RE 5100: Teaching Beginning Readers and Writers
RE 5100: Teaching Beginning Readers and Writers
TAKE HOME EXAM-Revised Again
Candy Kee
December 10, 2009
Imagine yourself being in a position to guide the development of a new literacy program, and these issues/questions are being brought to you. Your responses, then, can be seen as a series of persuasive essays. Persuade by giving evidence, rationale, and illustrative examples, if applicable, as to what your position is.
1. (A.) Make the case for your recommendation as to how much reading students need to do on a daily basis in order to make a years growth in reading per year.
An Appalachian State Professor (Gill), in the Reading Program once told me that tons of easy reading is like reading aerobics to a child and that if they do this they will improve.
A lot of reading during the school day and at home on the student’s
instructional reading level is necessary for a student to grow a year in a year.
Every subject in school or a culmination of history, science, art, health, math
And social studies must be available in an expository style on instructional
levels for all students. This will allow the students not only to learn
information in these genres but will also provide much of the necessary
reading practice needed to grow a year in reading.
Every child needs to read at least 90 minutes a day. Reading practice and
instruction can come in many different forms. Reading, writing, and being
read to for 75% of the school day is necessary to continue to grow in reading.
We know this due to all the research that has been dedicated to this issue.
Researchers followed students day in and day out at school, followed them
home and even installed cameras in the home to study and document time
the student was engaged in reading in order to figure out the amount
necessary to gain a year in a year. Research has shown that children from a
literate family has been read to 1500 hours before they start school. It is sad
that our curriculum is based on these kids in the classroom and no
curriculum is geared towards the illiterate. I could not find in my notes the
hours read to for illiterate kids but I think I remember 50 hours.
In addition, Tom Gill writes that good readers read every
eight days the number of words poor readers(bottom 10%)
read in a year. Also per R. Allington, the average amount of
time an elementary student reads during the school day is only
6 minutes(
The literate kids are going to achieve no matter what because they came into
school knowing a lot about reading already ; letter sounds and prior
knowledge from being read to. They just step right into the curriculum. The
illiterate kids step right into a pool of frustration because we try to start
them out with the literate kids. This is sad.
These kids eventually have to develop a negative attitude and one of “I don’t
care “, in order to hide from their low self esteem. It is a vicious cycle
Dr. Gill, in class, reiterated, “the less literate you are, the poorer you are”.
(B.) Tell how you would recommend that this reading time be accomplished. That is, how much would be done during reading/language arts block; and how much of that would be guided, independent, rereading, etc? How much would be done during the rest of the school day outside of the reading/language arts block, and how much would be done at home?
I recommend using Informal Reading Inventories with each
student in order to find appropriate instructional levels of each. According to
Dr. Gill in “Focus on Literacy”, the highest level of fluency and comprehension
is with no more than 5 errors per 100 words.
When reading levels have been determined, the teacher is faced with the task
of how to teach a full class of children on various reading levels in a way that
will provide for them the right materials they need for success. Centers are a
good way to provide the individualized instruction if the right materials are
present. I recommend a center with books on tape categorized
according to level. This center would be excellent for low readers to practice
in over and over again.
Another center can be devoted to reading journal writings previously made
about a story or a book the student read in the audio book center. My first
answer to this question was to add a writing center. My professor redirected
and wrote that writing should not be a part of this block. I consulted my
notes and found where I had written that “people improve reading by
reading” , “ kids get stronger by reading the same thing over and over again
until he can go up to next level,” and “students have to be actively engaged in
reading in order to improve.” Per John Guthrie, the time we spend with a
child reading should be him reading. Another group of students can be
involved at this time in SSR with the teacher conferencing individually.
Knowing that a lot of reading is necessary during the school
day to see growth, we still must find time during the day to get
this in. I read in Tom Gill’s writing through Focus on Literacy,
that if we have to interrupt the school day to schedule
uninterrupted reading, then education is suspect. What do I
think of this? He is saying that all areas of our curriculum
should be saturated with reading. Reading and writing across
the curriculum is a buzz phrase I have heard a lot but we really
don’t do that. If we did our literacy rate would not have
remained the same for so many years. Therefore to get more
necessary time reading we must find every possible
opportunity in health, art, science, and history for our children
to read.
