Joe's Reading

When I read something for the first time I try to focus on the main points. Reading the title first helps me figure out what I am reading and it helps me look for the main points of the article. If there are highlighted words or key terms in bold I try to figure out what those words mean and I make sure I know them before I continue reading. While I am reading I like to highlight or underline phrases that I think are important to the main topic. If I am being a really good student I will take notes on the reading too, but that doesn’t happen too often. Depending on the length of the text I am reading, I like to reread quickly to make sure I have the main points down and a summary of what I read.
As I read I try to keep an internal conversation going, or I write notes on what I think about the reading. This helps me stay on task because when I start to think about other things I can recognize that quickly and return to the reading. I like to ask myself questions or write down questions that I have from the reading. When I come across an answer to the question when I am reading I write it down. This really helps with remembering main points because I have thought about it, read it, and then finally written it down so it’s almost stuck in my memory. Reading for class usually takes me a while, but when I am done I feel like I have a good grasp on what I just read.

Rachel's Reading Importance

When I am reading there are several things I do to make sure that I understand the text. The first thing I do is read the title. This helps give me a good understanding of what the whole book/article/chapter is about. I then begin reading. As I am going along in my reading I make sure to look out for bold words or subheadings. These help me figure out important words or ideas that the author is trying to get across. After I read a page or big paragraph I usually stop and reflect on what I am reading. I ask myself what important topic or idea am I supposed to be getting from this text. This helps keep me accountable for what I am reading. I never really thought about it as having an internal conversation with myself. But when I actually want to remember what I am reading I have to ask certain questions to myself or nothing will stick in my head. By having this internal conversation with myself it keeps me on task and accountable with what I am reading. The only time I don’t really have to have an internal conversation with myself is when I am reading for fun. I think this is because there is less pressure on me to remember specific details than if I were reading something for class.

Reading Importance - Frantzen

What's most interesting when I look back at old text books and reading handouts from junior high is the percentage of the page that I likely had highlighted at the time. In my mind I had highlighted this information thinking it was very important, I highlighted it so I might refer back to it later, unfortunately I had highlighted approximately 80% of the page if not more. By the time high school had come around I had become a habitual "page-painter" which is not a particularly good nickname to have - especially when it came time for tests or papers and I would have to rely on my notes and highlights as a shortcut to helping me remember important points. Then came the dreaded history class freshman year of high school. The teacher had taken an entire period to explain the importance of highlighting just the right information - but to be honest, from there on I was very particular about what it is I highlighted on the page.



From that point on I became much more particular about what it is I highlight on a page - I am sure to highlight important dates, character information, setting and plot information, or if the reading is a research article of some sort I typically highlight ideas that I feel pertain most closely with the title of the article or the particular topic of research. Because I do have reading comprehension difficulties I also make quite a few notes in the margins of my reading, I find it much more easy to relate back to materials I have already read if I leave notes summarizing a particular point in the margin.

Lastly I tend to ask myself questions after I have read, many times these questions relate to the important ideas I feel I meant to take from the reading, when I do this if there is a question I cannot answer I likely look back at the notes and highlights I have already made and find what might be missing. Sometimes this step takes a little extra time but it helps me to ensure that I fully comprehend the reading materials I have been presented with.

Sarah Spitz's Reading Importance

This blog really got me thinking about how I read and what I do when I am reading. I guess it is true that as I read, I determine what is important and what is not in the text. How I do this, I am not sure. I realize that I must filter in and out all the information that is coming from the text. I think that I can determine what is important by the context of what I am reading. I know that whatever the main subject of the reading is, that the lines that relate directly to that are what are the most important.

I do think that I have internal conversations with myself while I am reading. These internal conversations are what help me process all of the information I am getting from the text. The conversations that I have with myself help me to understand and get meaning from what I am reading. It is almost as if I am studying the pages so that I comprehend the messages the text is trying to relay.

I think that having internal conversations with myself and determining what is important in the reading comes naturally from years of practice with reading. I think that the more you read and the better you understand the process of reading, the better you get at determining what is important and what is not when you read.

