Guided Reading Book Study- Chapter 1!

I'm so excited to be reading along with the girls at Freebielicious!

The book we are studying is The Next Step In Guided Reading!

So far, so good! I hope you are reading along with them as well, and if you aren't, START!

I promise, it's a quick and informative read!!

So today is first day of the study.....Chapter 1!

Here's what I took away from Chapter 1:

There are 4 main reading approaches:

Read-aloud (whole group with an above grade level text)
Shared reading (whole group with an on level text)
Guided reading (small group while the teacher coaches)
Self-selected reading (individual with a good-fit book).

Like most things in life, the key to doing something well is being PREPARED! (Just like in sports, you didn't walk onto the basketball court for your first game and expect to be superstar---you had to build your stamina to run and your endurance to last through the game.) The same theory applies to learning and working independently! Students, especially my kinders, need time to practice working alone and they need to build their stamina to work while they stay focused!
Take time to teach students HOW to work by themselves! (Yes, it can be done...I've seen it in practice and yes, every year I'm working on it!! I have yet to 100% master it but I keep trying year after year!!)

The author says it takes about 6 weeks following this outline:

Week 1: Let students work in small groups with activities they can do with little help from you! Watch how they play with each other and always praise for a job well done!
Week 2: Start introducing a workstation to one team at a time while others continue with the original tub activities. Continue introducing that same workstation to the other teams in the following days. Be sure to explain the station and give the students time to explore with it. The duration for the this activity should be 10 minutes!
Week 3: Start your introduction of the 2nd workstation and make the duration 15 minutes long. One of the teams is working on workstation one, you introduce station two to the next team and the other three teams are still working on those original tub activities.
Week 4: Introduce another workstation and make the duration 20 minutes long! (At this point, three teams are working with real workstations and two teams are still working with tub activities.)
Week 5: Make the jump and add two more workstations this week! The teacher should still be introducing the station but one at a time. So essentially, the teacher is introducing one workstation Monday, Tuesday and one rotation on Wednesday and the other station on one rotation on Wednesday then Thursday and Friday! Students are now rotating with two stations, with each one lasting 10-15 minutes.
Week 6: All students are working with true workstations now--- no tubs needed! If possible, make each workstation time about 20 minutes long.

***Important to remember: Have a class meeting to explain that students are not allowed to interrupt you when you are with small groups! (This is the REALLY hard part for me! I always give in!) The author suggest you giving the students a signal of some sort to alert them as to when they cannot interrupt you: hat, light or boa maybe???

In the following weeks, the goal should be to have students working independently for 60 minutes while you work with two to three groups!

That all seems easy enough, right?!? Sure does!!

The author give four pages of ideas for some common literacy workstations. Many of the ones listed are ones that are tried and true and teachers around the country love them! They include book boxes, buddy reading, writing, readers theater, word study, read the room and a listening station!
How to manage the workstations: A team task board or an individual task board-- both have their pro's but she does mention that the individual board seems to be more appealing since it lists individual tasks for each kid!
Lastly, the author writes about reading notebooks! I do bits and pieces of this but I don't have it all together in one spot. (I think that is something I will definitely change for next year!!) The notebook should have 5 parts: reading record, independent reading responses, guided reading notes, notes from whole-group lessons and new word lists! I know that I could modify this part for my kindergarten kiddos!!

I hope I made chapter 1 a little easier for you to understand!

Be sure to link up with your blog post. If you don't have a blog, be sure to join the discussion by comments on all of our posts!

See you soon for chapter 2!

Happy reading!!