Experiences With Moodle Reader for Extensive Reading

In this blog post I discuss some of my thoughts and experiences with using Moodle Reader, a module that provides quizzes for graded readers.

The creator of the site, Tom Robb, describes the purpose of the module to provide "support the Extensive Reading approach to language acquisition which advocates the reading of a large volume of material that is easier than the learner's language level, rapidly with little dictionary use, of material of the learner's own choice. Through this massive amount of reading the student can internalize the grammar and vocabulary that has already been studied."

My experience with trying to hold students accountable for their extensive reading both in and out of class led to a discussion with my schools' administrators about the implementation of Moodle Reader in order to encourage more participation in extensive reading. Prior to this term, students were asked to fill out a reading log on what they had read, and the majority of students were simply opening their books and commenting on a few lines from a particular page.

Struggles of Implementation

I assisted teachers in our school's IEP with getting accounts set up at the beginning of the school term, but ran into a number of setbacks during the initial set up period.

First, I found it difficult to set up the different courses and to have them categorized under my school name. After a number of attempts I had to contact the creator and have them set up for me.

Teachers also found that even after registering students for their courses their students still had difficulty accessing the class site. Random students had to enter a course enrollment key, while others could not log on with their password that the teacher had registered them with. I ended up having re-enter their password by using the "change password" command.

Another challenge we encountered was that teachers had to try and figure out the head word level of the books their students were choosing and see if they matched those provided by the publishers of the graded readers. For instance, in our library we have books organized by the levels of headwords from 1-6. However, a publisher might assign a book to be level 3 while in our library it falls under a level 4 or 5. For my own course, I ended up taking off the level restriction of the site. However, this meant that students had many more choices of books under the publisher to choose from in order to find their book for taking the quiz.

An addition complication is that when getting students used to taking these quizzes a number of them fail their quizzes and then are not able to retake them. This was useful in getting a dialogue going between myself and students about the appropriate level of book they were choosing from our graded reader library, but then I felt compelled to allow them to retake the quiz as it required information from the text that they perhaps had not focused on when reading it. So I had to go into the "view and delete attempts" and look up the student by name and then delete their quiz so they could retake it.

Benefits of Moodle Reader

Since I don't intend for this post to be a criticism of Moodle Reader, I must point out that there are some benefits to using it.

Most important, I think that using the module allows for more accountability for student's extensive reading. Teachers can easily view student's performance on quizzes and levels of books that they are reading and use this information to guide students in their extensive reading experiences.

Compared to my prior experiences of using reading logs to hold students accountable for their reading, I feel that Moodle Reader is a much better use of time. I don't have to think about grading reading log entries that I feel were written at the last minute and do not demonstrate that the student read the book. In short, this seems to be a much more meaningful way for students to demonstrate their extensive reading performance.

I think that on the student end, the instant feedback that they get can be valuable in letting them know how well they comprehended what they read. They will know instantly whether they passed or not and what grade they received.

The time limit feature also ensures that students can't just pick up a book they have barely read and answer all the questions by thumbing through the book. I tested this myself on a couple of books and find the 15 minutes were sufficient to answer the questions if I had read the book, but not if I was just skimming it to answer the quiz questions.

Is it Worth it?

I suppose the big question is whether I believe implementing Moodle Reader into an extensive reading program is worth the effort?

My answer is yes, but that it should be piloted first in one class before considering implementing it program wide. Many of the kinks of this interface make it rather cumbersome to get going. In addition to going through the videos and supporting materials provided to help teachers use Moodle Reader, I ended up corresponding extensively with the site's administrator in order to figure out some of the intricacies of the site.

Hopefully teachers will consider experimenting with Moodle Reader for encouraging accountability in their extensive reading programs,  but only after a trialing period first.

Considering Classroom Observations

For a developing teacher, the thought of having another teacher in the room observing you when you are teaching is nothing short of unnerving. He or she sits in the back madly scribbling in their notepad, so if you make eye contact you can't help but wonder what they might be thinking, might be writing, or worse, judging about you. It is a scene that I have now been on both sides of, as both the observer and observed.

The Observer

The class that I observed for my practicum requirement was a L2 writing workshop that involved four advanced esl students workshopping their papers with an experienced teacher acting as the facilitator. I came to the classroom to specifically observe the group process in a writing workshop environment, while keeping my own experience of hosting writing workshops during the year I taught EAP writing in China in mind. In the class that I observed, the students were going through drafts of a rhetorical analysis paper, an assignment that I've seen even L1 English writers struggle with in the writing center.

