Teaching First Grade: Reality and What Works For Me



Teaching Reading in the First Grade: Reality and What Works For Me

Introduction

Each day in my busy classroom, located at the end of a long hall filled with students in Kindergarten through Second grade, I anxiously await my 23 first grade students. Ideally I would like to only be looking for 16 students to enter my classroom but that is not reality. As my students arrive to school they are eager to learn and see what the new day holds, as am I too, ready to see what is in store and the day in the life of a first grade classroom.

As I am approaching completion of the Masters in Reading program at Appalachian State University I have learned information that has affected the way I teach reading in my classroom. My main focus in this program was to gain a better understanding to teach reading and language arts. Through my studies I have learned ways that impacts my students to help them in their journey of reading and language arts. Morris says, literacy is the key to success, (2003). I am a firm believer that reading will take you anywhere; however you have to be willing to work to become successful. There are some major components to teaching reading that I incorporate in my classroom: assessment, kinds of materials, types of reading instruction, and the instructional needs of my students. These are the four main parts I consider to be important in my classroom and allow my students to be successful. I hope to provide the reader with a brief synopsis of how I go about teaching reading to my students.

Assessment: What Kinds and What Purposes?

Assessment is one vital part that I implement in my classroom. Morris et al, state: children who fall behind in reading instruction in the first grade have difficulty catching up with their peers (2003). Knowing that my students who fall behind will have difficulty with reading in first grade and probably for several years if their not caught up; assessment is a crucial part of finding out what my students know and where I need to begin reading instruction at. All of the assessments that I have lised below are a teacher requirement in Yadkin County; however, I feel they are valid assessments and offer the reliability that I need to know where my students are functioning.

One of the very first assessments that I do in my classroom is a beginning letter assessment. This letter assessment allows me to assess my students to see whether or not they know capital and lower case letters of the alphabet. This is very important for me to determine what students know their alphabet and the students who do not know all or some of their letters. As a part of the assessment I also ask students for the sound of the letters and a word that starts with the letter. This assessment serves as a beginning starting point for my reading instruction.

After this assessment I also do a SORT (Slossan Oral Reading Test). The SORT is broken down into lists of words that start with Kindergarten level words and continue up through upper elementary level sight words. This allows me to see what words students may know or where they are functioning at as far as their sight word level.

I also do a beginning writing assessment at the beginning of the year. This assessment is an un-aided writing topic that I ask students to write about a certain topic. This allows me to see my students writing ability, by using this assessment I can get a good grasp of what my students know about writing and where I need to begin their writing instruction. This is mainly my beginning part of my assessment component.

After I have spent some time with my students and addressing their needs I begin to do North Carolina’s K-2 Literacy assessment. This assessment has several components: phonemic awareness assessment, high frequency word spelling assessment, and a running record assessment.

The phonemic awareness assessment is a pre-determined list of words that I give to my students. This list of words is phonetically decodable and it assesses student’s ability to spell words by sounding them out and spelling the best they can. Through this part of the assessment I can determine if a student can spell beginning and ending sounds, middle sounds (like short vowels, long vowels) of the words given.

The high frequency word spelling assessment is also a list of pre-determined high frequency words that students are ask to spell. There are four lists; one list is given each 9-week period. Students are asked to spell these words and are given a percentage grade based on what words they can spell and words they cannot spell.