Molly Paraschak's Reading Importance

I think it is very important for each student to have a strategy that works for them when they are deciding what is important for them to pay close attention to. One strategy that I use is reading through a paragraph and highlighting the main points that jump out to me, this is helpful because then when I look back at the paragraph instead of reading the whole thing I can look at what I have highlighted and remember what the paragraph was about. Another thing that I highlight in paragraphs is any sentence that has definitions in it or any sentences that have statistics or people's names in them. Those type of sentences are always very important and things that need to be highlighted so that you can remember. When I read I do have a conversation with myself when I read each sentence I ask myself if something in that particular sentence could be made into a test/quiz question; if it can then I highlight it. I also ask myself questions about what I just read and if I cannot answer them then I go back and find the answer and highlight the answer. I know what is important in the text when something is in bold faced print or something is repeated a lot in the paragraph. I also know something is important in the text when as I stated earlier statistics or people's names are brought up and then a description of what the person did is behind their name, that implies that you need to remember the person's name or what he/she did. People interrupt texts differently, so there are many strategies that I did not discuss that you could use; but the one that I discussed is the one that works the best for me.

Trisha Bingham's Reading Importance

Over the years, I have developed my own strategy for reading. It involves several steps that weed out unimportant material and focuses on the important details of a text. My first step is to read titles. If what I am reading is a text book or something scholarly, I look at every heading possible. I take mental notes of these headings as things that I need look for while doing the more in depth reading. If what I am reading is a novel or story, I pay attention to the main title and then read the back cover. My next step is glance at what words may be bolded or italicized. These words are usually important or must-know terms for the text. I usually write these words down so that I can check them off as I read. This helps me make sure that I know all of the vocabulary upon finishing the reading. If this is a novel, then I skim through the dialogue. This helps me see what the important conversations are. Then I actually sit down and read the text. I use my notes from before about headings, titles, and important words to direct my thinking as I read. I usually take additional notes as I come across these ideas.
The main conversation I have while reading actually comes at the end of the reading. After completing the above steps, I always reflect upon what I have read. I usually ask myself, "Have I found everything I needed to find?" or, "Have I covered all the notes I took before actually reading?" From there, I check my knowledge with all of my note to make sure that I have mastered all that I need to. I usually wrap this up with asking myself if I have any questions. If not, then I consider my reading completed. If so, then I go back and reread to answer my questions.
To know what ideas are important from a text, I usually look at the titles and headings first for main ideas. Then I look at different-printed words as important vocabulary. After finishing the reading, I always recheck with end notes or text summary to make sure that I have mastered all that was expected of me.

Kaelyn Riley's Importance in texts

When I think about my own reading, I realize that I am a sucker for bold print, headers, and attention grabbers, such as different fonts from the rest of the text. In school, I have always had to memorize definitions so the words that are bolded are usually important to know. As I am reading, I am usually thinking about three things. First, ‘how does this relate to something I already know about?’, next, ‘does this topic interest me and why?’, and finally, ‘how does this relate to me, or my life?’.

If something I am reading applies to something I already know about, it helps me to think about what I already know about the topic, what I want to know, and where I think the new passage will take me in the reading. I also think about if the topic is interesting to me, probably less consciously than I realize, but if I do think it’s interesting, I am more willing and likely to pay close attention. If I do not feel interested in the topic, I am more likely to skim for the bolded words and get a brief understanding, but maybe not to the fullest extent. When I am interested in a passage, I try to pick up on the small details and sometimes will re-read a paragraph to understand the full context.

Now that I am reading a lot of text for my classes that have to do with my future employment, I am paying a lot more attention to what I am reading than I was, for say, my history class freshman year. These texts relate to me, and will directly affect me, so I know how important to not only be reading it, but also comprehending what it is I read.

I know my reading sounds selective, but I guess I have this disposition after having to read so many different texts for college that I have had to become more careful in how I use my time reading.

I think it’s hard to say you know exactly what is important in a text, especially if the author or publisher does not use any specialty writing techniques, such as bolding, underlining, quotes, or anecdotes. If a text is written in one long paragraph, it can be hard to pick out the author’s emphasis or meaning. So my best suggestion would be to keep an eye out for those writing techniques I mentioned previously.

