Best Practices in My 2nd Grade Classroom



Best Practices in My 2nd Grade Classroom

Holly Tilley

RE 5710

Dr. Dave Koppenhaver

April 21, 2011

Best Practices in My Second Grade Classroom

Introduction

Growing up I always knew that I wanted to be a teacher. I was that student who sat in the classroom and really watched the teacher so I could go home and practice what she was doing with my brother. Being a teacher today has been one of the most fulfilling accomplishments in my life. I knew what I wanted to become and I went after it in full force. After graduating I knew I would like to return to complete a master’s program but I didn’t know which direction to go in but that soon changed after stepping foot in the classroom. I wanted to make the most out of a master’s program and I wanted to take part in a program that I knew would benefit me and my students in my class. Based off of what I had seen from students I became eager to enhance my knowledge on teaching children how to read and write. I felt confident about everything else I was teaching but I knew there was more to teaching students how to read and write and I wanted to know what that was.

Learning to read and write is critical to a child’s success in school and later in life. Each day as I walk into my classroom I know I have to make the best decisions for each of my students to make them the best reader and writer that they can be. That is the main reason why I returned to school to get my master’s. Part of the return was for me to become a better teacher but mostly for my students. I want to make sure that I impact their lives in a way that I know will benefit them in the long run. I wanted my students to share a love of reading with me.

“The greatest gift is a passion for reading. It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind. It is a moral illumination.”

~Elizabeth Hardwick

I currently teach 2nd grade at a small rural school that has a huge focus on Math, Science, and Technology. We are not yet classified as a Title One school. I teach reading and language arts for a combine total of 135 minutes, which is 2 hours and 15 minutes each day. I really like how my literacy program in my classroom is the focus of our learning and school day. There are aspects of my program that I do like and there are some that I wish to change. When looking over the different questions to respond to for this paper it really had me thinking more deeply about my own teaching technique and how I have changed my teaching throughout the course of this master program based on the best practices that I have been taught. I try to make sure that I am always using some type of instruction that has been researched and proven to be a best practice. I want to make sure that I give my students the best and through out this program I have learned many valuable teaching techniques that I can use to enhance my students reading and writing abilities.

B. Materials, Technologies and Media

My classroom is full of materials that are used by me, colleagues, and my students. Most of the materials are provided by my county but some do belong to me. When thinking about the materials that I currently use in my classroom I mainly use books. Our main source of reading material is our basal for whole class instruction. I also use leveled books provided by our Fountas and Pinnell kit, novel sets, and books on compact disc for small group instruction or one-on-one time.

Leveled books are used for guided reading and independent reading as well. Leveled books allow for students to be challenged just enough and gives them instructional reading at their level. I am a big fan of novels and I love when I have the chance to use a novel set with my class. It is like a whole new world has been discovered when they get their books for the unit. I like the freedom that novels give me and my students and all the activities that I can integrate with our novel. I am not a fan of having a structured program like the basal but it does provide excellent literature for my students. Novels are also used by my higher level guided reading groups to complete literature circles and book talks. I have a few books on compact disc that my students can listen to and read along with. I really encourage my struggling reader’s to take advantage of these resources during SSR time. When I say struggling reader’s I mean the students who need help with their reading fluency. I also have a few literacy games that are used to build students reading fluency. When it comes to teaching Fundations, (phonics program) my resources are very limited. I only have 4 letter boards where students can actually manipulate and move tiles around to build words and I have 22 students. So, I have started incorporating word sorts into my phonics approach that goes along with what our program is asking us to do at the time. I think my most prize possession when talking about my materials is my classroom library. I have it separated into genres with all types of reading materials. All of my books are in baskets on my bookshelves with the covers facing out so students will be intrigued by a book cover and want to read that particular book. These books are available to students all day long and they are allowed to use them during SSR time or when they have finished an assignment.

I also have many different writing materials to help facilitate my writing instruction. Each student has their own writing folder to help keep their writings together and then I also give them a separate writing folder with many different writing resources inside. For instance, inside the folders you would find; appropriate story starters, describing words, transitional words, sparkle words, etc. I also have chart paper, pencils, pens, white boards for each student and markers.

