jamie.vet...@gmail.com I'm a first year Special Education teacher in a high-need middle school in Southeast DC. I teach three 80 minutes blocks a day of English Language Arts to classes of about 12 students (one block is 7th grade; the other two blocks are 8th grade.) I do not have any aides in my classroom so my direct instruction needs to be based in texts that are "one-size fits all," short, low-level and engaging. My students current performance levels range from 1st grade to 6th grade. So, I need help selecting the best books to use for short segments of whole group instruction to teach skills like elements of plot. Ideally, the text should take no more than 5 minutes to read (we do choral reading). My students then take each skill and practice it through partner/independent reading of texts leveled for appropriate rigor. They also each get indivudalized vocabulary words/different graphic organizers etc. I should probably also add that I do not have classroom sets of books, so I ideally need texts with either black and white photos (better for photocopying). My other struggle is with collecting oral data; it's incredibly difficult to do one-on-one tell-backs or check fluency levels as I am only one person in a room of 13 students that all want my attention... _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org.
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