- Give a specific example of a student's (or a group of students') struggles with reading in your classroom this year. Do not name the student(s).
- In your opinion, what would fix the problem?
- Read what your colleagues are posting about reading concerns in their classroom -- feel free to add your comments.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
reading concerns in your classroom
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It is hard in Kindergarten, especially at the beginning of the year because we are just starting to learn some words. Students who don't remember the words yet depend on the others to say it for them and they are passive listeners. Taking the the students in small groups (Guided Reading) usually helps as they are right in front of me and it forces them to be tuned in more. I tell them I need to hear each person. I also can make sure they are following each word with their finger. It gives the kids who are easily distracted more of a chance to focus because I am close enough to direct them. We do have an advantage at this level as they are soooo excited and want to learn to read!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Connie. It's hard in kdg because everything we read follows such obvious patterns, it's hard to know if they are really reading the words or just following the pattern. I am going to work more this year on reading with expression and not doing choral readings so slow because then they sound like little robots!
ReplyDeleteSince all my students struggle with reading I do work on fluency to help with their comprehension. I do alot of modeling and we reread together so they can hear what good reading should sound like. Some think reading is just saying the words and not thinking of what reading really is. I have to remind them that when they are reading they are telling a story and that it should sound like a story not head bobbing reading!!
ReplyDeleteCo-teaching in the fifth grade classroom this year, I have been privileged to hear what good reading sounds like (something I am not use to in the resource room :) Something that I have found interesting, though, is that I would much rather listen to a conscientious student read slower rather than those that I would deem competent readers. These students lack any expression or emotions, are very monotone, avoid punctuation, and have many repetitions, making it sometimes painful to listen to.
ReplyDeleteIn the resource room, here are some things I have noticed about my struggling readers. They often say the word "Skip" when they get to a word they don't recognized by sight rather than trying to apply decoding skills and phonics. These students also tend to look at the first letter(s) of a word and guess at a word rather than looking at the word as a whole.
I feel that continued modeled reading, in both the general ed classroom, as well as in the resource room are a key component of the reading curriculum. Students need to hear what good reading sounds like. They also have to feel comfortable reading with expression and emotion. I feel some students are embarrassed to read aloud in front of others, therefore they just hurry to get it over with. We need to make students feel comfortable and want to read aloud. They just don't feel confident.
An example from my classroom this year comes from a student who would be considered one of my top readers. This student rushes through reading passages orally, I believe to try to impress his/her peers. This makes the reading difficult to understand, and I believe his/her comprehension suffers because of it. Additional practice through readers' theater performance is one way Mrs. Koenig and I are trying to get this student to improve in this area. Listening to the recording of himself/herself seems to be of some help.
ReplyDeleteThe children in preschool are learning about how reading looks. Some of them are not exposed to this in their homes. By holding a book the correct way and turning the pages correctly as well as respecting books, the children see how reading looks. The children are read to at least once a day so they see what reading looks like through modeling. In the writing center, I have made books with repeated text for the children to make by adding pictures. Many of them have chosen to make them and read them on their own (for the most part). In taping one of my little guys reading, it was great to see him use his picture clues to read as well as use his finger to follow the text. I agree with Connie in that being a good strategy.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that I have noticed with a few of the students in my room is that they mix up their b and d when writing. I have one student in particular who always does this when writing his/her name. He/she reads the name correctly with the wrong letter in place but swears that the 2 letters are the same. We have been doing some exercises and practicing with these 2 letters during guided reading time.
ReplyDeleteI have another student, one of my struggling readers, who could care less about reading. I have a really hard time keeping him/her engaged and wanting to read. I encourage this student to go to the bookshelf during centers and chose a book that is appealing and look through it. I really try to keep him/her engaged during guided reading by asking questions and getting him/her involved as much as possible.
I'm still working on getting all of the kinks worked out with everyone. I know I'll get there soon :)
I have found that the students do a lot of reading of words, not sentences. This causes them to lose any idea of what they are reading. Punctuation marks are a bit of a nuisance to them also. They would rather just ignore them and get through the reading. I have tried to emphasize that they need to read to the mark at the end of a sentence not just the end of the line. I try to read from a chapter book at least once a day. I try to use expression to make the reading more interesting and to show how it makes the story more fun. The readers theatre we did really helped with the expression with some of the students.
