I love to read, but I used to hate teaching reading. The basal textbook bores even me, concepts on the pacing guide are never as clear-cut I’d like, and besides, how do you teach reading to a nine-year-old who hates to read? (I’m still open to suggestions on that!)
A few years ago, in light of less than stellar reading test
scores, our principal encouraged our grade level to try something new. She promised to support anything we were
excited about doing as long as we could promise results. It was the first time I’d been encouraged to
think outside the box in this area and it didn’t take long for me to realize
what was missing.
Books. Not textbooks,
not guided reading books, not books that were written to be taught—books that
were written to be READ, to be devoured, and to be discussed. What my students needed were novels that
would transform them, both as readers and as human beings.
We also needed time.
The only way I knew to accomplish that was to simplify things,
streamline my reading lesson plans.
Guided reading, in its truest form, wasn’t doing the trick for my fourth
graders. I was so busy trying to keep
different groups on task and juggle five or six different books and readers
that I knew I wasn’t really giving any of my students what they needed. Furthermore, while I knew I still had to
teach skills and concepts, I wanted to spend more time integrating them into
novel study than I spent teaching them explicitly.
Out of all this came my novel units. I started from nothing and created them,
question by question, quiz by quiz, and word by word. What also came out of this was results! Our test scores improved and much more
importantly, our students got excited about reading. We continued to teach guided reading by
pulling our struggling readers into small groups and providing more support,
and sometimes we taught two related but differently leveled novels at the same
time (such as I Survived the Sinking ofthe Titanic, 1912 and Titanic, BookOne: Unsinkable). But the fact that
we were are all reading either the same or similar books makes everyone feel
like they’re on the same team and, more importantly, enables me to take
advantage of every teachable moment. Now I love to teach reading!
My novel units are Common Core aligned and so easy to use. My students love them too. At first, I didn’t think I’d be able to use
the same format all year long but it’s been three years and I haven’t had a
student complain yet. I’d love for you to
try them in your class too. There are
several different freebies available on the tab above. Please let me know what you think by
providing feedback, and I’d love to hear what books you’d like me to put on my
list for the future.
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