August 07, 2007 Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller
Dear First Grade Team and Other Teachers Wishing to Implement/Improve Reader's Workshop in their Classrooms,
We're currently studying the book Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller. We encourage any one who wishes to participate to join this discussion. By reflecting on Debbie Miller's work and how we could/are implement(ing) it in our own classroom. As a former teacher of students with special needs (mostly inclusion), I gained a wealth of ideas and a handful of great ideas! Please excuse all type-o's as this is a group about big ideas and possibilities. The purpose to share ideas about implementing reader's workshop shop in individual classrooms keeping the needs of our students in mind. This is just like a group discussion without being face-to-face.
We'll begin with chapter one and procede in order (probably 2 chapters a month). Let's begin sharing what it's like in our own classroom before beginning chapter 1. Sometimes, it helps to develop an understanding of what it's like to walk a mile in the other teacher's shoes before jumping right into how to implement a new program or new ideas.
I teach first grade and have a variety of reading levels in my classroom. I continue to struggle with how to best meet the needs of the CLD students in my class (Culturally Linguistically Diverse). Some of my students recognize all of their letters and are able to write phonetically recognizable words, while other students know only a handful of letters and are not able to even write their name. I hope that reader's workshop is able to provide a format for me to meet the needs of a diverse group without changing the effectiveness of the guiding reading groups or read aloud time that is already happening. I'm still struggling with how to fit it into my schedule. I am willing to share my schedule if anyone is interested, but for now reader's workshop will only be about 20 minutes long (they also have about 30 minutes of reading group seatwork time to continue their individual part of reader's workshop). Unfortunately there is only about 15 minutes after reading groups for students to share their center work.
As the picture above shows, we don't want the students to have any illusions about the enjoyment and learning that come from books. In the illustration, I see that there isn't a top or a bottom (after careful inspection). I'd like to think that there is a precise way to teach, but if there were a machine would do it. We're the decisive element in the classroom.
Dear First Grade Team and Other Teachers Wishing to Implement/Improve Reader's Workshop in their Classrooms,
We're currently studying the book Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller. We encourage any one who wishes to participate to join this discussion. By reflecting on Debbie Miller's work and how we could/are implement(ing) it in our own classroom. As a former teacher of students with special needs (mostly inclusion), I gained a wealth of ideas and a handful of great ideas! Please excuse all type-o's as this is a group about big ideas and possibilities. The purpose to share ideas about implementing reader's workshop shop in individual classrooms keeping the needs of our students in mind. This is just like a group discussion without being face-to-face.
We'll begin with chapter one and procede in order (probably 2 chapters a month). Let's begin sharing what it's like in our own classroom before beginning chapter 1. Sometimes, it helps to develop an understanding of what it's like to walk a mile in the other teacher's shoes before jumping right into how to implement a new program or new ideas.
I teach first grade and have a variety of reading levels in my classroom. I continue to struggle with how to best meet the needs of the CLD students in my class (Culturally Linguistically Diverse). Some of my students recognize all of their letters and are able to write phonetically recognizable words, while other students know only a handful of letters and are not able to even write their name. I hope that reader's workshop is able to provide a format for me to meet the needs of a diverse group without changing the effectiveness of the guiding reading groups or read aloud time that is already happening. I'm still struggling with how to fit it into my schedule. I am willing to share my schedule if anyone is interested, but for now reader's workshop will only be about 20 minutes long (they also have about 30 minutes of reading group seatwork time to continue their individual part of reader's workshop). Unfortunately there is only about 15 minutes after reading groups for students to share their center work.
As the picture above shows, we don't want the students to have any illusions about the enjoyment and learning that come from books. In the illustration, I see that there isn't a top or a bottom (after careful inspection). I'd like to think that there is a precise way to teach, but if there were a machine would do it. We're the decisive element in the classroom. Happy teaching!
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8 comments:
I to have used reader's workshop before, but this year it is proving difficult to implement. Our schedules are very difficult to accomodate so instead of the ideal 60 minutes I am only doing 30 minutes 4 days a week. I typically do read-aloud daily, as well as, guided reading. I attempt to do shared reading at least once a week as well. All of the reading that I teach I also try to connect to some form of writing.
I completely understand the scheduling frustration! My hope is that some of the nonfiction materials can also hit science/social studies needs adn that some of the read alouds can also be brought into reader's workshop mini lessons. My schedule will only allow reader's workshop to be 4 days a week as well. My writing during reader's workshop is minimal. I always expect students to log their book, author, and maybe one thing about their book. Occassionally I find it necessary to give them extra work over difficult topics. I know that today my class made the text to text connection about the last two read alouds we've had A Very Full Morning and First Day Jitters. These books were fun, because the connection was pretty obvious. The book leads you to believe that the character nervous about school is a student, but you find out at the end of both books that the nervous person is the teacher.
Maybe we could share some of our student writing during team planning.
Cristina...do you know how to change my username on here?
I don't remember how I did what I did. I am having a few techinical difficulties right now too! I launched reader's workshop today by doing what the Debbie Miller book suggested and creating a list of things good readers do. I was pretty impressed with some of the things that they came up with!
After watching the first video I feel a bit better about what to do during the readers workshop time. What I struggle with is trying to have enough materials for all the levels. Also since it is early in the year we aren't even 100% sure of what the kids can do. I am planning to start simple with things like focusing on story elements and strategies for figuring out words that they may not know. What do you think of that being my mini-lesson?
I think that mini lessons are completely up to the teacher based on the needs of his/her students. Currently, my mini lessons are focusing on 3 main themes. The themes include phonics/phonemic awareness, comprehension (making connections, and how to handle the routines of checking out books, getting new books, looking for just right books and eventually how to abandon a book that isn't right for you.
I understand the frustration with lack of materials. Hopefully, we'll hear about the availability of funds soon so that we can order books and storage for the books. If you have suggestions about purchases let me know. I've looked at a classroom library from Scholastic for 1st grade (nonfiction and fiction), purchasing individual books, and I'm looking at other companies. I'd like to try to order 3-4 complete sets just for the ease of ordering and making sure we each have different titles so that when we switch books each trimester the kids still have a completely new selection.
The video was a great reminder of the vocabulary that I need to be using on a regular basis. It was also a reminder of how much I could include reader's workshop with read aloud. I'm going to do my best to display anchor charts, but space is always at a premium. I'd like to figure out a way to use the ceiling.
How you given any thought to the song books that the teacher in the video made? It's an easy way to supply reading materials for kids just learning to read. I'll try to bring the copies of some of the get to know you phonemic awareness songs tomorrow. Maybe we could ask for several binders each to store these song books or at least predictable pattern texts.
I am thinking about next week continuing with mini-lessons on book care and checkout. I am also going to limit to an extent what is available to them. Some of them are choosing level 16 books which they are not ready to read. I was going to focus on checking out "just right" books and strategies for figuring out words that they don't know.
Cristina,
I think your suggestion of limiting books is a way to get kids started choosing just right books. I wonder if you put just a few higher level books and modeled what a too hard or just right book was like. Conferencing should really help especially when you ask them to read a page and they don't know what to do. Maybe conferences in small groups might help with this as well.
I think maybe I made their logs too difficult. Right now I just want them to write the date, title, author, and what they liked about the book. We've talked about how to choose a book, how to record a book, and what to do when you're finished with a book. There is so much to learn and so little time. I can't believe it's already a new school year!
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