Reading An emphasis is place upon reading in our first grade classroom. Our curriculum is based upon the balanced literacy philosophy. This page will provide parents, teachers, and others with information and links on supporting a child's development of reading skills and strategies. What is Balanced Literacy? Developmental Reading Levels Reading Strategies Prompts to Use Components of a Balanced Literacy Program Modeled Reading Teacher reads selection aloud to students Provides a model of reading fluency with expression Develops story comprehension Enriches concept and vocabulary development Encourages prediction Fosters enthusiasm for reading Develops active listening Shared Reading Teacher and students read text together. Builds a community of readers Promotes reading strategies Increases awareness of concepts in print Builds sight word vocabulary Develops fluency Increases comprehension Guided Reading Teacher selects appropriate text for a small group of students who are similar in strengths and needs to provide instruction that targets specific reading strategies. Promotes student use of reading strategies Develops comprehension Encourages independent reading Allows teacher to work with individual groups of children on specific reading skills Builds sight word vocabulary Expands student belief in own ability Independent Reading Students read independently Encourages strategic reading Increases comprehension Supports writing development Extends experiences with a variety of written texts Promotes reading for enjoyment and information Develops fluency Fosters self-confidence by reading familiar and new text. Modeled/Shared Writing Teacher and students collaborate to write text; teacher acts as scribe. Develops concepts about print Develops writing strategies Supports reading of text Provides model for a variety of writing styles Models the connection among and between sounds, letters, and words Produces text that students can read independently Interactive Writing Teacher and students compose together using a 'shared pen' technique in which students do some of the writing. Provides opportunities to plan and construct texts Increases spelling knowledge Produces written language resources for classroom use Creates opportunity to apply what has been learned Independent Writing Students write independently Strengthens text sequence Develops an understanding of multiple uses of writing Supports reading and spelling development Develops writing strategies Information obtained from Balancing Literacy: A Balanced Approach to Reading and Writing Instruction published by Creative Teaching Press in 2002. Developmental Levels of Reading Early Emergent Readers who are just learning that illustrations and books tell a story. Students often memorize the text as part of the developmental process. Children at this level are often found in the K-1 classroom. Skills to Focus Upon Front and back of book Title and title page Top and bottom of a page Where to begin on a page Left-to-right progression and return sweep Print contains meaning Word/space One-to-one correspondence (word match) Recognizing letters Basic punctuation (period, question mark) Learning high frequency/sight words Upper Emergent Readers grasp many of the basic concepts of print and are ready for more complex stories. Students begin to integrate strategies and to gain meaning from print. Children are most often found in the K-1 classroom. Skills to Focus Upon Building prior knowledge Strengthening knowledge of concepts of word/space, first/last word, one-to-one word match, and words/letters Identifying high frequency/sight words Identifying letters Recognizing basic punctuation marks Identifying initial consonants Beginning to use reading strategies and cue systems Early Fluency Readers are beginning to achieve independence by integrated meaning, structures, and varied text. Students are still developing an understanding of plots, character, and simple literary elements. Children at the early fluency level are often found in first or second grade classrooms. Skills to Focus Upon Taking risks without fear of making errors Using picture clues as a means of cross-checking Reading on to gain meaning Using first/last consonants Increasing sight vocabulary Retelling stories Identifying punctuation marks Rereading for meaning Self-correcting Integrating strategies by using one strategy to cross-check another Inferring more from the text to comprehend fully the author's intent. Fluency Level Readers are reading fluently, using reading strategies effectively and becoming involved in stories at deeper levels of understanding. Students at the fluency level are most often found in second grade and on. Skills to Focus Upon Increase fluency The ability to read text independently The successful use and integration of reading strategies An understanding of basic literary elements Information obtained from Guided Reading: A Practical Approach for Teachers published by the Wright Group in 1995 Early Reading Strategies 1. Look at the pictures Meaning is the ultimate goal of reading. Readers predict about words based on clues provided by the pictures. 2. Does it make sense? Readers use pictures to determine if what they read makes sense. 3. Get your mouth ready. Picture clues alone do not provide enough detailed information. Readers initially concentrate on beginning letter(s) of unknown words. 4. Does it look right? By looking through a word from left to right, readers check their predictions about the word. They confirm or reject predictions based on the sound-letter relationships. 5. Reread. Children reread to use knowledge of oral language and to check meaning. 6. Does it sound right? Readers use their knowledge of both spoken and literary language to check if what they read can also be spoken. 7. Look for chunks. Using onsets and rimes, readers make analogies to decode unfamiliar words. Taken from Reading with Strategies published by Celebration Press in 1997. Prompts to promote the use of strategies To encourage independence at difficult words, use prompts, such as: Look at the pictures to help yourself. Think of a word that would make sense and try it. Look at how that word begins. Get your mouth ready to say that word. Go back and reread. Look for a chunk in that word. Can you think of another word that might fit here? To encourage cross-checking, use prompts, such as: Does that make sense? Does it sound right? Can you say it that way? Does that look right to you? This word makes sense and sounds right, but does it look right? Were you right? How did you know? If your child reads successfully, use comments, such as: Good for you. I saw you checking the word with the picture to see if you were right. I like the way you worked out the hard part. You found out what was wrong and you fixed it! Good thinking. If your child encounters difficulty, praise their attempts by using comments, such as: You stopped because you knew something wasn't right. That shows me you're checking what you read. I like the way you tried to help yourself. I saw you use several strategies (name them) to try to figure out that tricky word. That's what good readers do. Taken from Reading with Strategies published by Celebration Press in 1997. Special thanks to Grace at for the adorable graphics! Return home