DEMA's Cornerstone Web Page

UPDATE: Glossary of Terms \| Principal Strategy Books 08-09 \| The Literacy Block \| Reading Strategies \| 6+1 Traits of Writing \| Wall of Words-3rd \| Wall of Words-2nd \| Wall of Words-1st \| Wall of Words-K \| What does a scientist do? \| Scientists use tools. \| Sticking to Magnets \| Asset Map Goals \| CALENDAR1 \| FAQ \| What is Cornerstone? \| Links for Kids \| Links for Parents \| Links for Teachers \| Teacher \| TABLE5 \| UpdateIndex \| Help

VIEW: Home \| Glossary of Terms \| Principal Strategy Books 08-09 \| The Literacy Block \| Reading Strategies \| 6+1 Traits of Writing \| Wall of Words-3rd \| Wall of Words-2nd \| Wall of Words-1st \| Wall of Words-K \| What does a scientist do? \| Scientists use tools. \| Sticking to Magnets \| Asset Map Goals \| CALENDAR1 \| FAQ \| What is Cornerstone? \| Links for Kids \| Links for Parents \| Links for Teachers \| Teacher \| TABLE5

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Please note: You may continue to use this page type if you desire. <P align=center><STRONG><U><FONT size=4>Cornerstone Literacy Framework Glossary of Terms</FONT></U></STRONG></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Asset Map </STRONG>- the process used to determine the school's assets and areas of needs in three categories: teaching, student learning and school/classroom community.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Crafting </STRONG>- a time when the teacher and whole class sit together while the teacher teaches an intention explicitly (through modeling, thinking aloud, a child strategy or author's writing) with the expectation that the students will then emulate the model. It often involves talking about how a student can think through a task.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Composing Session</STRONG> - a process in which readers and writers work independently to apply what has been taught in the Crafting session. Teachers confer with individuals and occasionally conduct Invitational Groups. Students occasionally work in pairs, trios, meet in book clubs, and/or share their work in progress with peers during Composing sessions.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Conferences</STRONG> - a time when the teacher meets individually with a student during Composing to converse with him or her about his/her work. Teachers praise, question, suggest, and extend what has been taught in the Crafting Session in order to ensure students apply what has been taught and challenge themselves in reading and writing. During a conference, teachers may invite students to share during the Reflection Session or suggest that he/she attend an Invitational Group.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Deep Structure Systems</STRONG> - the three cognitive processes that permit readers and writers to understand and create meaningful written pieces and to understand what they read. Known as the meaning making systems, they include the semantic, schematic and pragmatic systems and the strategies that learners use to improve them (comprehension strategies, book clubs).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Demonstration</STRONG> - an opportunity during a Crafting Session or Invitational Group for a teacher to demonstrate classroom practices, rituals, routines, and policies. These may include demonstrating the habits and rituals of living a literate life as defined by the Living Language section of the Literacy Framework.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Exemplar</STRONG> - a model of student work submitted to the Exemplar layer of the Literacy Framework. Accompanied by a Teaching Reflection from the teacher, an Exemplar is considered an excellent demonstration of a Learning Outcome.</FONT> </P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Grapheme</STRONG> - the smallest unit of written language that represents a phoneme in the spelling of a word.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Grapho-Phonic System</STRONG> - use of the phonemes associated with letters and common blends in order to build and pronounce words, recognize patterns in words and use patterns to pronounce words.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Inquiry</STRONG> - to establish a stance in which students and teachers investigate, question and research ideas from books and writing together.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Intimacy</STRONG> - a climate of respect and civility using rituals, a predictable schedule and a warm, inviting environment; children have ownership for topic choice, book selection and engage in in-depth discourse about books, writers and ideas represented in language. Teachers continually expect more from students, probing ideas further and pressing children to explore their intellectual limits.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Invitational Groups</STRONG> - a small group of children identified by the teacher for in-depth instruction based on a shared need. The groups meet only for a limited time until the learning need is met and change constituency based on need. Children can opt in to an Invitational Group if they believe they share the need being addressed.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Learning Opportunities</STRONG> - Crafting, Composing Meaning (conferences and invitational groups) and Reflection; the four key components of the Daily Literacy Block, each of the learning opportunites apply to reading, writing, speaking, and listening.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Learning Outcomes</STRONG> - the expected outcome for the student learning based on the teaching intention, defines students' learning outcomes in language familiar to them.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Lexical System</STRONG> - one of the three surface structure systems that permit readers to read fluently and writers to write fluently. The lexical system relates to all the words any reader recognizes visually and can pronounce - permits the reader to recognize features of words and whole words, morphemes and bound morphemes; permits the children to recall and recognize high frequency words and pronounce them however they are printed; permits writers to produce words on paper fluently.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Literacy Action Plan</STRONG> - a plan developed by the school team to guide the school reform work as well as the school-wide instruction based on the information from the asset map, school data, annual school review and staff collaboration.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Literacy Block</STRONG> - a block of time set aside daily to devote to literacy instruction. Within a literacy block a teacher may manage to incorporate a few components of a balanced literacy program: reader's workshop, writer's workshop, word study, etc.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Literacy Change Model</STRONG> - a model used to guide the continual improvement process in any Cornerstone school. It includes four key components and is considered a circular process. The components are:</FONT></P> <UL> <LI> <DIV align=left><FONT size=2>Focusing: Create a Vision</FONT></DIV></LI> <LI> <DIV align=left><FONT size=2>Establishing: Design a Literacy Action Plan</FONT></DIV></LI> <LI> <DIV align=left><FONT size=2>Developing: Collaborate in Professional Learning</FONT></DIV></LI> <LI> <DIV align=left><FONT size=2>Enhancing: Monitor Progress</FONT></DIV></LI></UL> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Literacy Framework</STRONG> - a comprehensive, research-based framework that defines the essential elements of literacy learning, ensures depth and focus on what matters most for children's learning, assumes high levels of intellectual development for all children, is designed to accommodate state standards, and helps teachers focus on content most crucial to their student's literacy learning.