Abstract
Students who do not learn to read at or close to grade level by the end of elementary school enter the secondary grades unable to meet the demands of their content area classes. The students within these walls came to me with their own uniqueness and various degrees of capabilities. Students were selected based upon their need for improved reading comprehension. After interviewing the classroom teachers (there were 4 different ones) and observing students in their classroom setting the research students were selected. I met with each student individually to get an estimate of what their reading levels might be. The four components of CSR (preview, click and clunk, get the gist, and wrap-up) can be used to stimulate student’s motivation to read, help with decoding print, and comprehend and respond to text. Researchers believe it has improved their students’ reading comprehension, increased their vocabularies, and enhanced cooperative skills,
Student’s process over the long term will be evaluated based upon their ability to begin to show automaticity in utilizing the strategies learned as part of CSR. The acquisition of content comprehension can be evaluated by observing students as they interact and use dialog in their cooperative groups.

Educating Exceptional Children: Using Collaborative Strategic Reading
Statement of the Problem
Research states that there is approximately 20% of elementary school students are at risk for reading failure. 5-10% of those students have difficulty learning to read despite reading instruction that is successful for most students (NICH, 2001). Three-fourths of the unemployed lack sufficient skills to function successfully in the nation's work force. Many children, including those with learning disabilities, fail to learn to read in the first grade. During their earlier years, they may fail for two or three years without effective intervention. This is thought to be due to the lack of basic readiness skills or inappropriate school methodology. If these students aren’t identified early and appropriate instruction provided they may be passed along in school. The availability of basic reading instruction is no longer of concern. Students who do not learn to read at or close to grade level by the end of elementary school enter the secondary grades unable to meet the demands of their content area classes (Lyon, 1997).
Significance of Research

There are students with reading and learning problems who fail to monitor their understanding when they read. Researchers believe the use of CSR can improved their reading comprehension, increased their vocabularies, and enhanced cooperative skills, (Bergman, J.L. 1992). This strategy is great for students ELL students and students with learning disabilities. Its purpose is to reduce illiteracy. It allows them to reduce illiteracy, contribute to their groups and feel successful.

