Blog Post #6 Chapter 5 - Organize an Outstanding Classroom Library- Samantha Guest

Reading materials are available in almost every part of my classroom. No matter what center they are in or what activity they are doing, they are almost always reading. The chapter says that the availability of reading materials greatly impacts children’s literacy development. I was happy to also read that books contribute more strongly to reading achievement more than computer software does. We read a lot in my classroom. We complete a shared reading activity every day. We read in the reading center every day. We also read during independent reading time at the end of the day every day. I usually have books out on a variety of different reading levels. Some of the books have more pictures and colors, and some have more words. I try to also put out books in the library that go along with our unit or the theme for that time. I also have several class books that we have made together because the children love reading them and looking at our work. I try to read as many books as I can from our classroom library so that the students can then retell the story by themselves. This way they know all about the book and are way more interested in reading it. The chapter mentions that we need to ensure that students have books at home to both borrow and keep. I make sure that they have books by making them with the class about once a week. We will make paper emergent reader books at school that the students read, color, and take home to read again. For example, last week we made a book called My Jj book. I also will provide beginner books called BOB books for my students to borrow and practice reading at home. I have already seen a tremendous amount of success through doing this. The chapter also says to provide a lot of choices of books and I definitely put out as many books as my baskets will hold to give them lots of options. The chapter also talks about teaching students how to care for books, and with 4 year olds I have definitely had to do this. I have modeled how to “nicely and gently” turn the pages and hold the book. We have discussed how special and great these books are and we want them to last a long time so we have to take care of them. By now, most of them have learned how to do this. We also have a lot of “reading buddies” in the reading center, which are small stuffed animals that the students can hold on to as they read. This helps them to feel more comfortable reading and it helps them to enjoy reading more! 

Blog Post #5 Chapter 12-You Only Have So Much Time-Christina Cleland

'Lead an Interesting Life'-"We are not only role models for learning; we are role models for living."

I love this!  Life is short and we are meant to live it and live it well.  Our little people that come into our lives have an optimistic outlook about them, even when they come from hard circumstances.  Sometimes it is because they have not been in the world long enough to know that their circumstances may be different or challenging.  I think they soak up anything we tell them about our lives and how we live them.  I love sharing experiences with them and I love hearing all of their stories!  If I spend all of my time working and striving and never living, I lose my joy and so do they because I have nothing left to give them.

‘Trust Your Own Experiences to Help You Plan Well’ -I think this is incredibly important.  We spend a lot of time with our little people.  As the teacher I am the only one who can figure out each student and what they need.  While it is important to use curriculum and standards, I must always be attuned to how I need to restructure those plans to meet my students and help them grow.

'Make work being done while waiting pleasurable' is another key point made in the chapter.  We have ‘extra’ time in the morning when the students are eating breakfast and getting unpacked for the day.  I have many times been tempted to make that a time where they get straight to work at the tables but I have resisted because I think that morning welcome time is vital.  It builds a sense of community with our class.  Our students need routine in their lives desperately and they come to depend on our little welcome routine each morning.  I enjoy hearing them talk with each other about things and we learn a lot about them just by listening to what they have to say to each other.  There is plenty of time later for being quiet and listening so I do not mind the ‘talking and sharing’ first thing in the morning.

The key is to make an effort to lead a balanced life in and out of the classroom.

Blog Post #5Laurie Smith Routman Ch. 5: Organize an Outstanding Classroom Library

