Reading instruction in the elementary school is critical to students’ success in school. Students leaving elementary school, not reading at grade level, have a much lower chance of graduating from high school. “A student who can't read on grade level by 3rd grade is four times less likely to graduate by age 19 than a child who does read proficiently by that time. Add poverty to the mix, and a student is 13 times less likely to graduate on time than his or her proficient, wealthier peer” (Hernandez, 2011).
The teaching of reading has gone through numerous transformations and controversy continues over what is the best reading instruction. However, there is overwhelming evidence that the use of authentic literature and time for children to read, discuss what they have read and hear fluent readers, are critical to success.
Richard Allington has emerged as an expert on literacy education and continues to lead changes to instructional programs in the United States. He offers six critical elements of effective reading instruction. Those six elements are:
1. Every child reads something he or she chooses.
2. Every child reads accurately.
3. Every child reads something he or she understands.
4. Every child writes about something meaningful.
5. Every child talks with peers about reading and writing.
6. Every child listens to a fluent adult read aloud.
Allington states, “It’s time for the elements of effective instruction described here to be offered more consistently to every child, in every school, every day” (Allington, 2012, pp 14-15). When these six elements are included into daily literacy instruction students are able to make gains in their reading and writing abilities.
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The seven pillars of effective reading instruction are an important base to an effective and engaging classroom. Teachers, who are able to apply each of these pillars to everyday learning in the classroom, reach their students and provide instruction in meaningful and approachable ways. Each of these pillars provides important ideas and information that work together to create an effective learning environment in the literacy classroom. By accessing and including each of these pillars in my classroom environment, curriculum and instructions, students benefit from the more effective reading instruction possible.
Literature is a key component when speaking of literacy. Teachers need to provide students with endless amounts of practice experiences in reading to build their fluency rate. This should be done with different genres of texts and different levels. Reading a wide variety of literature help children develop rich vocabularies.
While I believe every child is a reader, I do not believe every child will be enthralled with reading all the time. All students have the capability to read and enjoy reading, but just like any other hobby, interest will vary from student to student. The students in my classroom will be encouraged in their reading, be provided with choice, taught how books can take you into another world but, my students will not be forced to read. This paper will illustrate my philosophy of reading through the theories I relate to, the way I want to implement reading and writing curriculum, and the methods I will use motivate my students to read and help them become literate.
Martínez, Harris and McClain (2014) maintain that, “among all of the academic skills a student learns in school, none is more fundamental than reading” Furthermore, they believe that competence in reading is essential for education, employment, productive citizenship, and living a successful and satisfying life. (p. 129) Daggett and Pedinotti (2014) explain that “life outside of school requires substantially higher levels of reading proficiency than most students experience in the high school classroom and even in post‐secondary education” (p. 1). Students, who struggle with reading in early elementary years, tend to fall farther behind as they progress through the educational system. Fiester (2010) confirms, “The National Research Council asserts academic success, as defined by high school graduation, can be predicted with reasonable accuracy by knowing someone’s reading skill at the end of third grade” (p.9) Thus, efforts to meet the needs of all learners remains a priority across the nation. As a result, states and districts require schools to submit school improvement plans, which identify specific needs based on data, strategic goals and instructional strategies targeted toward
Every child deserves a positive, safe, nurturing, and stimulating learning environment where they will grow academically, socially, emotionally, and physically. My role as an educator is to provide my students with this type of environment as well as an education that will help them succeed academically and become life long learners. It is the responsibility of a literacy educator to provide students with this type of environment, but also to provide instruction that will help students become successful readers and writers. There are numerous programs and philosophies about literacy and reading. Through years of experience and research, one begins to develop their own creative approach on teaching these skills. After looking at different programs and seeing the positive and negatives of each, an integrated and balanced approach of literacy seems to be the best way to teach the differing needs of each student.
