Leslie,
I ask myself the same questions. I don't see the point in teaching
someone a strategy in a deliberate manner if they have already
internalized strategies that allow them to derive meaning--and
pleasure--from reading. I talk about strategies with the whole class
and work on them in a more intentional way with children who have not
internalized them. With the more "strategic" readers I tend to focus
on strategies like inference, because even if they know how to infer
they can still miss places where inference will get them deeper into
a text. Another one I work on with these readers is noting changes in
a character over the course of a story. These are strategies that
naturally get us into rich conversations and multiple interpretations
of a text. Of course I also work on these strategies with the less
"strategic" readers, but I find that it tends to come later, and with
those readers I am working more on strategies like making personal
connections, creating mental images and self-checking for meaning.
I am lucky to be in a school (so far) where I am not required to
write my objectives up for the children. I see these objectives as my
objectives. Of course I want the children to develop strategies that
will unlock texts for them, but I hope that their objectives have
more to do with finding texts of interest to them and becoming
competent and confident enough of themselves as readers that they can
have the experience of getting lost in a good book. I question the
value of having third graders--like you, I'm a third grade
teacher--become so metacognitive about their own reading process.
Sometimes I think that we are losing sight of the distinction between
what is important for teachers to be thinking about and what is
important for children to be thinking about.
I also agree about the math manipulatives. The point of manipulatives
is to help children picture abstract concepts. I like to have them
available at all times so there isn't a stigma attached to using
them, but requiring children to use them when they don't need to
impedes mathematical efficiency and the ability to internalize
understandings and strategies.
My experience has been that children will use them as long as they
need to, but it's the rare child who holds onto them longer than that
because once you don't need them they slow down your thinking.
Occasionally I have a child whom I feel is holding onto them beyond
what is necessary. I work with that child to gently see if they are
still needed, and if not we can celebrate the child's ability to do
this "hard math" with sketches or equations and let go of the
manipulatives.
I appreciate that you wrote about seeing the joy. To me, that is at
the heart of the enterprise, even though it is neither measurable nor
amenable to direct instruction.
--Ellen
At 12:41 PM -0500 11/8/09, Stewart, L wrote:
I love teaching, but lately I have been questioning the way I teach,
particularly reading. I am an avid reader. Reading is an integral
part of my adult life. I was never taught any reading strategies.
I have children in my classroom who love to read and read way above
grade level. I feel that they, like me, have already internalized
the strategies and yes they can be strengthened but probably that
will happen naturally as well. The more they read, the stronger
they will become. It seems that we are prescribing medication
whether the child is ill or not. It's like using manipulatives in
math. Our new math program requires the use of manipulatives all
the time. It used to be that you used maniuplatives when you
differentiated for the child who was having difficulty with a
concept. It seems like we are heading back to a one-size-fits-all
mentality which scares me. I sometimes think the reading strategies
were meant for educators so that we could become better teachers of
reading, particularly for our struggling readers, and I think we
have taken it too far and use it in all cases. When I look at the
current guided reading models it is so prescribed: everyone is in a
quick guided group with the teacher drilling a skill or they are
reading independently. I am having a difficult time seeing the joy
in that model. Where do the rich conversations that connect
children to each other and to literature take place in this current
model? Was the model intended for accomplished readers?
Leslie R. Stewart
Grade 3 Teacher
[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>
203-481-5386, 203-483-0749 FAX
To feel most beautifully alive means to be reading something
beautiful, ready always to apprehend in the flow of language the
sudden flash of poetry. ~ Gaston Bachelard ~
<http://thinkexist.com/birthday/september_24/>
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