LM_NET 11/12/98: No Subject

Ask the teacher to let you borrow either a science or social studies
textbook that the students use.  Then develop a lesson around that text.
Even though it will not be done in the context of an assignment, it will
mean more to the students because they will be working with topics that
they use in the classroom.  You can also ask the students which unit they
are
covering and plan activities around that unit.
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    After a brief lesson on using a book index, I play a game called "Play
or Pass."  I seat the kids in pairs and give each pair a photocopy of the
index of the same book.  I ask a question like, "On what page can you find
information about grizzly bears."  The first pair can play or pass.  That
is, they give an answer or not.  If they give a correct answer, they get a
point.  If they pass (can't find the answer) or give an incorrect answer,
the question moves to the next pair.  I refuse to repeat the question no
matter how far it goes, so everyone really listens and looks for the answer
in case it passes all the way to their team.  (This keeps everyone learning
and searching even when it's not their turn.)  We play until we run out of
time, and I give little erasers or some equivalent prize to the teams with
the most points.
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If you have a series of books--like the NEW TRUE or NATURES CHILDREN
series, it is fairly easy to set up what I call a "musical chairs"
activity where you have something to look up in the index, glossary, TC,
etc of each book and kids move around as they find each one.
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I start the year with my 3rd grade classes by reading Pinky and Rex and
the Spelling Bee (Howe).  I've xeroxed a class set of the Table of Contents,
pass it out to the kids, and they predict what's going to happen in the
chapter (after considering what the title is),  then they find out if they're
right when I read the chapter.  We have a Spelling Bee the following week
with my "Library Language" list (author, title, illustrator, publisher,
etc.) to
find out who is the Champion Speller of Ms.....'s class. This book might be
too simple for 4th grade, but you could adapt.
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I just did this today with 4th grade!  I collected a bunch of books I thought
they'd love (hockey, bugs, movie special effects, olympics etc) and xeroxed
trhe fist pages of the indexes. Then I made up questions they could only
answer, obviously, from the indexes.  The bonus was that they were so
intrigued that all the books went out!!
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I use a transparency of an index (for 4th grade, an encyclopedia
rather than almanac) and explain headings, sub headings, page spans, stuff
like that.  Then I hand out a sheet with silly questions on it, with a copy of
an index (we have five encyclopedias, one for each table).  The class and I
work on the questions together, so you can use successes and questions as
examples for the whole group.
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I teach the index to third graders and review it in fourth grade, by playing a
game with the index.  We use their science textbooks. First we talk about the
index - how and why it is used and the difference between that and the
table of contents. We also look at other parts of the book, such as the
glossary.  The children then divide into two teams and we number off the
children in each team.  I put a topic from the index on the blackboard and
all children have to look in the index, find the topic, and then locate the
topic on the appropriate page. All children look, but only the two number
one students, for example, are competing to earn a point for their team.
Those two students have a call bell, and the first student to find the word
rings the bell. We check to be sure they found the correct information.
(Other students close their books as soon as they find the word.)  The
children love this game. We play a similar game using the dictionary.
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I use the worksheets from my "bible," _Hooked on Library Skills_.  The best
I could do is offer to snail-mail them if needed.  The pages are from the
third grade section, but I've used them with both grades.  It's not what
you need for fun, just a practical  intro.  The fun part at least for the
index, which I haven't done  in awhile, involved the _Young Students
Encyclopedia_ or _Golden Book_  (This was with third grade.)  I photocopied
the index pages so each child had a  different part of the alphabet.  They
had to choose one topic  from the index, look it up, write a few sentences
and illustrate their work.  Third graders took at least two periods for
this task.  I hung the results in the hall with my sign that says "We
looked it up at the library."
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I don't know if this will capture their interest, but it will be helpful.
Have them bring one of their textbooks (social studies is best, if they
have one) and use that for the lesson.  This way, they will each have a
book in front of them to use.  After you review the table of contents and
the index, tell them you're going to give them some challenges (treat it
like a game) -- if you want to find such and such, where would you look?
You can also tell them that they can try to stump the teacher -- give you
a question that they get from the book, and see if you can find the answer
using just the index.  They'll be really happy if they stump you, and you
can talk about why you couldn't find the answer.
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I use Guinness Book of World Records to teach students how to use an index.
I gather enough copies so that students can look at one by themselves or
with one other student. The first week I have the students look in the
index for common topics; the second week I give them questions to answer
specific to their edition of the book. ( Each year I write a set of
questions for the new edition; I have a file of questions from the older
editions.) The students like to use Guinness, and we have lots of copies so
this lesson works pretty well.
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        I think you could create whatever works for you.  Here is what I
did.  (Note that I had never done much with these things before as
Classroom teachers spend a lot of time on them--but after a 2nd grade
teacher prepared a tremendously complex activity for her students and the
whole second grade I decided to create something much simpler)  I figured
at 2nd and 3rd grade kids just need a lot of practice looking things up in
alphabetical order.  So I pulled all my Natures Children books because
they all have indexes and glossaries.  (I find Table of Contents to be
very straightforward and most kids understand them quite well)  I prepared
a 4 x 6 index card for each with the title of the book, a word to find in
the index, and a word to find in the glossary.  Then I prepared an answer
sheet with grids for the title, definition of the word found in the
glossary, and page in the index.  (I wasn't really interested in
"correcting" these--just giving practice).  Kids moved around the room as
they completed each one.  It was a personal challenge to see how many they
could complete.
        Of course an activity like this has to begin and end with
explanations about what index and glossary are actually used for, etc. but
like reading fluency it also takes a lot of practice.  If you were
interested you could follow up an activity like this with more meaningful
questions to be answered.
        If you do want to do Table of Contents, magazines, like Cricket,
are also a good place to practice.
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---------------------
Johanna Halbeisen
Woodland Elementary School (preK-4)
80 Powder Mill Rd.
Southwick, MA 01077
johanna@massed.net