Since I teach at a technology school I have access to different technology resources to help enhance student learning and engagement. Our school has a whole class set of netbooks which I sign out for my students to use often. We use those to conduct research about a specific topic or to complete webquest that go along with our reading materials. Just by letting students use the internet provides them with new text formats, new purposes for reading, and new ways to interact with reading (Coiro, 2003). I also check out the netbooks to give my students opportunities to participate in our online learning community through blogging (Siegle, 2007). Students are able to blog about books they are reading in independent time and students also blog in a journal format during our butterfly unit to explain what they see while observing their butterfly. My main source of technology that I use daily with my students is our ActivBoard. Every lesson is focused around the ActivBoard. Students can interact with the board with every skill that is being taught. They can manipulate and move objects around on the board to make sense so they can understand their own learning. During reading we use the board mainly for vocabulary practice, completing story maps, or for word sorting to go along with our phonics skill of the week. We also use the board to play many interactive games.

We also have access to many flip video cameras and many digital cameras. In recent years I have taken full advantage of using the flip videos and digital cameras but I have not used them with my 2nd graders this year. I know that my students would love to get their hands on these technology devices so I do plan on using them before the end of the school year. I want my students to have the opportunity to be active in their own learning and I feel like technology does that. Our world is so driven on technology today and I want to make sure that I provide my students with what they need to succeed in the coming years. I have used the flip videos for students to record each other reading books and then uploading them to our website for them to watch at home. We also used the flip videos to make podcast, which I have done with older students but not my 2nd graders. As I am writing this I am asking myself why have I not giving this opportunity to my 2nd graders. They are just as capable of completing that task as previous students. Digital cameras are used to take pictures and create stories out of them. Recently students took pictures themselves of an object and then wrote a poem about their picture and it was very engaging and interesting to see their response. Another type of technology that I use mainly is our document camera. I use that to bring images to life for students. When I am reading a loud to students it allows everyone to see the pictures and words while I am reading to them (even though I like to hold it up and show everyone the pictures). I have many technology devices at my fingertips but I feel like I have been giving my students the short end of the deal. I feel like with so much being asked by teachers today and so much focus on testing that we don’t have time to actually use the technology that is around us. This is something that I strongly need to work harder on and integrate into my weekly lesson plans.

I try to reach out to my students by using different media types such as; video clips, blogging, movie maker, storybook online, audio, virtual tours, songs and much more. Every student does not learn the same and by having these different resources at least I can feel like I am reaching the majority of learners. Out of all of the media types listed above I use video clips the most. I am constantly streaming videos to help my students build background knowledge about what they are reading or learning. I use storybook online daily during snack time so students can hear other people reading books to them. That is one of the best ways for students to improve on their reading skills just by listening to others read to them. One type of media that I really enjoy to use in my classroom is songs. If I can find a song to go along with what we are learning then the students are going to hear it. I play a lot of songs during our Fundations time to help students hear the different letter sounds, vowel team patterns, and etc. The students really enjoy listening to these songs, that sometimes I don’t even think they know they are learning. At the beginning of the year I started a song book were we would add a new song each week. We would sing it everyday during our morning meeting. Each student had their own folder with the lyrics to each song where they could read them when they wanted to and especially during SSR time. I could see this really helping some of my students with their reading fluency. However this became really hard to keep with and made our mornings very rushed so I had to take it out. I hope to find a better place to fit this into my schedule because I thought it was a really creative and fun way to help enhance my student’s reading abilities.

Looking at the materials I have available I feel like I do pretty well with teaching my students how to read and write. I wished I had more of a selection to choose from with novel sets for my class but we are very limited and we make do with what we have. I still plan on using novels with my students along with the basal. When really looking at all of the materials that I use to help enhance a more engaging learning environment I really need to focus more on using the technology tools.

C. Reading Instruction

What does reading instruction look like in my classroom?

