Retelling

What it is as instruction as assessment

Retelling is

an oral (or written) account of a text in the child’s own words.

a way to reveal a particular element that confuses or interferes with a child’s comprehension.

enhances both comprehension and oral reading proficiency.

Through retelling, students learn to:

identify, clarify and organize thinking

identify important events/concepts

make decisions about organizing info

build a base of literal and implied meaning

Through retelling, students learn to

identify literary elements and genresevaluate use of language and interpret

meaning.

talk about language and interpret meaning

increase self-confidence with the acts of reading, writing, listening and speaking.

Different Forms of Retelling

Oral to OralTeacher reads aloud/ Students retell

orally.Perfect for: Non-reader or non-writerInsight into: Listening and oral

language skills

Oral to WrittenTeacher reads or tells text

aloud/Students retell in writing.Perfect for: Immature and mature

readers/writers.Insight into: Listening skills, plus

control over written language.

Oral to DrawingTeacher reads or tells text

aloud/Students retell in drawingsPerfect for: Non-readers/non-writersInsight into: Listening skills and control

over oral language skills

Written to OralStudents read text and retell orallyPerfect for: ESL or immature learnerInsight into: Reading comprehension

and control over oral language

Written to writtenStudents read text and retell in writing.Perfect for: Students who have some

control over reading and writingInsight into: Reading comprehension

and control over written language.

Written to drawingStudents read the text and retell it by

drawing.Perfect for: Students who read but have

difficulty with writing.Insight into: Reading comprehension

and control of oral language.

Retelling and Critical Thinking skills

Process thinking is enhanced since retelling requires knowing all the the story parts and putting them within the whole context.

Problem solving/Analytical thinking is involved since retelling requires analyzing the story to determine what is important and then organizing it for presenting the retelling.

Language/communication skills requires the reteller to control the language in order to retell the story. It also requires decontextualized language.

Independent Learning skills are enhanced when the reteller must define the boundaries and self initiate the retelling.

Retelling is on a developmental continuum

PRETELLING requires the child to think sequentially.

Child must think backward to retell a story and then forward to put the events in order.

The teacher should hear words like: FIRST, NEXT, THEN, LAST

GUIDED RETELLING is where the child is retelling in a supported or guided manner, using schema and topic knowledge combined with illustrations or story props to organize and remember the retelling.

Teacher is a guide or coach introducing strategies for organizing and scaffolding the story.

STORY MAP RETELLING introduces writing AS the child reads.

The child organizes the information from beginning to middle to end.

The goal is to increase the complexity of the retelling.

WRITTEN RETELLINGS

Now the child expected to interpret the story from the WHOLE to PART to WHOLE.

Then the parts needed to retell are reconstructed in writing.

WRITTEN RETELLINGS cont. The child interprets story from WHOLE

to PART to WHOLE and reconstructed in a piece of writing.