I think all three of the readings for today really connect in a way that is showing me so much about teaching reading to my students in the near future. Yopp and Yopp begin with putting a great emphasis on developing children's phonemic awareness. This article tells educators how to develop this awareness so that when moving on to higher grades that fluency and base knowledge is there. This is so important when creating excellent readers. I think that these ideas are good for any grade. Students in one grade are not on the same level. It is good to know what types of activities hit a certain topics when students need mini-lessons.
Connected with this idea, Clark's article helps teachers who are in slightly higher grades adapt to students who may have lacked in the phonemic awareness subject this far in school. It gives some word for word examples for teacher coaching in aspects of questions, cueing, and scaffolding. I think teaching children to read and developing their fluency is so important that it is sort of intimidating knowing that responsibility is in your hands. It is so helpful to see it done by teachers with the words to use when in a similar situation.
On the same lines as the examples above, chapter 5 in the book is full of activities, games, and conversations to give to students to help develop this important part of their literary lives. I love when I get ideas, and I think the ways that these activities are broken down step by step make it easy to remember for teachers and easy to modify to individualize to each students needs.
As a future teacher it is so important that I remember that all students are different, with a variety of backgrounds and knowledge. I may think that phonemic awarness is not something I need to know for 5th grade but the truth is that in reality, I will have students in the fifth grade who cannnot read past a first or second grade reading level. It is always good to know where students are coming from, what type of information they should know, and how to go over it if they missed something the first time!
Shonna, I agree with your comments, especially the one regarding having various level learners in your class. Like Renee and Monica mentioned in class, you'll definitely have above average learners and below average learners. It's important to remember that at any grade level you're teaching. I also like how the book and articles give examples on ways to work on phonemic awareness. I think coaching is an especially important method. That's one method of teaching phonemic awareness I plan on using in my classroom.
ReplyDeleteShonna,
ReplyDeleteIt is an overwhelming responsiblity that teachers have to teach kids to read! I always felt the same. I am glad you are already thinking about how to differentiate instruction in your classroom. Very thoughful entry.