A lot of these books are mundane and are written above
reading level. However, per Dr. Gill , publishers are coming out
with more and more trade books, chapter books and
magazines in the content areas written on various levels of
difficulty and with high interest for the student.
(C.)Make your case for how much reading the students who are reading below grade level need to do on a daily basis and recommend how this be accomplished.
Through the research and study of Guthrie, we know that if a child is reading
below grade level that the 90 minutes a day is not enough to catch up. The
student will remain behind. He states that if a child will read another 30
minutes a day they will grow another one third of a year. Therefore a total of
2 hours of reading a day is necessary to gain one and one third years in a
year. In order to make the time for the additional reading, 30 minutes of
pleasure reading or journal reading at home with family is recommended
and needed for the child to make gain. I know, Dr. Gill, that you added
a comment that we cannot insure that kids are reading at
home. I know this is true. Many schools provide family
involvement activities for reading, hold workshops, send home
books for families and children to read. Our schools in
Cleveland County are mostly Title One Schools. Money is
available for Parent Involvement and materials. We often
provide food and free materials at the workshops mentioned
above to encourage moms or dads and children to participate.
We also provide after school care through Communities in
Schools for low performing students. They are supervised by
certified teachers and have time to complete homework. They
also provide reading activities during these times. Students
can also gain reading time through content area reading on
instructional or independent level.
2. (A.) Make your case for how much reading material you would need for someone reading below grade level (you pick the grade and level, for example, a fourth grader reading on second grade level) to read across the school year. Show the math of how you got to this figure.
If a fourth grader is reading on a second grade level, I would need to provide
plenty of second grade reading material. In looking at some second grade
level books, the pages a book averaged to be 30. An average number of
words on a page in the book equaled 60. If this student is reading 60 words
per minutes at independent level, they will read 720 books a year if they read
the full 2 hours a day needed. 2 pages read a minute would equal a book
every 15 minutes equaling 4 books a day with 20 books a week times 36
weeks equals the 720 books.
(B.) Make your case for instructional and independent level reading vs. grade level reading. In this persuasive essay be sure to address alternative hypotheses and counterpoints that have been, or might be made, and how you would answer them. (For instance, an argument about why you can’t put a third grader in first grade material if it’s his instructional level because the state’s end of year test will be written at 3rd grade level and, therefore, reading at this level is what need to be practical). Be sure to give your rationale and illustrative examples when applicable.
Regardless of grade level the child is in, if he is reading below grade level, he
will learn absolutely nothing if given a harder text he cannot read and will
not pass the state tests given. We cannot teach a child to read hard books. He
must read a lot at independent level and instructional level in
order to gain in reading levels. As the student improves with independent
reading, the teacher can move him up to instructional level. On
independent level the student needs to be able to read with no more
than 2 errors per 100 words and be able to self correct. They need to stay on
instructional level, (5 errors per 100 words) until they test as
independent and then move up again. (Use IRI to find level and test).
They can be exposed to third grade EOG text and questioning strategies for
the EOC test through read aloud by the teacher.
Perhaps they will recall some of this later on as they catch up.
I think our test makers, DPI, administrators and teachers need to be
remediated in what we are doing to the kids that can’t read grade level
reading tests. We already know they will fail unless it is a fluke. We already
know the kids that will pass. We also know that the 50% literate and
illiterate rate still exists over many years so what are we doing? Well, we are
teaching kids to read that already know how, (they continue to excel which is
good but what about the others?), and are pretending to teach the kids that
can’t read. Our whole system of teaching is screwed up and lots of what we
do is for show. As I walk through my neighboring schools on visits I see the
shelves packed with many reading programs that are considered no longer
working or obsolete but they are gloriously displayed for the Board of
Education to see or a SACS committee to ooh and ahh over. Anyway, I think
the programs we currently use don’t work either. Now we are going back to
the old SRA program and principals are frantically trying to find that
program they purchased eons ago and stored somewhere. Our shelves are
also full of test taking strategy books, books on interpreting test scores, what
objectives to work on, practice tests and so on ( Boring but I guess ok for
readers on grade level).
