Kuunari

The series “Reading Notice and Note” features essays I wrote for a distance learning class while reading the book Notice & Note: Strategies for Close Reading by G. Kylene Beers and Robert E Probst. Overall, I found the book and the class enjoyable and hope this series helps others as they read and think about the book. 

Again and Again, while a simple signpost to identify, can be challenging for readers to analyze and understand what it reveals about the text. When words, phrases, or ideas are repeated in a text, the author is signalling that it is important for the reader to notice. It is important to spend time helping the students understand how to answer the focal question, “why does this happen again and again?” By answering that question carefully and completely, the reader can fully understand what the signpost in the text is conveying. 

When I taught Again and Again to my students in the Fall of 2018 to my fourth graders, I also used the first chapter of Hatchet to model and teach my students about the signpost. I had been introduced to the signposts in a couple of professional development opportunities the previous school year. As we started reading Hatchet it quickly became apparent to myself and my students that the author Gary Paulsen was using the signpost Again and Again to highlight something that he wanted us as the readers to notice.

Both “divorce” and “secret” started conversations in our classroom as the students tried to understand why Paulsen might have repeated those words. It was particularly hard as my students knew that the book was about a boy who survived in the woods. They wondered how divorce and secret might play a role in this novel. As we read the book, we paid close attention to when those words were mentioned again as they helped us understand the troubled relationship Brian had with his parents. 

Having read the book Notice and Note, I now would have added to this lesson about Again and Again by talking with my students about why the author would have included all these Memory Moments and Again and Agains in a book about a boy surviving in the woods. I would ask them to think about how these two themes in the book, survival and divorce, are related.

This is a question I had never considered in the 4 or 5 previous times I’ve read this book. If the topic of divorce had instead just been a part of the backstory at the beginning of the book, the story of survival would have had a very different meaning, and it’s important for my students to understand what that theme adds to the book. I plan to model this with my students both this year and next year when we read Hatchet again.

By sharing how these signposts have helped me understand even more about this book, they will see why I value these signposts and will hopefully find them valuable too. In addition, it’s important for teachers to show that they struggle with the text as well, rather than simply being experts. If we want students to be willing to put in the hard work of close reading texts, teachers need to not be seen as the arbiters of knowledge. 

Once the students become comfortable with this signpost, the authors of Notice and Note provide some additional questions to help guide the students to deeper understanding. Depending on what the Again and Again is about, the teachers can ask the students to connect the repetition to the setting, a character or their habits, foreshadowing of the plot, the problem or conflict, or the theme of the book. Often times, the signpost can help the students answer multiple questions. Looking at Hatchet, the repetition of divorce both foreshadows the plot, introduces a major problem that Brian is dealing with, and is a major theme in the book.

As a teacher, this is why I find the signposts so valuable. Teachers need tools that deliver a big bang for their buck, because we only have a limited amount of time with our students.  By identifying a signpost, a student is able to answer questions that fall under multiple different common core standards in an authentic way.