Literacy Work Station

The Project and Its Significance

Literacy workstations have become an integral component of reader’s workshops in the elementary classroom. According to Diller (2003), “a literacy work station is an area within the classroom where students work alone or interact with one another, using instructional materials to explore and expand their learning. It is a place where a variety of activities reinforce and/or extend learning, often without the assistance of the classroom teacher.” (p.3). Since literacy workstations are intended for students to complete away from the teacher, it is essential for a form of accountability to be included with them. According to Ford and Opitz (2008), student involvement in stations is crucial if they are actually

The students were grouped together based on their Fountas and Pinnell Guided Reading Level; each student within these two groups have been identified as performing below the fourth grade target reading level. The target reading level for fourth grade is R, whereas these students are on levels M, N, and O. The over-arching question driving the research study is Will standards based literacy stations improve student performance on weekly assessments? Throughout the research study, the focus will be answering two sub questions that address the over-arching research question. These sub questions are as follows: (1) Can station trackers facilitate on task behavior during standards based literacy stations? (2) Will station trackers improve student accountability and performance during standards based literacy stations? Throughout the course of the study, the students will participate in four standards based literacy stations during our reader’s workshop block. The stations that the students will attend are (1) independent reading and response (students will read for twenty minutes and then answer a response question related to topics recently learned), (2) quick-write (students will produce quick-writes in either the narrative form or the informational form), (3) standard of the week practice (this standard will vary), and (4) a standards based game (again this standard will vary). Students

It is suggested that using said stations provide the teacher with the perfect opportunity to meet with their guided reading groups while the rest of the class is engaged in meaningful, independent literacy work. The research has stated “things aren’t put into the workstations just to keep children busy” (Diller, 2003, p.5). Rather, each station should include engaging, hands-on activities related to the standards being taught. The research has shown several forms of literacy workstations that are proven to engage the students such as big books, a writing station, a poetry station, and so on. Research has also explained the importance of holding students accountable for the activities assigned during stations, as well as their behaviors during stations. More often than not, the form of holding students accountable is through an “I Can” list, which are a list of things that students are allowed to do at each particular station. Other research has stated that a vital component of holding students accountable at each station, ensuring they are engaged in the activity and completing it, is a form of tracker. As a result of that, classroom teachers must design an accountability tracker, suitable for their own students, to include in the literacy workstation model, so as to ensure they are completing required activities, and are on