The schools we have. The schools we need.

This week I read Allington's article which takes a look at some "confusions" about successful literacy teaching and the changes that need to be made to our schools in order to better meet the needs of all our students. One of the things that I found most interesting in this article was a proposed idea that instead of having short blocks of reading instruction every day, we should instead consider spending Monday and Tuesday only doing reading. With that schedule, children would be able to really dive into books with extended periods of time for independent reading. The hour or so that schools have allotted for reading everyday is a short time to cover everything that children need in order to develop good literacy skills. In that time it is even more difficult to find time for children to read books of their choosing. I know it would be nearly impossible for any school to switch to a schedule that allowed 2 days of solid literacy instruction and practice, but it could be very benificial to those who struggle with reading. What do you think of this idea? how could having two days soley for reading help and hurt your students?

What books should your students read?

As teachers we need to provide appropriate reading materials for our students who are at various levels of reading. This should be easy, right? As a teacher you may have several leveled readers collections in your classroom, but they may not be leveled the same way. I found Rog and Burton's article to be very interesting because a group of teachers took on the task of "re-leveling" their collections to be uniform.The inconsistencies between leveled reader collections make it very difficult to incorporate new materials into classrooms. It would be great if all books for children used the same system so that teachers and parents could provide children with appropriate reading materials. I think the system described in the article gave good descriptions of what they believe to be the various levels of books and the characteristics of the readers who should read each book. I feel like a group of teachers could use this system to re-level their own books in order to take the guess work out of what is an appropriate book for each child. 

Guided Reading

This week I "Using centers to engage children during guided reading time: Intensifying learning experiences away from the teacher." While this article did not focus primarily on guided reading lessons, it did speak of the importance of strong centers for children to visit while others are visiting the teacher at the guided reading rotation. Ford and Optiz believe that, "the power of the instruction that takes place away from the teacher must rival the power of the instruction that takes place with the teacher." (p. 710) This means that teachers should strive to have meaningful centers that are not cut-and-paste activities or worksheets. The centers they suggested set the children up to be successful, independent workers in centers that would "give them the opportunity to warm up before, review after, or extend beyond a guided reading session." (p. 714) This article helped me to see that while guided reading time with the teacher is essential, utilizing all time away from the teacher is also key in helping young readers. As teachers we must know our students, their reading and writing abilities, and their degree of independence so that we can create appropriate centers to help them become independent readers which according to the article is the ultimate goal of guided reading.

At the school I spend time at weekly, I see a lot of worksheets and cut-and-paste activities in their reading rotation centers. Have you seen the same, or have you experienced meaningful centers in schools?

http://www.learner.org/workshops/readingk2/support/ReadingTeacher.1.pdf

Making Words

While reading the articles this week, the making words section in Cunningham & Cunningham's article stood out to me. I love the way that they took the letters from one bigger word and used them to have the children make other words and see patterns. During CARE in Knox County Schools they often use pocket charts to build words, and I have seen how much the kids enjoy going up to the chart and making the words. I think that if there is the time for Making Words, kids would really enjoy the activity. Not only does it meet the needs of the struggling children in the class while providing a challenges the more advanced kids, but it is fun! Now that's a great way to have differentiated instruction!

What's an Anchor Chart?

Before reading Gregory and Cahill's article, I had never heard of the term anchor chart. An anchor chart is a chart that you create as a class that helps to ‘anchor’ information in student’s minds. In the case of this article, they used anchor charts to ask questions about the story and then make inferences. I liked seeing their examples of anchor charts in the article, so I thought I would look for some more good ones.

I like this one because it is laminated and can be reused!

This is a neat way to think about inferences.

Have you seen teachers use anchor charts in the school? Will you use them?