Stacy's Literacy Center Ideas

This website had a bunch of ideas for literacy centers. It gave the title, or what you would call the center and then below it would be a description of what the students would be doing in that specific center. It even had rainbow spelling which we did in class on Monday. It has the name of the literacy center in red, the primary skill being performed in bold black, and the description below in black so its easy to follow when browsing through the website. The next website I looked at gave more visuals of how you can set up your literacy centers. There was a picture of what the literacy board looked like which was kind of like the red, blue, green and yellow pocket thing that you brought into class. I really liked this website because each idea for a literacy center that they gave, they had a picture of what it looked like as well as one with the students interacting with it. It also had the title and an explanation of what should be done during the center. When comparing the two websites, I liked the second one better because it gave me more visuals of what the literacy center should look like. Although the first one gave a lot of ideas, it was less detailed and just boring.  I would reccomend the second website. There are a lot of resources that are given to you on the website so you don't have to go to other places to search for something to use. What you need to produce the literacy center is all given. 

First Website: http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/beginning10.html

Second website : http://hill.troy.k12.mi.us/staff/bnewingham/myweb3/literacy_centers%20Final.htm

Courtney Dressler's Literacy Center Ideas

http://teachers.net/lessons/posts/466.html

This teacher's website introduces teachers to a variety of literacy centers that she implements into her classroom on a daily basis.

Literacy Circles: Small groups both read and work together while studying a piece of literature from the series the class is focusing on

Browsing Box: Acting as a connection to reader's workshop, guided reading groups chose familiar texts read during group reading time and share them with the class.

Independent Reading Centers: Student choses a book from class library and completes a book review that is kept in a binder near the library for other students to look at in order to help them determine what they would like to read

Buddy Reading: Two copies of each book, from all level, are organized so that two students can read the book together and then either work as a pair or separately to draw or write about their favorite parts

Writing Folder: Students make their own books and write stories that they want to share with the class. It is encouraged that children be given a "book-like" format so that they feel more like an author. Books may also be "published" using word processor.

Journal Writing: Teacher uses prompt in order to engage teacher in writing activities.

Pocket Chart: Usually done using a pre-planned activity, the class can use sentence strips in order to show their comprehension of a previously read book.

Phonics Center: Phonics techniques are reinforced using literature, games, index cards, etc.

Handwriting Center: Using various materials, students are encouraged to practice making letters

Overhead: Using graphic organizers, graphs, venn diagrams, etc. students are encouraged to present their work and thought processes to their peers.

Sight Word Center: Using rubber stamps, magnetic letters, etc. word manipulation is reinforced in order to help students learn their sight words

Poetry Box: Using individual poetry binders as organizers, both professional and authentic poems are created, edited, illustrated in order to emphasize the importance of poetry.

Listening: Students may either listen to the teacher or a pre-recorded book, followed by some sort of activity to prove comprehension and understanding.

Big Books: Using pointers or other visual aides, kids read the groups either as a whole class or in small groups. Other manipulative can also be used in order to practice certain skills, e.g. pipe cleaners circling sight words.

Computers: "living books" or CD roms can reinforce certain phonics or literacy skills. Students can reflect their new knowledge or feelings of activities in their individual logs.

Stamp a Story: Students use large rubber stamps to create an illustration and provide a logical story to explain their thoughts.

Build a Sentence: After choosing sentence parts out of a bag, students create silly and humorous sentences that are recorded on sentence strips and shared with the class.

Deal a Story: Using many different colored cards, students chose a card that has a subject which to write about.

This website had many different ideas, a lot of which I would have never thought of on my own! Although I have summarized all of the teacher's activities in this blog, I highly encourage you to visit her website and read further about ideas and suggestions that she has for each activity!

Joe's Literacy Center Ideas

http://www.mspowell.com/otherwebpages/centerideas.htm
The first website I explored is titled Literacy Center Ideas: Motivating and fun materials to create your centers. This website gives a bunch of ideas for setting up centers in your classroom. The examples include book making, spelling centers, and different fun reading ideas to make literature more fun. I like this website because it has a few other links to other teacher’s literacy centers. I think it is good to see how other teachers set up their classroom and use their centers because we can use their ideas to improve our classrooms. This website has a ton of information and you could literally spend hours looking at of the activities. I definitely recommend this site.
http://www.elementary-teacher-resources.com/literacy-centers.html
The next website I visited is from elementary-teacher-resources.com. This website has some ideas on what to do in different types of centers. For example, in the reading center the teacher has an activity called books and baskets. This is where the students sit in laundry baskets and great from a selection of books. The teacher likes this idea because it gives the students personal space to read in. The teacher also brings pillows and blankets so the students can be comfortable when reading. Apparently it has been a big hit for this teacher during the past five years. I like this center because it is so different. It’s pretty cost efficient and it sounds like the students are having fun.