Improving Reading in the Primary Grades goes into depth on how we can increase children’s reading skills by helping children sound out certain words, which makes them understand the word more. By doing this, children understand what letter represents which sound. If literacy is neglected from primary schools, the neglect continues as the child gets older advancing into higher grades. Vocabulary plays a major role in comprehension therefore if teacher’s neglect spending time on vocabulary, the chances of the child being able to grasp comprehension diminish. Early Literacy Instruction in the Climate of No Child Left Behind encompasses the concept of children striving for greatness. Teachers work to make students comprehend the material being presented to them. In order to make sure students are at grade level reading, reading programs for kindergarten through third grade has been developed. They are running to establish the concept of all students maintaining high-level education. Teachers ensure that the time they have with students is being used to its full capacity. Upon reading these articles, upcoming teachers are able to incorporate strategies in hopes of enhancing reading comprehension skills of
A comprehensive approach to literacy instruction is when reading and writing are integrated. This happens by connecting reading, writing, comprehension, and good children’s literature. A comprehensive approach to literacy should focus on the many different aspects of reading and writing in order to improve literacy instruction. This includes teachers supporting a comprehensive literacy instructional program by providing developmentally appropriate activities for children. Comprehensive literacy approaches incorporate meaning based skills for children by providing them with the environment needed for literacy experiences. This includes having a print rich classroom where children are exposed to charts, schedules, play related print, and
It is a “reading world” we live in and students should be guaranteed every opportunity to succeed in this information driven society. Children today are overwhelmed with more reading material than ever before on billboard, television, the Internet and at school, causing reading to become a relevant and essential need in the life of every child (Lumpkin 1972). Being able to read has become the core of our information driven society. Yet, reading difficulties continue to plague the foundation of our education system creating a problem that only seems to be escalating. Hasselbring affirms that reading difficulties are a serious concern to our nation’s students claiming that, “as many as 20 percent of 17 year olds... [are] functionally illiterate and 44 percent of all high school students…[are] described as semi-illiterate”(2004). This is a harsh reality to face – a reality that stems from difficulties developed at the elementary level where reading complications arise and usually go unchecked. These reading difficulties are carri...
Literacy is an on-going skill that teachers and students alike should commonly study and practice in all grades. Problems faced by teachers, especially teachers in higher grades, are not having the skills to be effective teachers of literacy. To effectively teach literacy across content areas, a teacher would need skills such as knowledge of the reading process and the ability to cultivate the knowledge gained in order to make informed decisions within their classrooms (Clary, Oglan, Styslinger,
Instead of teaching lessons in literacy, we as teachers are more likely to provide models of literacy activities for children by reading it to them first. Practicing encourages students to be aware of what they're doing while they complete reading assignments.
When reading, children need to have good fluency, and phonemic awareness. One more factor to a comprehensive literacy approach is written expressive language. Written expressive language has two components; mechanics and composition/creativity. Mechanics involve the “how do you put your thoughts on paper?” A good writer has a defined knowledge of: sentence structure, paragraph structure, spelling, and handwriting. Composition/creativity involves the “how do you compose and organize for writing?” This is similar to comprehension because it includes oral language, world knowledge, visualization, and inner dialogue. The last factor to a comprehensive approach to literacy is instruction. Instruction has two components, opportunities to read and write and direct instruction. Direct instruction makes sure that the needed skills are taught. Children who have the opportunity to read and write with accuracy have a better understanding to early literacy (Christie, Enz, & Vukelich,
Learning to talk is a process that comes naturally and is an almost effortless learning experience for young children. This is largely because we as humans have evolved as animals that can communicate orally. However learning to read is a completely different skill to master altogether, this is because humans have been literate for a very short time. There are five key areas that teachers needed to focus on in order to have effective instruction if reading for young students. These five areas have become known as the five pillars of effective reading instruction and are comprised of: Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary and Comprehension. To effectively teach students these five pillars, a teacher needs to do this in a balanced approach using direct and explicit instructional methods. Taking a balanced approach is a key criteria in effective reading instruction, the NICHHD with scientific evidence has identified that the most reliable and effective approach in teaching the five pillars is through systematic and explicit instruction (NICHD 2000).
I thoroughly enjoy teaching reading to students. It is wonderful to see students learn something new by reading, anticipating what may happen next and finishing a great story and excitedly sharing what happened. I think it is so important to instill a love of reading in children early. Showing them that reading is exciting and fun will make them want to learn. Children need to know that reading isn’t just something they have to do but something they can learn that they will enjoy and will benefit them forever.
“The single most important activity for building knowledge for their eventual success in reading is reading aloud to children,” a report from 1985 by the commission
The authenticity of Interactive Reading is clear and therefore leads us to explore HOW we, as teachers, incorporate this strategy in our teaching most effectively. Fisher, Flood, Lapp, and Frey's study on "read-aloud practices" provides an excellent, research based framework for the implementation of Interactive Reading based on their observations of teachers in classrooms. Their 7 "essential components of an interactive read-aloud" is a practical guide of using this strategy and can be implimented with all children. These components provide a structure that allows us to teach ALL children (inherently allowing differentiation) while attending to common core state standards. Use of this strategy attends to the understanding of language and literacy development while providing for specific skill instruction in reading and writing.