The last part of the K-2 assessment and the part that I consider to be the most important for my instruction is the running record assessment. This assessment involves me assessing the students reading ability one-on-one. The student is asked to read a certain level (levels are set to North Carolina’s levels beginning at 1-2 going through 32-33, first grade levels are 5-6 through 15-16) of text. I begin the student’s running record by looking at what level they read last with their kindergarten teacher and move up one level. I begin the assessment one level above where they were reading because I take into account that several months has passed and they have had some reading instruction in the first grade. I begin the assessment by doing a picture walk through the book that the student is going to read. A picture walk is where you take a book and flip through each page and look at the pictures and discuss with the student what you think the book may be about. Then I give a brief description about something the book is about and I let the student read. As the student is reading the book I have a scoring sheet where I can record what the student is reading and if they are making any mistakes. This scoring sheet allows me to keep a record of what the student read and keep a close record of the types of mistakes. After the student has read the book and it is at their instructional level 90-95% accuracy rate I ask them questions about the book from the retell portion of the assessment. Examples of the types of questions that I ask are: Where did this story take place? Who some of the characters in the book? What is the problem? What is the solution? What did you like from this book? Why do you think the author wrote this book? Does this book remind you of anything you’ve read or done before? These questions are for a narrative book. If the books that I choose for the students to read are expository then the questions are a little different. They focus on summarizing, sequencing and things that the students learned from reading the book or things that the students already knew. The questioning part is scored based on a number scale of 1-4. In order for students to be instructional at this level they have to receive all 3’s on their questions. If they do not then I drop down a reading level. Comprehension is a vital part to reading. After all, comprehension is the reason for reading. If readers can read the words buy do not understand what they are reading, they are not really reading (Armbruster et al, 2001). The K-2 assessment is a big part of the assessing that I do in my classroom. It gives me information that I can use to help my students the best way in their reading instruction.

Another assessment that I have used, but is not required, is the Informal Reading Inventory (IRI) (Morris 1999). I mainly use this assessment if a student is beyond the leveled material offered to me by North Carolina and for my own private tutoring. The reading inventory has several components that allow teachers to assess a student’s reading ability. The parts that this IRI include are word recognition-un-timed and timed, oral reading- which examines the readers fluency, rate, and comprehension, silent reading-which examines rate and comprehension, listening-which examines the reader’s listening comprehension, and a spelling assessment-which allows the assessor to closely examine the student’s spelling ability.

I also am assessing my student’s everyday through informal observation. By observing my students on a daily basis I acquire information that is priceless to me as a teacher. I am able to learn about individual children’s motivation, attention, language development, who can recognize sight words easily, who can decode, and numerous other skills. Daily, informal observations of children in various literacy activities will tell teachers what children can and cannot do (Morris et al, 2003).

Assessment is imperative to my classroom and to meet the needs of my students. I take responsibility for my students reading instruction while their in first grade and assessing them gives me the necessary information that I need to appropriately help them with their reading.

Materials: What Kinds and What Purposes Do They Serve?

Materials are vital to have in a classroom. It is important that I use materials that get my students motivated. I use a variety of materials in my classroom to make sure I am meeting their interest’s needs. It is also vital that I use materials to meet the instructional needs of my students. Materials must be on a certain reading level to help a child improve in reading. In order for them to improve they need to be able to read leveled material that is on their level. An effective literacy program rests on a foundation of good materials, largely books (Fountas et al, 1999). I have included many of the materials that I use in my classroom that I feel are a necessity to make a print-rich and a print-friendly environment.

• Leveled Texts-These are books that are leveled reading material. They begin with early pre-primer level (level 1-4) to later first grade levels (13-16). I use these materials as the main reading material for my students. After I assess their reading level through running records, I determine what level they would be reading at instructionally. Researcher Lev Vygotsky’s “zone of proximal development”(Vygotsky, 1962) is important to remember here; children learn best at their developmental stage. An educator should target a reader’s instructional level. Fountas et al, state that the text you use should be just demanding enough to enable the readers to work out problems and learn a new strategy (1999). The texts that I choose are for new learning and should support and challenge my students.

• Word Study-The word study material that I use is the word sort cards. A word sort is simply a categorization task in which children lean to recognize the likenesses and differences among words (Morris, 1982). These cards have words or letters on them that students learn to read and then sort into categories. These begin at the consonant level with picture sorts working their way through vowel families and patterns. The word study program is a systematic way to learn words. It is very beneficial for my students.

• Books on Tape-I use a variety of books that are recorded on tape. These provide a valuable tool for my students. Books on tape offer a way for my students to listen to a fluent reader and follow along in a book. It is important for students to hear fluent reading. Research supports that using books on tape can aid in increasing fluency (Armbruster et al, 2001).

• Leap Frog Learning Pads-I use the Leap Frog Learning pads as a way for students to be interactive with texts. The leap pads offer a way for my students to listen to a story and be interactive by using the pointer to follow along as the leap pad voices the words. It will even help the reader to sound out a word.