Meredith Monserez's Literacy Centers Review

The first useful site I discovered while searching for Literacy Center Ideas is called "Literacy Centers/Literacy Stations: Learning center ideas, resources, and printables!" I found this website to be extremely thorough in regards to outlining how a literacy center should be managed and organized. It also provided many detailed ideas and examples of assignments that could be used in each literacy station. It also provided many printable handouts and center signs that can be used for each literacy station as well as links to books that the author of the site found more useful for literacy centers.
The different center ideas that were offered on this site included an Independent Reading Center, a Word Work Center, a Writing Center, a Listening Center, a Poetry Center, a Vocabulary Center, a Computer Center, a Language Center, and a Literature Circles Center. Not only does this site provide all of these center examples, but it also provides many different assignment and activity ideas to do within each center. Some of these assignments have corresponding handouts that can be printed directly from the website.
This site also provided suggestions for how to manage Literacy Centers. This is to not only keep everything organized, but also help the children know which centers to go to. One example of a management system was based on using index cards and cut outs. When the students would rotate to each center, all the teacher has to do it move the white index card with the child's name on it to the next center they are to go to. It was also recommended that each child have a folder that is designated for each Literacy Center. This will help keep them organized.
The link to this website is, http://www.busyteacherscafe.com/literacy_stations/main.htm
Another useful page that I found while searching for Literacy Center ideas came from the site titled "Ms. Powell's Management Ideas for Teachers." Within this site, there is a page titled, "Literacy Center Ideas: Motivating and fun materials to create for your centers." This page provides an extremely large amount of examples of different literacy centers that can be used. One example of a center that is suggested it a "Rainbow Spelling Center", in which the teacher posts the weeks spelling words and the children write them all three times each with colored pencils or colored markers. Others included were a "Listening Center", a "Stamp a Word or Story Center", a "Bookmaking Center" and a "Journal Writing Center." This page also provided many printable handouts to use during these centers. The link to this webpage is, http://www.mspowell.com/otherwebpages/centerideas.htm .

Literacy Centers- Jen Shearer

The first site that I came across that was of interest to me was The K-Crew's Website. It is a group of real teachers and real students and the teachers post their strategies, their pictures from class, and classroom activities. I really like this website because it offers so much! It is for kindergarten classrooms, which is one thing in particular that I dislike about this website. It is only geared towards one grade. However, as I looked at the website a lot of these activities can be adjusted and used with many other grades. It would just require using more difficult words and such. They offer: workshops, thematic units, balanced literacy, literacy centers and more. One thing that I really liked about this website was that it provides books for each lesson and it gives you a link for a summary about the book and a link to purchase it on amazon.com. I think this website does a great job at covering all the bases in everything they offer. They give you multiple ideas and stations to choose from. All seem like they would be a lot of fun for children and they seem like they would also help the children to learn a lot! I really think this website is great for teachers and it gives them great ideas that students would love. It is a very "hands-on" approach to learning. Another thing I really liked about this website was that it really worked hard to incorporate all subjects together and under the same theme.
http://www.thekcrew.net/index.html
I also found Teaching Heart's Learning Centers Page. This is a page put together by a teacher. She also includes many pictures and different ideas from her classroom. She has a lot of information and also offers a lot of ideas for teachers. She also gives ideas about how to run your classroom and she gives examples of how she runs hers. She gives website links that she used in her classroom. She also gives links to books or supplies that she found useful. She gives a summary of the supplies and books as well. I think this is very beneficial because it is what one teacher does and she is easy to contact. I like this site because it is one person and one classroom that these things are based off of. I think that makes it very authentic. http://www.teachingheart.net/LC.htm
The ideas and procedures found on both of these websites can be altered to make harder or easier for your classroom!

