Blog 5 - No More Independent Reading Without Support

In the remainder of this section, "But That," Miller and Moss provide us with some strategies that we can add to our tool belt. They label these strategies as "Tactics," and they cover a wide variety of topics. They discuss how to guide independent reading through classroom libraries, organization of those libraries, and monitoring. They then tell us to use that monitoring and conferring part to further our instruction and help our students on their level, and with the skills that are specific to them. If we notice that a larger group of students is missing something, that is when we would take the time to "catch" or "refocus" the group. Miller and Moss then go on to talk about the interaction between students. Students should reflect and share with each other. They should even engage in book clubs and lean on each other to help foster their learning and further improve the ability to become successful readers. Finally, we should assess them independently to get a real feel for their learning and improvement. 

This last piece seems to tie in everything we have talked about in this course thus far. We should use that monitoring and conferring portion in order to differentiate our instruction. Not all readers may need the same supports, so we really need to examine who needs what in order to provide meaningful instruction. Aha! Validation strikes again! The reflection, sharing, and book discussion section really validates what I took away from Module 6. While we need to guide and demonstrate learning, we almost need to let our students go and learn from each other. It seems as though in utilizing this tactic, our students will take away more meaningful experiences and connections. The idea of assessing students independently is something I think we do anyway. We need to know what they can do on their own. Have they made gains on their own? Or do they rely on us as teachers or their peers to gain insight into what they are reading? By thinking about these things, we can even further differentiate, and mold our instruction to better suit our students' needs. 

I absolutely loved this book and actually learned much more than I thought I would. I will definitely be sharing it with my co-teacher, and am looking forward to implementing some of the strategies with her. 

Blog 4 - No More Independent Reading Without Support

The final section of this book, section 3, is titled "But That." In the previous sections we learned what not to do, and what should be done instead. Now, the authors have begun to lay out the framework for how to make that happen. They break down the reading block in to 3, possibly 4, components. A short focus lesson should start the reading block, then students should practice what they have learned during a section of time that is scheduled for "Independent Reading." During this time, teachers can catch up, or re-teach as needed. Then, the teacher and students should reflect and share what they have learned. Miller and Moss go on inform us that in order for Independent Reading to be effective we must structure and teach in a certain way. Students need to be clear on their purpose of reading. Then, they need to engage in authentic reading. Is this something they would do in the real world when reading? Teachers should also support their choice. Finally, explicit instruction should be provided about why readers read. All of these components are necessary for readers to be successful during independent reading time. 

I mentioned in my previous blog, that I was unsure about the "focus lesson" or "mini-lesson." In this section Miller and Moss let us know that it is o.k. to teach that lesson in a small group. I feel much more comfortable about that section of the block after reading this section. This is something that I feel classroom teachers have become confused by with the mandated 90 minute reading block. A whole group focus lesson may be effective for some things. However, students with learning disabilities are probably going to need support in many different areas than your average elementary student. So, small group focus lessons may be necessary when students with disabilities are in the class. 

Another thing I enjoyed in this section was the idea of teaching students their purpose for reading. This is something that I feel should be taught at the beginning of the year when procedures are being taught and practiced. No matter the skill or purpose that the students are reading for, the same questions should be asked: What's my purpose for reading today? What am I going to try to figure out? How will I demonstrate my understanding for my learning goal? If students can learn this process from the very start, they should have a better understanding of their expectations through the year during independent reading time. Then, this same skill could be transferred to reading in any setting. Content classes, enjoyment reading, and even standardized testing. 

This section of the book really tied things together for me, and I look forward to reading about the "Tactics" in the remainder of this section. 

Blog 3 - No More Independent Reading Without Support

Continuing Section 2 - In the last part of this section, the authors sum up a lot of what we have already learned in this course. Teachers need to conference with their students and provide instruction based on their observations in a variety of methods. whole groups, small groups, pairs, and one-on-one. Also, something that Miller and Moss talk about to an extent is classroom libraries and varieties of text. Actually they support Fountas and Pinell's claim that a classroom library should have "between 300 and 600 titles."  Wow! Miller and Moss also speak the level of texts that students should be reading during IR time. They note that may independent texts are not the best. That actually students may benefit more from more difficult texts. Finally, the authors examine the idea that this cannot be done without the proper tools and support. Students needs incentive programs in order to want to strive to make progress and read more. They also need a variety of text to choose from. However, the key lies within the teachers. Teachers need ongoing professional development in order to continue to help their students. 

Not being a classroom teacher, I do not know the struggle of stocking a classroom library, but I do know that our literacy coach has worked really hard to get materials   for our teachers to use and stock their libraries with. So, this is something that other people are taking note of as well. I also truly enjoyed the notion that not all instruction has to come in whole group. This is something that I think general education teachers have gotten hung up on with the mandated 90 minute ELA block. They feel that they have to teach that mini lesson to the whole group, and they also feel that workshop needs to take place in the same manner and structure every day. I have worked closely with Marilyn Friend over the course of the past two years, and she states that for students with learning disabilities, this cannot be the case. I would think that this would be the same for a heterogeneous group of students regardless. So, it was nice to see some validation in that. We need to be more flexible during that 90 minute block and our teaching methods so that we can reach every student every day!

Blog 2 - No More Independent Reading Without Support

Section 2 - In this section of the text the authors begin to expand on their theory. If you recall the first section was titled "Not This," and the authors explained the issues surrounding independent reading time in most elementary school settings. This section is titled "Why Not? What Works?," and here the authors begin to delve into their rationale about how to make independent reading work and make it purposeful. Here, Miller & Moss make their case for why Independent Reading should become Scaffolded Silent Reading (ScSR). With ScSR, students are supported in their independent reading, they are still allowed to select their text, and read on their own at their own pace, but with support. There is a chart in the text that, in my opinion, outlines this process very well. It states that teachers should support student book selection, so that students find "just right"  books. Also, not only should a variety of genres be represented for each level, but students should be encourage to select different genres by using a "genre wheel" to help them decide.teachers should also conference with students and hold them accountable for what they are reading by asking questions and creating discussions that aide them in their independent reading.

As a special education teacher, I have always been focused on the "can they read?" aspect of student's reading. However, one comment that the authors made, made me realize that  should also be fostering a love of reading. Miller & Moss stated that, "the best readers read the most, and the poorest readers read the least." That one statement made me think that not only should I be focusing on whether or not my students can read, but do they want to read? If they don't want to read when they leave my classroom, what good have I done? They need to be reading both inside of school and outside of school in order to become a successful reader. This section not only made me think about what I should be teaching, but how. So, I guess Miller and Moss have made a believer out of me so far!

Blog 1 - No More Independent Reading Without Support

I chose to read, No More Independent Reading Without Support, by Debbie Miller, and Barbara Moss. 

Chapter 1: This is actually an entire section entitled "Not This." The chapter/section focuses on how independent reading is necessary, yet not utilized effectively in most schools. The authors examine the time constraints that most teachers fear when they try to implement independent reading time. The authors then elude to the issues of wasted time in schools altogether. The examine a specific school and their use of things like "calendar time," "morning announcements," "noisy transitions," and "DEAR time." While the incidents were specific to one school we all know that activities like this take place in manner of fashion in all schools. By merely examining these issues, one can only assume that Miller and Moss plan to offer solutions to these situations, and in turn state that there is indeed time for independent reading in classrooms. 

I have, of course, not yet finished the book. However, it seems like a promising read. I can only hope that Miller and Moss continue their examination of misused time in schools, and that they enlighten us on how to change things. I think most of us know that independent reading time is important in order to foster a love of reading in children. Now, we just need to know how to execute it!