Research Hypothesis Will the four components of CSR (preview, click and clunk, get the gist, and wrap-up) be successful in stimulating student’s motivation to read, help them with decoding print, and comprehending and responding to text? Method/Goals
Student participants
I am a regular education kindergarten teacher in a large intercity public school system. Our school student population is 99.7% African American and .3% Hispanic. My research involved working with students in the learning disability classroom at our school. We have one classroom of 12 African American at risk students with LD ranging from 3rd to 6th grade academically. There are 3 girls and the remaining 9 are boys. These students have had four different teachers this year. For some reason they just don’t stay. I am working with 2(29%) girls and 5(71%) boys. Some of these students have been in the same classroom with the same teacher or aid for over 5 years. This class has had to undergo several changes this year. She has been given a position as a resource teacher and they had to find a replacement for her. She was replaced with 3 consecutive special education teachers and a substitute. For some unknown reason, none of them remained. This is the first year they’ve been placed in an unstable environment.
The students I worked with were between the ages of 9 through 11 and in the 4th through 6th grades. Jay Quan is brown skinned, tall, thin, and 10.5 years old in the 6th grade He is receiving resource, speech, and social work services. He attends science in a general education classroom. He has two sisters. Alexus, a brown-skinned, stocky, 10 year old female says she likes reading Titanic and Harry Potter is in the 5th grade. She receives social work, psychology, and resource services. She has a sister and a brother. Tasia is a light skinned, healthy, 10 year old girl, with glasses in the 4th grade. This is her first year at our school. She has a sister. She likes playing basketball, taking pictures, fashions, and mixing and matching clothes. Tashia receives social work and resource services. Chantez is a thin dark skinned 10 year old male in the 5th grade. He receives social work, speech and resource services. He has a brother and lives with his single mom. Robert is a medium built 6th grade 11 year old. He says he likes to ride his bicycle. Robert receives social work services. He has an older brother and a younger sister. Michael is a heavy set 11 year old 6th grader. He has a brother and a sister. I knew Michael from last year. He volunteered to work with me. Something was different about Michael. He seemed to have lost his motivation. Michael receives social work, resource, and psychology services. Jacob a 10 year old has Cerebral Palsy causing him to walk slow and drag his legs when he walks. He is in the 5th grade. He receives physical therapy, social work, and resource services. The students within these walls came to me with their own uniqueness and various degrees of capabilities.
Measures/Evaluation
Goal #1- Determine Instructional reading level
Students were assessed using QRI examiner grade level word lists. My purpose was to find a beginning point for reading passage administration. This was determined by counting the number of correct responses in the identified automatically and identified columns. The total scores if correct responses determined if the student was reading at the independent, instructional, or the frustration level for that grade list. It is recommended that students be assessed at least two grade levels below their designated grade level.
Examiner Word Lists/ Assessments and Instructional level
I met with each student individually to get an estimate of what their reading levels might be. I used grade level Qualitative Reading Inventory -3(QRI-3) Examiner Word Lists to assess these students. The word lists consisted of 20 grade leveled words. The lists contain three columns; the word lists, Identified automatically (with-in 1-second) and the third column, Identified (if answered beyond the 1-second time frame). The reader level results are Independent (18-20/90-100%), Instructional (14-17/70-89%) and Frustration (below 14/below 70%).
Jacob was the first student I met with. I assessed him first using a 4th and then a 5th grade reading list and he did exceptionally well. I then assessed him using a 6th grade wordlist (Artifact #1). This resulted in an estimated instructional reading level. He had 4 miscues on his list, automatically identified 10/20 words, and identified 6/20 words, His total words read correctly are 16/20 words. He has an 80 % accuracy score.
