Just a reply to the concept of singing and fluency. I teach first grade and we begin each day with a morning sing... something I decided was a must after responsive training inservice. In fact, in my old district, morning sing was a school wide affair that began each day. Now I am not talking about traditional first grade ditties or nursery type songs. We sing popular songs of yesteryear and the here and now. Besides the community that it builds, I have found that it really helps first graders in a number of ways.... many examples of working with words are naturally built in..... this was eye opening to me when an emergent reader spelled the word beautiful in September... she just hummed "Oh what a beautiful morning" and when she came to beautiful she said she closed her eyes and pictured the chart....of course there are all the other working with words strategies that can be used just as well as configuration and visual imagery. Then there's all the reading comprehension strategies connections, mental images, determining importance.... in fact we just finished inferences and are now working on synthesis. The kids are singing "Let the day begin" by the Call a real happening now type beat......and are doing a marvelous job of inferring and synthesizing how they begin their days. Conversation has been going on for days about attitude, thankfulness, self-improvement, perseverance, cooperation.... we taken it to writing poetry as well as our own songs... It's also a good jumping board for our final unit in reading workshop: planning our lives as strong readers and writers ....lots of good stuff. Singing also helps with peer revision; our motto is ... if you we can't sing in front of each other, how could we ever peer edit? This sets such a wonderful tone for respect and cooperation, and understanding when kids come together to help each other... rather than that "gotcha,I'm smarter than you" that I've seen happen with younger children. During our research reports on the rain forest, kids would spend their time printing out articles and cutting pictures they found for other kids' reports while searching for their own info rmation. Then there's the whole aesthetic stance to text... I love when the kids pick songs for us to sing. They have to tell why they chosen a morning sing and how it would help us as community member or reader or writer.... Finally, another very early benefit for first graders: stamina! Children are not afraid on longer text. In September my early readers often choose books that are tad longer in length and say.... well it is not as long as our text in morning sing. I love morning sing... it sets up my day as well. I just don't plow into the day... more reflective and hopeful...
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