The goal of all
reading is comprehension (Johns and Lenski, 2005, 344). Reading comprehension is defined by
Reading First legislation as “the act or result of applying
comprehension processes to obtain the meaning from a graphic or textual
communication” (National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development, 2000, 3-4). In
order for students to be successful readers, students must be able to
complete a hierarchy of skills.
These skills include the ability to decode, have a rich vocabulary,
world knowledge, knowledge and application of active comprehension
strategies, and the ability to self-monitor their reading (Pressley, 2002,
1). In order to effectively
comprehend what they read, students must have a “fluid articulation
of all these processes, beginning with the sounding out and recognition of
individual words to the understanding of sentences in paragraphs as part of
much longer texts” (Pressley, 2002, 1). In order to help increase my
students; comprehension, throughout the course of the school year we have
been taking part in many lessons and activities that address the
improvement in this area of reading.
With the end of the school year approaching, we have been reviewing
the reading strategies that we learned so that we can make sure we are ready
to continue practice these strategies to help us to better remember what we
read, especially since our school’s Summer Reading Program is
approaching!
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All in all, the learning
of their reading comprehension strategies will help students to increase
their comprehension skills. The
activities presented in this newsletter were created keeping a variety of
different types of learners in mind.
The instructional approaches used have been proven by research to be
effective methods of instruction.
A variety of books and articles from different genres were cited to
ground each strategy being taught in literature. Books were also chosen and
activities were created with students’ interests in mind. The strategies were chosen to be
taught and based on my assessment of students’ needs as well as on
the basis of developing students’ overall reading comprehension
skills, since these skills will help them to become better readers and
writers.
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The activities
in this newsletter, as well as the ones that take place in the classroom were
not only designed with students’ reading development in mind, but
were also developed with students’ interests in mind. It is extremely important that
students have a great amount of choice when it comes to reading. The reason that this is so important
is because according to Romeo (1999), “many researchers have
indicated that students will be motivated to spend more time reading if
they are given some choice about the reading materials that they are
assigned” (4). By
providing students with book and magazine titles based on their interests
to teach and practice applying reading comprehension strategies, we are
helping to appeal to your children’s interests. This also provides them with the
opportunity to use and practice these strategies that they are learning at
school at home. According to Glynn (2005), “motivation is fundamental to
successful learning” (150).
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Vacca, Vacca,
and Gove (2000) state that “instruction has its greatest impact on
students when the teacher balances a high level of interaction with print
and explicit instruction in various tasks” (139). This research proven instructional
method inspired me to create lessons that encompass this. Throughout this newsletter, you will
find that a variety of different activities are presented to show students
how they better comprehend what they read. Some of these activities include
making and playing their own games, creating their own retelling of a
story, and the reading and writing of e-mailed letters to classmates,
family members, and/or friends.
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According to
Vacca, Vacca, and Gove (2000), “good readers use cognitive and
metacognitive strategies to engage their minds in dialogue so that they can
understand, respond to, question, and even challenge an author’s
ideas” (232). It is this
active reading that promotes students’ comprehension of what they
read. There are several skills
and strategies that students must master in order to be able to comprehend
what they read and write. Some
of these skills are building background knowledge, summarizing, making and
evaluating predictions, self-questioning, and self-monitoring. We have been working on these
strategies throughout the course of the school year because these are the
strategies that I have found through the assessments given to the class
(MSI, teacher made assessment, and teacher observations) that my students
were lacking knowledge in these areas.
In addition, we have been working on these strategies because
learning these specific comprehension strategies will not only help your
children to improve their reading in Integrate Language Arts, but will also
help them to comprehend what they read across the content areas in order to
aid in their comprehension in other subject mater. We have been learning these
strategies through use of Duffy’s Direct Explanation Framework. This framework teaches students to
accomplish these strategies through use of modeling, guided practice,
cooperative practice, independent practice, and eventually have them
transfer each strategy into a reading or writing opportunity. By using this framework to teach
these comprehension strategies to my students, I am scaffolding their
instruction, allowing them the time to learn how to complete each strategy
so they can eventually transfer it over to their own reading and writing,
as well as internalize it so they begin to do it automatically while
reading. This method of
instruction has the teacher demonstrate how to use specific strategies in
order to increase the student’s ability to eventually use these
strategies in their everyday reading and writing. Starting out by giving and showing
students a lot of help while first teaching each lesson, and then, as
students have more and more practice with the strategy, I take the back
seat and allow the students to become aware of when, why, and how they will
use the strategies that they are learning to become successful readers and
writers.
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Miss Pepin’s
Class Website
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Upcoming
Events!
¨ Picture Book Project Due
June 16th!
¨ Last Book Club After School on June 19th
¨ Electronic Portfolio Due June 20th
¨ Last Day of School is June 21st!
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