Reading Instruction in my classroom starts out everyday with fundations, which is a phonics approach program that our county follows. We spend about 20 minutes daily on our phonics instruction. During this time students are participating in word sorts or other meaningful activities that go along with our program. My assistant sometimes will pull small groups to work with the letter boards at this time as well. We start our phonics lessons out each day with reviewing our letter sounds and different vowel team sounds. After reviewing sounds we then move into our concepts that are to be taught. All of the lessons are on my activboard so students are allowed to come to the front and move letter tiles around to make words. Also during this time I integrate our spelling words for the week. For some reason our grade level likes to stick with the spelling words form our basal, which means we are teaching one phonics skill and then another skill for spelling. Next school year hopefully I can get the other teachers on board with combining our fundations skill with our spelling so we are not teaching two separate skills in one week. I think if we focus on just one skill students would have more practice and become more fluent with that particular skill. I also use different sorts for students spelling words.

After our phonics instruction we move into our shared reading (Routman, 1988) time. This is conducted daily for approximately 30 minutes. Each student has access to the text that is being discussed at this time. I am usually using our basal story for the week or our class novel. With each type of text we do multiple reads of each. Each read has a new purpose or maybe we are focusing on a new reading strategy. No matter what, each time is reading for a new purpose. I want to keep the students engaged in the story and always looking for something new. During this time is a great time for me to model to my students how I use reading strategies like re-reading to help me perform the task of reading the text. I also introduce the vocabulary during this time on Monday’s and each day after students participate in a 5 minute vocabulary exercise to help build their knowledge about our words. Sometimes I have students to write down their definitions in their notebooks but I give them the definition. I never have them to just look up words and write down the meaning. I also like to use the Frayer Model to help get my students to understand different vocabulary words. The Frayer Model is a graphic organizer used for word analysis and vocabulary building. This four-square model prompts students to think about and describe the meaning of a word or concept by . . .

• Defining the term,

• Describing its essential characteristics,

• Providing examples of the idea, and

• Offering non-examples of the idea.

These are the 4 basic prompts that are discussed but sometimes I modify the prompts and add synonyms and antonyms of the word. I really think using a graphic organizer to help students analyze words is a great technique and very adaptable for any grade level. This really makes the students think about the word on a deeper level than just reading a definition.

Once our shared reading time has ended we move into Reader’s Workshop. Readers' Workshop is defined as a student-centered, student-paced reading program. Students practice and learn reading through self-pacing, self-selection, sharing, listening, and a lot of reading (Atwell, 1998). Readers’ Workshop along with guided reading, last for about 50 minutes of our reading instruction time. I try to build off our shared reading experience and focus on the same strategy that we are using for our basal story. Usually reader’s workshop is more focused on comprehension strategies. I start out reader’s workshop with a short mini-lesson using some type of literature; whether it is poetry, a picture book, or sometimes I will use or basal story, etc. I use these materials to help model the comprehension strategy that I would like for them to work on with their partner during reader’s workshop time. For reader’s workshop I select 12-15 books for my students to use with a strategy and then together with their partner they can select the book that they would like to use to complete the activity. Reader’s workshop takes place everyday but does not look the same everyday. At the beginning of the week students select the book they would like to use and they just read it and become familiar with it. Then later on throughout the week they began to complete different exercises that go along with our strategy. Students are paired up during this time of reading instruction. One main reason why they are paired up is because I am also conducting guided reading (Fountas & Pinnell, 1996) during this time as well. Guided reading is an instructional setting that enables teachers to work with small groups of students to help them learn effective strategies for processing text with understanding. I have 4 different guided reading groups and I meet with 2 and my assistant meets with 2 everyday. This is the only time in the day that I have an assistant. My guided reading groups are based on instructional reading levels determined by giving our K2 assessment based on Fountas and Pinnell benchmarks/levels. My assistant and I both have groups at the same time for 20 minutes each so my students need someone they can talk to if they have a question or get stuck. Students can learn more from their peers and I love it when I can give them opportunities to work together. My high and low groups have guided reading at the same time so during their reader’s workshop time I can pair them up together for support for each other. For my low readers to hear the high students read to them makes them want to become better readers and I see them trying harder. I think by far this is the best time of my day with my students. If I could change one thing I would want to move guided reading to another time so I can interact with my students during reader’s workshop time but I can’t always get what I want so I have to adapt it to make it work in my room. Even though I am not with my student’s during their reader workshop time I can still see learning taking place and growth being made. Just to see my students interacting with each other and discussing their learning makes me glow. On Fridays my assistant and I get to walk around during reader’s workshop time and discuss books with each set of partners because we don’t have guided reading on Fridays.

