5 Easy Ways to FLIRT With the Text

There are five methods you use to FLIRT with the text. Flirting with the text is the beginning stage when you start to read a book. FLIRT helps you understand the reading and what you want to know. The five stages of FLIRT are find the form, look at the text features, identify connections, reveal the purpose, and transfer to organizer. If you noticed FLIRT stands for the beginning letter in each of the stages.


The fist stage is Find the Form. What does it mean when it says find the form? Finding the form of the text is when you try and determine the genre of the text. You go through the text and look at the title, headings, and anything else that stands out in bold print. This will help you figure out what kind of reading that you will be doing and what kind of p[ace you need to read at.

The second stage is Look at the Text Features. At this step you look at how the text is structured. You look if it is has paragraphs or if it has one paragraph. You also look for bolded words or different headings to see what the text is like. In this step all you are doing is skimming the text for the different text features. Most of the time you are looking for bolded words for this part of the section.

The third stage is Identify Connections. In this stage you are looking at the headings and bolded words and making connections on them. You are using your past knowledge or experiences and connecting them with the words in the text. You can look at the pictures and other things in the text and connect to them. Usually the pictures in a text are easier to connect to because you can visualize them easier by seeing everything.

The fourth stage is Reveal the Purpose. In this stage you are determining what the author wants you to know. The author always will show you in the reading what he wants you to know and what the purpose of the text. There is always a purpose to the reading and the author puts clues in the reading to show you that. He/she puts questions at the end of the reading sometimes to hint you the purpose.

The final step is to Transfer to Organizer. In this stage you determine what the author's purpose is, and then that will tell you what type of organizer you need to use. There are all kinds of different organizers that you can use. some of them are compare contrast, description, etc. the organizers will show you what you are going to be looking for in the text. All of these will help you better understand the passage and get you set up with the reading.

This was a guest blog by colleget student, Alex Leland. I would love to hear your secrets for preparing your mind to read. Share your thoughts below or join the conversation on facebook.com/myreadingsecrets If you liked this post, sign up for my newsletter for more tips to become a better student.

3 Quick Guidelines to Review with Note Cards

If you hate to study, try note cards for a quick and easy tool.

1.) Narrow your focus by breaking down what you read so you can get a better understanding of what you just read.

2.) They are easy to practice from and in many ways. You can make flashcards because note cards are two sided. You can take them anywhere and "Practice on the go". You also can make a group game so you don't have to study alone.

3.) They help you memorize what you read. So you're not lost or confused. They can also help you increase your memory. That way you will know the main points.

This was a guest blog by colleget student, Sarah Fields. I would love to hear your secrets for creating note cards. Share your thoughts below or join the conversation on facebook.com/myreadingsecrets If you liked this post, sign up for my newsletter for more tips to become a better student.

4C's for Relevant Teaching

I feel like I am drowning in the letter C. First the message was, "Make sure students can COMPREHEND what they read." Then I was told to, "strengthen CORE instruction through CORE reading programs." Next I heard about teaching 21st CENTURY skills through, "COMMUNICATION, COLLABORATION, CRITICAL THINKING, and CREATIVITY." Now, the whole nation seems to be getting involved with the adoption of the, "COMMON CORE state standards". Are there any more C's left? This blog attempts to put all the recent talk into a simple plan.

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills has built a simple framework of lessons that blend these C's into four main topics:

1. Communication: Sharing thoughts, questions, ideas and solutions

2. Collaboration: Working together to reach a goal - putting talent, expertise, and smarts to work

3. Critical Thinking: Looks at problems in a new way, linking learning across subjects and disciplines. One sample lesson suggests students visit www.kiva.org and select a person to support. Each group creates a presentation to persuade classmates to choose that proposal.

4. Creativity: Trying new approaches to get things done equals innovation and invention.Help students bring the text to life by visiting these sites. Google Lit Trips provides a new approach to reading. There is also Google Historical Voyages and Events for history teachers.

For the iPad generation and those who educate them, what does it mean to be literate? Yesterday’s definition is no longer relevant and tomorrow’s definition hasn’t been created. Given the ever-changing definition of literacy, perhaps it is easier to define the set of skills needed to be literate rather than defining literacy itself.

Keep in mind, each C requires a lot of modeling, practice, and facilitation. Without a teaCher, C is just a letter. Let me know how you use these four C's in your classroom.

3 Ideas to Ponder for Game Based Learning

In 2001, Marc Prensky wrote an article about the difference between Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants. Since then he has gone on to be an activist for the importance of game based learning.