“It is difficult to maintain a strong independent reading program without an excellent classroom library.”  It is important that children have access to many different types of books in the classroom so that they develop a love of them and of reading, but creating an organized classroom library can be challenging. With my 3 and 4 year olds, who are not reading independently yet, it is just as important to have a variety of book genres.  Just because they cannot read yet, doesn’t mean they cannot enjoy looking at the pictures or enjoy having it read to them.  They can still pick their favorites.  I recently received a book order from scholastic and it sat in the box for several weeks before I actually had time to go through it.  December was a busy month.  When I finally went through the boxes of books I automatically started putting them in piles by category.  Before I knew it I had begun organizing my classroom library.  My floor was covered in books and once I start that kind of project, I’m working until it’s complete.  I had several different stashes of books around the room that I included in the organization process.  I decided that for my students, the best way to organize the books was by topic.  I made categories like animals, numbers, colors, shapes, family, school, nature, self-help, etc.  I feel like this is the best way to organize it.  Right now I have the number books on display and the color and shape books in two separate bins labeled accordingly.  These are subjects that we are constantly working on, so I thought I would start by putting those out first.  I have a limited amount of space for my library, so I can only display a few categories of books at a time.  The others I’m not displaying are stored in bins that are labeled accordingly on the shelf by my desk.  I plan on changing them out every couple weeks so that there is always something new to look at in our reading corner.  Routman states that “an adequate library will have at least two hundred books, but an excellent library will have more than a thousand.”   I’m positive I have at least two hundred and that is a good start.  I plan on getting more to add to it over time.  I find at this age, it is more important to have books that peak the students interest rather than have them all leveled, especially since my students are not reading yet.  I am very excited about my small classroom library and I can’t wait to see my students enjoying it as well as how it will evolve over time.  I know it won’t always stay the way it is now because I will add to it and tweak it as my students’ needs and interests change.

Meredith Cox, Blog Post #5 Reading Essentials chapter 8 Teach Comprehension

“If we want kids to wind up with comprehension, we have to begin with comprehension.”  It is so important that we begin teaching comprehension in four year old kindergarten classrooms.  Many of my students are lacking in background knowledge and prior experiences to be able to comprehend the text.  It is so important that I expose my students to a wide variety of children’s literature while they are in my classroom. I have to help my students develop the vocabulary to discuss and answer questions about books in my classroom.  I accomplish this mostly by modeling comprehension strategies.  We talk a lot about what good readers do.  We focus on conducting picture walks when introducing a book. I encourage my students that they can do a picture walk themselves when they select a book.  Although they may not be able to read the words of the text, they can read a book by looking at the pictures and telling a story about what they see happening in the book.  When I select a book that I want to focus on comprehension, I try to use a predictable story that is easy for a four year old to comprehend.  This chapter stresses that students are not able to read for meaning if they are struggling over words and concepts.  To relate this to my four year olds, I believe that it is important for me to select children’s literature that is not too “wordy” for my students.  It is important to select a book on their level that they will understand.  After we read a story I usually place the book in our library center for students to read during center time.  I am so proud when I see my students using props and sequencing events that happened in a story that we have read over a long period of time during our shared reading time. 

1. Jennifer Campbell’s Blog Post # 6, Miller (2013), Section 1: Not This: Is There Enough Time? And Is Time Enough to Support Independent Reading?

At this beginning of this section, Miller talks about how some teachers spend their reading time running through the calendar, looking up vocabulary words, workbooks, worksheets, test-prep materials, and spelling practice. 

            I began the school year not wanting to consider an independent reading block only because I remembered times that when I worked in other classes, students read only during Interest Areas and they played.  They did not look at books for long periods of time and would often ask to leave for a better center, usually Blocks or Dramatic Play.  My first few weeks of school I did not assign Interest Areas and my students never picked the Library Center.  Once we got past that first month and some of my students were finishing up their work faster they needed something to do, so I told them to get a book.  We started filling in our odd left over minutes with books.  When we finally had our schedule finally ironed out, I added in a reading block once a week to see how it would go.  At first it was awful.  They looked at the books for five minutes before they lost interest. Sometimes they wanted an adult to read to them, which is great, except I would have a line of five students wanting to be read to and they spent the block standing around.  So we would end the block early and move on to something more captivating.  Each week I tried adding a few more minutes and each week it got a little better.  Now they are lasting the entire 30 minute block and sometimes I’ll extend it if they seem really interested in their books.  They have also become more likely to choose the Library Interest Area on their own and when I do assign it, they do not ask me if they can go somewhere different to play. 