Week Five- Differentiation

In this week’s book report from “No More Independent Reading Without Support” by Miller and Moss, I have learned ways to accommodate and strengthen students’ reading skills through differentiated instruction, support, and assessment techniques that are beneficial not only for struggling readers but for good readers as well. I took notice when I read upon allowing students adequate time to discuss what they have read to others in class. I believe this is a great strategy for me with each of my students because it is a way for them to explain what they know and have understood verbally. It also gets my students to regurgitate what I have taught them in class. As students as discussing their chapter summaries, I reinforce important concepts that relate to what they have read. My students enjoy taking the initiative to read what they enjoy outside of class and connect it to what they are learning from the textbook inside of class. I like to have my students work in small groups to have shared reading responses, to conduct student-led discussions, and to complete a Four Corners activity, where they would post important concepts and ideas from the literary resources that I provide to them relating to the daily lesson that I have recently taught. “Peer discussion is one way that students can demonstrate their knowledge of their reading, which helps to make them accountable and improves comprehension (Miller and Moss, pg. 35, 2013). I also like to have my students keep a daily journal of free-writes of what they have learned during the week. I try to have at least two to three individual student conferences for striving readers as well as good readers so that I can progress monitor their reading skills, strategies, and comprehension levels.

Week Four- Informational Text

As a physical education teacher, I’ve learned how important it is to incorporate a variety of different genres and informational texts that are developmentally or cognitively appropriate for the types of readers I have in the class. It is essential that I teach all of my students how to read for comprehension through different learning modalities. “To become readers who can master the complex texts necessary for college and workplace success, students need to read a lot” (Miller & Moss, pg. 24, 2013). I strive to incorporate time within the week for my students to visit the school’s library for research purposes. I want my students to be skilled in locating resources through traditional print and online/digital print. It is important that my students are well versed in the different genres. When it comes to book reports, I have my students research important facts using technology, and then choose from a different number of online formats to create an informational guide or info-graph to present to their peers. I always find time to listen to my students’ opinions as well as their thoughts regarding the different types of genres that they have read outside of class. “If we want children to become life-long readers, we need to give them materials that interest them, and to do so means including informational texts, historical fiction, poetry, magazines, graphic novels, and other genre” (Miller & Moss, pg. 27, 2013). I’ve learned that some of my struggling readers will have trouble understanding the difference between fiction and nonfiction books, and it is my responsible to show them what fiction and nonfiction books are. It is more than just showing students how to read, it is showing students how to read for mastery. During reading instruction, I will work with individual struggling students and conduct miscue analysis, then create a plan of action to strengthen my students’ phonemic awareness, vocabulary, comprehension, accuracy, and fluency.

Week Three- Independent Reading

During this week’s reading of “No More Independent Reading Without Support”, I’ve read about several different reading studies that are nationally proven to help struggling readers. I’ve also learned that it is beneficial to allot varying times for struggling and good readers in the classroom. Teachers should allow their students to choose their own types of reading sources or genres so that they feel comfortable with what they read. I strategy that I will change is the reading time allotted to each of my students in the classroom. Allowing the same amount of time for SSR or DEAR would not normally benefit struggling readers due to their inability to comprehend what they are reading (based upon the complexity of the book) within the same amount of time that it would take a good reader to read. I will continuously monitor my struggling readers while providing individualized and small group instruction when needed. Reducing the number of minutes during independent reading can help prevent boredom with struggling readers. I will remember to always differentiate my instruction when it comes to having diverse learners in the classroom, and to provide multiple avenues or mini-assessments to determine what my students know and what they choose to do in order to meet standards or mastery of the daily activities assigned to them. “The research says that IR is most effective when students choose their own reading materials” (Miller & Moss, pg. 18, 2013). I’ve experienced success for the past several weeks ago once I began giving my students the option of “choice” when it comes to reading selections (low, mid & high level texts). I have my students write summaries of book chapters that they have read, and how it relates to health and real-world experiences. “Letting kids choose what to read motivates them to read even when it is not required and gives students practice in selecting their own books, which can contribute to out-of-school reading” (Miller & Moss, pg. 19, 2013).

Week Two- Instructional Practices

In this week’s reading of “No More Independent Reading Without Support” I’ve learned many different instructional reading practices that I can use with my students. Some of the instructional practices that I’ve learned to reach struggling readers are differentiating reading instruction, guided reading groups, learning centers, and planning for reading instruction. Some of the other instructional practices that reaffirmed what I currently do in my classroom are whole-class reading discussions, read alouds, independent reading, explicit direct instruction, individualized reading assistance and interventions, and small group work (Jigsaw). I find myself using whole-class reading discussions, individualized interventions, and direct instruction the most in my classroom. I utilize my instructional time efficiently with different activities so that each of my students have an opportunity to engage in different learning scenarios and modalities, as well as for them to demonstrate success each day. In order to gain student feedback in a prompt manner, I use exit slips at the end of each class period as a formative assessment to asses my teaching effectiveness and students’ knowledge and comprehension. I think exit slips are a great tool to assess students’ readiness to move on to more complex and challenging reading tasks or book levels. “For students to do more than race through lots of books, they need a teacher to show them what behaviors they need to practice as they read, and the teacher needs opportunities to monitor and give feedback on how students are using those behaviors” (Miller & Moss, pg. 8, 2013). I agree that teachers should model/demonstrate what effective reading skills look like in front of their students. Each day, I read effectively with my students. I ask comprehension check questions to see if they are understanding what I have read (segments of a book) before I continue on. I then have my students write a summary of the topic(s) that the class had talked about (as a whole-class) or about the book. I always observe how well my students read independently as well as when they read for and in front of the class.

Week Two- Instructional Practices

In this week’s reading of “No More Independent Reading Without Support” I’ve learned many different instructional reading practices that I can use with my students. Some of the instructional practices that I’ve learned to reach struggling readers are differentiating reading instruction, guided reading groups, learning centers, and planning for reading instruction. Some of the other instructional practices that reaffirmed what I currently do in my classroom are whole-class reading discussions, read alouds, independent reading, explicit direct instruction, individualized reading assistance and interventions, and small group work (Jigsaw). I find myself using whole-class reading discussions, individualized interventions, and direct instruction the most in my classroom. I utilize my instructional time efficiently with different activities so that each of my students have an opportunity to engage in different learning scenarios and modalities, as well as for them to demonstrate success each day. In order to gain student feedback in a prompt manner, I use exit slips at the end of each class period as a formative assessment to asses my teaching effectiveness and students’ knowledge and comprehension. I think exit slips are a great tool to assess students’ readiness to move on to more complex and challenging reading tasks or book levels. “For students to do more than race through lots of books, they need a teacher to show them what behaviors they need to practice as they read, and the teacher needs opportunities to monitor and give feedback on how students are using those behaviors” (Miller & Moss, pg. 8, 2013). I agree that teachers should model/demonstrate what effective reading skills look like in front of their students. Each day, I read effectively with my students. I ask comprehension check questions to see if they are understanding what I have read (segments of a book) before I continue on. I then have my students write a summary of the topic(s) that the class had talked about (as a whole-class) or about the book. I always observe how well my students read independently as well as when they read for and in front of the class.

Blog 1

What I’ve read so far in the book (Chapters One and Two) entitled, “No More Independent Reading Without Support”, by Miller & Moss (2013), is that the teacher must provide support and effective interventions for all of their students, which includes developing and good readers. Helping students to time-manage their reading inside and outside of class is important to help better their reading habits. It is important for teachers to find time for their students to read for meaning and to discuss their reading with others. Encouraging collaboration amongst students and teachers during reading instruction is a proven reading strategy to help students construct their ideas and to learn from each other. “Teachers need to talk about how they make meaning of a text so that the process is “visible” to students” (Miller & Moss, pg. 18, 2013). I incorporate many different strategies to encourage open and constructive dialogue before and after a reading activity or lesson. “For children to develop the habits and identity of thoughtful, strategic, proficient readers, they need to practice and, to make their practice productive, they need the tools that we can provide through interaction” (Miller & Moss, pg. 1). I always try to get my students motivated and involved in real-life situations and debates regarding important health issues (reading materials) so that they share ideas and assist one another through problem-solving techniques for finding common solutions. I focus on building content vocabulary, fluency, comprehension, phonemic awareness, and accuracy. I’ve read about the importance of reading scaffolding techniques that my developing readers can use to help them with information texts and other reading genres. Before I introduce different reading texts to my students, I observe to see what they know from the reading, and to see if the reading is comprehensible for them. I think it is important for all teachers to implement similar independent and whole-class reading practices in the school so students know how to read productively, and that they are supported during the entire day when it comes to reading for mastery. School administrators should also be willing to support a school-wide literacy/reading program and allow their teachers to try new proven reading practices for diverse readers.

