Heart of Conferring

By Jennifer Wessberg and Tanya M. Pfeiffer

Weve all read or heard somewhere that our students are supposed to be reading for a large part of our readers workshop. But, what do we do when they are reading? How do we do conferring in a way that is manageable and effective for our students? How do we know if Sarah chose an appropriate book? How do we know if the little boy who loves non-fiction isnt just staring at the cool pictures? What should a child do after the conference? The Heart Of Conferring delivers a commonsense approach to all these questions and more. This book provides a structure and a roadmap to the fourth part of our readers workshop (read aloud, shared reading, guided reading, independent reading/conferring), the part that is most often overlooked. Conferring; The Heart of Conferring, written by two everyday teachers, takes the reader on a journey through the essential steps of the conferring process in the readers workshop. This book provides the everyday, working teacher with dialogue from real reading conferences, the benefits of why we do this, and the ever allusive how to confer effectively and keep it going all year long. This book will be enlightening to any teacher who confers, wants to confer or has tried and stopped. It will be an effective tool for the seasoned veteran or the first year teacher. Join us on our journey through the Heart of Conferring.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jul 23, 2013
• ISBN: 9781481755115

Jennifer Wessberg

Tanya Pfeiffer is a second grade teacher at Barbara B. Rose Elementary School in South Barrington, Illinois. She has been teaching for eighteen years. She began her career as a seventh grade math teacher and has also taught fifth and third grade, respectively. She is an active IRA member and has presented material from this book at the Illinois Reading Conference in Springfield, Illinois. Her passion is literacy and using conferring to get a child to come to the personal realization that they can be a successful reader. Tanya lives in North Barrington, Illinois with her husband Dan, singer-daughter Emma Grace and their super Border Collie, Mickey. In her free time she enjoys practicing Anusara yoga and playing the guitar for her daughter’s gigs. Jen Wessberg is an English Language Itinerant at Barbara Rose Elementary School in South Barrington. She has taught for thirteen years in third and second grade. She has enjoyed being a part of the LARC and IRA. Jen has presented at the Illinois Reading Conference in Springfield, Illinois and is excited to present internationally in the Dominican Republic this summer. Her passions are teaching literacy, traveling, and outdoor adventures. Jen lives outside of Chicago with her husband Mike, and two children.

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© 2013 by Tanya M. Pfeiffer & Jennifer Wessberg. All rights reserved.

Cover art by Dan Gonka

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 08/20/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4817-5509-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4817-5510-8 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4817-5511-5 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013909496

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Acknowledgements

Foreword by Mary Shorey, NBCT, Ed.D.

Purpose Of This Book

A note from Tanya, third grade teacher… .

A note from Jen, second grade teacher…

Chapter One       We Must Begin Before The Beginning

Universal Thinking Strategies

Literacy Pieces

Explicit Language and Anchor Charts: Making Students Thinking Public

Looking at yourself as a reader

How can we apply this to our conferring?

Real Life Example

Chapter Two       Essential Conferring

Conferring: the good, the bad and the ugly!

What is a conference?

Sharing

The Conferring Continuum

Subsequent Conferences

How does conferring help my students?

How does conferring help the teacher?

Remember… It’s a journey!

Chapter Three       Management

Conferring Notes-What do I write down?

How do I set a reading goal? What exactly do I say and do?

How often do I meet with each student?

How long do I meet with each student?

Where do I meet with my students?

What are other students doing while I am conferring?

What happens when I am conferring and I have a student interrupt me?

What does sharing time look like after conferring and independent reading have come to a close?

Chapter Four       Conferring Scope & Sequence: Fall, Winter, Spring

Fall

Winter

Spring

Chapter Five       Celebrations

Chapter Six       Giddy Up!

Dive In Theory!

Appendices

Bibliography

For My Dad

T.M.P.

For My Family Of Teachers

J. L.W.

Acknowledgements

From Tanya-There have been so many people that have helped Jen and I on our journey in writing this book. Some helped in small ways and others helped in larger ways. However, I know one thing is for certain. We couldn’t have done this without any of you! Thanks to Dan Gonka, for his endless patience with two authors that seemed to be going in two different places at all times and for your artistic genius. Thanks to Linda Lewandowski for keeping it real all those years, for reading chunks of text and giving us critical feedback. Thanks to Jen Burton for all her smiles, encouragement, feedback and loving friendship along the way. Thanks to Nancy Locke, a principal who took the time to allow her teachers to truly grow and expand beyond the walls of our classrooms. Thanks to our current principal Scott Carlson, for your encouragement, time, patience, and for valuing a professional community that puts a large emphasis on collaboration, communication and humor! Thanks to Anne Reichel, for sharing the story of publishing your own book with me and introducing us to Mary Shorey. Thanks to Mary Shorey for your enthusiasm, encouragement, critical feedback, and for writing our forward. Thank you to Eilene Peters and Sherry Bresnahan, some truly great teachers I have known along the way. Thank you to my parents, Tom and Sharon Tishler and Ryan, for years and years of love, support and encouragement. You are the guiding lights to which I sail my ship by. Endless thanks to my students. Every one of you. You have taught me far more than I could have ever hoped for. Thank you to Jen, my co-author. Jen, your friendship means everything to me. I hold you in the highest regard. You are one of the best teachers I have ever known. Thank you to my husband Dan. You are truly the most amazing person I will ever know. Thank you for years of love and support. You are beautiful. Thank you to my Emma. My singer, my writer.