Once we have wrapped up with Reader Workshop and Guided Reading our class heads to lunch but our reading instruction is not over. When students arrive back from lunch they select their books for SSR (Garan & DeVoogd, 2008) time and begin reading. We allow for 20 minutes each day for SSR time. I let my students read anywhere they would like to during this time and with whoever they would like to. After SSR I let a few of my student’s share their book in hopes that someone else might like to read that book at another time. I have noticed many book clubs forming during this time which shows me that my students are using this time very wisely and having fun with reading. Groups will even sit at our guided reading tables during SSR so they can feel like a group working together. My students will go to the media center and check out the same books so they can read together during SSR time and talk about their book. If you were to ask any of my students what is their favorite part of our day they would tell you SSR and that makes me smile. They look forward to this time everyday and no matter what I never take SSR away from my students. I believe that students should be allowed to have that free choice to read whatever they would like, as long as it is appropriate. I don’t mind if my students are just looking at pictures in a book they are still reading and hopefully creating a story in their minds. By letting students control their learning during this time gets them engaged and wanting to read more. During this time I like to read a good book as well but it always seems like that never gets to happen. I know that by me reading as well really motivates the students to read (Methe & Hintze, 2003). I try to work and read with some of my lower readers to help build their confidence and to work on their reading rates as well. If I have to work with students during this time I still let those students select books of interest to them but on their reading level. I want my students to have a love of reading and the best way is to provide them with a classroom that embraces literature and a teacher who gives them every opportunity to open a book and read.

The last part of my reading instruction takes place at the end of the day. For about 15 minutes I close our school day be using a read aloud or listening to stories being read aloud on the internet. I believe that a read aloud is very important for young children when they are learning how to read. By listening to a teacher or someone else on the computer really shows the students what a good reader should sound like when reading. Read alouds also help enhance a child’s vocabulary knowledge (Beck, McKeown and Kucan, 2002) and comprehension skills (Santoro, Chad, Howard, Baker, 2008). When choosing books to read aloud I let the student’s pick so they will be engaged in story. Once they select a book I try to take it home and read it myself and make any stopping points that I might want to make and jot down vocabulary words to discuss while reading. My students are exhausted at the end of the day but they really enjoy the read alouds and they are very active when discussing different concepts about the books. To me this time is very rewarding because I can really see what all my students are learning from different skills and strategies that we have discussed in our readers workshop time.

I feel like I spend most of my day trying to teach my students how to become better readers but really all I want for them is to love to read.

Comprehension

To help build my student’s comprehension abilities I try to incorporate different learning techniques. I feel like I am constantly questioning students and getting them to think more about their responses and to reach outside the box. With me being so pushy and wanting more, I hope enhances their comprehension skills. There is not a day that goes by that I am not doing something to enhance their understanding of text.

One big thing that our county is focusing on right now is the use of anchor charts (Harvey & Goudvis, 2007). Each month we focus mainly on one comprehension strategy with our students and create anchor charts to hang on our walls. The anchor charts are made during mini-lessons of reader’s workshop time to help guide students in the right direction with their own thinking during independent or partner work in reader’s workshop. I explicitly teach (Pearson & Dole, 1987) all comprehension strategies to my student’s which means I model the strategy that I want my students to learn. Then I allow for my students to practice using the strategy with guidance from me, my assistant, or a peer. After I feel like that have had enough guided practice then students will independently practice the strategy on their own where they will take full responsibility of their learning. Along with the anchor charts I like to use different graphic organizers. I feel like graphic organizers help students to put their thinking on paper where they can better understand. Sometimes we will use a graphic organizer to help with the comprehension strategy on our anchor chart. I don’t use graphic organizers daily but when I do I make sure they are appropriate and effective for the strategy we are working on.