 Finding consistent reading time in my daily instructional day for reading can be a challenge for me. Being as though I teacher high school physical education courses, my daily interactions with my students consist primarily of physical activities, rather than reading content material. However, I always find time at the beginning of class to incorporate a reading activity that focuses and builds upon prior knowledge and critical thinking skills. “Perhaps most advisable at this point is encouraging engagement with texts of varying levels of difficulty, providing greater support for students when they select more difficult texts” (Miller & Moss, pg. 22, 2013). I have students set reading goals (based upon academic reading progress) throughout each quarter and reward them for their accomplishments.

Catching Young Readers Before They Fall Chapters

I have continued reading the book, "Catching Young Readers Before They Fall." I am reviewing the last two chapters, 11 and 12.

Chapter 11 focuses on, Sharing Information with Families. It goes over sample questions that teachers may get from parents regarding strategies that parents can use to help their child at home. An example would be, "My child still does not know all his letters and sounds. What can I do to help him at home?" The book suggests answering that question by saying, "I think it is very important to have a partnership between home and school, so I am glad you asked. Not every child progresses at the same rate. You can read books to him at night, play alphabet games, keep a family journal to help build letter/ sound knowledge, etc." (Johnson and Keier, 2010) Some other key points that the book suggests when sharing information with parents is to honor the parent's concern, don't overwhelm the parent with too much information, and always follow through with parents. (Johnson and Keier, 2010)

Chapter 12 focuses on, Teachers Make the Difference. This chapter gives suggestions for how we can make a difference. It also states, "The teacher of a struggling reader will help determine whether that child succeeds or not, based on the teacher's instruction, attitude, and support." Some of the suggestions this chapter gives are, join a teachers as readers book discussion group with other professionals, gently push to include discussions about instruction for struggling readers at team meetings, and keep track of the time that your struggling students are involved in real reading and writing. (Johnson and Keier, 2010)

Overall, I think this is a great book for all teachers. We need to stay educated on ways that we can help educate our students to read. Reading is so important and it is a key skill that everyone needs to succeed in life. We need to catch all of these young readers before they fall!

Blog 5: Reading Essentials: Teach Comprehension

 During this blog I chose to read the chapter titled "Teach Comprehension" from the Reading
Essentials text. Routman opens up the chapter with a powerful statement saying, "If we want kids to
wind up with comprehension, we have to begin with comprehension." She also states, "When we
spend most of our energy focusing on words, students get the message that reading is about words
rather than meaning." So, that means that there is not enough teaching on meaning because the focus
is more on fluency (which is also important). Routman states that teachers cannot start teaching
comprehension in grade 3 because it can begin in preschool. Students must be introduced to
challenging, but interesting text in order for them to problem solve while reading. Some of the
reading strategies discussed in the chapter are what I am focusing on at this point with my focus
student and his guided reading group. The strategies I am focusing on with them include: making
connections, monitoring for meaning, asking questions, and making inferences in the form of
predictions. My students who are receiving this instruction at this point have moved up one or two
reading text levels. Routman states that teachers should not encourage students to just use one
strategy while reading because many are usually used at a time. After I teach my mini-lessons I
always ask my students, "What strategies can you use while reading today during independent
reading?" This shows my students that they can use more than one strategy instead of the lesson's focus strategy for that day. When teaching and modeling the strategies teachers can ask themselves: Are students using and applying the strategies I am teaching? How do I know that? What's my evidence? Am I teaching for understanding of text? How am I assessing for understanding? Routman also includes in this chapter questions teachers should teach their students to ask while reading for meaning: Does this make sense? Does this sound like language? (Does it sound right), and Do I know what is happening in the text? During my conferences and small groups I usually ask my students the first two questions and encourage them to ask themselves. Some days during running records I hear them ask themselves the questions out loud. Lastly, in the text Routman talks about the importance of collaborative talk. I realized it connects to grand conversations and Socratic Seminars because the students are making meaning. Routman also discussed "in-depth" questions in the text and I thought about the similarity these questions have with the article from this week about Socratic Seminars that was called "in your head" questions.

Blog 5 No More Independent Reading Without Support

Blog 5

Making the Most of Independent Reading

The Afterword section of this book has the very important quote that says, “There is no greater impact on students’ reading growth than giving them time to read.’ That kind of sums the object of this book up in a nutshell. This book has explained why we need to give students time to read, how we can find time in our day to give our students time to read, where we can gather the hundreds of appropriate books we need to have available in our classrooms for students to read, what we do to hold students accountable for their reading, how to share their ideas about reading in book clubs, among so many other things.

The beginning of the last section of this book describe how we monitor independent reading. Teachers should actively confer with students as they are reading. During these conferences, you are “ . . . actively gathering information about how they’re reading and what they need to grow as readers.” You are gathering information as much as you’re instructing. You “. . . use that information to set goals with students, share with parents during conferences, and inform small-group instruction.”

This section also introduced to me the idea of book clubs. This seemed to go hand in hand with the focus of this module about talk. The expectations for and the prompts used during book clubs were almost identical to those listed in one of our videos for this section.

I recommend this book for any teacher who is trying to reorganize her classroom so that it offers children more time to practice independent reading. It reminds me of one of my favorite sayings attributed to Mark Twain, “The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who can’t read.” Many of our children don’t have the opportunity to read or to learn to cherish reading in their homes. It is up to us to give them the time to read and support them in learning to love reading.

Blog Post 5: Chapters 11 and 12

Chapter eleven, Sharing Information with Families, focuses how to better communicate with parents. I really enjoyed reading this chapter because it gave great advice to teachers on how they should professionally respond to family members concerns regarding their child. There were sixteen commonly asked questions that parents have regarding their child. In the past, I’ve heard horrible stories of teachers responding in the “wrong way” to the parents of some of their students. I’ve even witnessed incidents where parents have become angry with their child’s teacher for responding in an unprofessional way. This chapter really guides teachers on what they can say in scenarios. A question that was listed as a concern a parent may have was: “It seems like my child just memorizes the books he brings home. Last night he even told me he could read it with his eyes closed. Is this okay?”. The response that was given to this parent’s question/concern was both encouraging to the parent and the child. Since I'm a substitute teacher, I personally do not get one-on-one meetings with parents, but when I worked at a summer school program I was always communicating with parents and ensuring the parents that their child was making progress.

Chapter twelve, Teachers Make the Difference, focuses on encouraging teachers to continue expanding their knowledge to help support struggling readers to improve. According to the text, “The generally accepted theory of how reading works is that reading consists of a number of skills that can be taught in some sequential manner”. The greatest thing I learned from this chapter is that in order to make a difference in the as an educator, I must change my way of thinking. Reading is a process and in order for a student to grow as a reader, they need help in building their reading process. “Many more teachers are starting to view reading as a process in the head of the reader and to understand that struggling readers need help in building that process”. The text list several possibilities of how teachers can begin to use this new way of thinking to make a difference in schools, teachers, and students. I plan to use all of the points given (p. 225), but the one I was able to use the most is: “Keeping track of the time that your struggling students are involved in real reading and writing. Is it as much time as your more able readers are spending engaged in authentic tasks?”. During this time, I could try working one-on-one with students to see where we need to focus more on.  

