Five Essential Components of Reading
While teaching literacy, I try to improve my students reading skills by addressing the following critical components of reading. An example of a teaching technique or tool is listed next to each component.
1. Phonemic Awareness 2. Phonics 3. Reading Fluency, including oral reading skills 4. Vocabulary Development 5. Reading Comprehension Daily Writing Journal
Students use their writing journals on a daily basis to express anything they want to write about. If students have trouble coming up with a topic there are two things I like to do to give students something to write about. The first thing I use to give student ideas on journal topics is to go to the "story generator". The "story generator" consists of three cups filled with Popsicle sticks with names of characters, events and settings on them. Before students begin to write I select a Popsicle stick from each cup and students can choose if they want to write what the "story generator" came up with or if they want to come up with their own topic. Another thing I like to use to generate writing topics is called the "Topic Target Board". The "Topic Target Board" is a dart board that students throw darts at to randomly find a writing topic. The number that their dart lands on corresponds with a topic list below the dart board.
Literature Circles
In literature circles, students read the same books and collectively come up with conclusions, connections and meanings of the text they are reading. In my class, we utilized working in literature circles to cover several different reading genres, including historical fiction and fantasy.
Daily Oral Language
I use DOL's as a warm up activity for language arts and reading lessons. DOL's consist of two sentences that have several mistakes. The mistakes range from spelling, punctuation, capitalization and word choice. Students have to make changes to the incorrect sentences each day. This is a good transition activity for students to begin thinking about language and how to properly communicate.
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Spelling Each week a new spelling unit is introduced to students. Students have an entire week to learn 28 new spelling words and their meanings. Throughout the week I provide students with several unique opportunities to learn and practice their spelling words. Below is a schedule for spelling during a typical week in the classroom.
Monday: Students are introduced to the 28 spelling words and take a Pre-Test on Study Island that I have created. This assignment can be revisited at home or at the computer lab by any student that wants to practice their spelling words. Tuesday and Wednesday: Students individually work in their spelling books to complete tasks related to the spelling words. These tasks provide students with the opportunity to practice how to spell words and use them appropriately in their writing. If students finish their work early, students are given crosswords, word searches and other puzzles to give them more exposure to the new spelling words. Thursday: The class corrects the work book tasks they completed on Tuesday and Wednesday. After correcting the work book, the class plays games the help them practice their spelling skills. Students also take a practice spelling test. Those that misspell less than 3 spelling words are exempt from taking the test Friday. Friday: Students take their spelling test. Cross-Curricular: During the week I encourage students to use their spelling words in their writing journals that they keep. I challenge students to see how many spelling words they can use in their writing so they become comfortable using new words and to further develop their vocabulary. Writing Process: Write Your Own Book
Students learned how to use the writing process (prewriting, drafting, revising, editing and publishing) while writing their own books to enhance their writing skills. Each day during this unit, students learned a new skill and applied them to the books they were writing. Just like any aspiring author, at the culmination of completing their final drafts, students were required to find a publisher. The publisher for their book had to agree that the book was of high quality and that it met the standards on the rubric. Once their final drafts and publishing contracts were turned in, students books were laminated and put together to make their own book!
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