• Technology-I use a variety of technology in my classroom. One way I use technology is through the computer. I use the computer to access several free reading programs. One program that my students’ love is . This program offers games, books, printables, and other interactive activities to get students involved. I also use the computer to access reading programs that my school has purchased for my students to use. “Reader Rabbit” is one program that my students use.

• Reading Anthology- The reading anthology that I use in my classroom is one that the school has adopted. It is the Houfton Mifflin Reading Series. I use the anthology as a whole group type reading. I do not require the students to read the text their self, only to follow along as I read or if a student wishes to read I let them read. Through the anthology I pull my literature components out of like-story elements and grammar elements. The anthology does flow on a continuum so I use it as we are studying a certain vowels and patterns as well. There are multiple ways I am able to use our reading anthology. All of the stories that are in it are available on tape so I am able to let my students listen to their stories on tape as well as listen to me read it. The stories are interesting to the students and they are excited when we read the stories from our “green reading books” as I call them.

• Children’s Literature- I use a variety of children’s literature as a read aloud in my room. As (Mitchell, 2003) says children’s literature embraces every genre, including picture books, poetry, realistic fiction, fantasy, historical fiction, and numerous more. I read a variety of genres to my students. My goal is to expose them to as many types of books that I possibly can. I read a book to my students daily. These books are quality children’s literature; many are award-winning books as well. These books provide a way for me to incorporate questioning that really makes the student’s think about what I am reading to them. It also helps to increase their listening comprehension level too. Many of the books that I read turn into writing journal topics. One of my students’ favorite books to read to them is the Junie B. Jones series written by Barbara Park. My students relate to the main character, Junie B. Jones because she is in first grade her self.. I also have a selected bin that I keep children’s books in where my students can view as they finish their work. I keep seasonal books or books that cover topics that we have discussed in our class. Through books, children learn more about themselves and their world, and they learn to think in new ways (Fountas et al, 1999).

• Big Books-Big books are exactly what the title says. They are giant books that provide a way for a whole group of students to view. This is considered a shared reading process. I use Big Books as a whole group activity. These provide a way for my students to read along as I read and point to the words. Fountas et al, says that sharing the task enables every child to participate in the act of reading and to learn critical concepts about how print works, such as matching spoken word to written word (1999). I also use these books as another way to provide a print-rich environment in my classroom. Using these books helps everyone in my classroom to enter a world of reading.

• Self-Selected Readers-These are books that students are able to choose out of a certain assigned colored bin to read a specific time everyday. Our school has adopted DEAR (drop everything and read) for the first 15 minutes of school. My students choose books that I have put into certain reading bins for them to read each morning. I choose books to put into their bins that are around their independent reading level. Researchers, (Cunningham et al, 1997) says that the books children are reading should be “on their own” level. These texts are usually a level below of what the student is reading at instructionally to be at their independent reading level. The self-selected readers allow the students to choose a text and read independently and quietly for about 15 minutes each morning. Many mornings I begin the day by reading a book and then let the students read on their own.

• File-Folder Games-File folder games are games that have been made by my assistant or me to help the students review a skill that they have learned. I have an assortment of reading games that when students finish their work they are able to get a game and play it to review a reading skill. Some examples of the types of skills are matching the short a words with pictures or matching antonyms together.

Ideally I would like to have even more materials readily available to my students and me. Some materials that I would like to have more of include: big books, books on tape, technology, and leveled texts. Leveled texts are a priority for me to have. The current texts that I have now are great but there are not enough books per level. Some of my lower readers need more practice at a certain level and there are not enough selections for them. I also have the problem of not having enough books to challenge my higher readers who are ready for my difficult texts. I would also like to have texts that cover both fiction and non-fiction. It is vital for my students to be exposed to both genres and they seem to have a specific interest of non-fiction texts. In reality I have to work with what I have, however I am pursing ways to get more leveled texts into my classroom.

My personal goal in my classroom, when it comes to the subject of materials, is to provide my students with the opportunity to be exposed to as many types of materials as I possibly can in their time in first grade. I want to provide my students with an atmosphere that is filled with reading material. I want them to have access to a wide variety of materials. By doing so it enables my students to see a world that is centered with reading. I want reading to be a positive experience for my students. Using good materials is best way for my students to learn and help them along their pathway of reading.