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Living Language</STRONG> - a section of the Literacy Framework focusing on the learning environment, resource and experiences that form the foundation for highly effective literacy teaching.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Meta-cognition</STRONG> - awareness and understanding of one's own thought processes; the ability to think about and control the learning process.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Mini-lesson</STRONG> - known in Cornerstone as a Crafting session. This is a brief lesson in which a teacher teaches a particular skill, concept or strategy to the group at a time when it is most needed and will be of most use. Students are expected to apply the skill or strategy taught in their independent work time (composing).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Modeling</STRONG> - teachers' implicit and explicit moves that show children how literate, intellectually eager people live their lives; includes demonstrating how they engage in reading and writing regularly and the rituals and habits common to literate adults.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Morpheme</STRONG> - the smallest meaning unit in language; usually a word, but can be a suffix or prefix which are know as bound morphemes because they only carry meaning when attached to a morpheme. (Example: a, i, to are morphemes; un, ir are bound morphemes because it only has meaning when attached to a word).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Onset and Rime</STRONG> - parts of spoken language that are smaller than syllables but larger than phonemes; an onset is the intitial consonant sound of a syllable. A rime is the part of a syllable that contains the vowel and all that follows it. (Example using <EM>brook</EM>: <EM>br</EM> is the onset and <EM>ook</EM> is the rime).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Phoneme</STRONG> - the smallest sound unit of language; associated with a letter or group of letters.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Phonemic Awareness</STRONG> - the ablitlity to hear, identify and manipulate individual sounds or "phonemes" in spoken words.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Phonics</STRONG> - the understanding that there is a predictable relationship between phonemes and graphemes; also known as the alphabetic principle.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Phonological Awareness</STRONG> - broader identification and manipulation of larger parts of spoken language such as syllables, onset and rimes.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Pragmatic System</STRONG> - one of the three deep structure systems that permit meaning making; relates to the ways in which readers and writers interact with ideas and themes from text, share ideas and opinions about what has been written with each other and deepen their understanding through these interactions; also referred to as the social construction of meaning.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Read Aloud</STRONG> - the teacher reading aloud engages students in text they might not be able to read independently, it expands their imagination, provides new knowledge, supports language acquisition and builds vocabulary. Read alouds can be used simply for the enjoyment of books and language or can be used as a context for instruction (see Crafting Session).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Reader's Workshop</STRONG> - an uninterrupted block of time during which children participate in all four Learning Opportunities (Crafting, Composing with Invitational Groups/Conferences and Reflecting) as they relate to reading learning outcomes.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Reflection</STRONG> - a time in which a few children share successful attempts at a recently taught strategy. Teachers model ways in which readers share and extend insights gained during composing. During this time, students assume responsibility for "teaching" their peers about the Learning Outcomes they have recently applied.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Research</STRONG> - Cornerstone's literacy framework has been informed by research done in the fields such as reading comprehension, reader response, and literacy studies. To view the framework's connections to research, go to the online version of the Literacy Framework at <A href="http://www.cornerstoneliteracy.org/">www.cornerstoneliteracy.org</A>.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Rigor</STRONG> - teacher creates a learning environment in which high expectations are the norm. Children are encouraged to challenge themselves and to come to understand themselves intellectually.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Schematic System</STRONG> - one of three deep stucture systems that govern meaning making during reading and writing; relates to the ways in which readers understand the larger ideas and themes in text, the ways in which knowledge is stored and retrieved in long term memory and the ways in which they relate the new to the known as they read; relates to the ways in which writers strategically make their work meaningful.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Sense of Urgency</STRONG> - teachers and students have a shared understanding of their goals and the work that needs to be done and the importance that they are actively involved in the process. Teachers and children feel efficacious when they understand the importance of their learning work.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Speaking/Listening</STRONG> - teachers provide a variety of opportunities for children to participate effectively in Crafting Sessions, Invitational Groups and during Composing when speaking and listening to deepen their understanding, convey their ideas and express their feelings.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Surface Structure Systems</STRONG> - the three cognitive processes that permit readers and writers to identify unknown words, pronounce words and read and write fluently. Known as the word identification systems, they include the graphophonic, lexical and syntactic systems and the skills and strategies language users employ to improve them (decoding, word analysis, using context to identify word meaning).</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Syntax</STRONG> - the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language; relates to the way words, sentences, paragraphs and whole texts are structures; readers and writers recognize correct syntax through auditory channels.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Teaching Intentions</STRONG> - objectives on which teachers focus with students.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Teaching Reflections</STRONG> - Cornerstone teachers' thoughts about their practice and suggestions for colleagues within the Cornerstone network are submitted to the Reflections layer of the Cornerstone Framework.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Think Aloud</STRONG> - verbally modeling the thinking that goes on during active reading and writing.</FONT></P> <P align=left><FONT size=2><STRONG>Writer's Workshop</STRONG> - an unterrupted block of time during which children participate in all four Learning Opportunities (Crafting, Composing with invitational groups/conferences and Reflecting) as they relate to writing Learning Outcomes.</FONT></P> Or, would you like to view and optionally restore one of these previous versions? 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DEMA's Cornerstone Web Page

Glossary of Terms

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