The thing I never see is walking into a third grade classroom to find
mountains of books available to read on all reading levels. I do see kids
sitting in “time out” in the back of the room because they are not
participating in the reading lesson. Well my goodness,
these kids usually are the ones that can’t read and then we put them in the
back because of it (so much for RTI). (Now we have PBS program—Positive
Behavior Support for these wayward kids.) We bought many programs for
all the schools and hired someone to oversee it. We also pay a RTI
supervisor(.
There we have it; the rich get richer and the poor get poorer or the smart
kids get smarter and the illiterate kids------get left behind!!
How do I know these things? Well, I know that research says we have not
improved in reading and the 50% illiterate rate still exists. I know what my
professor teaches in class and the readings he assigned.
Research has shown that we teach to our top readers
and use their tests results as benchmarks for students
of all levels. The material they read in the grade they
are in is on their grade level and reading level and
they read with no more than 2 errors per 100 words.
They continue to excel. Unfortunately, we treat the “ at
Risk” readers poorly when we expect them to read on
the grade level they are in and not the reading level
they are capable of. They make on an average of 18
errors per 100 words which is highly frustrational in
which case they learn nothing.
I was in Title l reading for 13 years. We used programs that did not work
and taught EOG vocabulary. If caught not following the established
curriculum---beware. Finally, one day a few years ago we adapted the CORE
reading program which is similar to Reading Recovery. I liked this program
but the entire time with the children was about 20 minutes a day. The
progress is going to be so slow and at that rate the kids will never catch up
and be able to pass a 3rd grade EOG. These kids are kept back a year and
now that I am teaching in the high school, I see these same kids. They have
outgrown their current peer group due to being held back. They still cannot
read so they fail all courses. They are dropping out even as I write to this
exam. I wish the state department would have test made for individuals just
to check individual growth on that student’s level. That would show the true
picture.
Of course that might never happen because people could not make money on
reading programs and making EOGs. (Sorry—I know this is way too long).
In conclusion to this question, what we need in the
classroom are books on varying levels. We also need IRI
testing of the students to document independent
reading level, Instructional level and frustrational level.
Testing should be administered to all on their own
level to track their individual progress.
3. (A.) Make your case as to what extent a working orthographic knowledge is necessary to become an accomplished reader.
We must have working knowledge of how letters work in words. We get this
knowledge by reading easy material. We are looking at meaning of the words as
we read and sub conscientiously looking at the spelling and using our working
knowledge to check it. As we look at the text our orthographic processor is
seeing the spellings and meanings of the words on the page. Our subconscious
kicks in and we continue to read fluently without interruption in the
orthographic processor and the meaning processor. (This statement is probably
redundant).
If a poor speller or poor reader is reading, his orthographic and meaning
processor are disrupted. He is trying to figure out the word and has to stop in
order to decipher the print. The reading becomes too hard. We need to read
material we can read so that our context processor works and we recognize all
words and can continue to read. Now we can dedicate
our energy and thoughts to the meaning of the text we are
reading. The only way to develop the orthographic processor is to read a lot.
It takes thousands of exposure to words in order for the orthographic
processor to become automatic.
(B.) Explain how 1) reading for meaning/pleasure at independent level and 2) writing for genuine purposes feeling free to try to spell words you don’t know how to spell, each increase one’s phonics/spelling, word recognition, and meaning vocabulary.
When writing for pleasure or genuine purpose the child needs to be free to put
thought on paper without the struggle of spelling properly. Inventive spelling is
necessary in order just to write thoughts without judgment on spelling. If the child
can guess first the spelling of a word and sees corrections later, he will have a better
chance of remembering the correct spelling. Per Marilyn Adams , spelling and
phonics should not take much time and 70% of time should be reading and writing
freely.
All children go through the invented spelling stage. Did Carol Chompsky say this in
a 1972 article? Also, children’s mistakes in writing are their current theory of the
spelling. They can correct the mistakes later but the writing process does not need
to be interrupted.
When reading for pleasure one needs to read on independent level. If they are
reading on frustrational level it is not pleasure reading anymore. It is work. We
start looking at all the consonants and vowels in the words to decode them. Our
eyes have to fixate on each unknown word and try to decode thus killing the reading
fluency and comprehension of the passage. (I know even fluent readers eyes fixate
on each word but it is very brief). When we fixate on the words we
also see every letter, therefore we become better spellers
just through reading.
