In my 3rd grade dyad placement I worked both with individual children (under the direction of the school reading specialist), and with selected reading groups of children that were similar in their reading level. This past week I had the opportunity to practice doing dibbles evaluations with my primary placement students. In both cases I had an opportunity to draw assessments in my mind on the individual strengths and weaknesses of these students but I was not yet in a position to discuss goals and how they could become better readers. The exception being the one on one sessions I had with the children needing extra help. I did offer some suggestions that seemed natural to me based on the mechanics of reading. Pausing at periods or speaking with expression. Not much in the way of assessment or goal setting. Armed now with a whole set of methods to conduct a more formal reading conference I feel better armed to help my student in my placement, and with my Juanita student.
In listening to a number of kids now its interesting to sense which kids can read, and which ones love to read. What is the secret to unlock what turns a kid on to reading? It would seem you can’t flood them with an armful of different genre books and expect them to get turned on by something in the pile. They will undoubtably think its a major waste of time, and reading takes time, so why bother. I know that, as I drown in a stack of textbooks. I now have but one measly pleasure book that I read less and less, unless I just say dammit. Me time, and I read for awhile before I feel guilty, and fearful of being behind in my studies, stop.
Reading has to compete with the TV, video games, texting, and who knows what else. How often do you hear a kid say upon asking if they have read Harry Potter, or Twilight, “Oh I saw the movie”. I have always taken my read aloud very seriously, and purposeful in that besides hopefully entertaining them, my enthusiasm excites some fiber in them to reading.
Routman has provided us now with some tools to evaluate the reader, and uncover some element that we can teach to perhaps turn on a student to love reading. I student that does not understand what they are reading or that struggles with vocabulary is never going to love reading because reading is meaningless. We can help.
Hi Kevin,
ReplyDeleteI also find it interesting to see which students truly love to read and which students are just going through the motions. In my main placement the students have an opportunity to read silently on their own and then they are able to partner up with a classmate and read a book to each other. It seems very robotic to me and I am not sure that kids are getting much out of it.
As a teacher I am interested in giving my students an opportunity to read, but I want them to create a list of the title of the book, the author and write whether or not they would recommend it to a classmate and if so who? My intent is to have them really thinking about what they are reading and why they like it or not. I hope this will lead them to some critical thinking about what they enjoy reading, which can help them as readers and me, the teacher, help them find more books that will capture their interest.
Wonderful and though provoking post Kevin!
Kim
I also think we can help students be better readers. Getting to know our students as people, as learners, as readers with interests and hobbies and knowledge. This seems common-sense, but is somehow overlooked often when educators in general think about teaching literacy. I like the quote, "I don't teach classes, I teach children."
ReplyDeleteKevin,
ReplyDeleteI'm in a classroom where reading conferences are frequent, but I'm seeing something a bit different. I'm seeing the reading conferences focusing almost exclusively on assessment (sort of like running records) and working on skills--comprehension, fluency, and so on. I think this is great, but I feel like what's missing is the sincere interest in what the student is reading. There's part of me (a naive part?) that's concerned that the more we turn the conferences into "work," the more we risk turning reading into work.
That's why I really like this post, Kevin!
Ian