Ages 4-10
Growing Readers: Units of Study in the Primary Classroom
Kathy Collins
Foreword by Lucy Calkins
Primary-school teachers face an important challenge: teaching children how to read while enabling them to build good habits so learn to love reading. Many teachers find independent reading time to be the component of reading instruction that meets this challenge because it makes it possible to teach the reading skills and strategies children need and guides them toward independence, intention, and enjoyment as readers.
In Growing Readers, Kathy Collins helps teachers plan for independent reading in their own classrooms. She describes the structure of an independent reading period and other components of a balanced literacy programme that work together to ensure young pupils grow into strong, well-rounded readers. Kathy outlines a sequence of possible units of study for a year-long curriculum. Chapters are devoted to the individual units of study and include a sample curriculum as well as examples of mini-lessons and one-to-one reading sessions. There are also four ‘Getting Ready’ sections that suggest some behind-the-scenes work teachers can do to prepare. Topics explored include:
- print and comprehension strategies;
- reading in genres such as poetry and nonfiction;
- connecting in-school reading and out-of-school reading;
- developing the strategies and habits of lifelong readers.
A series of planning sheets and management tips are presented throughout to help ensure smooth implementation.
The ideas found in Growing Readers will help create the kind of primary classrooms where children will not only learn to read, but learn to love to read.
Contents
Creating Classrooms for Learners, Thinkers, and Talkers; Experiences in Literacy Throughout the Day; Units of Study in a Primary Reading Workshop; Readers Build Good Habits; Readers Use Strategies to Figure Out Words; Readers Think and Talk About Books to Grow Ideas; Readers Pursue Their Interests in Books and Other Texts; Readers Make Plans for Their Reading Lives
Appendix; Bibliography; Index
2004 296pp paperback
978-1-57110-373-4
£24.99
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