Trisha Bingham's Literacy Center Ideas Review

While looking for Literacy Center ideas on the internet, I stumbled upon this website. It has many different literacy center ideas and topics that are linked to the website. If anyone needs ideas, I highly suggest the "A to Z Teacher Stuff" website. They also have an entire book of literacy center ideas for sale on the site.
The first site I found with specific learning centers described was the "Hubbards's Cupboard" website. On here they had a literacy center called "ABC Memory." In this center, students would be given two full sets of cards with a letter on it, uppercase and lowercase. Then the student would place all of the face-down on the table in a random order. Students would then take turns looking for matching letter cards while learning what sounds are associated with that specific letter. I really like this learning center because it is engaging. Children love to play more than they would like to be instructed. So this taps into their interests and also teaches them the letter sounds that they will definitely need to know.
The second literacy center I found was on the actual "A to Z Teacher Stuff" website. This portion directly described alphabet learning centers. One center was called "Matching Objects to Letters." In this center, the teacher would create an index card for each letter of the alphabet. Each card would have a corresponding object, like an apple for the letter "a." Then the students would take turns matching the index cards to the correct objects. I think that this is a good strategy because it relates letters to things that the students would understand. However, cultura backgrounds may put up a challenge considering that some students may call a banana a plantain or other varying titles.
Overall, I found that these websites were very helpful. I know see what a literacy center is and how it works.

Kaelyn Riley- Literacy Centers

I did a random search and came across some great resources for teachers who want to implement literacy centers in their classrooms. The first website I found is called Implementing Literacy Centers in the Primary Classroom. (http://www.trcabc.com/resources/curriculum/implementing-literacy-centers-in-the-primary-classroom/). It discusses the benefits of having literacy centers in classrooms for grades 1-5. The article says the earlier centers focus on word work, writing, grammar, reading, speaking, and listening. They then go on to list various types of primary grade literacy centers, which included: alphabet center, word study center, listening center, art center, writing center, handwriting center, paired reading, drama, poetry, computer center, journal center, music center, felt board center, author study center, and literacy games. Each one was described, and some even had links of exact activities that could be used in each station. This article shows us that literacy is not just sitting at a center reading. There are various ways to get children reading, and have them enjoy what they are learning about, rather than mundane, repetitive tasks. Later in the article, third grade through fifth grade centers are described as being more self-directed and independent activities, such as a book club and self-expression.

Another website I found about literacy centers was (http://www.hubbardscupboard.org/abc_centers.html). I really liked this website, because not only did it describe what some specific literacy centers were, but also had pictures of the activities, so that you could create your own stations using these examples. The author calls them ABC centers, in which the students get very excited to be active while also doing a lot of learning. They are “practicing and developing letter/sound knowledge, listening skills oral language expression, rhyme, letter formation, cooperation, etc.” On the website, rules are discussed which would be important to discuss with students so everyone understands the process of stations, and what is expected to occur. Also, organization described as having each student assigned to one of four groups, and then each group is color-coded, and then most of the ABC Centers are completed at their table. The materials needed are stored in labeled tubs at a level accessible by the children. The author also discusses some other links she would recommend, including some websites, and a few books.

Both of these websites make it very easy for a teacher, with the right materials, to set up stations for literacy skill practice. Each talks about the specifics of each station, and how to properly implement them, creatively.

Literacy Centers (Aimee Frantzen)

When I first googled "literacy center ideas" I decided that because I would like to teach first grade I would aim my first search towards activities appropriate for that grade level. The sites that began to list on google were mostly teacher created sites talking about the literacy center activities these teachers do in their own classroom. The first site I found is listed below:

http://www.teachingheart.net/LC.htm
One of the ideas I really liked on this site was more of an organizational strategy as opposed to a literacy center idea, but being the organizational freak I am, I really appreciated the idea. This teacher has literacy center time every day from 9:30-10:50 in her classroom. On each student's desk she has permanantly placed a colored dot. The dot corresponds with a center on her literacy centers chart, and the dot changes positions on the chart everyday so each student does a different center everyday. This also seems like a great idea because you can assign dots by children's reading levels.

Another idea I really liked on this website was this teacher's "listening center". This eacher bought books on tape and cheap walkmans at Wal-Mart but talks about another school she's heard of that recieved ipods for each student - if you had an ipod, teacher's could easily create and sync a playlist for each week's "listening center" with a few short stories recorded. The teacher then has the students fill out a worksheet on the story they have listened to. The worksheet includes drawing a picture of their favorite part in the story and then writing one sentence to describe the picture.