I also use my read aloud times to help build their comprehension strategies. I am always asking questions before, during and after to get them thinking about what is being read. The types of questions that I ask require my students to make predictions, use their background knowledge, make inferences, summarize, etc. To answer these types of questions require my students to use different comprehension strategies that we talk about during lessons so they are getting extra practice which will only enhance their comprehension skills. I also have my students to turn and talk during this time to share their ideas about the story. Something new that I have recently learned about is text talk (Beck & McKeown, 2001). Text talk is more directed towards read alouds to enhance student’s abilities to construct meaning. I feel like I do something similar to text talk but would really like to invest in a few stories through the program with scholastic to get me started on the right foot with this instructional tool.

Another instructional method that I use to build comprehension is reciprocal teaching (Palinesar & Brown, 1989). Reciprocal teaching is an instructional activity that takes place during reading with the purpose of gaining meaning from text and self-monitoring. Research reveals that reciprocal teaching has a positive effect on students reading comprehension ability. Reciprocal Teaching is defined as an instructional procedure originally designed to enhance students’ reading comprehension. The procedure is best characterized as a dialogue between teacher and students. There are four strategies that reciprocal teaching engages students with; summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting.

I feel like I use many things in my classroom to help enhance my student’s comprehension abilities. Not only do I use the things that I mentioned during whole class but during my small group time as well. During small group time students are receiving instruction on their own reading level so comprehension skills and strategies may vary due to students needs.

Fluency

Right along with comprehension I am daily incorporating activities to help make my students become fluent readers. Fluency is important because it provides a bridge between word recognition and comprehension. To be able to comprehend the text students need to be somewhat fluent in their reading or it will interfere with their understanding of the text. Students who are less fluent in their reading focus most of their attention on figuring out the words instead of understanding what the text is trying to say. To help create those fluent readers I try to incorporate different approaches into my instruction that I have found effective in research.

One of the main things I use is repeated readings (Dowhower, 1989). Not only do I use this with my students who are struggling with their fluency but with all of my students during guided reading. Repeated readings are not just for struggling students but for all students. Rereading allows for students to practice reading the same text over which allows them to become familiar with words they might not know. For students to become fluent they just really need to practice reading. Rereading also enhances a students understanding of the text to where they can interact with it. To go a long with repeated readings I make sure that I give appropriate feedback to my students so they know what they might need to work on and practice. For some of my really low students I also have them to complete different exercises with our word wall words and our leveled sight words.

One of the most effective ways for students to become fluent is through modeling (Rasinski, 2003). Our students need to know what fluent reading sounds like so we should provide it for them. I use my read aloud times to practice fluent reading for my students; which means as a teacher I need to read the book ahead of time. I also have books on tapes and cd’s that my students may listen to and follow along with. This is another activity that I think many of my students would benefit from when trying to enhance their fluency.

One instructional tool that I have recently found in research to be effective in building fluent readers is reader’s theater (Hudson, 2006). I have yet to use this type of instruction in my classroom but I have heard great things about reader’s theater. I have leveled scripts (Kuhn, 2005) for students on different reading levels but I have not found the time to incorporate this type of instruction into my reading instruction time. The purpose of reader's theater is to teach and practice fluent reading of printed text. By using reader's theater scripts, teachers can encourage students to read with expression and to practice important fluency attributes, such as pause, inflection, and intonation.   Reader’s theater can be a great learning experience for students while their having fun at the same time.

One of the most common ways that I help my students build their fluency is by partner reading. I allow my students to read with a partner during SSR time and even during reader’s workshop time. Just being able to have that other person to listen to can really help student’s to build their own reading skills. When I pair students up I usually pair a higher student with a lower student so that the higher student can be a model and can offer support and feedback to their partner.

For my students to become fluent readers they need the time to actually read, reread, and practice. The only way that anyone becomes better at anything is by practicing and I feel like that goes for reading as well. As a teacher I need to make sure that I give my students that time to practice reading and I feel like my SSR time provides my students extra time to practice their reading skills.