What You Need to Know About Assessments, Sharing Information with Families, and Making a Difference

For the last blog, I read chapters 10, 11, and 12 in Catching Readers Before They Fall. The authors talk about authentic, ongoing, and informative assessments. As teachers, we continually look for what readers can do and can almost do, and make a note of behaviors in order to provide support and guide your teaching decisions. Informal assessment tools include anecdotal notes taken during reading conferences or observing students. During conferences, teachers can look for what the child can do independently, what they can almost do, and what they can't do yet. Note-taking while observing allows us to see behaviors or patterns. Running records allow us to gain insight into which strategies are being used as well as the appropriate reading level for the student. Formal assessments include benchmarks, running records, and tests. Teachers usually use benchmark assessments at the beginning, middle, and end of the year in order to get information on a child's instruction level, comprehension, and fluency. "The more that we know about what students' strengths are and what they struggle with, the more closely we can match our instruction to what each child needs to learn next." Assessments ultimately inform our teaching. When assessments indicate that only some children need practice with a skill, then guided reading groups or conferences may be useful rather than teaching the whole class and repeating to other students. Every time that you instruct a struggling reader, you must help build his or her reading process system and ongoing, authentic, and informative assessment is what helps that to happen.

Chapter 11 focuses on sharing information with families. "The majority of parents are not educators and therefore they rely on us to inform them of how children best learn to read." It's our job to help families understand how they can help their children at home. This chapter is very useful because the authors wrote down common questions that families have and went through each of them to suggest ways that you can talk to parents about their child's progress. This will help strengthen the connection between home and school.

Chapter 12 reinforces that teachers make a difference. "School administrators and teachers alike should remain vigilant about finding ways to teach all children, no matter what their strengths and weaknesses." All children can learn. However, children learn at different rates and in different ways. Teachers must identify the needs of all of their students in order to provide the most effective instruction and maximize instructional time. Teachers have to change the world a little bit at a time.

Blog Post 4

I am continuing to read, Catching Young Readers Before They Fall. I gathered a lot of information from chapters 9 and 10. Chapter 9 focused on inferring and summarizing. The chapter states, "Some teachers may think inferring is predicting, but we believe it includes more than just predicting." Fountas and Pinnell says, "Readers who infer go beyond the literal meaning of a text to derive what is not there but is implied." There are many opportunities to infer when reading. These opportunities can derive from the setting, thoughts on characters personalities, a poems meaning, looking at the author's perspective, discovering the theme, determining a problem, discovering the meaning of new vocabulary, and when looking at figurative language. As teachers, we should stop during shared reading or read aloud books to ask questions and see what the students can infer about these different scenarios. They are using their thinking skills and what they already know so far about a book to infer what is happening. Inferring also helps build a readers comprehension skills. (Johnson and Keier 2010)

Chapter 10 focuses on assessment and looking closely at readers. The chapter says, "In order to know how our readers are progressing, we must be careful observers, constantly making decisions about how to use the information we gather to inform our instruction." The authors of this book believe that assessment must be authentic, ongoing, and informative in order for it to effectively be used by teachers. The chapter lists several different assessment tools including conferencing, anecdotal note taking, running records, developmental reading assessment, and beginner reading assessments. I think it is important to use a variety of assessment tools because if a student does not assess well one way, the teacher may be surprised if they use a different assessment tool. Students respond better to different tools so I think it is important to look at their reading abilities from more than one angle. (Johnson and Keier 2010)

Blog 4: Chapter 10-Assessment

According to Johnson and Keier (2010), "Formative, ongoing assessments by teachers and students
based on daily work need to be the mainstay." Our day to day teaching should not be determined by
results of standardized tests or computerized end of book tests because the data is just not enough to
guide instruction (Johnson and Keier, 2010). In this chapter, Johnson and Keier (2010) state that
literacy behaviors from students should be observed by teachers throughout the day during reading,
writing, and conferencing. Teachers should make notes on the behaviors they observe (Johnson and Keier, 2010). The observations show students who are struggling, as well as students who are ready to move on. I use this information in my classroom to determine my small groups, whether it is for text levels or reading strategies. In this chapter, I love this quote from Fountas and Pinnell, "You cannot see into children's minds, but their behaviors can guide your teaching decision" (Johnson and Keier, 2010). This quote means a lot to me because I believe when we observe our students reading behaviors and analyze the behaviors it shows us some of what goes on in their mind while reading. Based on the text, I agree that teachers should focus on all readers, but more time should be spent with the struggling readers. In my classroom, I meet with my struggling readers three times a week and my other groups one to two times a week. I assign my strong group of readers a book to read during the week. When they meet with me they discuss the book and strategies or skills they used while reading. When I work with my struggling readers, I model how to use strategies, and allow practice time as I listen to one child read a page or pages. Then, we discuss the strategies and how they were effective. Some of the assessment tools discussed were informal assessments such as anecdotal notes during conferences, shared reading, guided reading, and writing. Formal assessments discussed were benchmarks, running records, and adopted tests (Johnson and Keier, 2010). I actually thought running records were formal and informal. I thought running records from classroom leveled texts were informal, and assessments such as Fountas and Pinnell were the formal running records. This is something I am curious about. Although I have been teaching for six years I just learned the importance of conferences about two years ago. I would hear about it during professional development, but finally was show how to conduct a conference two years ago. This year my conferences are even better because I had a lot of practice. One "ah-ha" moment for me after reading the chapter was making sure the student is actually enjoying the book. I always focus on the strategies that I loss focus on the student's enjoyment. The text discussed the issue of finger pointing while reading. I can relate because I had a parent just this past week who asked me if it was okay to have his daughter point while she read because constantly loss her place or skipped lines while reading. I told him I do not encourage it because it slows down the reader. I told him to just encourage her to reread when he notices her error. Lastly, I like how this chapter discussed how to organize assessment data.. I am in the process of reorganizing my data notebook to include a binder with notebook tabs that include: class grid forms, class list for each month, guided reading planning sheet, and individual student forms. At my new school the data notebook was already created, but I plan to reorganize it to meet my expectations so that I can manage it better and monitor my students growth better.

Blog 4 No More Independent Reading Without Support

Blog 4

Making the Most of Independent Reading

The first directive is to provide a purpose for reading: What, How, and Why Readers Read. At first, I was wondering how one teacher could set an individual purpose for each reader and their books – IMPOSSIBLE! Now, I am thinking (and hoping) the author means students reading to practice the objective of the focus lesson.  

The author tells us to teach our students how to choose appropriate books and reminds us that the appropriate book is not always at the independent level. It depends on what the student’s purpose for reading is. The book could be on an instructional level if the student has extensive knowledge of the material or is highly motivated to read it.

It is also beneficial to show students what strategies readers use to make meaning of books by talking about your thinking as you have read alouds. Model how to talk about books with their peers just as you talk about books to your peers. Invite them to join in your discussion of the book as you read aloud. The author suggests the following books to help support independent talk: Questioning the Author (Beck et al. 1997), Reciprocal Teaching at Work (Oczkus 2010), Literature Circles(Daniels 2002).

After you model thinking aloud, choose a student to share something about the book they have read. Ask another student to expand upon the book talk by sharing “When you said . . . it made me think about . . .”

Another strategy to use is “Turn and talk.” The author says that turn and talk " . . . prepares students for student-led small group discussions . . ." You provide a prompt about a character in a read aloud for instance and the student turns and talks to their partner about that character. The teacher is supposed to move around the room and listen and guide, if necessary.

Tactics Teachers Can Use to Keep Things Hopping During IR

Have plenty of books. The author wonders why we should have 300 and not 1000. She says, "I'd strive for at least 1000 books and I wouldn't stop there." She says to look in book rooms whose keys have been forgotten, pick up text sets that are unused. Class libraries should have half fiction and have informational books. Many times, our libraries have many more fiction books. Organize the books according to subjects as well as instructional levels.

IR might only last for 10 to 15 minutes when you first begin. Make sure the students have instructional level books in their box as well as subject matter that they are interested in.

Monitor their IR. Look at the class as a whole to determine who might need to be refocused and ask them, “I’m noticing your having a hard time today. What’s going on? How can I help?” Don’t make it a punitive issue.

