Nikki Sullivan

STAR Strategy for Kelsey

The STAR strategy is a strategy on pages 22-23 and 121-123 from Promoting Executive
Function in the Classroom by Lynn Meltzer. It is a strategy that helps improve executive function
skills, reading skills, and writing skills. According to Meltzer (2010), the key elements of who,
what, when, where, why, and how focus students attention on the main ideas and supporting
details; the complexity of the format shifts as the complexity of the information increases, (p.
121). I selected the STAR strategy because it is a graphic organizer that would help increase
Kelseys reading comprehension skills, as well as learning new vocabulary. This strategy will
also increase her executive functioning skills because it will help Kelsey remember, plan,
organize, prioritize, and shift between the main idea of the reading and the details. As students
actively read both fiction and nonfiction, the STAR chart helps them to stop, reflect, and record
key information, thereby enhancing their memory of important facts, (Meltzer, 2010, p. 121).
This strategy would benefit my student in maintenance because it can be taught early on in
elementary grades, then modified used for more complex tasks in higher grades. There are also
multiple formats of this strategy, so we will use one for main ideas and another for learning new
vocabulary words. This strategy would benefit my student in generalization because it is a tool
that can be used across subjects for summarizing reading material, organizing ideas for writing,
taking notes, and studying. Since Kelsey has deficits in reading comprehension and learning new
vocabulary, this graphic organizer will help her focus on the major themes and main ideas of the
text she is reading, as well as the new vocabulary. If she uses this strategy effectively, her
academic performance will be increased, which will increase her independence and resilience.
On the next page, I have provided an outline for Kelsey to use throughout the whole text The
Giver. I would suggest that she take the time to fill this graphic organizer out after each chapter.
On the third page, I have provided an outline for Kelsey to use for new vocabulary terms we will
be learning from the text. As a class, we will fill this graphic organizer out together.9

WHO

WHAT

HOW
MAIN IDEA

WHEN

WHY

WHERE

Term

Who?

What?

When?

Where?

Why is it
important?

Pictu