Blog Post #3
As I continue reading No More
Independent Reading Without Support, I find myself needing to do more with
my students even at middle school age. I
am not sure what my students have been taught about Independent Reading in
their elementary schools. According to
the text, “Students need explicit instruction in specific strategies unique to
reading and writing in particular genre if they are to successfully negotiate
the many text types they should encounter as part of IR.” During Independent Reading time, that I have
since found out that our principal has changed the name to Independent Reading
because he is wanting to gradually change from SSR to IR, I have the inclusion
class so they may need more support than other classes. I even had a conservation with my principal
about the differences in Self Selected Reading and Independent Reading, which I
had completely forgotten about until I started reading this book. I am glad to see that our new administration
sees the need to have a culture change in our school.
After reading a quote in this book,
it reminded me of our district motto. Our district motto state that Union County
Schools and its stakeholders commit to students first in building community,
excellence, and lifelong learning, it fit with the quote from the book. The quote states, “If we want children to
become lifelong readers, we need to give them materials that interest them, and
to do so means including informational text historical fiction, poetry,
magazines, graphic novels, and other genre.”
I go back to it is all about choice.
If I am given a book that does not interest me I will not read it or not
want to read it. We are wanting our
students to have a love for reading and if we give them materials that they are
not interested in then we are defeating the purpose. Sure there are times when we must give them a
required text to read about, but during IR it needs to be their choice not
ours. We have to let go so the students
can enjoy and develop a love or at least toleration of reading. Students need to read to learn as well as
read for enjoyment. If we include all
genres in our classroom libraries this allows students more choice in what they
read. We have to have a variety so we
don’t bore our students are turn them off to reading altogether.
Once, when I worked in a different district, as a school, we were asked to read a book and complete a year-long book study. The book, in my opinion, was not a very good one and was very difficult to read. It did not interest me at all and so, I really did not read much of it. I simply skimmed what I would need to know to complete the study. And in the end, I got NOTHING from it! Kids are the same way. If it doesn't interest them, they will not read.
ReplyDeleteYES! I believe choice is huge when it comes to any reading, especailly independent. I am, like you, learning and seeing so many things that need to be changed to make IR time more successful.
ReplyDeleteJennifer, you make an interesting point. How do we increase that communication between elementary and middle school, so that our teachers in middle school know how to continue and expand the instruction students received in elementary school? That is an excellent question to pursue! In your opinion, what would help you as a middle school teacher? A meeting? A note? A video? A blog? Something else entirely? And that is interesting that your principal is trying to change the name of the reading time to IR since it is a different structure than SSR. I hope those of you in this class can help lead that charge towards IR!
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