A: In our classroom we follow a Reader's Workshop model that includes independent reading, written responses to text, shared reading, guided reading, and partnership reading. During independent reading, each student has a box of "just right" books from which to choose. Students are allowed to choose books at a level that is neither too easy nor too difficult for them. We will have several mini lessons on how to choose just right books, and I use the Fountas and Pinnell reading assessment to determine both a student's instructional and independent levels. I also conference regularly with students about their reading to determine if they are reading books that are at their "just right" level.
"Just right" books are books in which students can read most of the words fluently (but not too fast). Books that they understand, enjoy reading, and have some background knowledge about are appropriate. Though students may pause to decode tricky words, they should be able to get the overall meaning of the story (i.e. missed words should not detract from their comprehension).
Q: There are a lot of picture books in your classroom library. Shouldn't my 3rd grader be reading chapter books exclusively by now?
While there are hundreds of wonderful chapter books in our classroom library, picture books are still a viable option for our 3rd graders. Please do not discount quality picture books with meaningful, thought-provoking content for your child. Many picture books are leveled very appropriately for students in the 8-10 year old age range and contain themes, characters, and ideas that are developmentally appropriate for these youngsters. Our classroom library is set up to help students easily access books that both interest them and are appropriate for their reading level.
Picture books can be beneficial to struggling readers as well as those kids who seem to fly through everything they read. A good picture book can help add to a reader's fluency, help with intonation, and assist students in understanding books more deeply and meaningfully. In fact, I often use picture books as models for the mini-lessons I teach to help children understand complex reading conventions like point of view, mood, tone, and author's message.
Part of helping children choose books that are "just right" for them to read independently involves me really getting to know the kinds of literature that students really enjoy and steering them in the direction of books that will both interest and challenge them. I encourage all students to choose both chapter books and picture books from our extensive classroom library, and I conference with children to make sure that they fully understanding their texts.
Each Reader's Workshop session begins with a mini-lesson which targets a specific skill or reading convention I want students to focus on in their own reading that day. In our classroom, students do a lot of independent reading during Reader's Workshop. Each student has his/her own reading bin with a week's worth of self-selected books inside. To ensure that they are focusing on their texts, students also have a Reader's Notebook where they record Independent Daily Reading tasks (an assignment in conjunction with our mini-lesson), the genre book they are reading, and notes about the text (often students use post it notes to record these observations directly in their books).
As students read independently, I choose children with whom to conference about their reading. At this time, we discuss the text and I assure that the student is fully comprehending his/her reading by asking basic comprehension and higher order thinking questions. I check over the student's IDR (Independent Daily Reading task), and take notes on the student's reading behaviors as I listen to him/her read.
During this time, I also meet with guided reading groups, groups of students on the same reading level, who are reading the same text within that group. We focus on reading strategies, talk about the text, and make connections. Based on the group's needs, we may focus on a specific skill such as decoding or fluency.
Because students are spending time reading independently, it is important for me to find a match that fits their reading level (i.e. their "just right" level). After administering the Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Reading Assessment and meeting with students during individual reading conference and guided reading groups, I learn what types of reading materials best suit with the needs of each individual child in my classroom. I spent much time this summer leveling every book in our classroom library and organizing them by genre, topic, and author so that I can easily direct students to appropriate reading materials and so students can, over time, self-select their own materials easily and appropriately.
Experts in the field of reading have discovered that even very young students can read for extended periods of time when they are matched with books that they can read with 95% or higher word accuracy, and that they are more successful and engaged when reading books that interest them. Our classroom leveled library serves both of these purposes because, although I direct students to certain color coded books based on their "just right" level, they are still choosing the books within those levels that they want to read.
Finally, at the end of Reader's Workshop, we all reconvene in our meeting area and students discuss the connections they have made with our mini-lesson within their own texts .
Part of helping children choose books that are "just right" for them to read independently involves me really getting to know the kinds of literature that students really enjoy and steering them in the direction of books that will both interest and challenge them. I encourage all students to choose both chapter books and picture books from our extensive classroom library, and I conference with children to make sure that they fully understanding their texts.
Q: Can you describe what goes on during Reader's Workshop?
Each Reader's Workshop session begins with a mini-lesson which targets a specific skill or reading convention I want students to focus on in their own reading that day. In our classroom, students do a lot of independent reading during Reader's Workshop. Each student has his/her own reading bin with a week's worth of self-selected books inside. To ensure that they are focusing on their texts, students also have a Reader's Notebook where they record Independent Daily Reading tasks (an assignment in conjunction with our mini-lesson), the genre book they are reading, and notes about the text (often students use post it notes to record these observations directly in their books).
As students read independently, I choose children with whom to conference about their reading. At this time, we discuss the text and I assure that the student is fully comprehending his/her reading by asking basic comprehension and higher order thinking questions. I check over the student's IDR (Independent Daily Reading task), and take notes on the student's reading behaviors as I listen to him/her read.
During this time, I also meet with guided reading groups, groups of students on the same reading level, who are reading the same text within that group. We focus on reading strategies, talk about the text, and make connections. Based on the group's needs, we may focus on a specific skill such as decoding or fluency.