Blog Post 4: Chapters 9 and 10

Chapter nine, Spotlight on Inferring and Summarizing, focuses on ways to make sure students fully grasp the comprehension strategies taught to them. Comprehension strategies such as questioning, visualizing, inferring, and summarizing are discussed throughout this chapter. Chapter nine begins by giving great insight into how teachers incorporate whole class discussions and inferring on a daily basis during story time. A powerful statement that I found on reading stories to children is, “The beauty of storytelling is that the children have to create their own images, depending on the words of the story alone with no picture support. The point is to allow discussions to spring naturally from the ideas, confusions, connections, or questions that the students have”. In the past, I found it somewhat frustration when I would do storytelling or read-alouds with discussions throughout the story. I would always have students throw out comments that confused their classmates. The frustration would come from not knowing how to teach the students how to separate from making assumptions to making inferences. As the text stated, “Inferring is one strategy that we find often causes confusion for some teachers; it can be difficult to define and teachers can be unsure of how to teach for it”. The best way I learned to solve this issues is to model it for the students. I made inferences about a story as I read to the class.  

Before reading this chapter, I thought inferring was basically predicting, but inferring is much more than that. Inferring is basically figuring out something that the author doesn’t actually say within the story. Predicting is guessing and inferring is using context clues within a story to search for a fact. An example of inferring from the chapter is: “We read this sentence to any class of students-“The children put on their mittens and scarves and went out in the snow to play-then ask them, “What season is it?” and they always know it is winter”. This chapter raised my awareness of inferring and its importance.

After chapter nine focuses on inferring, the next focus is on teaching summarizing to students. From the text, I learned how to successfully model summarizing for young students. “When a reader summarizes he or she: deletes unimportant information, highlights important words or phrases, and puts ideas in his or her own words. Students need to hear you think aloud and see you do these things: cross out extra and/or repeated words, circle important words and phrases, and write in the margins”. I incorporated this into the classroom this week by modeling how to summarize exactly the way the text instructs. Then, I assigned the students to think about a book they recently read and to summarize the books or story in their notebooks. I reminded the students to tell the main ideas of the story without giving away the ending of the story. Since I was with second graders, I did walk them through this by asking questions such as: “What is the main ideas in the story? What are some important details in your story? How do you know they are important? Did these details cause a problem in the story?”. This assignment went very well. I only had a couple of students who needed one-on-on or small group support in completing this assignment.

Chapter ten, Assessment: Looking Closely at Readers, focuses on different aspects of assessing. The main point of this chapter is making sure the assessments used in the classroom are authentic, ongoing, and informative. Taking notes is a part of every guided reading lesson, and reflecting on the anecdotal notes allows us to see patterns and behaviors that change over time (p.182). Since I technically never had my own classroom with the same students, I do find it to be overwhelming to think about organizing all the assessment information on my students. I’ve been in classrooms where the teacher used sticky notes for everything, but that never seemed like a good idea. It only caused their desk to look like a complete mess in my opinion. The organizational technique I learned about in this chapter that I would like to adopt into the classroom would be the class grid for each subject taught, the monthly class list for reading, and the individual student forms (pgs. 191-194). The examples given in the text for thee organizational techniques appear to be very effective

What You Need to Know About Comprehension, Inferring, and Summarizing

Continuing with reading Catching Readers Before They Fall, I am going to be talking about chapters 8 and 9 in this blog. Chapter 8 focuses on whether or not strategies should be explicitly taught in order for students to understand and use them. Every student develops a system that will help him or her comprehend texts and many average readers, and especially struggling readers, will need support. Peter Johnson states that "we have to decide what to be explicit about for which students and when to be explicit about it." The need for explicit strategy instruction is higher for struggling readers, so we need to explicitly teach it to them and not as much to more advanced readers. However, we need to continuously encourage students to use strategies that they already know how to use, even if we are only focusing on a certain strategy at that time. We need to be present in order to support problem-solving attempts made by the student. With comprehension strategies, some students need to be walked through how a reader makes connections or questions or visualizes during reading. For some students, the process may start slowly before it speeds up and they are doing this often. Modeling strategies is one of the best ways for children to understand how to utilize them. For example, if a teacher begins to read to her students, she may not introduce the strategy "questioning," but she talks about what she is reading and models questions that she has in order to understand what she is going to read. "The goal is not naming a strategy, but applying it to the reading of text." The example for "visualizing" is similar. While reading, the teacher stops and talks about what she is visualizing from reading the text or what she is visualizing from prior knowledge to reading. "One goal should be for students to feel the strategy working for them-they will only take ownership of the strategy and incorporate it into their reading process system if they feel it has value for them."

This leads us into chapter 9, which continues to focus on strategies, but puts a spotlight on inferring and summarizing. It is important for students to have inferential thinking in order to understand pas the literal surface level of the texts. It is reemphasized that it is more important for students to infer while reading rather than know the name or definition for it. "We keep the focus of the lesson on comprehension and then have the students notice how we went about acquiring meaning." This will also help students to be able to do this independently. Students can learn to infer at the word level (meaning of new terms), the text level (predicting what might happen or inferring about the characters or plot), and beyond text level (theme, perspective, etc.). Of course, we want them to be able to infer on all levels as much as possible because inferring is closely related to comprehending. The book gives tons of books that can be used for inferring on pages 165-172. Summarizing is another strategy discussed in this chapter, especially on tests. In order to model summarizing, it's important for students to see unnecessary information crossed out, important facts highlighted, and the information rewritten in your own words. All of the strategies mentioned within these chapters are very important. However, it's more important that the students know how to use a strategy rather than know the name for that strategy.

Blog 3

In the text Catching Readers Before They Fall, I chose the chapter titled "I Thought I Knew How to Teach Reading, but Whoa!" Johnson and Keier (2010) explain some strategies in this chapter that teachers can use as a starting point with struggling readers. Some of the starting points include: letter identification, writing vocabulary, hearing and recording sounds in words, high-frequency word assessment, read alouds, shared reading with big book and poems, community writing, and time for independent reading (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Johnson and Keier (2010) states that teachers should look at working with struggling readers in a positive way in three ways: expect that the lowest-achieving children can learn to read and write, support children as they learn how to learn, and believe that you are the one who will teach this child to read and write (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Some early key strategies that were suggested for teachers to use included: thinking strategies to predict words, phonemic awareness, self-monitoring, and early fluency (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Johnson and Keier (2010) state that to teach directionality, teachers can write a sentence and cut them apart as the child practices pulling down the words after the teacher models. I started using this strategy with my first graders last year and this year to practice fluency along with directionality. I chose sentences that I knew would have a challenging word or words as a teaching point. then, I sent home in an envelope for students to practice at home. Johnson and Keier (2010) states that we should chose to begin reading books and writing messages to show children reading and writing as meaningful. "Thinking about reading is emphasized every time we read with students" (Johnson and Keier, 2010). If we do not take time to involve students in conversation, "we miss opportunities to get students to make connections, infer, and ask questions about what they are reading" (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Phonics is very important to teach to early readers because "many letters make a variety of sounds, and different letters or letter combinations can represent many sounds" (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Currently, I have three struggling readers who are struggling in this area because they do not remember the sounds of some blends and digraphs, as well as the letters that have more than one sound such as "g." Teachers can be flexible when teaching phonics and phonemic awareness by teaching it during transitions, before related arts, or at the end of the day. One concept in the chapter I liked was when Katie worked with three students on phonemic awareness by giving them three cards of a sun, table, pig, and BINGO chips. She called out words for students to match the beginning sound by placing the chips on the card. She would say "pencil/sun, pencil/table, or pencil/pig" as students determined the matched beginning sound. I am going to use this process with my struggling readers to practice blends, digraphs, and word families. Self-monitoring was also discussed in this chapter. I teach this strategy during mini-lessons, but based on my observations I know I have to go back and reteach it to remind my struggling readers. Lastly, when working with students on early fluency I liked the idea of "performances" after the teacher models. Last week my students and I read a lot of Dr. Seuss books during mini-lessons and partner reading in honor of his birthday. I shared with them how we did a reader's theater of Green Eggs and Ham when I taught at summer reading camp. So, now my students want to "perform" for our principal and reading coach. Now, they are preparing for their performances. Instead of performing Green Eggs and Ham I now think we are going to do "The Wonderful World of Dr. Seuss" as each group of partners choose a book to perform a few pages. This will build their fluency and they will have fun at the same time.