4. (A.) What can you infer about the reading process by the confusion an accomplished reader feels when reading “The none tolled hymn she had scene a pare of bare feat in hour rheum”? Use Jager-Adams’ four-processor model in your explanation.
Since our orthographic processor is seeing familiar words when we read, our eyes
fixate briefly on every word and continue on. We are also unconscientiously
looking at the spelling. Our working knowledge of what we are seeing allows us to
continue reading if the spelling and words are what we are used to. Difficulty
with reading the sentence also shows that good readers
have seen words so many times that they associate the
particular spellings with particular sounds and the
meaning. The passage above, although after some work we understand it,
confused us. Most of the words are improperly spelled, making us fixate on each
one longer than normal. Per Piaget, we go into disequilibrium or a confused state.
We are uncomfortable in reading the sentence because the spelling vs. the meaning
is wrong in our experience. Our reading is not automatic at this point and we have to
re read before moving to the meaning processor. Charles Profetti says we can only
do one thing at a time (Limited Capacity Model), so we use all our time trying to
decode. Comprehension and fluency is sacrificed.
(B.) What can you infer regarding reading intervention? (instruction from the
above)
Instructing a child to read on a level other than instructional is too hard for him. All
energy and time is spent on trying to process the letters into words, then pronounce
them and then extract meaning. Also, the words in the sentence above have more
than one meaning. Kids need to be able to make a connection between the printed
word and the meaning. The only way to do this is to read for
meaning a lot across all the elementary school years or the
reading can become dreaded and rigorous. The child is frustrated
and loses interest in reading all together.
Kids need to read and re read easy stuff in order to be able to extract meaning
effortlessly. This means on their level. In beginning readers, they go from
orthographic to the sound of the word and then the meaning. We felt like beginning
readers trying to read the sentence above, however, because of our experience level,
we knew what was being said even with the wrong spellings. So it takes thousands
of exposures to make since of words that sound the same with different meanings.
In order to get the exposure the kids have to read at least the recommended 90
minutes a day.
5. (A.) Explain why being read to from books with rich language and compelling plots that are written well above a third grade reading level is so important during the K-3 grades.
Reading books with rich book language and compelling plots will give the child a
sense of story and book language. These fairy tales grab the attention of young
children . They are able to be a part of the story and can make their own
predictions. The story teaches morals and shows emotion. As they are read to and
asked to retell, they do this using book language if they have been read to a lot.
These stories also increase vocabulary of the child. Soon the child has memorized
parts of the story and begins to attempt to read and point at words. These stories
allow the child to experience different things in life and gives him prior knowledge
to use as a comprehension tool later. When the child is able to empathize with the
characters in the book it makes the book their own. If a child learns empathy or
feels it through the fairy tales, in my opinion, it is a great lesson for life.
Reading books such as these create a love of reading that is needed in order to
learn. Per Dr. Gill, up to third grade, stories can be
understood if a child just has oral language. However,
starting around the fourth grade , the stories start to
include the vocabulary of book language. If a child has not
been read to, he may be able to read the words but possibly
not understand the story.
6. (A.) Discuss the effect of speaking a non-standard (vernacular) dialect on the following, and for each what you think are the instructional implications:
a. Word recognition and phonics/spelling
b. Reading comprehension
c. Written composition
d. Attitude towards literacy
e. Thinking
f. Oral communication of complex, abstract, thoughts
a. Students that speak a vernacular understand that river is r-i-v-e-r as
written or spelled but perhaps in their vernacular it is r-i-v-a. As long
as the instructor allows the student to continue to speak as learned,
they can understand the spelling as taught phonetically. They also
have the same word recognition capabilities as anyone with another
vernacular or speech as long as they are literate. Phonics and
spelling should be taught the same without pointing out any
differences in the way a child speaks.
c. Word recognition is not affected because spelling has
evolved to fit any dialect. The spelling system that we have has comes
from all dialects over many years. The dialect one has gives no
correlation with that persons ability to read and and comprehend.
People with any dialect in the same language
reads the same words with the same meaning but
just pronounce them differently in speech.