Jennifer Campbell’s Blog Post # 5, Miller (2013), Section 2: Why Not? What Works? Why Independent Reading Matters and the Best Practices to Support It

    In this section, I zeroed in on Miller saying “Fountas and Pinnell (1996) recommend that teachers have between three hundred and six hundred titles in their classroom libraries.  The International Reading Association (1999) recommends seven books per student.  More importantly, you need materials that address topics that kids want to read about.”  I think this especially important when providing materials for young children, some of which have not had much exposure to books in their homes.

     When I first started this year, my classroom library was a weird mix of books that had been left by other teachers and a few books that were provided along with the curriculum.  I do have a large personal collection of books at home that are still being used by my children that I will sometimes bring in to share, but I mostly have used the library to supplement.  I noticed, which I think is also typical, my students really gravitated towards books about animals.  Not just “Brown Bear” and “Pete the Cat”, but the National Geographic books about animals.  They even fight over them.  When I was given the chance to order books from Scholastic I used most of the money towards National Geographic books.  My students LOVE them!  They are no where near grade level and I’m sure my students will never be able to read the words, but I believe the exposure to a book that is fascinating to them is much more important to them at this age. 

Dawn Mitchell's Share Your Reading Life Regie Routman's Chapter 2

During the month of January our application we are working on learning about Socio Cultural Learning theories and strategies that help support student talk.   In our required reading this month Richard Allington identifies student talk as one of the essential components that characterize the most effective teachers’ classrooms. 

In January’s blendspace you will find a variety of resources we’ve included for you including the four theories that we are sharing with you such as Owocki and Goodman’s kidwatching excerpts that focus on sociocultural learning and talk and Chorzerpa’s suggestions for utilizing Socratic Seminar to promote active student engagement in learning.  You will also find in our blendspace an example of an award-winning podcast in the link to NPR’s “This I Believe” podcast series as well as a link to try out a very user friendly podcasting tool for students called vocaroo (vocaroo.com) 

This month for my blog post, I have chosen to read chapter 3 “Share Your Reading Life” from Routman’s Reading Essentials for many reasons.  First of all, I believe that this directs to the importance of talk in our classroom.  How many of us love to read and love to talk about what we are reading?  I know that many times I have read a book that has deeply affected me as a reader and I have immediately wanted to share that experience with another human. 

When I was in the second grade and read, Charlotte’s Web I remember sitting beside my best friend at the time, Amanda Ravan just a crying over the loss of Charlotte and the heart warming knowledge that I at 8 had experienced the joy of friendship.  When I was in the fifth grade and read Where the Red Fern Grows I remember vividly having to re-read it at night to my twin brother because I wanted someone else to know those two coon dogs, Little Ann and Ole’ Dan that had stolen my heart and made me love the outdoors all over again.

I’m a little embarrassed to admit to you that in college when Greg and I first met I read Nicolas Spark’s The Notebook and was so smitten by the idea of a love like that I asked him would he please read because I hoped that the new love we had found might grow into a lasting life time love like the two characters based on the author’s grandparents had found.  I know cheesy right! 

As readers we connect to what we read and we are compelled to share our thoughts with others.  When Lily Grace figured out what Severus Snape’s heart was really about in Harry Potter she had to run downstairs and tell me that he wasn’t all bad and she couldn’t believe I had let her peg him wrong all this time when I knew he actually helped save Harry in the end!  I told her that I was waiting to see her reaction and I didn’t want to spoil the discovery of loyalty in his character for her.  We then both concurred that J.K. Rowling had magical writing abilities to draw out his character development.

Our students need time to talk about what they’ve read, to transact with others who may affirm their thoughts and more importantly, who may challenge them and open them up to a new way of thinking.  In my first summer of the Spartanburg Writing Project, my book club that read and wrote under the influence of Barbara Kingsolver’s work that summer challenged my thinking and my writing in ways that grew me. 