I assessed Jay Quan with 3rd and 2nd grade word lists, and the 1st grade level (Artifact #2). He had six miscues, but self corrected one of his words. He identified 6/20 words automatically and identified 8/20 words. He was able to read 14/20 words correctly. He scored a 70 % at the lower end of the Instructional level. I attempted my assessment of Robert using a 3rd and 2nd grade list (Artifact #3). He miscued 4 times during his list assessment. Robert automatically identified 13/20 words and delayed in identifying 4/20 words. He read 17/20 words correctly. He acquired an Instructional level score of 85% on the 2nd grade level list.
Alexus was assessed at the 3rd grade, and 2nd grade levels, but surprisingly missed too many words. I then assessed her using a 1st grade examiner’s list. She automatically identified 11/20 words, while identifying 4/20 words. She read 15/20 words correctly. She had 3 miscues and one I don’t know. She scored a 75% putting her at the Instructional level for 1st grade (Artifact #4). .
Michael was assessed using the 4th, 3rd, 2nd and the 1st grade reading lists. He automatically identified 7/20 words and identified 6/20 words correctly. He had a total of 13/20 words read correctly. He had nine miscues, 2 which he self-corrected. With readability score of 65% Michael was at his frustration level on the 1st grade list (Artifact #5). I was frustrated, I had heard him read a 3rd grade text fluently last year. What had happened to him? I really did not want to work with Michael; I felt he wasn’t doing what he was capable of doing. I even stressed my concern to his previous teacher. She said that’s ok, include him.
Chantez was assessed using 3rd, 2nd, and 1st grade lists. I had to try the pre-primer listing with him. Chantez scored 10/20 words automatically 4/20 words identified. He had a total of 14/20 words he identified correctly. He had six miscues. He scored a 70% instructional level for the pre-primer grade level (Artifact #6) on his assessment.
Tashia was unable to be assessed on the 3rd, 2nd, and 1st grade level lists and had to be assessed on the pre-primer list. She automatically identified 7/20 words and 3/20 with the 1-second delay. She identified a total of 10/20 words correctly on the pre-primer word lists. She had 11 miscues. She scored a 50% which puts her at the frustration level for pre-primer (Artifact #7).These students were currently receiving support in their resource classroom during literacy instruction, but it evident that they need more help.
Goal #2- Comprehension of narrative text passage
I used all narrative passages to assess my students. They were all asked to read orally because they were having problems with word recognition. Students were not assisted with word recognition during reading, but were asked to continue reading. The total accuracy (counting all miscues) method was used to count miscues. After determining their instructional reading levels they were asked to read a passage and complete a retelling of the story. The passages included concept questions to measure prior knowledge of major concepts. The passages are followed by a retelling of the story and explicit questions regarding the concepts.
Tashia and Chantez were scheduled individually to take the pre-primer narrative reading passage assessment, Lost and Found. Chantez scored a 78% answering concept questions related to prior knowledge of the concept. He was familiar with the concepts. He was able to retell most of the events during the retelling of the story. Chantez scored at the instructional level for accuracy, independent for acceptability, and instructional level for the number of explicit questions answered correctly. Tashia scored 66% for prior knowledge. She was slightly familiar with the concepts. She was only able to recall half of the events of the story. Tashia scored at the frustration level across all three scores. Their lower reading levels and the amount of time I would have to work with them prompted me to use CSR strategies for word identification.. I began to work with this pair using word targeting miscues in their reading passages and word lists.
We adjusted the use of the Clunk Pattern Poster (Artifact #8) by focusing on strategies 3 and 4. I modeled and urged students to look for prefixes (at the beginnings of words), suffixes (at the end of a word), or small words within a word (Artifact #9, 10, & 11). I felt as if my work was cut out for me. The students seemed to have little or no knowledge of words like prefix, suffix author, table of content, or illustrator, long vowel patterns, or the concept of beginning, middle and ending sounds. I divided construction paper making a beginning, middle, and ending sound mat (Artifact #12) for word study. I used the alpha cards to decode cvc and ccvc words. I also used my students’ letter/sound/card mats to assist in distinguishing the difference in letter/sound association. Research conducted by panels from the Institute of Child Health and Human Development (2000), has shown that building blocks for reading instruction include phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle/phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). I was beginning to now understand why some students have been in the same room with no inclusion and no progress for the last 5 years. At first they were apprehensive, but they began to understand and they started to decode and I felt so good. The down side was that when I’d see them in the halls and ask did you go over your word list and they said I forgot. They were able to show progress, but it seems it wasn’t required of them. I then realized, I had spread myself too thin and could not devote more time to this pair. I thought I would include
