Goal: Comprehension/Strategy: Check for Understanding (Beginning Reader)
- This brought back memories of listening to my ELL kids read. I liked the visual of sticky notes to keep her accountable and to reference in the next conference. I sometimes worry about focusing on fluency or WPM as it can give a false sense of reading success.
- We don't have many ELL students at all, but I have to say that this coaching session was pretty abstract and highly verbal which are big red flags. I would love to see "Who and What" in some visual way that would keep her accountable and focused. Do you worry about checking for understanding during your whole class read aloud?
- I love this! I have heard other tricks like "when two vowels go walking, the first does the talking", but I have never heard of this one which is VISUAL. Have any of you incorporated this?
- So, this makes me wonder how you can do these conferences whereever the students are sitting? At times you need a whiteboard, markers, or sticky notes. I am not sure about this part.
- In my experience, many students struggle with leaving out all of those details and just narrowing the focus to the main events. I like the idea of breaking up the task by chapter and then editing them into a summary. This seems like a big 2nd or 3rd grade skill. Do those teachers have any tricks to share?
- I love that included a kindergarten example here! I think most of our primary teachers instinctively use beginning sounds and pictures in books to build up confidence about reading. Giving it a fancy name like "Cross Checking" is a great way to build PK-5 language across the building.
- I like to see the carryover with this skill in the upper grades. As the vocabulary in their books gets harder, it is important for them to realize that they still need to fall back on previously practiced skills.
- I like the idea of this because I do believe we have some students who do not hear fluent reading/are read to at home. I also think we have cut back at school on how much we read aloud to students. I am still, though, not sure about modeling non-fluent reading for students. That might take me some time to buy into!
- This part reminded me of how our non-proficient readers in many cases have limited vocabulary and limited experiences outside of school to develop it. We still must move forward and there is no fast or easy way to cram vocabulary in a meaningful way with children. I wonder how she gets from the "I don't know what silo means" to knowing it. Dictionary? The mini-notebooks to carry back and forth to the home are a cute way to keep communication open and add vocabulary practice, too.