If you don't know much about game based learning (GBL), watch this video for a definition and an explanation of three types of GBL.

Here are three ideas to ponder for GBL:
1. Involvement: One cannot play a game without DOING something. Active participation gets students involved in solving real world problems right from their computer. When students are involved in the learning process they are more motivated, build stronger neuro-pathways and remember more.
2. Interest:Lev Vygotsky's zone of proximal development (ZPD) theory states there is a continuum of learning between what the student can do with help to what the student can do without help. When students are in their ZPD, they are interested, involved and willing to take risks. As a result, educators strive to keep a balance between modeling what the students should do, then guiding them while they do it and finally allowing the students to try the activity independently. Unfortunately, every student has a different ZPD, which makes it very difficult for educators to meet every student's needs. GBL allows the computer to match the appropriate level for each student which keeps them in a consistent balanced state of "just right" tasks.
3.Individual FeedbackSharing ideas during class can be extremely risk taking and giving feedback to every student, every minute of class is virtually impossible. However, GBL creates a low risk state because they are only interacting with a computer. GBL also gives incremental feedback regularly. Students are able to monitor their progress as they try different strategies. If the strategy doesn't work, students just restart the game and start again. Each time students pass a level, they are intrinsically motivated to pass the next level.

One of my favorite author's for understanding the how the brain learns is neurologist and teacher, Judy Willis. I feel this whole video is important, however if you are short for time and only want to watch the information about gaming, scroll forward to the 8:40 time.


How do you feel about game based learning? Do you feel there is a place for it in your classroom? What do you think about the role of technology and our students' ability to sustain attention? Leave your comments below or join the conversation on facebook.com/myreadingsecrets

For more information on GBL, check out GamesParentsTeachers.com

Figurative Language

Everyone is looking for a fun and creative way to introduce figurative language to their students. Don't recreate the wheel, York Township's elementary teacher, Katie Haun, has done the work for you. Check out the two videos she made for free on animoto.com:

Video One

Video Two

If you are interested in using animoto.com, check out the blog post that explains how to create your own videos in just 5 easy steps.

3 Tips for Locating On-line Information

It's 6:08 am Sunday morning and I silently let my yellow lab, Maggie, outside to do her morning business. Before I know it, she is barking wildly and running across the lawn after a black animal. I am not concerned because our one neighbor has two black labs and our other neighbor has a black cat...so this morning run is a common event. I don't want Maggie to wake up my kids so I open the door to quietly bring Maggie back into the house when my sleepy eyes focus on the black SKUNK that is slowly turning around to spray Maggie right in the face.

"MAGGIE get over here right now!" I scream, but she reacted too late. Maggie runs to me sneezing and stinking of major skunk oil! My mind starts asking tons of questions, "Now what am I going to do? I have never had a dog that was sprayed by a skunk before. Should I use tomato juice? Do I need to take Maggie to the vet?"

I decided to do AN INTERNET SEARCH before I drove all the way to the grocery store to buy tomato juice. If you ever smelled skunk, then you know time is a factor for this search. I needed to find the right answers to my questions as fast as I could.

1. Use quotes - I needed to know the best shampoo solution to remove skunk smell so I used quotes to keep the search result focused on certain words in a certain order. I typed in, "how to remove skunk smell from dog" and received 7,000 results but without quotes the search received 64,000 results.

2. Cross check at least 3 sources - I then scanned my results to see if there were any results that had the same answer. Several listed hydrogen peroxide, baking soda and dish soap. I clicked on the top result to see if the source was credible. Did they have experience removing skunk smell? My first result: 10 tips to remove skunk smell I clicked quickly to a similar result: Get Rid of Things My final result was a youtube video from a dog trainer.
All three results suggested hydrogen peroxide, baking soda and dish soap.

3. Use the word "and" or the "+" sign - Now I needed more information about how to get the skunk smell out of my house since I let Maggie into the house to do the Internet search. I kept the quotes around, "how to remove skunk smell from dog" and then used a "+" to link the word "house". This controlled my search results to include information for both my dog and my house.

The Internet can be wonderful if you know how to control your search results. Don't spend all day searching the Internet with nothing to show for your hard work. When you're proactive, you find the answers you need quickly and with little effort.

I would love to hear your secrets for locating on-line information. Share your thoughts below or join the conversation on facebook.com/myreadingsecrets If you liked this post, sign up for my newsletter for more tips to become a better student.

PS - The solution worked. Maggie and my house no longer smell like a skunk. Thank you to all those wonderful people who shared their knowledge through the world wide web!