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In this Podcast, Jennifer Serravallo answers the question “What format or organizational method would you recommend for teachers that are newbies to Reading Workshop and are trying to keep conferring notes? Binders? Apps?
Serravallo discusses methods she has tried unsuccessfully and successfully for note-keeping during Reading Workshop and mentions that the most important things for her were:
1. Having a system that is manageable; and
2. Being able to see individual student’s progress over time through your chosen method. I was interested in this podcast because I’m looking into switching up how I manage to confer notes.
Serravallo first mentioned a system that she tried at first, sectioning off a binder with tabs for each individual student and for each student she would have a T-chart where she would document student strengths and things she taught them. She would also have a class list in this binder to keep track of dates she met with students. However, Serravallo mentioned there were challenges with this system because when she met with groups of readers, she would have to flip between the three students she met with or pull the files from the binder and re-file them after Reading Workshop. Another issue she mentioned was that information in this binder was difficult to share with school-based team members because it wasn’t easy to pull and refile. I have tried this system myself for guided reading but found it hard to keep up with mainly because during the guided reading session, flipping between pages of 3-4 different students was time-consuming for me causing me to miss out on observing reading behaviors, and at times this was distracting to students.
A second method mentioned by Serravallo, was a system her entire school had adopted which was using file folders. In this method, each child would have their own file folder and on one side would be reading notes while the other would be writing notes. A bin of file folders would live at a designated area in the classroom and other teachers could pull those files with students that they worked with allowing information to be shared amongst teachers. Students could also pull their own files for Reading Workshop, which uncomplicated things. This is a method that my colleague and I are discussing for next year since we will be team teaching together. We have discussed the idea of having a binder for each student, but I think a file folder with binder clips would be easier for grade 1 students to open and close rather than a 3-prong binder which we would have to hole-punch paper for and students would have to maneuver paper over the binder prongs without ripping it.
Serravallo also mentioned that there are some popular apps that she knows some teachers are using, though she hasn’t used them herself. These apps include Evernote, Pensive, and Google Docs. While these apps may be useful, I think it’s more convenient to have a file for each student where hard copies of their work remain because these can also be used for parent-teacher conferences and don’t require other teachers working with the student to know specific technology or be familiar with specific apps.
As a final thought, Serravallo mentioned that it’s not so much how you store the notes but what notes are being taken. She mentions that conferring notes should have strengths, possibilities for next steps, and one thing she taught the student so that these notes were like “ a seamless conversation from one conference to the next and she could come back to what she and the student worked on in the previous lesson and recap or see how the skill taught in the previous lesson is progressing. I appreciate this idea and think this is a great way to track students’ individual progress as well as build a relationship with each student by remembering what their strengths are and working from where each student is.
Jennifer Serravallo has plenty of free resources on her publisher’s website, and I found a template that could be used for recording student’s strengths, next steps, and strategies for their binder or folder, whichever you choose to document student progress. Here it is: https://www.heinemann.com/jenniferserravallo/resources/assets/rsb-note_taking_form.pdf
Serravallo, J. (2015, October 9). Teachers ask Jen serravallo, episode 12 [Audio podcast]. Apple podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/teachers-ask-jen-serravallo-episode-12/id1037686677?i=1000354545089
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