Supporting the Literacy Needs of English Language Learners

Up until the past few years, I have had limited experiences working with English Language Learners (ELLs) in the classroom and no experience working with them as a reading interventionist.  As I began to work with ELLs to provide their reading intervention I  realized that their profile was different from what I typically saw with …

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The Basics of Shared Reading

Shared reading is a highly beneficial way to spend 10-15 minutes of your instructional time daily. Shared reading is a time in which the teacher and students read an enlarged text at the same time (choral reading).  Often the text is written on chart paper or projected by some means.  It is important that the …

Are We Providing Scaffolds or Swooping in for the Rescue?

There is a fine line between providing a student the support he/she needs and doing the work for the student. Unfortunately, when we cross the line and provide our students with too much help we are stealing opportunities for them to : Develop a sense of agency Feel like a problem solver Take initiative Feel …

Reading Recovery: Is it for Dyslexic Learners?

"I do not teach the way I do because I love it. I teach the way I do because it is steeped in research and I see what the research suggests playing out in the results from my own students."

Have We Gone Intervention Crazy?

In our zeal to support all students in reaching grade-level goals and passing state tests, we may have lost sight of what the most important activities students should engage in while at school.  We have increased the amount of test prep activities, increased the number of assessments given and even increased the number of students …

Tackling Vowels Within a Complex Theory of Reading

Thank you Maggie @GoReadBooks for suggesting this blog post! As we know, many of the letters in the English language have multiple sounds associated with them. Vowels sounds, in particular, can be quite tricky for some students to learn. My stance is that while learning vowel sounds is important, children should not be held back …

Don’t Teach Strategies: Searching, Self-correcting & Confirming (part 2)

In part 1 we explored the idea of teaching strategies versus teaching for strategic activity and looked closely at self-monitoring and cross-checking.  In part 2 we will continue to explore the notion of helping our students build an effective processing system. "Decision processes that happen in the head" will serve as my overly simplified definition of …

Don’t Teach Strategies: Self-monitoring & Cross-checking (part 1)

When teaching children to read it is important that we ask ourselves whether we are teaching strategies to our students or whether we are teaching our students to be strategic readers? You might be wondering what exactly I mean by this? What is the difference? *Just to clarify - I am using the word "strategy" …

What Works? Independent Reading Works!

"Research is clear that when students spend time in school reading self-selected books with a teacher who is working hard providing direct and individualized instruction, results are impressive. So, in essence, IR is the perfect use of instructional time!"

Experiencing the Reading Process as a Novice Reader

Recently, I started the exciting journey of learning the Korean language as well as Hangul, the Korean writing system.  While learning a new language I have had the opportunity to engage in the reading/writing process as a novice reader/writer. Disclaimer:  As a literate adult with a whole lot of experience with reading and writing English, …