Because students are spending time reading independently, it is important for me to find a match that fits their reading level (i.e. their "just right" level). After administering the Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Reading Assessment and meeting with students during individual reading conference and guided reading groups, I learn what types of reading materials best suit with the needs of each individual child in my classroom. I spent much time this summer leveling every book in our classroom library and organizing them by genre, topic, and author so that I can easily direct students to appropriate reading materials and so students can, over time, self-select their own materials easily and appropriately.
Experts in the field of reading have discovered that even very young students can read for extended periods of time when they are matched with books that they can read with 95% or higher word accuracy, and that they are more successful and engaged when reading books that interest them. Our classroom leveled library serves both of these purposes because, although I direct students to certain color coded books based on their "just right" level, they are still choosing the books within those levels that they want to read.
Finally, at the end of Reader's Workshop, we all reconvene in our meeting area and students discuss the connections they have made with our mini-lesson within their own texts .
Q: How can I improve my child's phrasing and fluency in reading?
New readers have the most difficulty with phrasing and fluency. You can hear it when they read. They are likely to read in slow, halting phrases. No inflection. No attention to punctuation. No modulation of voice. Without proper phrasing kids miss out on mood, tone, humor, and the drama that books have to offer. And ultimately? They miss out on fully comprehending what they are reading, too.
All that is normal for early and emergent readers, of course. After all, they're just getting the hang of this whole thing, and they've got a lot going on in their heads: decoding strategies, one-to-one correspondence, visually following text, and trying to figure out exactly what the book is saying in the first place. Unfortunately, many older students continue to read with that same flat affect in their own reading well after they have mastered decoding strategies. As such, they are really missing out on fully experiencing the richness of language literature has to offer; they aren't able to truly appreciate the nuances of language that help them wholly immerse themselves in the books they read. They can't be transported into stories. In short, they aren't entirely understanding what they have read.
Reading, of course, is about understanding and meaning. A big part of being able to fully comprehend a book is to be able to read it fluently to fully appreciate its meaning. This is why, in addition to whatever instructional level book your child is reading is class, I encourage students also to practice simpler, independent texts to build stamina, confidence, and fluency.
Parents of older elementary students often wonder why teachers continue to ask students to read picture books or to read the same books over and over. The primary reason we do this is to help kids attain better phrasing and fluency. Because when students feel confident in their reading, when they're not bogged down with having to decode, they can better focus on how the words should be read. Children also can begin to assimilate familiar sight words into their reading vocabulary and quickly decode them in future reading passages. Which is really all fluency is: reading expressively for meaning.
So if, in addition to the guided reading text your child is working on in his/her reading group, your youngster is working with some simpler picture books, the reason is probably to help build his/her fluency, phrasing, and intonation. Make sure your child works on those texts as well, and remind him/her to focus on what is going on in the story, how the characters might be feeling, and how to read those words in response. It also doesn't hurt for those superstar early readers and older readers to continue to read good quality picture books, the illustrations in which can assist these students in building fluency.
As a teacher, I often tell parents that the best thing they can do to help their young readers develop these skills is by modeling fluent reading themselves. Choose books with dramatic dialogue or that require great expression. Try echo reading poems or simple expressive texts where you read a line and your child echos back the line with the same expression you used. Read simple plays and talk about how each character is feeling and might express him/herself. Choose books that have two characters and each take on the role of reading the dialogue of a character. By playing off each other, your child will really get a sense of how his/her character's lines should be read.
If you want to help develop fluency skills further in your children, there are some fabulous books on the market that really help students delve into the drama, humor, and imagination of stories by using a variety of basic writing conventions. In our classroom we use Reader's Theater to help students understand how to embrace the characters about which they are reading.
My favorite author for helping develop these skills in early and emergent readers is Mo Willems, an award winning children's writer out of Brooklyn, and the author of such classics as Knuffle Bunny, Knuffle Bunny, Too, the Elephant and Piggy books, and the Pigeon books.
Here's why I believe Mo Willems' books are so fabulous for helping kids attain fluency:
* Fun pictures that boldly show how characters are feeling and reacting help students understand how they should be reading the character's lines.
* Text sized to meet the situation at hand. Bold lettering for excitement, anger, outrage, frustration. Small letter for timidity, whispering.
* Speech Bubbles highlight what characters are saying and help kids understand that someone is saying something specific in relation to another character.
* Simple, humorous stories draw the reader in. In short, Mo Willems really gets what will make the average early to intermediate level reader crack up.
* Multiple punctuation marks (exclamation marks, question marks) emphasize how the words should be spoken.
At the time I originally wrote this article, my daughter Lily was a first grader, reading above grade level--not crazy-genius above grade level, but slightly a year above benchmark. However, she didn't always have the best phrasing on some of the books she read. She loved turning to Mo Willems' stories to work on her intonation and vocal inflection. Here's an example. As you'll see in the text and pictures, Willems provides the young reader with a blueprint for HOW to read the story even if it's only the child's first read through. In the video below, Lily reads "There's A Bird on My Head."
In the second video, Lily reads "We Are in a Book," a story that most kids find fall-on-the-floor hilarious. In both cases, no one had to teach or show Lily how to read these books with expression. The pictures and text are just screaming to be read for dramatic affect. You can hear that Lily "gets" the sense of surprise, frustration, and humor the characters in the story are experiencing. And being able to do so, helps her comprehension and overall understanding of the texts.
If you're interested in Mo Willems' work to help your own child work on fluency or if you're just looking for some great children's literature, you can find a complete list of his stories here at Amazon or check out his website.
Happy Reading!
