[kristen_teach]

Does anyone do textmapping? It sounds interesting but I'm not sure how to start. Is it something that you do a unit on? Use every once in awhile to introduce new strategies? Use all the time?

How do you handle all the copying and cutting and all that? Do you make a scroll for each student, or one for a small group, or mainly use one for on-the-board lessons?

Any positives or negatives?

Here is the website if you need more information about it: www.textmapping.org.

[Penny]

I teach reading improvement and I feel one of my jobs is to help the kids read nonfiction texts more effectively. That's generally what I use textmapping for. (It could be used for other things, but I haven't tried it for fiction yet.) I use it as a strategy. It's a comprehension tool. It wouldn't be practical to use all the time, but when you want to make a point and show the kids "the big picture" in the text.

I've copied science and history textbook chapters and had the kids color code headings, subheadings and chunk the text underneath so they can see by a glance how much space was used for each section. We mark pictures, charts, graphs, and captions. Highlight vocab words in one color and context clues or definitions with another. We also mark any other text feature. This helps my kids notice the textfeatures. They usually skip over those things. We look at the scroll after it's color coded and talk about what is obviously more important and what the author wants them to notice. We then read, code the text and answer questions. The kids say all the marking and coding helps them a lot. It also does help them to see the big picture and the points the author wants them to notice. It helps them understand why textfeatures are important and need to be paid attention to.

I've done it with TAKS passages, too in preparation for the state test. It helps us feel like we're making progress on those test passages and is a lot better than flipping transparencies all around. The passages don't seem quite as endless when we can see the whole thing at once.

Basically I make one scroll for each small group. Of course, I run Read 180 and have Small Group rotations come up to me so it works easily for me. We spread the scroll out on the table or tape it to the board. When we do TAKS passages we tape it to the board and do the sidewriting by every paragraph when we work in Small Group.

In a regular class I would split the kids up in groups and demonstrate how to mark it up with a scroll taped to the board. Make sure they have a place to spread out the scroll. You can tell at a glance how much progress they've made and how well they understand the text.

Personally I love textmapping and my students say it does help them. The only disadvantage would be having the room to work on the scroll. The scrolls do get cumbersome at times.

Hoped this helped.

[Bob]

(Thought this information might be helpful). Highlighters sells a marker (that lasts forever) that erases. One end highlights and the other end has a chemical that erases. For totally clear results, I find that I need to erase that same day, and not all types of paper work as well, but I've erased somewhat adequately marks made after a year.

I've never used the above procedures for text mapping. I like what was mentioned. I could really use it in 3rd grade. I do a lot of prepping for independent nonfiction text studying in fourth grade; usually we discuss such orally, and kinesthetic and visual modalities would certainly be a called for addition to my lessons.

For fiction, a graphic organizer that really helps map the text is to draw a triangle. I have one on laminated construction paper that I've used for years, and for the students, I ditto a copy. The triangle has 5 rows of lines, one line for the top row, two lines for the second row, three lines for the third row, etc. Underneath, I write what goes on the line. On my construction paper, this is written on a diffenrent color of paper glued under each row of line(s); on a student's ditto, I just draw a little caption rectangle under each row. The first line tells the main character. The second line, in just two words, describes the character. The third line, in only three words, tells the setting. The fourth line, in four words, tells the conflict. The last line, in five words, tells the resolution to the confict.

By being restricted to the exact number of words, the students are required to creatively think through the story to make their map fit.