-I bookmarked this site for future use, it could make a great teaching resource.

For my second search I opted for second grade ideas, this is what I found:
http://hill.troy.k12.mi.us/staff/bnewingham/myweb3/literacy_centers%20Final.htm

This page had pictures to go along with ideas and you saw this teacher's students actually doing the literacy center activities.

Although I find alphabetizing tedious and unnecessary at this point, especially because dictionaries can now be accessed online now I still find it important that kids know and understand how to alphabetize, this helps to build their literacy. This website had a cool alphabetizing activity where the kids would sit down and alphabetize pictures of vegetables with words on it, this activity was called "vegetable stew".

Lastly, I really liked the "making words" activity. Students had teacher selected magnetic letters and in partners played a game where they had an certain amount of time to "make the most words", this is a great idea and kids will have fun with it.

Stacy Toedter's guided reading video

I chose Modeling Guided Reading FAQ simply because it had the most views and I wanted to see why that was. The clip was fairly short, only 9 minutes, but it answered a lot of questions about guided reading. It is in interview format and starts out asking why is it important for teachers to do guided reading. I was interested in hearing this answer because in class it has become known that guided reading is important to do in our classrooms. The teacher's answer was that it provides extra support to struggling readers. As teachers, we can differentiate instruction til we find a strategy that works for the particular student. With guided reading we can introduce new skills to students who may be ready to move on in the group but still be able to provide explicit instruction to those who are not ready to move on. When asked how often and how long should guided reading be done, she answered every day and she normally does it for 45 minutes a day, meeting in groups for 15 minutes each (3 groups a day). But from my understanding, guided reading should be done for longer than that, like 45 minutes per group..im a little unclear about that. She answers that in guided reading, they introduce reading strategies and practice skills that have already been taught. The books are in levels and depending on what level the student is in, that is the level in which they choose their books from. It is individualized to help each student become better readers. The teacher knows each student's strengths and weaknesses and thats how they decide what to work on in guided reading, and that is also how they can group the students. She also mentioned book bags, which are just clear plastic bags that children can choose books based on their interest and level and they can take these books home with them to read with their parents. I think parental involvement is a very important part in a child's education. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txC-Qo_8GiU

Hickeye's Guided Reading Idea

Although my clip is not from youtube, instead it is from hulu, I find it supplementing our class reading in a very interesting way. Many times oral reading is considered perhaps the most important part of guided reading. In the video that I watched is a segment on how dogs are helping low-income kids in Chicago improve their reading. It is a program that combines children, dogs, volunteers, schools, and great results. The reason why oral language is such an important aspect in guided reading is it allows teachers a great assessment opportunity. This reading is not completed in a homogeneous context yet it has a larger audience. The goal of the "Sit, Stay, Read" program is to get students to read aloud to the dogs and volunteers in the classroom. Later on these students are accessed on their reading comprehension. This program has opened up a new aspect of reading. Kids love dogs, and many of these students who have struggled in their reading have come to love reading. Because the dogs are non-judgmental and if students mispronounce a word at first they have no reason to feel embarressed. Many critics believe that reading aloud is critical to beginning literacy. This method may not work as well as student's reading matures, even so these needy readers have many substantial progress. Many students that come from low-income families have had very few hours read to them at home. We discussed this in class earlier in the year how important it was to children to be introduced to literacy at a very young age. Since these students were not raised in households that encourage reading, they fall behind in class. It is not necessarily the fact that these students come from low income families, but because they are only read to on average for 25 hours before they enter school compared to average income families that read to their children for 1000 hours.

The students also write about their experience. Teachers are also able to evaluate students not only in their reading and oral skills but also comprehension and writing. Children who participate in this program improve 24 word per minute in their oral reading and children not using the program increased only 9 words per minute. Another important concept to remember is the student's attitudes in the classroom and towards reading. We discussed this in class when referring to our own teaching philosophies. This program changes kids attitudes about reading because they are now motivated to read because they feel comfortable in their surroundings and who they are reading to. Some students work together when writing their experience and interact better than they did during the normal school year. It is important to remember that audience plays a factor in children's ability to learn. Dogs have made a positive literacy experience for many children in Chicago

To learn more... watch this video!

