What is the Global Read Aloud?
"The premise is simple; we pick a book to read aloud to our students during a set 6-week period and during that time we try to make as many global connections as possible. Each teacher decides how much time they would like to dedicate and how involved they would like to be. Some people choose to connect with just one class, while others go for as many as possible. The scope and depth of the project is up to you. While there are official tools you can use such as Skype, Twitter, WriteAbout or Edmodo, you choose the tools that will make the most sense for you. Teachers get a community of other educators to do a global project with, hopefully inspiring them to continue these connections through the year." Source: Pernille Ripp, Global Read Aloud
I chose a Google Site for the packaging of this Hyperdoc as a way to connect with other classes around the world and share our learning as we read "The Wild Robot". Students will respond to the tasks presented in these lessons through Flipgrid or Padlet. I'm partial to these formats because they eliminate the restrictions that time zones and bell schedules limit our connections to.
Last year we shared our thinking with students across five different continents through the Padlets embedded in the "Pax" hyperdoc. I look forward to connecting with even more students and teachers this year.
Use the official hashtags: #GRA17 and #GRAWild on Twitter and Join the Facebook Group
To see more examples of novel hyperdocs and to get a slide book explaining how to create your own novel hyperdoc, visit the Credits & Additional Resources Page.
I created these "booksnap" slides with the intent that they would be shown on the projector as we listen to the story. I felt that the visual annotations of my thinking would give students something to look at and be thinking about during the read aloud, since they won't have a book in front of them to look at. When we get to a page that I have "snapped" we will pause and discuss the text and questions on the slide before continuing with the read aloud. Since I added my booksnaps to a slide deck I was also able to include some mini videos with reminders about the reading strategies I was referencing in my snaps. There is a slide deck for students to create their own booksnaps as well; it can be found on the book projects page of this site.
For the class vocabulary slide deck, you will need to assign this Google Slides presentation through Google classroom and choose students can edit OR add your students to the slide deck (that you make a copy of) by email (as collaborators) if you don't have Google classroom.
I would not recommend sharing a link to your slide deck as "anyone can edit" with your classroom.
An Overview of the Assignments - labeled by (week.strand):
.1 Assignments are the read aloud and discussion of the text using the Reading Guide Slides for each week. I created these "booksnap" slides with the intent that they would be shown on the projector as we listen to the story. I felt that the visual annotations of my thinking would give students something to look at and be thinking about, since they won't have a book in front of them to look at. When we get to a page that I have "snapped" we will pause and discuss the text and questions on the slide before continuing with the read aloud. There is a slide deck for students to create their own booksnaps as well; it can be found on the book projects page of this site.
.2 Assignments (Blog & Vlog) are journal assignments related to connecting with the text. Throughout the book, the main character Roz feels different emotions. This is an important theme in the story-the question of whether or not robots can experience emotions. The journal prompts focus on the emotions mentioned in the text that week and ask students to connect to their own experiences through writing or video response.
.3 Assignments are related to the common core standards for ELA within the Craft and Structure strand
.4 Assignments are extensions. We may or may not do these in English class. These assignments highlight connections to science, animal behavior, adaptations, etc. and the math/science core teachers are partnering with the ELA/History core teachers in my grade level for Global Read Aloud lessons.
The focus of our work will be to think about and discuss the text "The Wild Robot" by Peter Brown. The teaching strategies described in the books "Notice and Note: Strategies for Close Reading" by Kylene Beers and Robert Probst and "Mosaic of Thought" by Ellin Oliver Keene and Susan Zimmerman have influenced the way that I teach comprehension, and elements of these philosophies will be noticeable throughout the reading guide. You may want to consider ordering one or both of these books if you don't have them already.
My intent for the reading guide is to use the slides as prompts for discussion and analysis of the text; like visual mini-lessons on reading strategies. I have noticed that my students struggle with the comprehension of text when it is presented in an audio format alone. I am hoping that their understanding of this year's book for the Global Read Aloud will improve by adding visuals of my thinking about the text and increasing the amount of student discussion throughout the book. These slides include an annotated passage with my avatar acting as a "Guide on the Slide" explaining the reading strategy. There are questions to discuss and sometimes a short audio or video component to explain a strategy, connection, or literary device in a little more detail.
This is the reading guide with BookSnaps for the entire book-SPOILERS HERE. If you don't want the ending to be ruined, don't look. I have broken this main Slide deck up into weekly slides and those can be found under each week's heading in the drop down menu at the top of the page.