S-e-a-r-c-h-i-n-g
Surface/Deep Structure Strategies
For Multiple Venues

One example from Liba Peters used during "Morning Message" in her kindergarten class:

Modeling Reading and Writing and Thinking through "Dear Class" letters in kindergarten

The letters not only provide a good crafting lesson, but they also build classroom community by implicitly saying, "I'm glad you are here today and what we do today will have real meaning connected to your lives." I may choose to write the class a letter in the form of a poem or a list of facts about my life or my students. I do this daily with my children. It is amazing how many of them can read the entire letter and how well they pick up on the six cueing systems.

The idea for a class letter came from the book, The Morning Meeting, by Roxann Kreete. It was written on the premise that just as we know that it makes sense to identify the most effective practices to teach a subject such as writing, we must recognize that the same effort must be endowed if we are to succeed in the social and emotional domains. In other words, we must teach social and emotional skills with the same structure and attention that we devote to traditional subjects.

October 18 Dear Sweethearts, I bought popcorn at Wal-Mart. Then I bought a hamburger at McDonald's because I was starving. Next, I stopped at a stop sign. Then I stopped at a red light. Have you ever done any of these things? Tell me about it. Love, Mrs. Peters

Deep Semantic - I modeled word selection by deciding to use "starving" instead of "hungry" to show how really hungry I was. Schematic - I recorded an actual experience from my life and posed the question about how it was like their experiences. I reread and revised my piece. I used words familiar to them. Pragmatic - My audience was the children. My purpose was to build community by sharing my life with the children in the form of a personal letter. I asked them what they would like me to address them as and they collectively chose "sweethearts." Surface Syntax - Beginning, middle and ending to my story. Grapho-phonical/Lexical - I used words on the word wall (high frequency words) and words from the environmental word wall (words they have collected from their environment). I spelled out-loud to show how I used phonics to spell words.

We would like to hear what others of you are doing. Submit them to "Reflections" on the website "Framework" tab.