E. Language Arts/Writing

I address language arts into everything that I do throughout the day. I am able to integrate it into any of my lessons. Teaching language arts is a very important part of my daily instruction. The purpose of teaching Language Arts is to teach students the language abilities they need to communicate effectively as individuals and as contributing members of society. My students are involved in reading and writing all day, every day of the week. When thinking about how I teach literature I basically teach it through reading to my students. I read all types of genres to my students so they can become familiar with the different types of reading material and writing. I also like to develop units around genres where we spend at least 2 weeks on that particular genre and complete different activities around it.

Another important part of my daily routine is writing instruction. My writing instruction is delivered to my student’s through a Writer’s Workshop (Calkins, 2005) model. I only have 30 minutes for writing instruction so I have adapted Writer’s Workshop to fit my class. I begin each workshop with a short mini-lesson that either focuses on a genre of writing, conventions, story content, etc. During the mini-lesson I model everything that I would like for them to consider in their own writing. Sometimes I am able to use mentor text when introducing or reviewing certain elements of writing and especially author’s craft. Anytime I can use books to help my students to understand a topic I use them. After the short mini-lesson students are sent back to their seats to work on their own writing. For the first 10 minutes everyone writes including me. After the first 10 minutes I start conferencing with individual students. I try to at least get to 4 students a day. During the conferences I like to see what my students are thinking and I always try to help them build off their own thoughts, not mine. I always start out by giving them one compliment about their piece of work. Then if something is needed to be changed or added in their writing I instruct that student on their level of understanding to help complete the task that I am working with them on. After students have time to write and I conference with them we have a sharing time where students can share their writing pieces. I decide on which student I would like to share based off of my conferences that I had that day and one that has used the topic of my mini lesson in their writing. After students have finished their pieces of work and went through the writing process where it has been edited then they begin publishing their work. After they publish their work they share it with the class and I hang it up in our room or put it in their writing folder to share with their parents.

One of my favorite things to teach my students during language arts is poetry. I use many poetry books to introduce the concepts of different styles of poetry writing. My students love when they get to make their own poems. However I feel like as a teacher I push poetry to the side and I do not give it the attention that it deserves. Being a part of this master’s program has given me some really great ideas for incorporating poetry into my language art instruction in a more effective way. I would really like to work on developing a poetry unit/poetry workshop for my students to participate in during their reader’s workshop time and writing time. I think students need practice reading poetry to really understand what poetry is. I could also tie in some comprehension pieces during reader’s workshop and then really focus on developing our own pieces during writer’s workshop time. In her book, In the Middle, Nancy Atwell writes: “teachers I knew avoided teaching poetry because they felt intimidated by it. They perceived poetry as difficult to read, difficult to understand, and, especially, difficult to talk about. They stopped reading it the moment it stopped being required. Seventy years ago half the literature taught to fourth grades in the United States was poetry. Today, it’s 97 percent prose and just 3 percent poetry. Either we love it, as I did, but can’t imagine how to begin to help students experience it…or we don’t read it and don’t love it … Poetry deserves better and kids deserve better.” Students need to be surrounded by poetry when discussing this type of genre. They need to be able to have many different resources to look at and read on their level. I would really like to create poetry stations during my poetry unit so students will be able to interact more with this type of writing and be able to create and illustrate their own pieces. For each genre of writing I like to develop my writer’s workshops around that theme and keep them going for at least 2 weeks. During these times I use strategies and skills needed for each type of writing.

I want my students to be successful writers and I want them to understand that writing is a way of communicating meaning. I feel like through my teaching and my ongoing education that I am able to provide my students with the writing instruction that they need.

F. Responses to reading and literature

There are many different ways readers can respond to literature in order to gain insights into text, reveal their thinking, and interact with literature in meaningful ways. A person's response to a piece of literature is the only way to know what they understand and feel about individual pieces and collections of literature. In my classroom I try to offer as many different ways as possible for my readers to respond to their text. I know that some students respond better orally and some respond better by writing their responses. In my room I accept both forms of responses. I sat down and made a list of the different types of responses that I use with my students and the list surprised me. I used more than I thought! I won’t list all that I do but I will discuss the ones that I use most often.

