Sheryl Elliott. Chapter 4, November Blog Teach with a Sense of Urgency

I especially liked the checklists: Top five things we do to ensure students become excellent readers and top five things I do to ensure students become excellent readers.  This list gave me a mental checklist of things I need to do more of in my classroom.  I know I need to give students more time to discuss their reading.  I have been having book discussions on itslearning, which has been a huge success.  The interactive reading paragraphs really interested me.  We are on our third chapter book read aloud.  The students seem to love it.  I think I’ve done a good job of discussing the book after we’ve read, but I need to do more interaction as we are reading.  I love chapter book read alouds because I love to see the students’ reactions in certain parts of the books.  Using the chapter book read aloud during my mini lesson is effective too.  The students are familiar with the characters and the plot, so it is easy to discuss.  For example, we have been working on theme.  We are reading The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.  This book allows us to discuss theme a lot.  I guess I just never thought of that as interactive reading.  That’s a really cool way to describe it! The author states that students become readers and writers when they are introduced to massive amounts of texts.  I agree with this 100%.  Shared reading and writing and having a great classroom library are very important part of a student’s reading and writing success. The last page of the chapter really spoke to me.  I know my expectations need to be higher for some students.  The author really stepped on my toes.  I’ve got to forget about home life, all kids can be held to high expectations.