In this month’s article, Allington states,  "..if we want to increase substantially the amount of reading that children do (and would I argue that this is one absolutely crucial step toward enhancing reading proficiency), it is important to give children books they can read and choices regarding which books they will read. Likewise, crafting a supportive conversational environment in which students talk to their teachers and to their peers about the books they are reading is an important component for sustaining increased reading. And active teaching of useful reading strategies expands the array of books that children are able to read. Finally, shifting evaluation to focus on effort and improvement enhances students' motivation for reading."  (Allington, 2002 pg. 8)

One of the strategies that Routman made in this chapter is to share your now and your next book and to have a record of your reading.  In my writer’s notebook I have a running list of books I’ve read so I can remember them for mentor texts and for the memories.

Each month I visit Mr. K’s Used Book store in Greenville (in Verdae Shopping Center off the Motor Mile) and buy my stack for the month.  Below is my picture of my Now Book stack.  Every single book in this stack was recommended to me by a friend.  Keri Lyles from Arcadia recommended Outlander (she was right, it is full of adventure, history, suspense, and a little romance too!).  A friend of mine I met in Kentucky when Tasha Thomas and I presented at a Writing Conference there recommended The Goldfinch to me on facebook and The Martian was highly recommended to me by my parents. 

Here is a picture of my Next Book Stack and both books on this list made the list through talking with others.  The Rick Bragg book is on my next stack because he is an all-time favorite of mine and two friends, Susan Cox and Pam Ray recommended this one to me recently.  The ESV Bible was given to me for Christmas by my husband Greg because two friends of mine recommended this translation to me. 

Other take aways for me from this chapter include:

*Favorite Author Area – page 30

*Baskets of Recommended books – page 30

*Keeping a Simple Reading Record – page 35

*Demonstrating How You Read and Your Love For Reading – page 36

Routman says on page 24 that it is important that we share our love of reading with our students.  “I want students to know I am compelled to read.  It is almost impossible for me not to read.  It’s much more than enjoying a well-told story, increasing my knowledge about the world, following directions, or say, understanding philosophy.  Reading pervades my life and sustains me the same way friendship and love do.  Reading gives me joy, comfort, perspective, new ideas, questions to ponder, and connections to other lives.  I want nothing less for my students.” (Routman, page 24)

I agree whole-heartedly.  #readersareleaders

Sincerely,

Dawn

During the month of January our application we are working on learning about Socio Cultural Learning theories and strategies that help support student talk.   In our required reading this month Richard Allington identifies student talk as one of the essential components that characterize the most effective teachers’ classrooms. 

In January’s blendspace you will find a variety of resources we’ve included for you including the four theories that we are sharing with you such as Owocki and Goodman’s kidwatching excerpts that focus on sociocultural learning and talk and Chorzerpa’s suggestions for utilizing Socratic Seminar to promote active student engagement in learning.  You will also find in our blendspace an example of an award-winning podcast in the link to NPR’s “This I Believe” podcast series as well as a link to try out a very user friendly podcasting tool for students called vocaroo (vocaroo.com) 

This month for my blog post, I have chosen to read chapter 3 “Share Your Reading Life” from Routman’s Reading Essentials for many reasons.  First of all, I believe that this directs to the importance of talk in our classroom.  How many of us love to read and love to talk about what we are reading?  I know that many times I have read a book that has deeply affected me as a reader and I have immediately wanted to share that experience with another human. 

When I was in the second grade and read, Charlotte’s Web I remember sitting beside my best friend at the time, Amanda Ravan just a crying over the loss of Charlotte and the heart warming knowledge that I at 8 had experienced the joy of friendship.  When I was in the fifth grade and read Where the Red Fern Grows I remember vividly having to re-read it at night to my twin brother because I wanted someone else to know those two coon dogs, Little Ann and Ole’ Dan that had stolen my heart and made me love the outdoors all over again.

I’m a little embarrassed to admit to you that in college when Greg and I first met I read Nicolas Spark’s The Notebook and was so smitten by the idea of a love like that I asked him would he please read because I hoped that the new love we had found might grow into a lasting life time love like the two characters based on the author’s grandparents had found.  I know cheesy right! 