Ja Quan with the larger group, but I felt he would benefit by being a part of Tashia and Chantez’s group. The answers to his concept questions revealed that he was somewhat familiar of the concept of trading toys. He scored 67%. He was able to retell story goals, setting, and events. He failed to mention story overall resolution. Michael was assessed using the first grade narrative passage, The Pig Who Learned to Read. Michael scored 78 % on familiar knowledge of the concept. He was able to retell about 70% of the story out of sequence. . Michael read at an instructional level for explicit questions. I wanted to have him work with the larger grouping, so we could eventually use the group roles. He always asked to come to my class, but sometimes was very playful or moody and didn’t want to complete the work.
I used the narrative, ‘What Can I get for my Toy” (Artifact #13) to assess Robert. He was somewhat familiar with the concept of trading toys. He scored a 67% on the concept questions. He had a total of 17 miscues (substitutions or omissions). These were recorded on his miscue Analysis Worksheet (Article #14). He scored 29% for final graphically similar spelling of his miscues, and 71% semantically acceptable in none meaning changing of miscues.29% of his miscues were self-corrected. He had 90% accuracy rate, 96% acceptability rate at a 2nd grade instructional level.
Alexis read Whales and Fish (Artifact #15). Her retelling showed some recognition of main idea. She randomly retold the events of the story. She had a problem with her implicit question, but correctly answered her explicit question. Her Miscue Analysis (Artifact #16), showed a 54% initial and 23% final graphically similar letters. There were 23% semantically acceptable miscues and 31% self-corrected miscues. She was able to answer the implicit questions and 2.5 of the explicit questions. She read at an instructional level for 2nd grade expository text. She had 93% total accuracy and 77% total acceptability with her miscues.
Jacob was 83% familiar of his Abraham Lincoln concept. He read the passage Abraham Lincoln (Artifact # 17) and had a total of 13 miscues. During his retelling he put events in sequence and included settings, goals, and events. He had a reading level of instructional for 6th grade. (Artifact #18), 53% of his miscues had final graphically similar letters. 31% of his miscues were semantically acceptable and 54% of his miscues were self corrected. He read with a total accuracy if 96% and total acceptability miscue score of 99%. He answered all of his explicit questions correctly and 3.5 of his implicit questions. He read at a high instructional level for 6th grade. I began to introduce my CSR strategy concept to the two groups, I presented the Clunk Strategy Poster and worked with the groups using word sorts and word lists. We discussed what type of stories they liked. I used lower level picture books with repetition to work with group one. As they studied word lists they were asked to record them in their learning logs and take them home for practice. Sometimes this task was completed, but at other times they did not. Students showed improved word decoding skills during our sessions, but would forget and have to begin again. I asked them to look for the studied spelling patterns in their classroom textbooks. I don’t know if they will continue, but I hope they won’t forget how to use their decoding skills. I did see some progress as they attempted to read Corduroy. They were able to read each page and then retell the events. I noticed the frequent use of pictures helped in their retelling of the story. I think if they had more one on one they might be able to be inclusive.
Goal#3- The CSR reading strategy
Students were instructed in how to use the Collaborative Strategic Reading (CSR) strategies. There are four strategies used as part of CSR’s Plan for Strategic Reading The strategies are Preview, Click and Chunk; Get the Gist, and Wrap-up. These strategies are used before, during, and after reading to encourage reading comprehension. They were assessed through the use of teacher observation, learner log documentation, and self and peer evaluations using a cooperative learning log. The components of CSR and when they are used are:
Before reading:
Preview -Goals:
The student previews the passage by scanning the text and searching for clues Generate interest Stimulate background knowledge

