Guiding Readers Ch. 4 & 5

I am linking up with Beth from Thinking of Teaching again for our Guiding Readers Book Study.  I know, I know!  I'm a smidgen late with the chapter 4 review but I've been battling a cold and I'm just starting to feel like myself again.  So today you get a two-for-one!

Chapter 4 - Guiding Early Readers

I was really impressed to see that early readers are expected to process most of the print on their own and that you don't need to read the text aloud for them.  That to me is a huge leap from the emergent readers!  The three main cueing systems are semantic (meaning), syntactic (language structure), and phonetic (letter-sound correspondence).  Also, we are starting to monitor comprehension through their self-monitoring.  It's important to give a lot of praise for this and point out what people did correctly!  It shows the other students in the group that there are different ways to self-monitor and self-correct. 

Light bulb moments:

• Retelling is an important after reading focus at this stage.
• "Talk to their brains"
• The learning goals next to every lesson routine!  I don't know how I missed this in the earlier chapters, I guess I was so excited that I forgot to go back and read the sidebar notes.  But I love them!  SO helpful!
• Loved how the teacher incorporated movements and questions into her Word-Building.  I even taught that skill as an assistant and I can't begin to tell you how much I feel that this would have made a difference.  Something they can remember back on and really understand!
• Writing may be an even more effective tool for phonics instruction than reading because it calls for active learning.

Chapter 5 - Guiding Developing Readers

This is the transitional stage between oral reading and silent reading, tracking and fluency, and word-level and text-level comprehension.  Their nonfiction reading also expands.  Lori Rog included a great website to check out that lists books and series for all ages and interests (www.kidsreads.com). 

Before Reading
There are no more picture walks but you might point out some illustrations.  The purpose for reading is focusing on comprehension strategies.  Same as before, with emergent and early readers, introduce vocab words ONLY if it necessary for understanding and the text does not give enough context clues to figure it out.

During Reading
You're only going to read a small chunk of text at a time and remember to not have them read aloud on their first reading.  Pick a place to pause and have the students read up to that point.  If they finish early, have them go back and reread (never hurt anyone).  After everyone has finished reading, discuss the reading process.  Continue this process until you finish the text.  On the first reading students are more focused on making sense of the text and the second reading is where they are more likely to think critically and focus on strategies.  After your comprehension goal is addressed then you can focus on a word-level goal!

After Reading
Spend a lot of time  discussing, interpreting, and evaluating what y'all read.  Encourage your students to support their opinions by going back and referencing the text.  Graphic organizers are very helpful when students want to categorize their information.  I noticed that some of my students are at this stage (yes, I teach 5th grade), not many of them but more than just one.  So I found this chapter very helpful in how to help those few struggling kiddos and pull them up to where they need to be.

Again, I just love the lesson routines and the sample areas of focus (good ideas for mini-lessons).  Don't forget that I will be hosting Chapter 6 next week!  Can't wait!!!

Sabra