Reading Instruction

Reading Instruction is the key component in my classroom that must be implemented. I consider this part the most important above any others and the most challenging as a teacher. It is the most important because this is where students actually receive instruction and where I address their needs to develop reading comprehension and reading fluency. It is the most challenging because of the variety of students needs that have to be met. I as the teacher have to organize a program that will incorporate reading strategies to meet my student’s needs. I try to set up my reading program in a way to meet the needs of my students into two categories of main instruction: whole group and small group.

Whole Group Reading Instruction

Whole group reading instruction is a time where I am teaching with the whole class at one time. This time is usually during the mornings before much time has passed in the school day. I have a section in the back of the classroom allotted to “Group Time” that my students go to each morning. The students gather around me sitting on the floor where I can have their full attention. During whole group reading instruction I do different things. Whole-class instruction can help identify students’ prior knowledge and experiences that will affect new knowledge acquisition (Valentino, 2000). I focus on comprehension activities during this time and fluency. One thing that I do is read a variety of books to my students. Reading to children is one of the most effective literacy demonstrations you can do, (Fountas et al, 1999). As I am doing guided reading, we are discussing the book through questioning techniques. Research shows that teacher questioning strongly supports and advances students’ learning from reading (Armbruster et al, 2001). This allows me to see who understands the reading of the book. The discussions allow me to pick up on several things to see whether or not they are getting the main idea of the book or the topic at the time we are discussing. Some types of books that I read during this time are children’s literature, big books, and stories from our reading anthology. If I choose a big book we spend much more than just one day on the book. I may first read the story to the class and discuss, second let the students echo me as I read and third let the students read together the book. This helps to increase their fluency. If we read their anthology I approach it the same way except I allow students to read it aloud independently if they wish. I do not ever make child read out loud during whole group if they do not want to because these books may not be at their instructional reading level.

Whole group time is also a time that I spend discussing vocabulary, lessons, grammar lessons, story element lessons, and introducing spelling words. The grammar lessons are lessons that are based with whatever grammar I am introducing for the week. For example, if I want to discuss contractions, I set aside a time to talk about contractions. I try to tie whatever grammar we are learning into our reading stories as much as possible. When I am working with story elements I try to do the same as integrating as much as I can with the story we are reading. If we are working on beginning, middle, and end of a story I tie the lesson in by working on the story we are reading at the time. Our reading anthology has a good lay out for discussing the story elements and grammar and integrating them together with the story. I use it almost daily to help me with the whole group reading instruction. I also use it to help with spelling words. If our spelling words for the week are the –at family then I find the story that goes along and focuses on the –at family words. I like the anthology because it does have a word focus for the teacher to concentrate on for the week; however if I feel my students are not ready to move on and have not mastered the words, I use other books to incorporate learning the words. I try to integrate all of our whole group instruction as much as possible. I want my students to be able to see that how reading can connect with all types of topics.

Small Group Reading Instruction

Small group reading instruction is a time where I divide my class into four different reading groups and work with each group. Small group instruction is a time to provide opportunities for working with students who have common needs (Valentino, 2000). Through small group reading instruction I am able to focus on my students reading ability more closely, especially their comprehension, fluency, and word recognition levels. I group my students based on their reading ability that I have assessed through their running records for small group reading instruction. Research says that grouping students that teaching a group of like-ability allows teachers to adjust the pace of instruction to students’ needs (Hopkins, 2003). I group them as closely as I can to be on the same or near the same reading level. I have labeled my groups by colors: red, blue, purple, and green. I have three groups with 6 students and one group with 5 students. I call my small groups reading instruction time “reading groups.” I have four main stations in my group time. Each group spends approximately 15 minutes at each station before rotating on to a new station.

1. Station One is the listening station. In this station students listen to variety of books on tape. They all listen to the same book by using headphones that hook into the tape player. This provides students with a skill where they can listen to a fluent reader and follow along in a book as the reader reads. Tape-assisted reading is one way to help increase fluency (Armbruster et al, 2001). Another part of this station is the Leap Frog Learning Pads. The students use these as another way to listen to books, but they are able to be interactive with the stories. I alternate the listening station to books on tape or the Leap Pads to give the students a variety of material.

