Story Map RapsAuthor(s): Mark HowardSource: The Reading Teacher, Vol. 42, No. 1, Children's Choices Favorite Books for 1988 (Oct.,1988), pp. 92-93Published by: Wiley on behalf of the International Reading AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20200025 .

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Teaching reading as a life skill Nancy A. Anderson

In the middle grades, after basic liter

acy is achieved, students may become

complacent in their minimal reading ability and no longer see improvement as a priority. Still, they may not be able to read well enough to function ef

fectively in their occupation, their

community, or society. William Powell in a 1977 Journal of

Reading article placed the career liter

acy entry level at grade level 7.5, plus or minus a half year. He believes that

progress to this level permits minimal work choice and the ability to meet the demands of most "survival tasks."

When reading is taught through the

concept of career education, middle

grade students are more likely to un derstand that reading is a life skill and to be motivated to continue to improve in it. Career education brings into fo cus the concept that school work is rel evant to the tasks they will perform as adults. The following activities merge career education and reading.

Ask each student to name an oc

cupation that s/he would like to have; have them name the reading skills this

occupation requires. (A nurse must be able to read instructions written on pa tients' charts as well as the names of

medication s/he must administer. A taxi driver must read street signs and

interpret maps. Homemakers may read

newspaper ads and must read container labels. Sales representatives must read detailed catalogs and information on

products.) A field trip to a local business al

lows students to see a real purpose in

improving reading skills as a result of

seeing workers who use their reading skills consistently on the job.

Invite speakers to tell the class how they use reading in their jobs and to discuss what they learned in school that helps them most in their work.

Ask them to bring examples of materi als they are required to read in their

jobs. Have students interview parents

and neighbors to learn about the types of materials they must read in their work. Ask the students to bring in ex

amples of these materials and then de

termine the levels of difficulty. Have

them select some specialized vocabu

lary words from an occupation they are

interested in and determine the mean

ings. Set up a career learning center

with packets containing information

about various careers that interest the

students. (Free information is availa

ble from industry and government.) Leisure activities are a part of

everyone's life. The ability to locate in

formation about a hobby or interest area and the enjoyment of pleasure

reading should also be stressed as

meaningful reasons for improving

reading skills.

Anderson teaches at the University of South Florida, Tampa.

Creative writing and painting Leah B. Nachman

Kindergartners are usually eager to ex

press themselves to their classmates while playing, but reluctant to share their thoughts in front of the entire class. To encourage them to express

their own ideas, start by reading a

story that relates to a holiday or a unit

being studied. Later in the week, ask the children

to paint a picture, but not to begin until

they know what they want to show. If some children cannot think of any

thing, ask them to recall the story they heard earlier.

Give children approximately 20 to 30 minutes to complete their paintings. Later, during independent playtime, have children individually explain their paintings and tell a story about them. You then print each story on col ored paper, read it back to the child, and glue it to the painting. Each child's

painting is displayed in a prominent place.

The goal of the activity is to encour

age children to express their ideas and create simple stories. Children become

independent thinkers, their language and vocabulary increase, and their sto

ries begin to reflect more creative ideas.

The activity requires little prepara tion time and can be done individually, in groups, or with the entire class, de

pending on the available materials.

The materials needed are paper, water

color paints, and some newspaper for

easy clean up.

This activity increases children's use

of varied language and their ability to

express themselves confidently. It also

develops some prereading skills. Best

of all, the children are very proud to

see their paintings and stories on dis

play.

Nachman teaches at Nob Hill Elementary

School, Sunrise, Florida.

Story map raps Mark Howard

Story mapping helps students identify and better understand the relationships among story elements. However, stu

dents often become passive and unin terested if mapping is used over and over in the same way. Story Map Raps

motivate students while maintaining the technique's effectiveness.

I used the following cooperative les son with my 6th grade reading class, emphasizing story mapping with nov

els.

My students had extensive experi ence with story mapping. However, since I was transforming the written

story map outline into a rap song (a

popular style of spoken musical verse), I modeled how I wanted them to apply story mapping, using a familiar fairy tale.

Giving the students visual examples of how to separate the elements of the

92 The Reading Teacher October 1988

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Practical teaching ideas

story map (setting, characters, prob lem, events, solution) and translating each element into musical verse helped their understanding. (See Sample story

map and story map rap.) The students moved into small

groups to create their own rap song. They cooperatively developed a story map of a novel recently completed in class. Their excitement led them to be

gin writing the rap song without the

story map outline. To keep them from

eliminating this important step, I sug

gested presenting the story map and

rap song separately and having the small groups turn in a written story

map along with their song.

Using the elements of the story map, the groups wrote their raps, incorpo rating familiar rap language, music, and tempo. The Samples here show what one group did with "The Three Little Pigs."

Although most students found the task simple, I feel a lesson on rhyming

words and developing word families would be helpful.

The groups practiced their rap songs, including musical accompani

ment, sound effects, props, costumes, and dance movements. We videotaped each group's performance for the class to evaluate and enjoy.

In a large group discussion of the

story map process, we reflected on

what we accomplished, how we did it, and what we gained. This helped stu dents think about the strategies and

cognitive processes they used. In assessing these 6th graders' writ

ten story maps and rap songs, I noticed that they easily identified story ele

ments and were able to differentiate between important and unimportant events within the story. I also observed

improved comprehension of story ele

ments, as determined by a comprehen sion test; active processing and

participation in decision making; use of higher level thinking skills; deeper level processing using analysis and

synthesis of information; increased awareness of metacognitive processes; and increased group interaction and social skills.

Howard teaches at Cunningham Elemen

tary School, Denver, Colorado.

Sample story map

Title: The Three Little Pigs

Setting: A forest; pigs' houses

Characters: Mother Pig, the three pigs, and the wolf

Problem: Pigs were sent out to live on their own but needed to find se cure homes to keep safe from the wolf.

Events:

1) First pig bought hay for house; wolf blew down the house and ate the pig.

2) Second pig bought sticks for house; wolf blew down the house and ate the pig.

3) Third pig bought bricks and built house; wolf was unable to blow down house.

Solution: Third pig built a strong, secure house and was able to outfox the wolf and eat him for dinner.

Sample story map rap

Title: The Three Little Pigs In a forest far away at mama piggy's house,

lived three little pigs with very hungry mouths.

Money was a problem and mama couldn't pay, so she sent the little piggies out and on their way.

So sad-so sad; Mama felt real bad. Real bad - real bad; Mama wasn't so rad.

The piggies were afraid and sought a place to stay, cause the big, bad wolf was hard to keep away.

The first little piggy rounded up a bunch of hay and he built his flimsy house in less than half a day.

Good job - Good job : He thought he was real cool.

Real cool - Real cool : But he really was a fool.

The wolf came huffin' and puffin' to blow the house down, he had that pig for lunch and that was no ground round.

The second pig found sticks to build his house anew, this would provide support for sticks were strong he knew.

So smart - So smart : This pig he thought was smart. So smart - So smart : Soon to be a part of the meat mart.

The wolf took in a breath and huffed and puffed a little, soon the pig was dead because his house it was too brittle.

So the third little piggy had his work cut out for him, but he found some bricks to use and his future was not so dim.

Hurray, Hurray : This pig he used his brain.

Hurray, Hurray : But the wolf was such a pain.

Again came the wolf his breath which smelled of pork, a huffin' and a puffin' but this pig he was no dork.

The wolf tried many tricks to have this pig to eat, but the pig he tricked the wolf and wolf became dead meat.

Dead meat - dead meat : Oh the wolf was such a pain. But the third little piggy used his brain for his own gain.

IN THE CLASSROOM 93

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