Juli Kendall's Weekly
Reading Workshop Journal
A MiddleWeb Listserv Project
Self-selected members of the MiddleWeb Discussion List are joining
together to explore the Reading Workshop and other ideas about supporting
young adolescent readers. Juli Kendall, a reading teacher/coach in Long
Beach, California, is helping moderate the discussion. Juli is also keeping
a weekly journal of her own Reading Workshop initiative. Find out more about
our project at our Reading Workshop homepage.
You'll find Juli's background article here.
Links to many of the tools created by Juli and her colleagues are embedded
in these journals. Most often, when you click on them, a PDF file will begin
to download. You'll find a list of the downloads here.
Week #22
Exploring the Riddles
in Guided Reading
Even after all these years, there are still many teachers puzzled about
guided reading. Why is it so elusive? How does it help readers? Now, finally,
not answers, but riddles make it more understandable for me.
A riddle in the midst of a puzzle is fitting. But how about riddles in guided
reading? I found out that in guided reading there are lots of riddles. Actually,
I've probably discovered many more riddles than answers. Sometimes I feel
a little like Pooh Bear when he recited the poem, "Cottleston Pie."
Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie,
A fly can't bird, but a bird can fly.
Ask me a riddle and I reply:
"Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie."
Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie,
A fish can't whistle and neither can I.
Ask me a riddle and I reply:
"Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie."
Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie,
Why does a chicken, I don't know why.
Ask me a riddle and I reply:
"Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie."
From The Tao of Pooh, Benjamin Hoff, p. 39
What exactly is guided reading anyway? Guided Reading has various
meanings. Two books, The
Art of Teaching Reading and Guiding Readers and Writers: Grades 3-6,
give excellent information about the subject. Even, today, guided reading
is not absolutely the same thing to all people. So, learning all you can
about the subject is a good start to sorting things out.
What do you need? Guided reading is not easy to do. For one thing,
you need to know at what level students read with understanding. In some
cases, teachers know student levels but do not have texts that match those
levels. In order to do guided reading, you need sets of 6 to 8 books, poems
or other texts to use with small groups of students who are reading at the
same level. After 10 years of doing guided reading, I can attest to the
fact that no day goes exactly as expected: "Expect the unexpected."
What's unexpected? Students need independent activities to do while
you're working with a small group. This is where unexpected things always
occur. Some classes encourage students who are not working with the teacher
in guided reading to do independent reading. Others have independent centers
with literacy activities, and still others post lists of assignments on
the board that are to be completed by the other students during guided reading.
Whatever system is used, excellent classroom management is a must. In our
classroom the Independent Reading
Rubric helps us monitor our students and encourages them to take responsibility
for their work and evaluate themselves while others are doing guided reading.
How does everything go together? In fact, overload is the natural
state of things. Sometimes it feels like you're managing a three-ring circus.
Building on the tone set by the teacher, the classroom might be a mix of
engagement, disengagement and "floating." ("Floating"
means moving quickly from one thing to another; never settling in to one
activity for a length of time.) Monitoring and adjusting instruction, as
well as reteaching, works well for us and helps keep everyone on the right
track.
How can you get started? That guided reading is under study at our
school is a surprise to no one. Last year, they promoted the concept by
buying everyone a book about the technique. Since then additional attempts
to implement have moved slowly--a lot else has been happening. Currently,
we're trying a five-week book study on Guiding Readers and Writers: Grades
3-6. One thing that may help teachers is seeing it modeled; visiting
classrooms while students are participating in guided reading or watching
videos that model the technique. So far, for the teachers that have been
confused, seeing it in these ways shapes up as the best way to "get
it."
But how can you get better? At least we're working together to "puzzle
out" guided reading for our students. By sharing materials and student
work, modeling lessons for each other and asking questions or posing riddles,
we improve our own understandings. Supporting each other as we teach with
kids in classrooms is the ultimate goal.
What can you do about your limitations? Puzzling out guided reading
takes determination. The limitations for a teacher can be overwhelming.
Benjamin Hoff's book, The Tao of Pooh, offers some insight into how
limitations are turned into strengths through self-reflection.
"Once you face and understand your limitations, you can
work with them, instead of having them work against you and get in
your way, which is what they do when you ignore them, whether you realize
it or not. And then you will find that, in many cases, your limitations
can be your strengths." (p. 39)
I pull out my list of "limitations" for guided reading and read
it again, understanding now what guided reading has taught me: I need to
forgive myself mistakes. I can't have everything I want. I must be strong.
There are times when we need to stop and do something else. Most of all,
keep on trying to make it work for the kids since it brings big gains in
reading with understanding.
See Juli's February curriculum map
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