2. Station Two is the reading station. I man this station. This is a station where students are reading in a group with me. Students are reading the same text in the group. Students are reading leveled texts that match as closely as I can to their instructional level of reading. We spend a lot of time working on comprehension skills and fluency skills. Comprehension strategies help students become purposeful, active readers who are in control of their own comprehension (Armbruster et al, 2001). I spend a lot of time helping my students develop strategies needed to comprehend the text that they are reading. Monitoring, modeling, and questioning the students are some of the strategies that I use everyday to help with comprehension. Decoding and word recognition skills are also a big part of this group. If a student does not know the word I teach them strategies to go about figuring out the word. Some strategies that I use is sounding the word out, picking out chunks of the word that the student knows, and thinking about the context the word is in. If I think the word is entirely too hard or I know that the student will not get the word I will go ahead and give them the word because I do not want to break their comprehension of the text being read. I begin this station by: First, I introduce a new book by modeling reading, I begin the reading of the book and ask the students to echo read with me. Then, I let the students take the book home for take-home reading. The next day we read the book out loud in the group. I usually let a student read one page at a time then go on to the next student. This day is like round robin reading. They take the book home one more night for reading. The next day we begin a new book. I encourage my students to re-read the books because re-reading promotes fluency. Repeated and monitored oral reading improves reading fluency and overall reading achievement (Armbruster et al, 2001).

3. Station Three is the word study station. My teacher assistant mans this station. She has been formally trained in the First Steps reading program. The golden rule for word study instruction is that teaching is not telling (Bear et al, 2000). Teaching is modeling and facilitating. In this station she works on systematic approach to word sorts of the spelling words and pattern we are currently studying for the week. Systematic phonics instruction produces more growth in spelling among kindergarten and first grade students than non-systematic or no phonics programs (Armbruster et al, 2001). Research says that children needs hands-on opportunities to manipulate word features in a way that allows them to generalize beyond isolated, individual examples to the entire groups of words that work the same way (Bear et al, 2000). This station is one of my student’s favorite stations. They love to work with the words and they are excited to see their spelling words. My assistant usually does word sorts with my students for the first three days of the week and then on Thursday they play word games, like concentration. On Friday she gives them a word quiz in their word study notebook. In this station the students are working word sorting of words by gaining word recognition skills to learn to read and spell new words. Repeated word sorting routines require students to discriminate and make critical judgments about spelling patterns, word structures, word meanings, and use (Invernizzi et al, 1997).

4. Station Four is the seatwork station. This is the station that students are working on skill sheets to reinforce skills that we have been discussing throughout the week. The skills include: phonics-spelling words, comprehension, and grammar. Usually there are 3 sheets that are put into a folder. I go over in detail the sheets before we start our rotations. This station is a reinforcement of all the other reading instruction that takes place throughout the week. Essentially the students are given 3 worksheets to keep them busy at this station. Ideally I would like to implement this station differently by not having to use worksheets. My goal for the next school year is to have new ways to help my students reinforce the skills we are working on instead of worksheets.

Spelling

As (Morris, 1993) puts it, in learning to read and spell an alphabetic language, phoneme awareness is the underlying mental “glue” that allows written words to enter and remain in memory. This research supports that students need to first understand the individual letter sounds before they can begin to understand the written word. So, I first begin the year with critical reviewing the consonants and their sounds. I set up four stations that revolve around the consonants and their sounds. After I have spent several weeks I then begin with short vowels. I start with “a” and work on the short vowel a families. I begin with the –at family in spelling. I give six spelling words with nightly homework to reinforce spelling at home. I give short assignments to complete at home: writing sentences with spelling words, writing the words and circling their word shape, writing words 3 times each, and practicing spelling the words orally. During class time as a whole group I do make-a-word spelling activities as a whole class review of the spelling words. I also have a “Word Wall” that students use to learn to read and spell high-frequency words. These two models are adapted from the 4-blocks model by (Cunningham et al, 1997)“ I incorporate a big part of my spelling instruction at school by the word sorts that I do during reading group time.

Meeting the Instructional Needs of My Students

As a teacher, meeting the instructional needs of my students is one of the most challenging tasks I have upon me. It is difficult to meet every student’s need when you have 23 children in your classroom; however, I take full responsibility for my students learning while they are in my classroom. In teaching children to read there is no substitute for having them, on a daily basis, read stories and study word patters at the appropriate difficulty level (Morris et al, 2003).