One of the most often reader’s responses that I use in my classroom is oral responses. I am constantly asking questions before, during, and after readings to see what my students understand or to see how they feel. I usually am doing this during whole class and small group instruction. When I do this whole class I know I can not see what all of my students are individually thinking so I usually have a follow up response that students have to turn in. When addressing the whole class to respond orally they turn and talk to a partner and I monitor by walking around. I also create anchor charts (Harvey & Goudvis, 2007) with my class which leads to student responses being placed on the chart. I use anchor charts mainly to introduce and help support our comprehension strategies. When I read a text to students I will ask them to respond on an index card or orally for me to write on our anchor charts. One of the main reasons why I ask for oral responses is to model for my students different types of responding behaviors like; asking good questions, oral summary, etc. I want them to be able to conduct their own responses when in literature circles and working with partners.

One type of reading instruction that I have adapted into my classroom is literature circles (King, 2001) and I absolutely love them. This is a great tool to use for reader’s response. I love sitting back and watching my student’s taking control of their own learning. Literature circles are student lead discussions that revolve around a book. Students work in groups to discuss books of their choice, taking on roles to help facilitate the work. During literature circles students are given different roles in which they have to fulfill, which means bringing back to the group to discuss their response. This type of work also holds students accountable for their work. If a student does not participate then they are letting their group down. This is a great format to help students begin thinking about how to respond to their own books during independent time.

Not only do I use a lot of oral response but I use many different types of written responses. I like to tie in some writing whenever I can during instruction. I would say that I use writing responses more than oral just because it allows me to see each student’s response instead of just a few when asking the whole class to respond orally. I feel like I have a better understanding of each as an individual. For my students who I know struggle with writing I have them to respond by writing but then let them explain their writing to me in their own words and then I can help them add to their writing.

Our reader’s workshop is developed around responding to literature based off of the strategy that we are working on at the time. So usually students are working on a type of written response to turn in to me. Sometimes the responses are partner work and other times they are independent assignments. When they are working on independent assignments they still have their partner for assistants but they are responsible for their own work and turning it in. Usually the activities are based around some type of comprehension strategy so their responses might be retelling, summarizing, comparing and contrasting, analyzing, etc. I try to think of fun and engaging ways for students to respond and focus on these strategies. I have had my students to create book jackets, book reviews, write a letter to a character, flip books, books of their own, and many more activities. I don’t just give my students a list of questions for them to answer to see what they understand. I provide meaningful activities for them to express how they feel about a text and to show what they have learned from it.

There are many things that I would like to add to my options of reading responses and one would be a reading response journal. I don’t really ever have my students to journal during reading time and I think this would be an excellent way to integrate writing as well. I would like to create a journal for my student’s to respond in after their SSR time. I would only give them a few minutes to respond but I think this would be an interesting way for me to see how they are using strategies and skills in their own reading books. I would try and respond to each student as well. I would also keep a reading response journal and rotate it around the room so each student has a chance to read my responses and respond back to me. I would also like to start integrating the use of technology through an online learning community (Larson, 2009) such as a blog. Anything to do with technology has the student’s attention at first glimpse. I would like to set up some type of reader’s response for our weekly stories in a blog format and allow students to make their own comments about the story and respond to others in the class as well. I have used a blog for other things other and the conversations that I see occurring are amazing. I would like for my students to communicate about their readings in the same way and create online discussions about their text.

Responding to literature and reading may be hard for some students and easy for others but as teachers we have to be able to find ways that will allow everyone to express their thinking of a text. Whether the response is oral or written you need to know how your student is interpreting the text to make sure that are on the right path.

Conclusion

As a third year teacher I do not feel like I know everything about teaching but I do feel like I have the confidence to make the best decisions in my classroom regarding reading and writing based on what I have learned in this Master’s program. I entered this program to become a better educator and to ensure the best education for my students and I feel like I have the knowledge that I need to assist my students on the right path. Not only do I want to impact their lives today and tomorrow but for forever and I feel like this program has helped my in doing that by teaching me the best practices used in reading and writing.

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