As readers we connect to what we read and we are compelled to share our thoughts with others.  When Lily Grace figured out what Severus Snape’s heart was really about in Harry Potter she had to run downstairs and tell me that he wasn’t all bad and she couldn’t believe I had let her peg him wrong all this time when I knew he actually helped save Harry in the end!  I told her that I was waiting to see her reaction and I didn’t want to spoil the discovery of loyalty in his character for her.  We then both concurred that J.K. Rowling had magical writing abilities to draw out his character development.

Our students need time to talk about what they’ve read, to transact with others who may affirm their thoughts and more importantly, who may challenge them and open them up to a new way of thinking.  In my first summer of the Spartanburg Writing Project, my book club that read and wrote under the influence of Barbara Kingsolver’s work that summer challenged my thinking and my writing in ways that grew me. 

In this month’s article, Allington states,  "..if we want to increase substantially the amount of reading that children do (and would I argue that this is one absolutely crucial step toward enhancing reading proficiency), it is important to give children books they can read and choices regarding which books they will read. Likewise, crafting a supportive conversational environment in which students talk to their teachers and to their peers about the books they are reading is an important component for sustaining increased reading. And active teaching of useful reading strategies expands the array of books that children are able to read. Finally, shifting evaluation to focus on effort and improvement enhances students' motivation for reading."  (Allington, 2002 pg. 8)

One of the strategies that Routman made in this chapter is to share your now and your next book and to have a record of your reading.  In my writer’s notebook I have a running list of books I’ve read so I can remember them for mentor texts and for the memories.

Each month I visit Mr. K’s Used Book store in Greenville (in Verdae Shopping Center off the Motor Mile) and buy my stack for the month.  Below is my picture of my Now Book stack.  Every single book in this stack was recommended to me by a friend.  Keri Lyles from Arcadia recommended Outlander (she was right, it is full of adventure, history, suspense, and a little romance too!).  A friend of mine I met in Kentucky when Tasha Thomas and I presented at a Writing Conference there recommended The Goldfinch to me on facebook and The Martian was highly recommended to me by my parents. 

Here is a picture of my Next Book Stack and both books on this list made the list through talking with others.  The Rick Bragg book is on my next stack because he is an all-time favorite of mine and two friends, Susan Cox and Pam Ray recommended this one to me recently.  The ESV Bible was given to me for Christmas by my husband Greg because two friends of mine recommended this translation to me. 

Other take aways for me from this chapter include:

*Favorite Author Area – page 30

*Baskets of Recommended books – page 30

*Keeping a Simple Reading Record – page 35

*Demonstrating How You Read and Your Love For Reading – page 36

Routman says on page 24 that it is important that we share our love of reading with our students.  “I want students to know I am compelled to read.  It is almost impossible for me not to read.  It’s much more than enjoying a well-told story, increasing my knowledge about the world, following directions, or say, understanding philosophy.  Reading pervades my life and sustains me the same way friendship and love do.  Reading gives me joy, comfort, perspective, new ideas, questions to ponder, and connections to other lives.  I want nothing less for my students.” (Routman, page 24)

I agree whole-heartedly.  #readersareleaders

Sincerely,

Dawn

Blog Post #5 Trina Lancaster Routman: Ch 5 Organize an Outstanding Classroom Library

          I wrote a Donors Choose grant that was funded right before Christmas. All month long I have been receiving books supplied through Amazon. It has been a delight to open each and every package! The students have been so excited to see the books as well. You see, these are the books they asked for. They wanted books about Peppa Pig, Daniel Tiger, Pete the Cat, Barbie, Thomas the Train, Hello Kitty and many more of their “friends” as they call the characters. Routman says, “If students are to choose to read and develop positive attitudes about reading, they must have access to engaging reading materials.” After seeing these students look at the books that were previously in my classroom library and watching them, now I really believe this is true. They are excited about getting their favorite books and even ask can they get them when we are doing other activities.