Another example would be: My sister in law is from Connecticut. She
lives with my brother in North Carolina. Her dialect is totally different
and she says ca for car. The sound she makes after the c
in car equals “ar” in spelling no matter how she
says it. She has taught third graders for 35 years in
North Carolina. Her sense of written word is the same as ours even
though the pronunciation is different.
She also writes with the same rules that we do. The dialect is just the
way the words are pronounced as it relates to where we grew up and
the sounds we hear.
Dialect does not affect writing because spelling has evolved to fit all
dialects. Dialect is just a way of saying words. The problem with
education and dialect is the close minded opinions of teachers in that
they think their way of speaking is the right way.
g.
The spelling system that we have has come from all dialects over many years.
In reference again to d,e,f, and then g,(sorry if I am redundant---I needed to
write this stuff), let me begin by saying that we are all living in the
center of our own close minded universe. Whatever we perceive to be right
or perfect within the group we live in becomes our reality. We all need to
stare at a picture of the world or even the universe to think about what a
small, minute, insignificant person we really are. I live in Casar, NC which is
25 miles from Shelby. Even the people in the city limits of Shelby frown on
the country people. We must be illiterate and backward! How ridiculous.!!
We are all surrounded by group or community after community that are also
living in what they perceive is their reality. No group is better than the other.
Dialects are everywhere and I even believe there is some difference in dialect
within a group of similar descendants. Dialect has nothing to do with a
person’s ability to learn . The screw up comes when certain groups are
judgmental or teachers are judgmental of students due to dialect. The
dialect cannot be changed. It is almost like trying to change the skin color of
a person. Others and yes our teachers can permanently damage the self
esteem of a child by making him feel inferior. This is the damage done in
teaching and then in the employment industry. Talk about “Close the Gap”
movement!! We seem to do everything in our power to widen it. As I
pondered these questions, it came to mind that in the mid 1990’s our local
educational personnel were recruiting teachers from the northern states to
come and teach in our schools. What a slap!!!! Our educational leaders are
the most close minded group of all when it comes to dialect! As a result of
the recruiting movement, many young teachers flocked to the Cleveland
County area to give “new blood” to the area and to teach the poor backward
children with undesirable dialects a better way or phonetic way of speaking.
A lot of these teachers could not hang in
due to culture shock and ran back home. Their perception of reality was
shattered and they found people that existed outside of their experience
range. Even the teachers remaining have failed to make any improvement in
reading test scores! Duh---the vernacular has not changed either!
How unfortunate that our community leaders and local
people also regard certain groups of people in a negative way. I know I have
strayed from the question. There is not correlation in dialect, reading ability,
reading and writing except in a person’s judgmental mind.
Adding to the writing composition question at hand, all children are expected
to write composition with 100% accuracy in syntax and spelling. All
children struggle with writing regardless of dialect and this is due to our
stringent state standard of what proper writing is. If a child fails at writing it
is because he cannot conform and fit into that tiny little box called a writing
rubric.
In employment, yes, I believe dialect poses problems for the non-standard
crowd. Thus the movement to find employees outside a certain area as
explained above.
Because our vernacular or non standard English can
be a problem when seeking employment, students can
learn to “Code Switch”. In each of our communities,
families, or with peers, we all most likely relax in our
method of communication. My grammar may not
always be proper when I am around friends and family
and I lapse into more of the vernacular,
pronunciations and phrases I learned as a child.
When I am in the company of authority or around a
group that views my vernacular as improper English, I
resort to my standard English way of speaking. This is
“Code Switching”.
Children in the classroom and most often African Americans
come to school using the vernacular speech they grew up
with. Teachers view this as improper grammar especially
when subjects and verbs do not agree or slang is used. The
teachers often chastise the child or correct them often. I
feel that is the wrong way to help the student. We must be
accepting of the vernacular. However, teachers can help
students learn standard English or “Code Switch”. We must
explain the reasoning behind code switching from our
vernacular to Standard English. Students, if willing, can
use it depending on whom they are communicating with or
if they are in a social situation where standard English is a
more effective and accepted way of communicating.
7 (A.) Why is there a high correlation between socioeconomic status and whether the dialect one speaks is considered standard or non-standard?
