Looking inside classrooms

This week I am a discussion leader and read the article "Looking inside classrooms: Reflecting on the "how"as well as "what" in effective reading instruction by Taylor, Peterson, Pearson, and Rodriguez.  In this article they described a study they conducted about reading reforms.  Within the study they found that the most effective reading teachers were using more small-groups, used high levels of student engagement, and engaged students in higher leveled thinking.  Teacher need to be careful about their interaction styles.  In this study more teachers were just telling students great amount of information rather then coaching and letting children take responsibility for their own skills and strategies.  Using a more student-support way of teaching leads to a better understanding and greater reading achievement in the classroom.  It was found that whole group instruction was used more often than small-group reading instruction.  This type of teaching for reading showed that small-group instruction was found in the most effective schools for primary-reading.  When a child is just learning how to read they need more instruction catered just for them because the whole class is not struggling with the same skills.  Whole-group instruction could be a lesson for everyone in general but there needs to be a time when a teacher can talk to his or her students individually.  A great time for small-group reading instruction is during center time.  Everyone in the class is occupied with other educational activities while the teacher is helping a small group in reading instruction.

Leveling for Reading

In the Rog and Burton article, "Matching texts and readers: Leveling early reading materials for assessment and instruction," they talk about the "just-right" text level for readers.  I thought it was interesting that the correct level of text for children is material that 90-95% of the words can be read easily.  I thought that the level would be a little more challenging than this percentage but in the article it says that more difficult text is on a frustration level and not appropriate for reading instruction.  While reading this article, I also didn't realize how many different areas are considered in determining a child's reading level.  Several important factors to consider when deciding an appropriate reading level include the following: vocabulary, size and layout of print, predictability, illustration support, and complexity of concepts.  This article has great strategies for categorizing each of the ten different reading levels.  Being able to recognize a child's correct reading level is important to their confidence and growth as a reader.  A proper reading level is also essential for teacher to be able to give appropriate reading instruction to his or her students.

Here is a great website for level readers

This is a game website for different leveled readers