Connecting Comprehension and Technology: Adapt and Extend Toolkit Practices (Comprehension Toolkit)

When we begin our technology journey by grounding it in time tested comprehension instruction, we ensure that our use of technology is meaningful and authentic. We help students see the natural links between strategies they use in print text and the strategies they need to use when navigating the vast digital world.
--Stephanie Harvey, Anne Goudvis, Katie Muhtaris, and Kristin Ziemke

Active literacy strategies matter now more than ever! Our students are growing up with dynamic information systems and constantly changing online texts. Connecting Comprehension & Technology will help you expand your students' literacy toolkit to incorporate practices that help them thrive in this digital world.

Through their celebrated Comprehension Toolkit series Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis present an active literacy learning framework that grounds students in the nonfiction reading and thinking strategies they will need throughout school and into college and careers. In Connecting Comprehension and Technology Steph and Anne invite teachers to join them in Katie Muhtaris' and Kristin Ziemke's classrooms to envision and embrace technology as a powerful tool for extending these Toolkit practices and enhancing literacy instruction and innovation.

Offering the know-how born from years of classroom experience and clear steps for getting started, Connecting Comprehension and Technology provides practical lessons that teach students how to navigate, evaluate, collaborate, and communicate through digital resources. Not limited to specific hardware or software, lessons are designed around technical functions; tools readily accessible to students in their world and easily adopted in your school, whether you are taking your first steps into technology or looking to leverage existing resources.

Organized around Steph and Anne's active literacy learning framework, Connecting Comprehension and Technology will help you to teach your students how to:

Monitor Comprehension

• Reflect Thinking with a Drawing Tool
• Think About Online Information
• Notice Internet Distractions
• Evaluate Internet Sources

Activate & Connect

• Annotate Thinking Digitally
• Narrate Thinking with Podcasts
• Explore Web Features
• Compare Text and Web Features

Ask Questions

• Share Questions Online
• Read an eBook to Answer Questions
• Ask Questions in Online Discussions
• Research Lingering Questions Online

Infer & Visualize

• Visualize with Digital Drawings
• Create and Illustrate Digital Poems
• Infer with Visual Cues
• Infer with Media Cues

Determine Importance

• Organize Thinking on a Spreadsheet
• Research Digitally Archived Questions
• Collaborate on a Spreadsheet
• Evaluate Infographics

Summarize & Synthesize

• Produce a Media Project
• Create an Inquiry Movie
• Record a Video Book Review
• Create a Book Trailer

Samples

• Introduction and Sample Lessons

Not limited to specific hardware or software, lessons are designed around technical functions; tools readily accessible to students in their world and easily adopted in your school, whether you are taking your first steps into technology or looking to leverage existing resources. The accompanying DVD provides live-from-the classroom video footage of the lessons in action and a rich sampling of student work.

Stephanie Harvey has spent her career teaching and learning about reading and writing. After fifteen years of public school teaching, both in regular education and special education classrooms, Stephanie worked for twelve years as a staff developer for the Denver based Public Education and Business Coalition (PEBC), a partnership of leaders from education and business, who support innovation in public schools.

Insatiably curious about student thinking, she is a teacher first and foremost and currently serves as a private literacy consultant to schools and school districts. In that role, she conducts keynote speeches, presentations, workshops, demonstration lessons, coaching sessions and ongoing consultation to teachers, reading specialists, literacy coaches, principals and district administrators. With a focus on K-12 literacy, her specialties include comprehension instruction, inquiry-based learning, content area reading and writing, nonfiction literacy, and the role of passion, wonder and engagement in teaching and learning.

Stephanie has written many articles, books and resources; her Heinemann publications include the title Comprehension and Collaboration which she co-authored with Smokey Daniels, and The Comprehension Toolkit series which is an in-depth Curricular Resource for comprehension instruction co-authored with Anne Goudvis.

Click here to read recent Heinemann Blogs from Steph.

Connect with Steph at @StephHarvey49

» Listen to an interview with Stephanie Harvey on Education Talk Radio--2/29/2012 (30:35)

Anne Goudvis has taught students in grades K-6 over the years, beginning her teaching career in urban schools on the south side of Chicago. She spent many years as a staff developer in the Denver area, working in culturally and linguistically diverse schools. Currently, Anne works with schools and districts around the country to implement progressive literacy practices and comprehension across the curriculum.

She is the coauthor with Stephanie Harvey of Strategies That Work and The Comprehension Toolkit series, along with resources including Scaffolding the Comprehension Toolkits for English Language Learners. A history buff, she and Stephanie also coauthored the Short Nonfiction for Teaching American History series, which includes strategies for teaching historical literacy and student articles about often overlooked voices and people in history. With Inquiry Illuminated, Anne, Steph, and Brad Burhow show how curiosity and student agency thrive as kids engage in Researcher's Workshop across the curriculum.

Katie Muhtaris is a co-author of Read the World: Rethinking Literacy for Empathy and Action in a Digital Age, Amplify: Digital Teaching and Learning in the K-6 Classroom, and Connecting Comprehension and Technology. She currently works with kindergarten through fifth grade as an Instructional Digital Age Learning Coach, supporting teachers and students in the areas of literacy, humanities, and technology. As an experienced educator in both urban and suburban settings, Katie consults with districts to implement innovative instructional practices with a close eye on student impact. Katie is an internationally recognized expert in technology and workshop model integration. Katie works with districts to develop innovative learning experiences for teachers and students that merge the best of print and digital resources and tools. Her other areas of interest include inquiry based instructional models, integrated social emotional practices, and building cultures of support and risk taking among teachers.

You can connect with Katie on Twitter @KatieMuhtaris.

Kristin Ziemke is a teacher, staff developer, and the co-author of Read the World: Rethinking Literacy for Empathy and Action in a Digital Age, Amplify: Digital Teaching and Learning in the K-6 Classroom, and Connecting Comprehension and Technology. Recognized as an international expert in literacy, inquiry, and technology, Kristin collaborates with organizations around the world to develop learning experiences that redefine school. Currently serving as a resident teacher and learning innovation specialist for the Big Shoulders Fund, Kristin has been recognized as an Apple Distinguished Educator, Chicago Public Schools Tech Innovator of the Year, National Board Certified Teacher, and Emerging Leader by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Her work has been featured by Apple, EdWeek, Mindshift, and Scholastic.