All language has a standard dialect and a non-standard. We usually use our non-
standard or vernacular language among friends and family. Whomever has the
control , power or money in any society or group of people controls what is
spoken. The group of people with the wealth or power usually have
the better paying jobs, political clout and education. Dell Hynes, a linguist that
traveled to Mexico to study dialect found the same type of situation where the
higher paid and more educated group had more power and their dialect was
considered the standard. The groups with poor background and not educated spoke
the non standard or vernacular and were looked down upon.
(B.) Why is there a high correlation between literacy and whether the dialect one speaks is considered standard or non-standard?
Historically a literate group of people in a society or community are also the people
With education and a good paying jobs that have clout in the community and are
politically active. Dialect of some students even sway the opinion of teachers when
listening to the dialect without even seeing the child. There was a study in Memphis
Tennessee. The teachers played tapes with children’s voices (black and white),
saying the same thing but they had different dialects. Just the dialect when hearing
the voices convinced the teachers that some were not as literate as the other
children.
After analyzing the differences in dialect, 88% of the teachers said the white
students were smarter. Even the black teachers had negative attitudes about the
dialect of the black kids. Historically again, the more literate people with a standard
dialect have been studied and they are the students that succeed in school and life
vs. the low socioeconomic kids that speak non-standard. Opinions can ruin people.
If one speaks in the vernacular he is dumb and socially inept.
8. Noam Chomsky inferred that we are born with a language acquisition device (LAD) that is pre-programmed to learn language.
A. What convinced him (and Pinker and others) that this was true? That is, what did they find out kids could do that convinced them that they are prewired to learn language?
Noam Chompsky believes everyone is born with LAD and already had knowledge of
the words of their language. He believed that children heard the language being
spoken even in the womb (especially the prosody), and that they were born into the
language. They did not learn the language from just copying what they heard but
made hypotheses about what they heard over and over again and formed rules
from it for their language. Again, the child was already programmed with a variety
of hypotheses when they were born and had to put the language being spoken into
each formula to see which one was correct. This is called their Language Acquisition
Device. This is per research of Chompsky.
A child interacts with parents as they grow. The parents and especially the mother
reinforces the babbling that the child makes and says words back to the child as in
translation. Babies coo and babble from 6 months up to a year before they utter a
real word. The babblings and translations are usually repeated often as the family
gets into a daily routine. The child dresses, eats, plays, visits, goes bye bye and
other things in a repetitive daily manner. In other words, parents emphasize certain
words. The babies also learn prosody and intonation by hearing parents and
mainly the mom talk. We say the mom because historically she was the one
spending most of the time with the babies. As the child gets older, they
begin to understand words right before they turn one. At
this point the child knows the pragmatics of language and
begins saying words from one year up to the age of two.
As the child’s LAD is working and as he hears language he
continually hypothesizes or deducts rules from what is
heard and tries to apply the rules to words. The child says
words he has never heard before. We know this per
Chompsky’s research because children go through stages of
word calling. They say goed for goes or go using the ed rule.
The child has never heard anyone say goed but he applied
the ed rule even though it was incorrect.
B. What do they think this language acquisition device is doing with the language it is exposed to and its own language production system to be able to figure it out?
Chompsky said that the LAD (mechanism in the brain we are born with),
has built in switches that are constantly filtering through language being heard to
see if it fits into the speech patterns of the child’s mother
language. If a child hears a different language , he without
awareness will recognize the language is not his.
The child through the LAD continually uses his own
grammar rules to acquire his language that is most often
heard. He hears this language through father, mother, close
family members. Everyday routines where words are often
repeated as in bathing, eating and playing become very
familiar. Eventually when the child begins speaking he has
an opportunity to practice the language as he understands
it through the LAD.
.
C. 1) What does this tell us about how we acquire a sense of book language? 2) How does this translate to how we help our students acquire or increase their sense of book language?
If babies learn spoken language in their dialect from many repetitions of the
word, then we must also read to children from books a lot for them to acquire
book language. If stories and books have not been read to the child from the
beginning, it is hard for him to learn book language. There is a book, “Child’s
Sense of Story”, written by Arthur Appleby, where he applied the theory that
reading to a child over and over again and letting them retell develops book
language. Actually, the retelling was Piaget’s idea. He said developing book
language was a developmental process and necessary.