During Reading:
Click and Clunk-Goals
Used to teach students to monitor their reading comprehension Click- portion of text which makes sense Clunk - a breakdown in comprehension

Get the Gist
The process of identifying the main idea
Student restates the main idea in his/her own words

After Reading
Wrap-up –Goal
Students Generate questions and answers about content Improve student knowledge, understanding and memory.

During Phrase II: students will be put into cooperative learning group roles
Leader – leads the group Chunk Expert- uses chucking cards Announcer- calls on group members to share ideas Encourager- gives feedback

I chose the trade book “Strong to the Hoop” for the second group. The group began with Jacob, Michael, Alexus, and Robert. We reviewed and discussed the forms and their purpose. We talked about the table of content, author, illustrator, CSR definitions, and application of the strategies. We practiced by reviewing after each short passage read. I found out that the students had writing problems in addition to reading comprehension. Many times it wasn’t possible to get more than two students of this group at one time.
Although, we were using one text, we started each session as if it were the first, beginning with a preview of what we though the next section would be about. At the onset of the book each study wrote what they knew about basketball. All four students were not in attendance at the same meeting. Joseph wrote a paragraph using two sentences. His writing was legible, comprehendible, and showed that he had prior knowledge of the concept (Artifact #19). He also had knowledge of capitalization and punctuation. He used manuscript to write. He was able to use the trade book cover and book title to predict that the book was about playing basketball. Robert said he really didn’t like basketball and kind of turned his nose up at the book. (Artifact #20), he wrote using cursive, no capitalization or punctuation. His prediction was more comprehendible than his prior knowledge sentence. He predicted the book was about learning how to play basketball. During reading he had a problem with the clunks Marcus and the word aim. As he read we discussed his looking for smaller words. He recognized the word us in Marcus. He knew the beginning /m/ sound. He knew the hard /c / Ka sound. He was still working on the /ar/ r controlled vowel sound. In the word aim he knew the ending consonant sound, but failed to recognize the ai_ long a spelling pattern. I think he got a little confused about Get the gist or just wrote what he learned in the wrong area. Alexus’s prior knowledge of basketball was her experience of playing the game with her brother (Artifact #21). She wrote using capitalization, cursive, and the absence of punctuation. She spelled boy as bard, lost as lowst, and fall as all. She needs more practice in predicting and word study skills. I feel these students would benefit from a lot of one on one phonemic awareness and phonics skills.
Procedure
Materials used: (CSR) Collaborative Strategic Reading Strategy Cue sheet - outlines procedures to be used Learner Log
Cooperative Learning Rubric
Clunk Pattern Poster
Cooperative Learning Role sheet
Question Prompts
QAD graphic organizer
Clunks and clues graphic organizer
KWL graphic organizes Trade book: Strong to the Hoop Trade book: Corduroy Sound card place mats QRI-3 Test Materials QRI examiner wordlists QRI story retelling Word lists
Student Portfolios

Students were selected based upon their need for improved reading comprehension. After interviewing the classroom teachers (there were 4 different ones) and observing students in their classroom setting the research students were selected. I was informed that they all had some difficulty with their reading. Seven students were recommended and I wanted to help them all. I decided to accept the challenge to compensate for student absenteeism and non-availability.7 students were recommended for my practicum study. Their classroom teacher thought it best if she called their parents and received oral permission for them to participate in the research. The students were interviewed individually regarding their views on reading and what they thought of their reading skills. They were asked if they would like to learn ways to help them become better readers. They were also given a consent form to sign. We also discussed their families and their personal interests. I set-up appointments and met with the students during my preps, our lunch time, and my kindergartener’s quiet or center time. I made arrangements to work with the students individually or in groupings of 2, 3, or 4 a total of ten or eleven hours per week. The students were assessed and assigned to grouping to engage in word study to enhance their decoding skills. They listened to the modeling of passages read and how to apply CSR strategies. They began practicing with me and working toward having a whole group with positions. This was kind of hard to accomplish due to attendance.
Results
Students completed a second reading of their initial Examiner’s word list. The results were recorded on a chart (Artifact #22), The students were given the same Examiner Wordlist assessments to see if the CSR strategies had helped them with decoding words which created a clunk. Jacob was able to automatically identify 10 words correctly on his beginning assessment with a 30% increase. He also decreased the amount of words identified by 50%. His total words correct increased by 15%. Alexus also increased the number of words automatically identified by 15%. She decreased the number of words identified by 50%. Her total words read correctly increased by 5%. Robert increased his words read automatically by 15%. He decreased the number of words identified by 50%. His total words read correctly remained the same. It’s apparent that the CSR strategies have helped the students to increase the number of words read automatically on the Examiner’s Word Lists. I think continued basic word studies, a review of phonemic awareness rules, and practice of the writing process would help my group. They were really not quite ready to complete the task of assuming roles in groups. It was hard getting to work with the final three persons in the second group. I had to catch up the person who was previously absent in able to work as a group. Some learning logs were incomplete, because students failed to work independently as planned. They have been used to never ending scaffolding. They will need more consistent practice in facilitation their own classroom. I think I should have tried a simpler task with this group.
Student’s process over the long term will be evaluated based upon their ability to begin to show automaticity in utilizing the strategies learned as part of CSR. The acquisition of content comprehension can be evaluated by observing students as they interact and use dialog in their cooperative groups. The results will also be demonstrated through academic achievement on state wide mandated reading assessments, teacher observations, and quarterly progress reports.

References

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References Continued

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