Blog Post 3

I am continuing to read the book, Catching Readers Before They Fall by Pat Johnson and Katie Keier. This week, I will be reviewing chapters 6, 7, and 8. Chapter six covered interactive read aloud. As teachers, sometimes we have to just let our students talk. The book states, "Interactive read aloud time is the perfect setting for having students actively involved in talking and thinking about texts." (Johnson and Keier) Reading is a social time and I love that books allow students to recall and make connections to their own lives from reading. This is a very important time for students to have social interactions.

Chapter 7 covered how to teach reading. My first year of teaching, I remember thinking, "how in the world do I even begin to teach reading?" This chapter goes over where to begin. First, you have to know where your students are academically. Use the tools that your school provides you with to find this out. This can include letter assessments, DRA, high frequency word assessments, etc. Then, begin working on key strategies. This book states that key strategies include: directionality, thinking strategies, letter identification and phonics, phonemic awareness, knowing the difference between words and letters, self monitoring, and early fluency. (Johnson and Keier) These really are the beginning steps for teaching a child to read. I would also say finding out their interests. Find books on topics that they are interested in.

Chapter 8 covered comprehension. This chapter focuses a lot on questioning. It suggests having questions ready before, during, and after a lesson to keep students engaged and thinking. It also talks about visualizing. Visualizing as you are reading, allows one to comprehend things. The book states, "When you visualize, or make visual images as you read, you usually are making that image based on some prior knowledge you have with that topic, or you are inferring based on some past experience." (Johnson and Keier)

Chapters 6, 7, and 8 provide great insight for teaching reading and guiding instructional strategies!

-Kristen Cochran

Blog Post 3: Catching Readers Before They Fall. Ch. 6, 7, 8

Chapter 6, Interactive read- aloud: Talking Our Way Through Texts, focused on how to engage young children in think-alouds, modeling, and interactive discussions with literature books. This chapter taught the difference between traditional read-alouds and interactive read-alouds. Before reading this chapter, I thought traditional read-alouds and interactive read-alouds were the same thing, but I learned from the text that interactive read-alouds are critical pieces of our literacy instruction for all readers. Traditional read-alouds require the child to sit and listen without really interacting with the story and the teacher. Using a picture book to teach is an interactive read-aloud. According to the text, "a purposefully, planned instruction provides the teacher time to model the reading process through think-alouds and interactive discussions as he or she helps readers, struggling or otherwise engage with books in a safe, risk-free environment". I learned that ineractive read-alouds are very critical to literacy instruction. All children, but especially ELLs need to be able to hear several books read aloud to them in English so that they can hear how English sounds (p.98). One of the biggest problems I've had with interactive read-alouds is student getting off topic. This chapter taught me several ways to manage this problem in the class. According to the text, "Books can be mirrors into our selves, our culture, our life experiences, and our community. Children need books that reflect who they are as people and that reflect what is happening in our world, our school, and our daily lives. Children need to see themselves in the literature they read and that is read to them". On page 102, there is a list of tips for an effective think-aloud. I found that making sure the texts are interesting, engaging, and a good match to be most effective in helping students to be able to stay on topic during the interactive read-alouds. I really like the idea of teaching the students how to "turn and talk". Turning and talking to a partner allows all the students to participate in preparing to read and gives them a chance to connect to the book personally as they activate and share their prior knowledge (p. 104).

Chapter 7, I Thought I knew How to Teach Reading, but Whoa, focuses on struggling readers at the emergent level who need lots of support as they learn to take on the earliest strategic actions (Johnson, p. 108). I really enjoyed reading this chapter because it was very informative of teaching teachers how to teach: directionality, voice/ print matching, phonemic awareness, early self-monitoring, and early fluency. The part of the chapter that was most informative to me was page 120, Phonemic Awareness I previously was confused on the difference between phonics and phonemic awareness. Phonics is the relationship between written and spoken sounds and letters. Phonemic awareness is the understanding that spoken words are made up of distinct sounds and that these sounds can be manipulated. On page 120, there is a visual use that shows the difference between phonemic awareness and phonics Phonemic awareness refers to hearing and noticing things about the sounds (ears), and being able to manipulate the sounds (mouth), but it does not include being able to identify letters (eyes) (Johnson, p. 120). The most shocking fact I learned from this chapter is that, "The federal government's research warns against too much emphasis on phonemic awareness. In fact, as little as five hours of training a year is more effective than programs that use more than eighteen hours of training in a year (85)" (Johnson, page 121). By the time a child is in the first grade, phonemic awareness should only be targeting students who really need it. According to the text, "Children who have severe issues with letter identification can be taught how to look at print by sorting and manipulating magnetic letters based on features: curvy letters, letters made with sticks, letters with circle parts, and so on".

Chapter 8 ,Comprehension: The Bottom Line, examines the thinking and the teaching behind comprehension strategy instruction (p.133). This chapter taught me that comprehension strategies in reading don't stop in elementary; it's a prolonged learning strategy. According to the text, "In order to have an efficient and integrated reading process system, the child must self-initiate the strategies, using them when he or she deems necessary to understand a text or solve a problem while reading".   I found the Gradual Release of Responsibility chart to be most effective in helping to see what the students can apply on their own. The teachers perform the modeling, shared demonstration, and guided practice part of the chart. The students are responsible for the independence part of the chart.

What You Should Know About Interactive Read-Alouds and Difficulties That May Arise When Teaching Reading (Ch. 6&7)

It's important to remember to read a wide variety of books to students. Using those picture books to teach is called an interactive read-aloud. "An effective interactive read-aloud has children talking before, during, and after reading" (Johnson & Keier). In order for students to construct ideas, negotiate meanings, and develop independent thought, it's important for students to talk about their thinking. Inviting students to talk during interactive read-alouds helps keep them engaged in the book. There are a few things to think of or do before or during an interactive read-aloud. First, before reading, it's important to build background knowledge in order for students to focus on what the book is going to be about. Second, when students are able to talk to a partner, "they have a chance to connect to the book personally as they share their prior knowledge" (Johnson & Keier). Interactive read-alouds allows teachers to model what readers do and how they think. "Multiple experiences such as these establish a solid foundation for children as they become independent readers and thinkers" (Johnson & Keier).

Interactive read-alouds model for all students, even those who are struggling. Teachers have to make sure to find the strengths of all students. Directionality, thinking strategies, phonics, phonemic awareness, self-monitoring, and fluency are all important to focus on in order for students to be successful. Thinking about reading allows for the student to anticipate what the story might be about and to predict the story line. It also allows them to search and gather from the pictures to make meaning. It's also important to make sure that the students are able to self-monitor. The earlier the child can self-monitor, the faster he or she will be able to become a fluent reader. As a teacher, it's important to reinforce any checking or confirming behavior. The book also listed many suggestions for teachers if they are feeling overwhelmed. These include observing another teacher, asking for help, and celebrating every learning achievement that the struggling student makes. Challenging students will help make you a stronger literacy teacher. After gaining experience and knowledge, you will figure out what is right for your students.

Blog 3:  No More Independent Reading Without Support

Earlier in this book, a term was introduced that explains to me what the authors are trying to accomplish - “scaffolded silent reading” or ScSR.  Although the authors use the acronym IR in the remainder of the book, I think ScSR is more appropriate. They advise teachers to move beyond reading while their students are reading to actively conferencing with students as they are reading independently. The authors state that teachers need to be:

*assessing “the match between student self-selected books and students’ abilities by listening to them read,

*coaching students in using reading strategies,

*and engaging them in book discussions.”