9. (A.) To what extent do you think each of the principles of literacy learning and instruction is being honored in your school?
(B.) Why or why not? (You can address A and B together for each principle)
I think we are way overdoing the phonics teaching. Teachers are dedicating approx.
30 to 45 minutes a day on Saxon phonics. Our children are experts on macrons and
breves and still cannot read. Not only do we spend too much school time on this,
but homework up to 30 minutes a night is assigned. Not delivering on the
homework brings grave consequences in the form of failing spelling. Parents have
no idea what all this stuff is in Saxon phonics and cannot help at home even if they
wanted too. Spelling test are also a biggy during the week. Spelling word are
usually assigned from a sight word list and Saxon phonics recommendations. Kids
continue to fail spelling and can’t read based on these teachings, however, a child
can be scarred for a long time seeing the big F on the report card.
One thing we do that is good is to allow the child to check out books from the library
on their book level to read. I applaud this but they have to take an accelerated
reading test on these books and accrue a certain amount of points or good grades a
week or again be plagued with the F. This is a huge part of the reading grade and
having a computerized test on all books just plum takes the joy out of it. I have seen
parents help their child cheat to pass the tests and I have seen frantic children get
sick from the stress. Oh and did I mention they could only check out two books a
week? They cannot check out another one at all even all year if those books are not
returned. They say we are teaching responsibility. I say we are teaching fear and
failure.
There is a beautiful bookroom at the school with thousands of leveled sets
and even book bags to take home with books, books on tape and activities to go with
them. The room is impeccable and has been for seven years. Something is wrong
with this picture. Oh well---the room looks good if we have visitors.
The spelling and the writing block seem to take up most of the time dedicated to the
language arts block. Yes, I know that writing is not reading but gee, we can’t fail that
4th grade writing test you know. I know I said 4th grade but we always overdo
writing from K and up to prepare for this test.
Sometimes the students can pick a book just to read and we do SSR. However,
better make sure you are really reading even if you can’t because the teacher is
going to conference you!! Then if all that isn’t enough to teach any kid to read, we
must remember to read at least 20 minutes a night at home. Parents must sign the
reading log to prove that the student read. I have seen older brothers and sisters
sign or the kid in tears begging dad to sign the paper before they get out of the car at
the school car rider line. If the log is not signed---another F. The signing becomes
the most important thing and not the reading.
Guess I think we could do a better job.
10. In order for the balance of 40, 30, 20, 10 to be approximated in your school, what do you think should stay and what do you think should go?
Wow---that is a tricky question. A state test in science has been added to our
elementary level children so we must prepare lots for that. Then we have not done
too well in math over the years. A new program was just adopted this year and
Saxon math was dumped. We have to work really hard now to prove its success
and its worth since thousands of dollars were spent on a new book adoption.
This is going to cut into our academic day.
At least we have somewhat of an excuse( we think), in reading since we are 80%
free and reduced lunch and a Title 1 school.
Teachers are also inconsistent in the way the academic day is spent.
I know the language arts block is 90 minutes but this includes lots of phonics,
spelling practice and writing. In K-2. In grade 3 and 5 the EOG questions, vocabulary
and strategies are taking the lead in time spent in the block. In grade 4 we have the
EOG stuff too but add to that the writing test preparation.
In answer to the question, for now I would dump a lot of the phonics and spelling in
K-2 grades and concentrate a good portion of the block (40 minutes on reading
aloud and reading individually with guidance). The books would be fairy tales and
fables with rich language and engaging plots in order to gain the interest of the
readers. We have so much Title 1 money that tutors can be hired just to read with
the students that are reading below grade level. Thirty minutes can be spent on
children reading simple stories independently and having a retell. Since phonics is
so heavily pushed, use the 20 minute block just to work with letter sounds in words
that are in simple rhymes from the fairytales we have read. The remaining time we
can read a science passage, social studies passage in trade books that have been
purchased by or Title 1 money. In the grades 3-5, we can also use tutors reading
with behind readers up to the full 90 minutes if possible. I say let the accelerated
kids read on their own during this time and conference with the teacher as well.
All of this time reading, to be effective, must be on the
children’s instructional and independent reading level.
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