Elementary Reading Resources
Reading A-Z Teachers create student log-in and assign reading levels for online reading (funded by the Derry Cooperative School District)
Storyline Online free streaming videos of popular books read by celebrated actors and activity guides for teachers and parents.
Old Farmer’s Almanac for Kids features fun games, riddles and puzzles.
PBS kids offers a variety of reading games to practice literacy and math skills. They have also added games centered around teamwork, feelings, and adventure
Reading Machine provides links to 36 online games that students can play to foster their reading skills.
Reading Rockets provides links to a variety of apps that can help students practice essential literacy skills.
Workshop Structure
Focus Lesson - The teacher models a skill or reading habit that students will work to develop and demonstrate in their reading/writing. These focus lessons target skills in Common Core Standards and in our district’s curriculum plan.
Independent Reading or Writing - Students read or write independently (at the independent level to develop fluency and stamina while applying skills and habits taught in the focus lesson). During this time, teachers may be conferring and/or working with small groups.
Conferencing - Teachers conference with individual readers to assess and guide their work during independent reading/writing. Conferences inform teacher decisions about future instruction and help teachers monitor student progress.
Small Group - Teachers gather small groups of students to reinforce skills during independent reading. Small groups might take the form of strategy groups, book clubs, partnerships, or centers, and might meet once or a number of times over a few weeks.
Share - Teachers guide students in sharing their reflections of skill applications that took place during independent reading. Sharing may be done in pairs, small groups or as a whole class.
How You Can Help at Home
- Show that you value reading in your home. Have books available in places where your children spend a lot of time. Let them see you reading for pleasure and for information. Talk about what you have enjoyed or found interesting, as well as what you do when reading gets challenging.
- Read with your children and talk about what you’re reading. Have conversations about the characters, events and/or information, your reactions to what you are reading, and what you notice about the way the book is written.
- Provide books written at your children's independent level. Encourage them to spend time reading alone, but also make time to listen to them read. Encourage them to reread familiar texts to develop fluency and expression.
- Read books to your children that are beyond their independent reading level. This is an important way to expose them to new ideas and vocabulary that can’t be experienced when only reading at their independent level, while avoiding having children reading books that are too hard and not beneficial.
Understanding Your Child’s Reading Level
Reading levels are formally assessed each November and May, using the Benchmark Assessment System. The formal Benchmark Assessment is given individually to each student, who is asked to read a series of texts at varied difficulty levels, and then talk about what was read. Varied reading proficiency levels might be determined for each student. A description of each follows. Teachers informally assess reading progress during weekly conferences.
Independent Level - the level a child should be reading at home, as well as during independent reading in the classroom. It is the “just right” level for a student. The student can read with high accuracy and fluency, and have a thoughtful conversation about the text.
Instructional Level - the level a student reads at school when working with a teacher on developing new skills. The student knows many of the words and understands most of what is read, but needs instruction and support to be proficient.
Placement Level - If a student’s assessment results do not reflect classroom achievement, or an instructional level wasn’t found due to limitations of the assessment, a teacher will consider current and prior assessments, as well as observations during Readers’ Workshop, to determine the student’s appropriate instructional level.
Hard Level - the level that is too difficult for a student, even with adult support. Students do not benefit from reading text at this level, and it should be avoided.
How You Can Help at Home
- Show that you value reading in your home. Have books available in places where your children spend a lot of time. Let them see you reading for pleasure and for information. Talk about what you have enjoyed or found interesting, as well as what you do when reading gets challenging.
- Read with your children and talk about what you’re reading. Have conversations about the characters, events and/or information, your reactions to what you are reading, and what you notice about the way the book is written.
- Provide books written at your children's independent level. Encourage them to spend time reading alone, but also make time to listen to them read. Encourage them to reread familiar texts to develop fluency and expression.
- Read books to your children that are beyond their independent reading level. This is an important way to expose them to new ideas and vocabulary that can’t be experienced when only reading at their independent level, while avoiding having children reading books that are too hard and not beneficial.
Words Their Way is a hands-on, developmentally-driven approach to word study that illustrates how to integrate and teach children phonics, vocabulary and spelling skills. (Pearson, 2008)
What is Word Study?
Word study involves “doing” things with words - examining, manipulating, comparing and categorizing - and offers students the opportunity to make their own discoveries about how words work. (Bear, et. al., 2012)
Purpose of Word Study
- It teachers students to examine words to discover the regularities, patterns, and conventions of the English language in order to read and spell.
- It increases specific knowledge of words- the spelling and meaning of individual words.
Three Layers of Word Study
- Alphabet - learning the relationship between letters and sounds
- Pattern - learning specific groupings of letters and their sounds
- Meaning - learning the meaning of groups of letters such as prefixes, suffixes, and roots. Vocabulary increases this layer.
Word Study at Home with Families
- Word study activities are modeled and practiced in school, so your child can teach you how to do them.
- Remind your child to sort the words into categories like the ones we did in school. You child should read each word aloud during this activity. Ask your child to explain to you why the words are sorted in a particular way- what does the sort reveal about spelling in general? Ask your child to sort the words a second time as fast as possible. You may want to time him or her.
- Have your child sort his words the way they sound, as well as the way they look. Ask your child to explain why the words are sorted in a particular way.
- Help your child notice his patterns in words read at bedtime. Making connections between them will move the patterns into long-term memory.
- Help your child notice words that follow the patterns, as well as ones that “break” the rules.
- Do a blind sort with your child. Lay down a word from each category as a header and then read the rest of the words aloud. Your child must indicate where each word goes without seeing it. Lay it down and let your child move it if he or she is wrong. Repeat if your child makes more than one error.
- Assist your child in doing a word hunt, looking in a book he or she has already read for words that have the same sound, same pattern, or both. Try to find two or three in each category. Have your child do a word hunt, looking in books, magazines, newspaper, on food boxes, etc... for words that have the same sound, pattern, or both. Try to find two or three for each category.
- Do a writing sort. As you call out the words in random order, your child should write them in categories. As soon as each word is written, have your child show it to you to check for accuracy. Call out any words your child misspells a second or third time.
- Do a speed sort in which your child sorts the words as fast as possible.
Resources
Terms
- Sorting - organizing words into groups based on similarities in their patterns and meaning.
- Oddballs - words that cannot be grouped into any of the identified categories of a sort. Students should be taught that there are always words that "break the rules" and do not follow the general pattern.
- Sound Marks - / /- Sounds around a letter or pattern tell the students to focus only on the sound rather than the actual letters. (example: the words gem could be grouped into the /j/ category because it sounds like a j at the beginning).
- Vowel (represented by V)- one of 6 letters causing the mouth to open when vocalized (a, e, i, o, u and usually y). A single vowel sound is heard in every syllable of a word.
- Consonants (represented by C)- all letters other than the vowels. Consonant sounds are blocked by the lips, tongues, or teeth during articulation.
- Headers - Words, pictures, or other labels used to designate categories for sorting.
- Word families - Words that have the same vowel and ending letters (example: cat, bat, fat, sat, etc...).
- Digraph - Letter combinations that have only one sound (examples: sh, ch, wh). Blend-Letter combinations in which each sound can be heard (examples: bl, gr, sp).
- Base word - A word to which prefixes and/or suffixes are added.
- Prefix - Letters added to the beginning of a base word which change the word’s meaning (examples: un-,pre-, re-).
- Suffix - A letter or letters added to the end of a base word to change the word’s form (exa mples: -ly, -es, -ing).
- Affix - A prefix or suffix added to a base word.