With so much emphasis placed on test scores, the authors state that “At every grade level for all ability groups,

*individual schema-based learning (Students connected new learning to what they already knew. As students engaged in IR, teachers provided individualized instructions when students encountered obstacles.),

*conceptual learning (Students self-selected with teacher coaching, two expository trade books on the same topic and then read them back to back.), *transactional learning (Readers silently read teacher-selected fiction books related to a thematic unit and engaged in teacher-monitored classroom discussions based on the texts.)

produced the highest comprehension scores. Situated practice, workbook practice, and basal reader groups produced the lowest scores.”

Early readers need more scaffolding during ScSR to include oral reading activities like repeated reading, choral, echo, partner, or assisted oral reading along with explicit reading instruction. Readers need to talk about what they read and be held accountable through reading logs and written summaries. The authors recommend using the reader’s workshop model where a focused lesson is presented, then students spend the majority of their time reading and practicing what they learned during the focused lesson. Students then close the reading time by reflecting and sharing what they have learned.

Striving readers benefit even more from ScSR than average or above average readers. They need more help in selecting appropriate books and instruction on reading strategies. For many of these striving students and for more and more of our other students, reading at school is the only reading they will do all day.

Blog Post 2

I chose the book, Catching Readers Before They Fall by Pat Johnson and Katie Keier. I will be focusing on chapters 4 and 5 for this blog post. The first thing that stood out to me in chapter 4 is figure 4.1 on page 54. It provides an example for the things that readers check for when word solving. It is an equal balance between meaningful information and deciding if something makes sense, using structural knowledge to decide if something sounds right, and using visual knowledge to decide if something looks right. All 3 of those are very important clues to check for when reading. I will be more cautious to stop and ask my students these things during guided reading if they become unsure of a word.

The chapter also states, "Many teachers who work with beginning struggling readers find themselves at a loss for what to say when a child reading with them gets stuck on a word. It happens to all of us." (Johnson and Keier) I find myself in this situation at times because I want to help my students but I become fearful that I will only confuse them more. The chapter goes on to give ideas for ways that we can encourage students by giving them promptings such as, run your finger under the word to see if it looks right, let the first part of the word help you, keep your eyes on the message. (Johnson and Keier)

I also enjoyed reading chapter five because it discusses the components of a comprehensive framework. Figure 5.1 on page 73 suggests ways to incorporate reading and writing into your classroom. It suggests, read alouds, shared reading, guided reading, and independent reading. It also suggests morning message, community writing, and independent writing. (Johnson and Keier) These are all things that we do in 4K that are a part of our daily schedule. Guided reading is something that becomes mandatory in kindergarten but I have started this process with several of my 4K students who are ready.

I really like the writing tips that this chapter suggests. We do journals twice a week in 4K at my school and I am always searching for ways to help my students strengthen their writing. Some of the tips include, check and confirm, predict what letter or word will come next, generate and recognize high frequency words, and recognizing that text is read and written left to right, top to bottom, and that there are spaces between words. (Johnson and Keier)

I highly recommend this book to all Early Childhood Educators. I am already finding ways to strengthen my teaching skills to promote learning in my classroom!

-Kristen Cochran

Blog Post 1

For this assignment, I chose the book, "Catching Readers Before They Fall" by Pat Johnson and Katie Keier. The first chapter focuses on Expanding our Paradigm of Reading. "We believe by expanding one's knowledge of reading process in all its complexity, any teacher can increase his or her repertoire of teaching reading to children who struggle (Johnson and Keier 2010)." This chapter encourages teachers to keep trying to develop teaching stamina. It suggests how desperately our readers who are struggling need us and it is so important to get to them before they fall.

Chapter two focuses on why all students are not successful. "The children who are not learning to read are often confused, frustrated, and slowly giving up hope on themselves as readers (Johnson and Keier 2010)." I also learned through this chapter that ongoing research believes that there are many things going on inside of children's brains when they are learning to read. These different things consist of keeping a constant check on themselves while reading, noticing when things are misread, and using a variety of strategies to fix their own errors while reading.

In chapter three, Vygotsky takes a seat in the classroom. Vygotsky has a few basics for the classroom that he believes. Through this chapter, I learned that he believes, the most effective learning takes place during the students zone of proximal development, the language that teachers use play a crucial role in students cognitive development, and the environment plays a huge role, the students should be in an environment that fosters lots of talking and interactions with each other.

So far, I would recommend this book for teachers to read. It is helping me to see how students think while reading as well as what will foster a successful learning environment that will encourage students to become better readers!

-Kristen Cochran

Blog Post 2: Chapters Four and Five of Catching Readers Before They Fall

I've really been enjoying this book, Catching Readers Before They Fall. The title for chapter four is Beyond "Sound It Out". This chapter was very informative to me because it teaches teachers different ways they can help their students in solving words. The chapter teaches three ways that proficient readers read: Meaningful information, structural knowledge, and visual information. The text states, "Students need to learn the importance of paying attention ti the visual information in print, beginning, with how to notice the first letter. They also need to check their predictions against the letter information or number of words on the page. Finally, they need to take on the responsibility of checking for themselves and not waiting for someone else to monitor their errors for them". The part of the chapter that I've been making sure to use more in the classroom is asking the students questions after they finish reading. Asking the students questions like, "Does that make sense?" can really help me to guide the students in the direction that they need to go regarding their reading comprehension skills. In the chapter, it discusses how teachers can purposely make mistakes in front of the students so that they can tell the teacher what they did wrong. I've tried this strategy only to have confused the students, so I think this is best for more advanced or sufficient readers. 

I previously found teaching students to use a balance of the sources of information like meaning, structure, and visual to be difficult. After reading pages 64-66 I figured the best way for me to teach balance of sources of information is to use it in my morning message. This chapter provided several prompts that help the students to be able to self-initiate problem solving. 

 Chapter five, A Comprehensive Literacy Framework, focuses on how the classroom instruction and environment is designed to help the needs of the readers. The chart on page 73 of the components of a comprehensive literacy framework. The text gives a great example of when children are participating in reading/writing to, reading/writing with, and reading/writing by. The chapter states, "If we want to support children as they build an effective reading process system, then we must show them what it looks like when a proficient reader is using his or her system. Shared reading provides a place to do just that". When I use the components of a comprehensive literacy framework on page 73, I always make sure to remind the students to make sure they are using the information they've already learned to help guide them or to make sure they are self-monitoring. 

“Blog Two: No More Independent Reading Without Support

Common Core states that students should be able to “read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently.” While this book states that Common Core does not require the independent reading to be accomplished during class time, it does require the standard for all grade levels. The standard also specifies informational texts. If you look in lots of early childhood classrooms, you will find that they are filled with lots of fictional stories but less informational texts. The amount of time students spend in IR (independent reading) makes a difference too. Good readers and poor readers need differing amounts of IR time to get the most out of the experience. The book states that “ . . .different time allocations should be provided for students at different stages of development.” (REALLY?! Not only do I need to let them read, I have to know how many minutes will be most beneficial??!! Sorry – that is just a little much to expect.)

Studies conducted on students said that “. . . reading easier texts during IR resulted in achievement gains” while other studies showed that students needed to be challenged in their reading to make gains. I’m not sure which I believe the most – or both could be correct under a given set of circumstances. The classroom library makes a great difference in students’ accessibility to the type and number of books – especially for poor readers. A study by Krashen (2011) shows “ . . . access to books as a factor in increased reading performance, while the evidence for workbooks, computer programs and other materials is not as strong.”

Mark Twain said, “The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who can’t read.”

