Readicide Week 3: Blog Hop Extravaganza!

Welcome to Week 3 of Focused on Fifth's blog hop extravaganza!  Just a reminder, we are reading Kelly Gallagher's Readicide as our first group project together.

 

This week, we read:

 

   First of all, the tsunami refers to the practice of reading a novel to or with your class and then giving them a crazy amount of work to do in order to fit in "all the reading standards" at once.  This is a pretty popular way of teaching, and I will admit that I've done it myself.  I didn't realize that it *kills* a lot of kid's love for reading though (it sort of makes sense looking back on my experiences now).  The endless worksheets, write ups, notetakers, post it notes and breaks that we teachers take while reading a book takes all the fun and joy out of reading for kids.  Gallagher gave an example of a newly arrived Australian student in an American school who said she would have read 4 books back home (Australia) in the time it took for her class to finish one book in America. This is known as overteaching. 

    When I was having problems with students reading progress this last school year, I went through a process in my district called "IC".  In a short paraphrase (which the IC team would hate) IC is an intervention team that consults with you before you can refer kids to get tested for special education. They take on individual and group cases in hopes that learning problems can be fixed with instructional tweaks ie, better strategies. In my group IC process, my mentor teacher gave me several reading strategies that are proven to work, and I had to use them EVERYDAY and document the results.   In my heart, I kept thinking that just reading more would probably work better because the strategies chopped into every reading experience we had for many weeks.  They weren't bad strategies, and I may use them again for informational bits of text, but they totally killed my love for the novel we were working on, so I can only imagine how the kids felt.  I know the strategies worked for some kids, but I had to ask myself: did they foster a love of reading for my class as a whole?  No, I'm pretty sure I was guilty of "over teaching" and not letting my already negative readers experience a reading flow.  

   A reading flow is when a reader is so engrossed in a good book that nothing else seems to matter.  It would seem like a dream come true as a teacher to catch my students in a reading flow. (I have a few times with a few students, but not nearly often enough.) The overteaching of books prevents students from experiencing this reading flow. Looking back, I probably could have used the reading strategies from my IC team on an academic time block while enjoying a good novel on a more recreational time block.

So how can we as teachers get our students out of Readicide and into a reading flow?  Here were some practical tips that Gallagher recommended:

   I am definitely going to incorporate the 20 minutes of SSR time into next year's reading block. In a 2001 study done by McQuillan it was shown that students provided with 20 minutes or more of sustained silent reading a day made significant gains in writing fluency, writing complexity, and vocabulary (regardless of prior vocabulary knowledge).  I've had my doubts that students can be responsible during this time, but I'm determined to create an inviting environment and bring back silent reading as the next cool thing.

Here's another tip from this book!

 

  Gallgher reminds his readers that we aren't just reading novels with our class to become better readers, but the importance of reading and enjoying reading goes far beyond the classroom walls.  While students read, they are making countless connections to the outside world through their books. Culture, social issues, moral dilemmas and solutions all present themselves through novels. Gallagher recommended finding current events that may tie into central themes or problems going on in the novels we read with our classes.  We (teachers) must be the ones to provide these articles to students, so they can make real world connections between our novels and the outside world.

   Gallagher suggests that after students read a non fiction article, they come up with the one simple “big idea” from it (10 words long).  I can see how a method like this could tie into the central theme of a story.  He also recommended the jigsaw method: where several groups each get an article to read, and then *share* their findings with the class. This way, the class can be exposed to  several topics in one. I like doing this method with my 5th graders using Time For Kids. The topics are varied, but the kids get really excited to share their findings with the rest of the class.   

Here's another tip for avoiding Readicide:

 

     Instead of giving students endless worksheets through a novel study or a giant book report to do, Gallagher suggests giving students a quick summative essay that shouldn't take them more than 20 minutes to  complete.  This way students have some kind of accountability in their silent reading and the teacher can give them fast feedback by reading their essays. Instead of having to recuperate from the last novel and all of its work, students will be more eager to start a new book.

In summary, there are three key ingredients for helping your students become READERS!

 

   Tip 1: Students need interesting books to read, and the teacher must bring these books to the students through the library or other means.  Also, teachers need to talk up good books, so students will give them a chance.

   Tip 2: Students must have time to read their books in school.  Whether students are playing video games or playing soccer, they live in a world today that may not be very friendly for a nightly reading assignment. This is why teachers need to provide those precious minutes to students IN SCHOOL!  Gallagher also points out that it is counteractive to blame the internet, computers, television or video games for eating into reading time at home.  It's the way of the world now, so teachers need to find the time in class to promote reading if they want to have good readers! 

   Tip 3: Students must have an inviting place to read their books.  I added the word inviting because I feel like some classroom or school environments may not be comfortable places for students to read in.  Students want the same comforts that adults do if they're going to read for pleasure.  This is why I'm trying to redecorate my classroom this year to make it more friendly and inviting for readers.

I hope you gained some practical tips from this blog hop to help in your own classrooms.  Please stay tuned to next week's Readicide blog hop!

 

Also, please check out my fellow blogger and 5th grade teacher: The Research Based Classroom!

 P.S. If you enjoyed my graphics, please check out the following tpt clip artist's stores.  They are fabulous artists that make learning come alive!  

Glitter Meets Glue and Illumismart

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