the process above. Of course, a skill like this requires further practice, but overall, I think the students have a base.