Spring 2008, EDUC 330 Reading in El I

This course was taken with Crystal Maas. I enjoyed her reading class because she was very straight forward. She told us it is important on how we set up our class room. When we put things up on the wall it is a guide for those students who need to use it and that's alright. She told us to make our reading area inviting and comfortable to our students.

We learned about balanced reading - shared reading, independent reading, read aloud, guided reading, phonics/word study, and writing. She broke down each of these groups and told us how to use them. We also did lesson plans using each of these reading groups. We were introduced to running records. Crystal gave us information on the three reading cues - semantic, syntactic, and graphophonic.

I did practicum work at Ladera with Mrs. Velasquez Kindergarten class. I did several read alouds with her students because I was also there for my Oral & Written Language class. I combined some of my practicum work with other classes which worked out well. I also did some shared reading and observed guided reading at Northeast Elementary.

Teaching/Learning Process: While students are reading during independent reading I will conference with them at their reading table. I will ask the student questions like: How is your reading coming along? During your reading does anything seem familiar to you? Can you relate to any of the characters? I would then ask the student to read a passage to me that has a connection in it. We can use this passage to discuss comprehension.

Comprehension: During our conference time I will ask the student to tell me about the book he/she is reading. I'll then ask if he/she enjoyed reading the book, why or why not? By answering these questions I should know if the student is comprehending the reading. If the student is not comprehending the reading I would encourage the reading to make other connections. I'd tell the student to put themselves in the story as one of the characters. Then I would ask questions like: How would your feel if that happened to you? What would you do?

Accomodations: I will have books of different levels in the classroom including multicultural books. Once the students have chosen a book I would ask to check the book to make sure the student is on the right track. If the book is too easy or too difficult for a particular student I would carefully encourage the student to think about the book they chose.

Assessment/Evaluation: I will assess the students by discussing the book with them, and asking questions. I'd ask them to tell me about the book and about any connections they were able to make.