Assessing my students helps me to determine what their specific needs are. After I assess my students, I have a pretty good idea where each child is instructionally ready to begin in reading. I rely heavily on the running records portion to help me determine their levels and informal daily observations. I can meet their diverse levels by placing them in a certain reading leveled text. As I stated earlier, I group my students based on their reading ability for small group instruction. This is the only grouping that I do that is homogeneous grouping. Grouping students in the same reading level is important to help students in learning to read. The major advantage of grouping is that is allows children processing similar reading skill to read stories and study word patterns at the appropriate difficulty level (Morris et al, 2003).

For my students who struggle in reading, they receive special services from our specialists at school: Title I, Exceptional Children, and English as Second Language teachers. These teachers serve the students who need assistance and provide them with specific skills to meet their individualized needs. I also have my assistant who has been trained in the First Steps program to work with students too. The First Steps program is designed to help children in reading on tutoring basis. Research supports this program in the Howard Street Tutoring Manual by Darrell Morris. I also have a high-school student who pulls some of my students to work with one-on-one. She works with my students with leveled materials and games to help them with reading.

For my students who are English as Second Language learners (ESL) I try to provide them with as much assistance as I possibly can. I reduce the amount of spelling words that they have or give them a different list of words. I seat the ESL students where they can have a close friend by so if they don’t understand something they can communicate with their friend who might be able to possibly help them. I provide a lot of visuals for my students so that they can have a good understanding of the reading assignments or assignments in general. I group them all together in one reading group with two of my exceptional children for reading instruction in small groups. My goal for my ESL children is to provide a positive atmosphere and to be able to teach them as much as possible.

Conclusion

In reality, reading can take you anywhere. Reading is an invitation to the world ( Mitchell, 2003). Reading instruction is an essential part of my classroom. I spend nearly half of my instructional day teaching and facilitating reading instruction. As I tell my students “practice makes improvement,” the more you read, the more you will get better at reading. I emphasize the importance of reading in every situation I can in my classroom. While my students are in the first grade and in my classroom I expose them to a wide variety of reading in the most positive way I can. It is my duty and my eagerness to seek the needs of every child the best that I can. My class motto is: “Be the Best You Can Be!” I expect nothing but the best from my students and from my self. I want my students to be successful and I have every intention and belief that every child can learn to read with the appropriate instruction and interventions.

References

Armbruster, B., Lehr, F., & Osborn, J. (2001). Put reading first: the research building blocks for teaching children to read. 1st ed. : Center for the Improvement of Early Reading Achievement .

Bear, D., Invernizzi, M., Templeton, S., & Johnston, F. (2000). Words their way:word study for phonics, vocabulary, and spelling instrucion. 2nd ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall.

Cunningham, P., & Hall, D. (1997). Month-by-month phonics for first grade systematic, multilevel instrucion. 1st ed. Greensboro, NC: Carson-Dellosa.

Fountas, I., & Pinnell, G. (1999). Matching books to readers: using leveled books in k-3. Portsmouth, , NH: Heinemann.

Hopkins, G. (2003). Is ability grouping the way to go- - or should it go away?. Retrieved Feb. 09, 2005, from Education World Web site: .

Invernizzi, M., Abouzeid, M., & Bloodgood, J. (1997). Integrated word study:spelling, grammar, and meaning in the language arts classroom.

Mitchell, D. (2003). Children's literature: an invitation to the world. 1st ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Morris, D. (1999). The howard street tutoring manual:teaching at-risk readers in the primary grades. 1st ed. , NY: Guilford.

Morris, D. (1993). The relationship between children's concept of word in text and phoneme awareness in learning to read. Research in the Teaching of English, 27, 133-153.

Morris, D. (1982). Word sort: a categorization strategy for improving word recognition ability. Reading Psychology, 3, 247-259.

Morris, D., & Slavin, R. (2003). Every child reading. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Valentino, C. (2000). Flexible grouping. Retrieved Feb. 09, 2005, from Eduplace Web site: .

Vygotsky, L. (1962). Thought and language.. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

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