During the two workshop sessions I observed I attempted to transcribe as much of the dialogue as I could as well as describe the actions that took place between the participants. Overall, I was amazed by the level engagement by the students, how with only a little prompting from the teacher they were able to provide constructive criticism to one another and cite examples using supporting details from their peers' papers. When they were asked to find thesis statements and three of the students looked through the student's paper that was being discussed and found three different thesis statements, it took little commentary from the instructor for the student to realize that he/she had failed to provide his readers with a clear direction. The instructor seemed to have truly mastered the art of facilitation in always asking just the right questions to elicit responses.

I am wondering how much of what I witnessed was tied to the actual amount of in-depth instruction in rhetorical analysis students had prior to the workshop. Or was their ability to provide higher levels of feedback more related to how the workshop was facilitated and structured? I suspect the answer is a little of both. Nonetheless, the experience made me wonder how much of my own Chinese student's ability to provide valuable feedback in writing workshops back in Xi'an were either because of instruction, level of fluency or workshop facilitation. I would like to argue that it was due to the level of fluency, yet now I'm not so sure.

The Observed

I think the hardest aspect of being observed as a new teacher is having to face up to seeing the areas where you need to improve. In hindsight this seems rather absurd, to think that you might object to an aspect of professional development that can only contribute to making you a better teacher. In fact the majority of teachers find a great deal of benefit from observing or being observed (Richard & Crooks, 1988). Why is it then that myself and my fellow graduate students almost cringe and tense up at the very mention of a scheduled observation my a senior teacher? I suspect that part of this fear is tied to the notion of someone seeing you exposed and revealed as an amateur to someone who has learned the ropes and may be passing evaluative judgements along to you following the observation.

So far though, in the first informal evaluation by one of my coordinators, the process has not been as painful as I had suspected. I say this despite having been observed when one activity went well beyond the time I had allotted for it in my lesson plan and another that went terribly awry. I now feel that for this observation I was fortunate to have these things blow up in my face. The teacher/supervisor was able to point out to me that I needed to use more gambits with my speaking activities as to provide the appropriate amount of scaffolding for students. She explained that if I begin to do so, then I may see my activities more closely following the allotted amount of time that is set aside for them in the lesson plans. I understood how providing more scaffolding was tied to my issue of pacing.

My second informal observation occurred during a low level reading lab, where the focus is mostly on extensive reading, increasing fluency and building comprehension. Here again I encountered the similar issue of my pacing seeming to lag and I found that I was spending much more time explaining things and fretting over classroom management issues than I should have been. When I went for a walk with the observing teacher to discuss the observation, she focused mainly on the issue of classroom management. She explained to me that I needed to split up some of the male students in the class who talked a lot and seemed to take most of my attention and time. She suggested that if I were to place them near the front of the class, then I might see less issues with both pacing and management. But she pointed out that most of all I need to be more firm with them, to stop being Mr. Nice guy.

Now that I've gotten through these initial informal observations, I'm actually looking forward to hearing what my coordinating teachers have to say through the formal evaluations when they focus on specifics. These observation experiences made me realize that even when things don't go according to plan, the end result is usually beneficial in the long run. Had everything gone well, the opportunity for development and learning may have been missed.

Motivating Students to Read

One of the classes I'm currently teaching is a reading lab for beginning ESL students. In some ways this class is a love/hate relationship for me.

Growing up, I had a distinct love for reading, and still do. I remember taking part in the summer reading programs that our town's library would host, where I could win prizes and books for reading. As I grew older, I entered the sleuthing world of the Hardy Boys, while my sisters, followed exploits of Nancy Drew. In high school I eagerly devoured Stephen King's "The Stand" and the Gunslinger series along with a slew of fantasy series books. There was something so stimulating and enthralling that drew me into to those imagined worlds that television or movies could never come close to replicating.

Thus my motivation for reading was often tied to what I personally gained from it. Sure there were the prizes given to me by teachers and the local librarian--those aspects of extrinsic motivation--but these dimmed in comparison to the worlds that the words on the page transformed into. Thus the motivation for me was strictly intrinsic.

I think about these experiences when I stand in front of my class and encourage my students to read. With beginning readers like this, I know I can't speak of goal setting or how reading will benefit them later in their studies. Rather, I've been told by an expert in second language reading that I need to find ways to match students with books tied to their interests, to get them to recommend books they find interesting to others, to build their self confidence and to find other ways of drawing them into extensive reading.

This is a big responsibility, especially when I constantly find myself playing technology police and taking away cell phones that are cleverly hidden behind the books that they are reading, or should I say, pretending to read. The question of how I can find ways to pierce that shield of disinterest that seems so prevailing is one I continue to struggle with as a developing teacher.