Dog-Eared Pages: Kids Improve Skills by Reading Aloud to Dogs

Rachel's guided reading video

In the video clip I watched on guided reading a 1^st grade teacher was going through FAQ’s about guided reading. The clip was very informative and showed clips of children actually doing guided reading strategies that she suggested. One thing that I really liked about this video was that the teacher answered all the questions I had about how to enforce good classroom management while working in guided reading groups. She also gave me good ideas on how to organize the books in the classroom. One thing she does for her kids is label ‘book bags’ for them, which has books on their level in them. They are able to pick one book from that bag each night and take it home with them to practice reading. She also includes extra materials to help them like flash cards with key words on them and stuff like that. It was really interesting to hear someone else talk about how they run guided reading in their classroom. One of the things that she did talk about in the clip that went along with what the Saunders-Smith article addressed was how to keep track of student’s progress in the groups. The teacher in the video kept a clipboard nearby with the lesson plan so she could make notes on it though out the lesson. She said that this helped her to keep an archive of each student’s progress so she could make adjustments accordingly. The article stresses the importance of this as well. Overall I thought this article answered a lot of questions one might have about the big picture of guided reading. The one thing that I wish they would have gone more detail in was the actual set up of a guided reading lesson.

Aimee Frantzen's Guided Reading

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HytE0pGoKw4&feature=related

My guided reading clip being only 9 minutes and 39 seconds long in length was likely just a small portion out of a guided reading lesson that these first grade students took part in. What was interesting to me was that when the teacher was sort of re-introducing the guided reading lesson she talked about how the children who each had a buzzer would buzz in on a question, and whoever buzzed first would give the answer and if the answer was correct the student would get a point. At the end the student with the most points would recieve a skittle (just one skittle?? hah!). I thought the use of a "token economy" was sort of interesting to see within a guided reading lesson although I am not sure I like the idea because I feel as though it means kids would be answering questions for reasons different than the just prove their reading comprehension. On the other hand, it is bribery in a sense for students to complete their reading so they may answer comprehension questions correctly. One thing I did like was that before they began talking about the book the teacher had a short discussion with students on how to be a good reader. This was similar to some of the things we saw in the guided reading video in class that we watched last week and I thought this was a good idea in general. One thing I did not necessarily like or agree with was the question format, all the questions asked during this almost 10 minute clip were multiple choice, they were not open ended and in my mind multiple choice questions do not make good questions for reading comprehension purposes. An example of a question asked in the clip is seen below:
"What are the different types of corals?" - This is a good representation of the questions asked.

Towards the end of the clip the students seemed to be getting bored and fidgety although they were still participating, I feel the questions although they were at a first grade level, may not have been challenging enough for these students. One thing I thought was good though was that the teacher was asking somewhat unplanned follow-up questions in regard to some of the students' answers to her original question, this lead to very little reflection though this reflection was good.

I thought this was a mediocre example of guided reading. In all I really would have liked to have seen more open-ended questions.

Joe Kartholl's guided reading

Guided reading video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofUOywdg1p8&feature=related

I chose this video from YouTube because I wanted to see guided reading in action. This is a pretty short video, but it shows how the teacher and students react in guided reading instruction. I have gathered from the video and from our readings that guided reading is a great tool to use in the classroom because it can show the teacher exactly where the students are in their learning. Whether a student is struggling or excelling, guided reading gives the teacher a clear understanding where the student's progress is in reading. From my understanding there are three stages in guided reading. The first stage takes place before the reading. This is when the reader makes predictions, vocabulary is introduced, and questions are asked as to what strategies the reader will use when reading. The next stage takes place during the reading. This is when the teacher helps guide the reader. The teacher may help out with a word, or ask things like "does that make sense?" The final stage occurs after the reading is done. Now the teacher can ask questions to strengthen comprehension skills.
I really like the idea of guided reading. I think it is extremely beneficial to the student and the teacher. I wonder how much the books cost for guided reading. If you are on a tight budget how can you still provide books for guided reading? I think this is a very important idea and hopefully I can have guided reading in my classroom.