Three years ago when our school's reading scores dropped on our state test we were introduced to a year of professional development with Nancy Boyles. Her book became the bible and her worksheets became the cure for the cause. Nancy is a lovely woman, however her book does not provide a basis for teaching reading and she limited her view on teaching reading to her book (In a sidebar discussion she questioned the efficacy of literature circles and book clubs in my classroom.). At the time, our school was all about improving our test scores. Encouraging children to want to read or to enjoy reading was not part of our role as teachers. Fortunately or unfortunately, our scores DID improve that year, but I believe it was due to the fact that everyone was being "watched" so everyone had to teach. My administrator gave all the credit to Nancy Boyles.
For the past year and continuing this year, due to a change in district curriculum leadership, our professional development was delivered by a professional whose roots are in the Teacher's College for Reading and Writing (Columbia University). We also were using elements from Fountas and Pinell (Guiding Readers and Writers: Teaching Comprehension, Genre, and Content Literacy<http://www.nextag.com/Guiding-Readers-and-Writers-3495295/prices-html> ). Those of us who were reading To Understand for our personal growth watched as good teaching practice began to fly out the door. Once again our children were expected to read, analyze, and finally to write about their reading on a daily basis. Children were writing in reading journals about their guided reading lesson and discussing strategies that they had called upon while reading. Then children were also expected to write a letter to their teacher about the independent reading book that they were reading. This letter had to include a summary and again some discussion of the reading strategy/s that they had called upon while reading to increase their understanding. Some children had to write about the book they were reading at home for "homework". Children are beginning to associate reading and writing about the reading as one in the same. While there is admittedly a strong connection between the two, I believe you can be a strong reader without necessarily being a strong writer. I also believe you can love to read a book without necessarily loving to write about one. All of this writing to read took away from creative (process) writing time in our school. As we continue to search for the "pill" that will fix our students' reading struggles, I wonder how many potential lifelong readers we will lose in the process? I think that in our state (and most likely in many others) we are so concerned with scores that we continually change horses in midstream leaving many teachers confused and feeling inadequate in their teaching practice. I don't profess to have the answer, but I think that allowing children to get lost in a book without having to analyze it and write about it must play a part in the direction we take. Alas, our reading scores went down this year. I guess it's time find and dust off Nancy Boyles again! Leslie Grade 3 Teacher 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/> _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
