Chelsea Horsburgh PME 811

Over the years, by collaborating with others, I have been able to fill my teacher tool kit with a variety of strategies and activities that help me to better meet the needs of students. In my experience working with middle school students, I have found it essential to have a wide array of tools in order to keep learners engaged and invested in learning. Engaging middle school students in reading can be challenging and can require some creative ideas to hook them into reading. In recent years, by observing my colleagues I have learned two new strategies to engage all readers, 1) book tastings, 2) book-talk cafes. Book Tasting:  Last spring, I was fortunate to observe our Secondary Librarian invite students to a book tasting. During the book tasting, our librarian transformed the library into a cafe complete with placemats and menus. Instead of a menu of food, this cafe offered a tasting of books, organized by genre. During the book tasting, students were invited to choose ...

Blog #8 Data Collection for Reading Conferences In my last post, I shared research on the effectiveness of reading conferences to meet the individual student needs. Reading conferences allow teachers to notice student strengths in a genuine way, which helps to not only build trust between the teacher and the student but it also allows the teacher to help each student to grow as a reader. After learning more about reading conferences, it is clear that they are an effective research-based approach to meeting the needs of struggling readers. McMillan (2014) explains,“Assessment is an integral part of teaching and learning, not something just done after instruction to document student achievement” (p. 8). When considering the importance of assessment and the value of reading conferences one thing I wondered, “how can I keep track of all my reading conference data?”. In this post, I want to share a few resources I found for organizing reading conference data in order to maximize teache...

I am currently teaching at a school that has adopted the Reading and Writing Workshop Curriculum 6-8. While we just finished our third year of implementation for the Units of Study for Writing, last year, was the first year of implementing the Units of Study Reading Curriculum in grades 6-8 . One area I was curious to do more research on was about reading conferences. My question is, “how can reading conferences be used to support struggling readers?” To answer this question I spent some time digging into research about reading conferences.  What is a reading conference:  According to Serravallo (2019) “Connfering is the heartbeat of the literacy block” (p. 1). During a conference you engage with students one-on-one or in small groups and, “it allows you to value each child's language and literacy practices, and their own literacy development, and to treat each child as a competent learner (Serravallo, 2019, p. 1). Conferences allow teachers to meet each student where t...

In a previous blog post, I mentioned the importance of students talking about books in order to build a community of readers in the classroom. Today, I want to share a tool that can be used to promote discussion and build a community of readers in your classroom.  I currently work at a school that has an adopted one-to-one device program. In my classroom, I am continually striving to use technology as a tool which promotes learning and enhances my lessons and activities. Last year, I was looking for tools to help engage struggling readers when I discovered Flipgrid.  What is it:  Flipgrid is a website which creates a social learning platform that allows educators to ask a question, then the students respond in a video. Teachers create “grids” to facilitate video discussion. Students are then able to respond to one another, creating a “web” of discussion. Increasing the level of student talk in the classroom can help to increase students level of engagement and com...

Reading Aloud in Middle School  Is reading aloud to middle school students an effective strategy to engage struggling readers? Reading a story aloud is often a common practice both in school and at home throughout elementary school. However, as students get older it is often common for students to engage in much more independent reading than shared reading. Research has indicated that the practice of reading aloud is beneficial for both younger and older readers. Ivey (2003) noted, “The bottom line is that when teachers read to students, they enhance students’ understanding and their inclination to read independently” (p. 812).  There are also many additional benefits to reading aloud including:  Building Community: When all the students in a classroom listen to a shared book it allows the students to build a sense of community through the shared experience of listening to a particular story.  Mentor Text: Using read aloud also provides teachers ...

“By putting a book into the hands of a child, we can put hope directly into that child’s hands. We can put love directly into that child’s hands and we can show them, look: you have the power to make this world better” (Mulligan & Landrigan, 2018, p. 1). Atwell (2007), explains the number one reason kids cite for not reading more is, “they can’t find books they want to read” (73). In order to build regular reading habits for all students, it is essential that students have access to many books and personal choice of what to read (Mulligan & Landrigan, 2018, p. 4). Teachers can help students establish regular reading habits by providing access to a wide variety of choice books. It can also be helpful to have students create, “Someday”, “Want to Read”,“To Be Read Lists”. These are lists of books that a student is interested in reading in the future. By having a plan of what to read next, it reduces the likelihood that a student will not read because “they can’t find books they...