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From: Johanna Halbeisen <johanna@MASSED.NET>
Subject: ELEM: HIT=> teaching indexes and TOC, Pt. 2

Part Two of ideas on teaching indexes and table of contents:

When I "review" this with my middle schoolers, I hold up a big, thick
book, like a one-vol book on American History.  Then I pretend I'm doing a
report on, say, the Statue of Liberty.  I ask, "so I guess I'll just have
to skim through this book, page by page, until I find something about the
Statue of Liberty.  Or do I?  Is there a faster way?"  I ham it up
depending on the class.  Someone always says "use the index"  or "find the
table of contents."  Then I talk about where these are usually found in a
book, that sometimes illustration pages are printed in a different font,
that they have to use their language skills to think of synonyms for the
topic they are searching for, etc.....  I talk about the need for
efficiency, using not wasting time, etc.
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Our middle school media specialist used the telephone book and the yellow
pages.  She created questions like:  My sister is geting married.  Where can
she get a wedding dress?  I want to order a pizza, which store is closest to
me? etc.
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I teach the skills of using an index and table of contents to grade three
thru the use of  Guiness Book of World Records.  I have saved enough old
copies so that students work in teams of two.  They are highly motivated
to learn to use this unique reference book and master the idea of index
with headings and subheadings quite easily.  We spend about four lessons
refining the skills and then I have made a Guiness Game for the last two
sessions.  The questions are on cards - they draw a card, answer the question
by finding the reference in the index in Guiness and then turning to the
page and locating the answer.  Each group of four has a gameboard and they
move around the board based on whether or not the question was answered
accurately.  They must read the answer aloud to their group.  If correct,
they roll the dice and move along the gameboard.  It is noisy, but they learn
and have a great time.  We have a championship game between the
classrooms and the winners get what else but a current copy of Guinness!
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I usually just use one of their classroom texts (i.e. Social Studies or
science).  Have a brief overer view ofwhat they do then have a sort of
quiz bowl to have them locate items -- 1st just the T of C, then the
index and if they seem ready let them figure out which would be best to
use depending on your question.  The end of chapter questions or
teachers guide could help you decide on the questions to ask.
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Since most of "my" 980 kids learn what a table of contents and index _are_
in Language Arts, I teach them how to _use_  them in the library. E.G. , to
use an index to find information in a library when there isn't an entire
book on a subject:
First -- suppose you want a book on a specific dog (butterfly,horse, etc.).
                how many breeds of dogs are there (lots)
                could many libraries have an entire book on each breed?
                would our library have a book on just dogs (I also include a
brief logic lesson in families and relationships eg. -- Dog family would
include german shepherds)
                then you could look in the index
I also compare the index to the libraries catalog -- which library would be
more likely to have your book - a big or small. Which book would be more
likely to include your breed -- big or small. At one point I also ask them
which book is likely to have the latest information -- old or new... the
goal is to teach them that a book's index is another tool to find
information in a library when it might not appear to exist.
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I start off indexes by playing a game with the Guinness book of World
Records.  However, you need four or five copies of the same edition to
play.  The older copies work best if you have some from the early 90's or
late 80's.  I keep some around just to play this game.
I set chairs up prior to class in rows--four rows if I have four copies of
the book, five if I have five copies.  My classes are usually about 24
children so either 4 rows of 6 or 5 rows of 5.  When they children come in
they sit in a chair.  I then give the first person in each row a copy of
the Guinness book.  I instruct them that I will ask a question that can be
answered by referring to the index and then locating the info. on the
correct page.  (You willl need to go through the book ahead of time and
choose questions that can be found using the index--example:  The names of
the famous SIAMESE twins.  I always put the page I found the answer on and
the answer on my page also so I can check if there is a debate....)
Then the first person on each team holds his book up in the air while I ask
the question so there is no thumbing ahead before the question is asked.
They quickly learn the index is much faster then flipping through the book
to locate an answer.  The first person to find the answer stands up and
says it aloud.  If it is correct, they get to come to the front and stand
by me.  If not, they sit down and continue looking until someone comes up
with the right answer.
When everyone from a team is standing up front with me, that team wins.
The kids LOVE to play this and it does give them good practice using the
index.  I also purchased a whole set of Children's World Almanac a few
years ago as a bonus after a paperback book show and I have worksheets made
up to go with it where they have to use the index to find the answers.
Both of these are good for this age group.


---------------------
Johanna Halbeisen
Woodland Elementary School (preK-4)
80 Powder Mill Rd.
Southwick, MA 01077
johanna@massed.net

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