ReplyDeleteI have two students who struggle with decoding words. They don't look at beginning letters, endings, or anything in between. They don't think about what makes sense in the story and will say anything that comes to mind. We have been working on making words, word families, repeated readings, choral reading, partnering with a higher level reader, sending them to Joanie,... I'm not sure how to fix this. I plan to add more guided reading time to my schedule so I can meet with all of my groups every day for more practice. I will also begin some readers theater this week. Any suggestions?
ReplyDeleteI find most of my students struggle with sight word recognition and have little to no decoding skills. We practice with many blending drills on a daily basis, but they are unable to blend words together independently. This leads to a lack of confidence,especially with one particular student. If I don't hear "I Can't" or "I Don't Know" every third word, something is wrong! What I have noticed when the student comes to an unknown word they look at the beginning sound and guess a word that doesn't even make sense. They are unable to look at the word as a whole. My students spend so much time reading each individual word that there is no fluency or comprehension going on.
ReplyDeleteThings that I have tried include: repeated repeated repeated reading, partner reading, books on tape, and finding books below their instructional level. I agree with everyone that students need much modeled reading so they know what good reading sounds like.
Our preschool class does similiar activities (making books, letting the children "read" them to their friends, etc.) as Jennifer's class. Since we do not have "readers" in our classrooms, we don't have specific examples of one who struggles but we do read to them. I even read to them in a boring way a couple of times and they all agreed that they would much rather hear me in my "normal" way. We check for comprehension (in large, small and one on one groups), we talk about letters and the sounds they make, we talk about how letters make words, etc.). This year we both are also focusing on authors. We have baskets with the author's picture on it and all the books that we could find from that author. They seem to be more interested this year in books in general!
ReplyDeleteI still have a couple of students who will read what they think the words are instead of what they really are. They are the only students still "allowed" to use their fingers to point to the words as they read. They find out that they don't have enough words or too many words. I am also able to point out that the words they are reading don't have the same sounds as the words on the page. I model and discuss their reading with them. Guided Reading time is a great time for me to help them to look at their words. I know we can get those fingers out of the books so that we then can work more on fluency!
ReplyDeleteI have a small group of students this year who are having a lot of trouble with decoding words. They often get a lot wrong on the phonics pages we do. They are also my lowest readers this year. They often read words incorrectly and then lose the meaning of the story. I have been working on more decoding with them and I am going to try to do more reader's theater in my room this year. I don't have a lot of students who I feel are high fluency readers this year. We are doing quite a bit of oral reading and fluency activities, but I still think these particular students need even more. Hopefully we can get extra help for these students this year.
ReplyDeleteIn my classroom, 43% did not meet grade-level requirements for the spring BRI fluency assessment. Within this group of students, some are within a few words of grade level and others are in the third grade range. I am trying to get everyone to the fifth grade level through modeling, partner reading, Readers' Theater, echo reading, and individual attention. I am doing bi-monthly CBM probes with each student. Students set their own goals and are tracking their progress. My students really seem to get excited about fluency activities because they know they are making progress toward their goal.
ReplyDeleteDebb said...
ReplyDeleteI have many students who pause in places that don't make sense. This really affects the meaning for them. They don't understand the concept of looking for a phrase that makes sense on its own. We have been doing some daily fluency practice with chunking phrases. This is done as a daily short activity so that students can see how to chunk appropriately. It only takes 5 min. or so. We have been practicing 2-person reader's theatre plays. Yesterday we had a few groups present their plays. Afterwards, students identified what each group was doing to "be a good reader." They identified things such as "using expression, pausing at periods, changing loudness, making it sound like talking." The students were able to identify many of the elements that I would want to teach them. They seemed to like this activity. We will continue to do 2-person plays and presentations. I do think it would be helpful to audio tape some struggling readers and some fluent readers. We could listen to Readers #1, 2, 3 etc. and identify what they are doing well and what they could do to become a better reader. I need a device to record these readers. I started out doing guided reading with the little books that came with our reading series just to get a feel for what skills I need to work on with students. I would love to read more novel units with different groups of students. I have found, though, that there are so many levels within this room that I could spend half of my day doing guided reading. I decided that since we are pushing for fluency, I would focus on things like reader's theatre, chunking activities, listening and "fix the reader" activities. If students become more fluent, they will be more ready to "attack" and enjoy a novel unit. I am a little frustrated that we aren't doing trade books for guided reading. I think that it can be quite enjoyable for students. I just think that they aren't ready for it at this point. We took a break in our reading series and read Caleb's Story. The students seemed to enjoy the book, but they seemed to need a lot more guidance than I ever anticipated. For now...fluency, fluency, fluency activities. Any suggestions on how I could reasonably do novel units with some choice involved and leveling considered??