From Jen-Thank you to all who helped us in this project’s infancy, Jen B., Tonia, Nancy, Chris, Linda, Laura, Kathy, Dennis and Stephanie. You all either read or reviewed early copies, gave feedback and positive encouragement to two new authors, enlightening us to understand that we had an important message to share with teachers. Thank you to the amazing professionals that I learned so much from on our D220 literacy committee and for keeping literacy alive. Becky, your leadership and passion for enhancing a teacher’s ability to expand our practice is your greatest gift. Kathy Schmidt, I am forever thankful for the time you invested in my twenty-one year old self. I was new at this crazy craft and you saw potential where sometimes I didn’t. You taught me the importance of looking at each child as an individual. Nancy, my first principal, thank you for believing in me and settling for nothing but the best. Scott, our current principal, thank you for always allowing us the opportunities to grow as professionals, and thank you for continuing to put children first. Thank you Anne Marie and Jen Burton for keeping literacy alive! Your passion is contagious and was greatly needed during sleepless weeks of one-handed diaper changes. Thank you to Tanya; you were the little match when I needed my fire lit! Thank you to my special angels. You know who you are! I am so grateful to know you during this walk of life. Thank you to my sweet mother. It is a privilege to be your daughter and friend. Mike, my husband, thank you for partnering with me in this crazy time in our lives and for giving me needed space to complete this project. Thank you to my sweet children, A.J. and Sarah. You are too young yet to know how this book has impacted our family. You are a gift.

Foreword by

Mary Shorey, NBCT, Ed.D.

The Heart of Conferring

By Tanya Pfeiffer and Jennifer Wessberg

Within five minutes of meeting and talking with authors and classroom teachers, Tanya Pfeiffer and Jennifer Wessberg, I could see that they are incredible teachers. Their goals include empowering the learner by providing the tools and strategies that will help students navigate the text complexity requirements of today’s common core standards, but more importantly they help students to think strategically as they nurture a genuine love for reading. They believe that conferring is the heart of reading instruction, and they provide a guide for how to use conferring to make a difference in your reading instruction. This is a book by teachers for teachers.

After twenty plus years of teaching when I pick up a book about teaching I look for two things: reminders of what I feel is best practice—Oh, I used to do that, I can’t wait to try it again and new ideas that are easy to implement. This book provides both. Tanya and Jennifer carefully describe the process of conferring. Their conversational style and student examples walk you through the 5 steps of their conferring model. They provide ideas and templates that you can adapt and use in your own classrooms. I found that their new versions for favorite practices like an organizer for read alouds, and a new twist for buddy reading to be innovative and helpful.

From student, Jeff, who says he has nothing to say about his selected book in a September conference to the girls who richly describe their thinking strategies in June, Tanya and Jennifer walk you through a suggested timeline for developing the skills of conferring for both teachers and students. Their section on management is particularly helpful for teachers. It includes important suggestions for teacher issues like, what is the rest of the class doing when I am conferring?, time management, goal setting, note taking, and more.

Teachers can add to their toolboxes when they read a section that the authors call, Celebrations. Here Tanya and Jennifer invite you to explore fun possibilities that you can take, adapt if you choose, and use in your own classrooms. They provide rich descriptions and visuals for their favorite practices.

What I like best about this book, though, is the focus on the learner. Tanya and Jennifer describe and give examples from their own experiences with their students. You’ll smile and nod when you recognize the Jeffs and Sabrinas in your own classrooms, students that immediately understand how to confer and those that need lots of practice. The authors describe how students appreciate and enjoy a quiet moment alone conferring with their teacher.

One of my favorite questions asked during a reading conference is, How has reading this selection changed you? Students ask and answer questions like this as they learn to apply thinking strategies. Time for reflecting with students about the process of conferring and the application of strategies is a regular feature of this model. The authors discuss goal setting and the importance of building student accountability. The result is that students gain the confidence and motivation needed to continue to grow and learn as they discover the power and joy in reading.

Tanya and Jennifer stress that this book is a guide and they challenge the reader to develop their own reading program with an emphasis on conferring. Their conclusion asks readers to close the book and write down some ideas (if you haven’t already). And to just get going, Giddy up!

Mary S. Shorey, NBCT, Ed.D.

Most teachers don’t mind spending more time for their students learning, but they do mind wasting time on teaching with little result. Fu

Purpose Of This Book

Our purpose for writing this text is simply to let teachers in on the benefits of teaching reading using conferring as the underpinning of reading comprehension instruction. It is to demonstrate the need for conferring to empower children with the ability to know, apply and articulate their thinking strategies. We have included real life examples that will serve to clarify methods. These examples will also demonstrate the level of understanding students can achieve when conferring is used in coordination with other literacy pieces. Also, since this book has been written with two authors, we’d like to clarify to our readers that when we use the word ‘we’, we are referring to ourselves together. When we use the word ‘I’, we are referring to either one of ourselves.

You can use this book to begin or continue to facilitate reading conferring into your everyday instruction with success. Your students will succeed as a result. This book should provide the necessary tools and insight about conferring so that your students will know themselves as readers and thinkers and walk away from your classrooms in June feeling great about themselves. Use this book as a guide, not a rigid stance toward conferring. It can enhance what you already know and do, or you can use it to introduce something totally new for you and your students. We have met so many teachers that want to confer but just don’t know how to get started and then keep at it. Or, they begin with every good intention and, in October, wind up frustrated because they haven’t experienced stellar results. Take heart! This book is a message that it takes time to practice, observe and develop a conferring practice. Find a colleague that you trust talking with and spend time collaborating together. Our best advice is to just dive in!

A note from Tanya,

third grade teacher… .

From as far back as I can remember text has had a magical allure for me. I am not sure why. I can remember, as a child, visiting the Emma S. Clark library in