Blog 2: Comprehension: The Bottom Line

Blog 2

Shameeka Spann

 This week I chose chapter 8 in the book Catching Readers Before They Fall. This chapter was titled “Comprehension: The Bottom Line.” It focused on comprehension and comprehension strategy instruction. According to Johnson and Keier (2010) “The end goal of reading instruction is for the students to be able to comprehend what they read” (Johnson and Keier, 2010). Johnson and Keier (2010) also state that proficient readers automatically apply comprehension (Johnson and Keier, 2010). So, struggling readers are in more need of comprehension instruction. Teachers should also focus on the transitional readers with comprehension because there are areas in comprehension that could still be covered with them to succeed. One thing that stood out to me in this chapter was when Johnson and Keier (2010) stated, “If we ask top readers to slow down, learn about a strategy, name it, or learn how it works, it would interfere with their processing (Johnson and Keier, 2010). So, basically the authors are stating that these students are able to comprehend so we should not interfere with their fluency by asking them to slow down when reading or explaining strategies they used. This actually opened my eyes because when I noticed my strong readers making errors I would tell them to slow down reading. Then, I noticed they would struggle to focus. Now I have learned, that those were miscues my students were making. I was interfering with their fluency. I’ve learned through this process and the chapter in the text that my strong readers need to be trusted because as teachers we have a hard time letting our students grow. According to Johnson and Keier (2010), “Students do not have to be aware of how they comprehend, as long as they did” (Johnson and Keier, 2010). The gradual release of responsibility was discussed in this chapter on how teachers should introduce strategies that includes: modeling, shared demonstration, guided practice, and independence. I have used this model most of my years of teaching because I view it as the “I Do, We Do, You Do” concept. In chapter 8, a sample lesson was presented focusing on what strategy instruction should look like. The teacher, Pat modeled for the students how to practice the questioning strategy without naming the strategy, but thinking aloud to model it. Then, students actually shared what they observed. This is new learning to me because I always thought I had to name the strategy at the beginning of the lesson for my students before I modeled. Visualizing was also modeled by the teacher Pat as she used poems during shared reading. I used Pat’s model of not naming the strategy in my classroom as I taught a lesson about drawing conclusions. My students were able to understand the strategy and use the strategy during the read aloud. In the upcoming week I am also planning to use shared reading as I introduce author’s purpose without naming the strategy, but involving student conversation. In conclusion, Johnson and Keier (2010) state that effective teaching in comprehension should include: text large enough for students to see, teacher reads as students follow along, students engage in conversation, students practice strategy with partners as teacher observes, students share how the strategy was helpful. (Johnson and Keier, 2010). “Comprehension is thought- and that is definitely the bottom line when it comes to teaching reading” (Johnson and Keier, 2010).

What You Should Know About "Sounding it Out" and a Comprehensive Literacy Framework

We have to keep in mind that English is not consistently phonetic and that 40 to 50% of words cannot be solved by sounding them out. Students can use other ways along with letters and sounds to solve an unknown word. We have to support children as they build word-solving strategies. If you are a proficient reader, you know that you don't depend only on phonetics. You also look at the structure of the sentence, what part of speech the word is that is unknown, and what word makes sense with the content. Struggling readers who are focusing only on phonetics need to be taught or shown how to use other sources to figure out a word or sentence which include meaning, structure, and visual. Does it make sense? Does it sound right? Does it look right? These are questions that students should ask themselves when reading (or self-correcting). Beginning readers tend to focus on one source, which is chosen by which comes easiest to them. You can teach students to listen to themselves when they read in order to fix something if it doesn't make sense. Another thing that can be taught is using a picture and a first letter to figure out the word. Students should also be taught to skip the word and read the rest of the sentence and try to figure out what makes sense in the sentence. Modeling strategies can help students perform them as well in order to become fluent and proficient readers.
We also want to keep in mind the components of a comprehensive literacy framework. Reading includes read-alouds, shared reading, interactive read-alouds, guided reading, and independent reading. Writing can include morning message, community writing, and independent writing. Reading aloud is very beneficial for struggling readers. Hearing more and even being able to follow along can help them to see if the word looks right or sounds right. Shared reading can provide an opportunity for community, as children talk, think, listen, and join in on the reading. "Actively engaging children in reading a familiar text can support them as they begin to transfer strategies into their own reading and writing." During guided reading, children can try to solve words with help from the teacher. An introduction can be provided in order for the student to think about what he is reading. During independent reading, children can reread books, which can help build fluency, allowing the student to think more about the content of the text rather than the words, and it can also build confidence in reading for the student. Community writing can be together or in small groups. During this time, students can contribute and learn what can fit in to prewritten sentences and they can create their own sentences with the help of one another to suggest and correct as they go. It's important to focus on reading and writing because using what they know in one area can help them in another.

Catching Readers Before They Fall chapters 1 & 2

This post is going to cover my readings for chapters 1 & 2. I knew there was a process for reading, I guess I still find myself amazed at all of the things we do in milliseconds that we have to break down for children one step at a time while also not making that the only strategy we use. I continue to find myself going back to something the author's said early in chapter 1 - the most important safety net for struggling readers is going to be their classroom teacher. My next thought was "wow, how do classroom teachers find that 1 student out of all 25 or 30 of them and say "okay, you and I are going to work together to improve your reading". I also find myself thinking about how if I were a classroom teacher, how would I restructure things to assist them in working on their reading and helping them to establish the strategies that I don't even remember establishing. I think for me, the one thing that I continuously come back to is, I'm not a classroom teacher. This has bothered me for a while, a lot of the things mentioned here are geared toward classroom teachers - which they should be since the responsibility they have is so terribly important. I have come to some important conclusions... I can be helpful to the classroom teacher, I can make sure that the things my student needs are there for them when they need it. I can help to mitigate, to the best of my ability, the things that are making this process-building mission that much harder. These are things like if they are a student that has some vision, are their environmental factors that are making the process more difficult? Some of these could be things like is it too dark, is the spot they're sitting in too bright or are they facing toward a window and is this causing glare? If they are having materials enlarged, how large is it, how many letters can they get on a screen at once? If they can only get part of a word, they are having to memorize the word, then memorize the word in the context of the sentence and then try to comprehend what it was that they just read. That just sounds exhausting and it's a wonder that any Visually Impaired child learns to read at all - but somehow they do, somehow I did too. I had the thought that maybe I could reinforce the skills and the reading strategies that the teacher is working on in class when I pull the student out for supplementary instruction. I don't know if it would be appropriate for me to do things like a miscue analysis but maybe it would be helpful to mention things I notice they are having difficulties with when they are reading.

Blog One: No More Independent Reading Without Support

Sande Tisdale

Blog One: No More Independent Reading Without Support

   I was very happy to see the title of this book in the list of suggested readings. I was one of those teachers who gave children self-selected reading time while I was working with small groups but I often felt the children weren’t engaged in IR in a productive way. I remember reading about the example of ‘finding Waldo.” Some children do gravitate to activity books or pictures books rather than books that engage them in real reading. I like the idea of Scaffolded Silent Reading (ScSR). The book states that a “. . .study found that in-school IR led to gains that were better than the national averages in reading rates and a 43 percent average increase in the proportion of ideas recalled, representing a substantial increase in comprehension over the school year.” Independent reading is important but I feel like I need to spend more time teaching children how to do it effectively.

    I was interested to read the section about the correlation between IR and the success of students. I think we all agree “ . . . that the best readers read the most, and that poor readers read the least.” I was happy to see that the authors wrote about the difference between those relationships being correlational as opposed to causal.  I know that children who have access to lots of books and an emphasis on reading at home are generally those who have more well educated parents, who live in households with higher incomes, and whose parents value education. All of these factors affect the acquisition of reading skills.

   I have a lot of teachers’ sites saved on social media. I now find myself looking at these activities with a more discerning eye – asking myself, “Would this activity be more important to my students’ education than having the opportunity to practice reading?” I also am taking another look at my morning activities. I loved gathering my children together on the floor in the morning to do calendar activities and read alouds. In second grade, we don’t dress bears like the example in our book but are all of our activities more important than students’ reading? Some, I would say yes; others, not so much.