Accessing Background Knowledge Strategy
An explanation of this strategy and instructional charts can be downloaded at the end of this post.
Have you ever used the traditional K-W-L chart (What I Know, What I Want to Know, What I Learned) only to be frustrated by the direction your students’ responses steered the lesson? I know I definitely have experienced this scenario numerous times. If you can relate, you might be interested in a modified version of the chart.
As you know, the traditional K-W-L chart prompts students to access their background knowledge.
I bet you’ve had at least one little person in your classroom who either maintains they knew all the information in a text you read together, or, they become upset when the text presents information that contradicts their background knowledge.
What we want our young students to understand is that readers read nonfiction text to learn something new and that learning something new is a cause for celebration! 😀
The chart below is an excellent instructional tool to introduce to your whole class during Shared Reading lessons. It’s a fabulous tool when introducing new information in other subject areas, such as Science, Social Studies, and Health. Once students are familiar with it, then a smaller version can be used during small-group lessons, such as Guided Reading, whenever students need to access their background knowledge related to a nonfiction text.
An Improved Version of the K-W-L Chart
To explain this strategy, I’m going to reference the book shown below.
Reading Focus Question
The teacher poses a specific question that will be answered in the text students are going to read. This helps to narrow students’ focus when they access their background knowledge. It also provides a clear purpose for reading the text since students want to find out if their background knowledge is correct.
Sample Reading Focus Questions:
What do you know about elephants?
This question is much too vague and will result in students sharing a wide range of facts and beliefs about elephants. In all likelihood, the lesson will be pulled in a direction the text does not support.
What do you think elephants use their trunks for?
This specific question will narrow students’ responses to one aspect of this animal. The lesson will move forward in a meaningful and engaging direction as it will connect to the text.
Here’s An Explanation of the Chart
1st Column: What I Think I Know
The wording of the first heading acknowledges the fact that not all our background knowledge is accurate.
Suggested teacher dialogue: We know that our brains always search for what we already know about a book’s topic. Sometimes the information in our brain is correct. Sometimes our brain thinks information is correct but after we read, we find out it wasn’t correct. So, let’s find out what your brain thinks is the answer to this question.
Read the focus question you’ve printed on the chart.
Students’ responses can be recorded on post-it notes and attached to the chart. This allows the post-it notes to be moved to a different column once the text is read. Alternatively, you can duplicate the chart on a white board and record the students’ responses there.
2nd Column: We Were Correct
After the text is read, any post-it notes with accurate information on them are moved from the 1st column to the 2nd column.
If you’re using a white board to record the chart’s information, arrows can be drawn from the accurate information in column one to column two.
3rd Column: Yay! We Learned Something New!
When the text teaches us new information related to the focus question, it’s recorded on a new post-it note and attached to this column. (Sometimes a post-it note in column one only needs a slight revision to make it accurate. It can then be moved to column 2 or 3, whichever you and the students think is best.)
Another benefit of this strategy is that it inevitably leads to a complex skill students need to master ~ explaining what an author has said using their own words. In the example below, a student’s background knowledge was that elephants use their trunks to eat food. The text uses the phrase, “grab food.” A valuable discussion will ensue when you ask students if that phrase means the same as, or close to, what’s written on the post-it note.
Additionally, during this instructional process, word choice will often need to be discussed. In the example below, the teacher would guide students to determine if the verb “talk” is accurate when describing the sounds elephants make. Students might argue that when elephants make noises, they are “talking”. In this case, the teacher would need to clarify the definition of the word “talk” (speaking or communicating with words) in order to convince students to choose a more accurate word or phrase.
As you’ve likely experienced in your classroom, some students feel deflated when their responses aren’t correct. To alleviate this, I make a big deal about the fact that we learned something new from the text.
Suggested teacher dialogue:
Yay! Guess what just happened in your brains? That’s right. We learned something new which means the neurons in your brain just grew new dendrites. So, your brain got stronger! Woo-hoo!
4th Column: Now We’re Wondering…
Depending on the stamina of your students and/or your instructional focus, you may exclude the 4th column.
If you choose to use this column, students’ questions related to the text are recorded on new post-it notes and attached to this column. In future lessons, students read other texts in an attempt to answer their new questions.
Download your copy of the explanation of this instructional tool and the accompanying charts to guide your students to access their background knowledge in an effective manner.
If you find the background knowledge strategy visual included in this download useful, you might be interested in the full resource of Visuals for the Key Comprehension Strategies. Click on the My Shop button to preview this resource.