          Routman also stated that, “Classroom libraries are a literacy necessity; they are integral to successful teaching and learning and must become a top priority if our students are to become thriving, engaged readers.” I always knew that it was important to have books available for our students and that they needed to be something they were interested in reading but I never thought to purchase the books that Routman called “light reading” books. The books that the students want to read to get them hooked on books. For the most part the books in my classroom library are what I call “school books”, Routman called them “higher brow” stuff! Some books are award winners, books by well-known children writers or Scholastic. All are great books, and the kids like them when I read them, but seeing them with the books they asked for and loving them is a whole new experience for me! It makes my heart warm watching them!

          So far the books are in a tub, but after reading this selection I will get the students to help me organize them in a way that will be meaningful to them and see how it works out. Having a library for myself and one for the students gives me a little bit of a relief. Now I don’t have to worry about them tearing up my books because they don’t care about them, they love their books and are trying really hard to take great care with them. It really is amazing!

Blog Post #5  (Lisa L. Smith)

“Organize an Outstanding Classroom Library”

Reading Essentials     by:  Reggie Routman

“The availability of reading materials greatly impacts children’s literacy development.”  This is one of the most important points in the chapter.  Children must have access to good books of all kinds to develop the love of reading.  Helping students find books that interest them is essential in developing young readers.  The section on light reading and its importance hit very close to home for me.  Not necessarily with my four year olds, but my concern that my children did not necessarily want to read books that challenged them at their Lexile levels as they progressed through school.  They were more interested in books that appealed to them.  The importance of developing a love for reading far outweighs whether the book is “hard enough” for them. 

Creating a class library is challenging sometimes.  How do you organize it?  Can the students understand the structure of the organization (especially the younger ones)?  But organization is as important as including different genres (especially non-fiction, which is not typically featured in classroom libraries).  It is also extremely important to make classroom libraries appealing and comfortable.  No one wants to read in a cramped and uncomfortable environment.  We want the children to choose the library as their top destination.  Involving the students in the library design and organization can help give them ownership.  It can also help us look at how they see things and how the books can be most accessible and useful to them. 

Book display is also important.  The books must entice the reader to open them and look inside.  If all the students can see is the spine, the books do not beckon the reader.  There are multiple ways to organize the books in the classroom from rain gutters to baskets to bins.  The main point is that the books are displayed in a way that the children can see them, touch them, and choose them. 

I do have a classroom library.  I have it organized in bins, but it does not tend to stay organized as much as I would like.  However, because of our CDEP guidelines, I also have book bins in every single center.  This has been highly effective.  The children may be “playing in centers or interest areas”, but they pick books in the math center basket about counting and shapes.  The look at books in the science center about kinds of animals or dinosaurs or weather.  They look at books about buildings and structures in the block center and attempt to build the structures.  I think the classroom library is extremely important, but I have also found it highly effective to include book bins in every center.  It is amazing to watch the children choose the books, while engaging in play.  I must be honest, I wasn’t sure they would and was pleasantly surprised to see that they do.  

Samantha Guest Blog Post 5: Routman Chapter 8, Teach Comprehension

This chapter was all about teaching for comprehension right from the start. When you think about the main purpose of teaching, and comprehension is one of the most important reasons that we teach. We teach for students to learn and for them to comprehend the material being taught. We are always assessing for comprehension, but we should also be teaching for comprehension on a deep level. This chapter focused mainly on reading comprehension. There were several strategies listed that are key to achieve full understanding when reading. The key strategies listed are making connections, monitor for meaning, determine importance, visualize, ask questions, make inferences, and synthesize. I thought about these strategies in the eyes of my four year old students. Usually I am the one who reads books to them in our classroom so I think that it is my job to make sure these strategies for comprehension is being used effectively. I will often make connections during a shared reading by asking the class to share things about themselves, similar to what happened in the story. I will often have the class predict what they think will happen and make inferences about why before we start reading. At the end of the book we will always talk about what happened and what the importance of the story was. These are just a few examples of how I use these strategies in my own classroom. I also learned that when selecting texts for my students it's important to remember to use texts that are easy enough and meaningful enough to support comprehension. I have to make sure that the texts are on their level to support not only their understanding, but their enjoyment of reading.