In music textbooks (grades 2-5) we have a few sentences of information on nearly every page to introduce the song and some comments on the context from which it originated. I often wait until we have sung the song a time or two before having this information read aloud. I usually ask for volunteer readers and often the same ones raise their hands.
ReplyDeleteJoanie suggested that I have those confident readers read the information and then have everyone read it aloud together. I tried this with third grade and it seemed to work for them. Still a few were not even looking at the book page, so I reminded those few to join the reading and we read at least twice more. It doesn’t take long because it is only a few sentences, and then we can resume singing. Thanks, Joanie, for the suggestion.
I know I am on elementary turf here, but reading is my big deal this year. I've reveled in the readers who gobble books up for years. I've instructed "the classics" and my favorite classroom books to the masses for a very long time. The 5-7 who gobble up books read my books, trust my recommendation, and appreciate the read.
ReplyDeleteThe problems come in how the rest handle book reading. A larger number treat the books as homework or as quick skims to pass tests. A piece here, a piece there, and do the work assigned, - some do the work expertly by the way, while others with mediocrity
Then there's another group that is increasing in number every year, who won't read or are very slow. The undeveloped reader, the stubborn reader, reluctant, struggling, whatever you want to call them.
To address the apathetic and reluctant reader, I have changed my approach to novel reading. I've become enslaved to the principles of a book entitled "The Book Whisperer", the philosophy being to give time in the classroom to read, to surround them with books, to immerse them with books, to talk about books, in the halls, in the classroom, incessantly, to select books and stack them up in front of the noses of reluctant readers until they can't avoid me anymore. We even blog about our books. It's books, books, books.
Today is Oct. 17, a quarter in, 4 weeks of Book Whispering. It has been eye-opening for me-- on one hand to converse with so many students about what they're reading. I've learned so much about kids in this endeavor that I never knew before,- just through their book choices and their talking to me about what they're reading- with so much excitement. It has been SOMETHING!
On the other hand, it is equally frustrating to have to face the challenge of getting that handful of non readers students to read a book. I can't avoid it, or shove it under the rug, or just mark the failing grade. That's not an option. But, they're wearing me down. That handful are amazingly stubborn. They are hardcore apathetics. It's very hard to know what will turn them on when they refuse to put eyes on a page, even if the story is suited to a tee, or the cover is exciting. After repeated attempts to find a suitable book for a kid who only wanted books set in the woods and with "gross stuff" in them, I gave a boy a book about a guy who lived in the woods and had to eat Guts, entitled "Guts" and he would not read it! Just wouldn't.
It's the biggest perplexing dilema I face. And I have no answer yet. I have 3 students like this, two boys and one girl. Refuse to try. They are all resource students, and I'm turning them over to resource teacher for first half hour of every class to see if she can accomplish what I cannot in Second Chance Reading. I have to wonder if it is too late by the time they get to me to get them to read. My last ditch attempt is to have the two boys in Hatchet with the audio book. They have refused that tooo, but are trying again...maybe this time? ...the girl will not use audiobook at all. I've tried. I'm stuck. It's been quite a trip so far. I'm committed, but exhausted with the latter handful.
Everyone who has taught this year's sixth grade agrees that there is a huge range of abilities. One class has six resource students, plus a few one the border. The other class has students that are reading, writing, etc. on a high school level. One third of this class ranks somewhere in the 90th percentile in reading.
ReplyDeleteAfter a semester of creating different lesson plans for both classes, I have joined forces with Mrs. Haferbier to introduce the one re3ading class to 2nd Chance Reading. I consider myself a student as well, so my trust has been put in Mrs. Haferbier's experience.