As a product of Accelerated Reader, I can definitely see what the author was talking about. After I stopped having AR, the thought of not having points did diminish my motivation to read new books. I was always told what to read and how fast I needed to read it and then took a pointless test to get points. Half of the time I would not read the whole book, I'd only read until I thought I had all the information I needed to take the test. Accelerated reader is a good tool to get students to read. However, the transition from AR to not having AR hurts students because they no longer have incentive to read. We as teachers must learn how to give students options on what to read and to integrate reading into our curriculum.
The problem with integrating books into our curriculum is that the book becomes the curriculum for our subject. You should definitely use books, but it's the delivery of the book that matters most. It is emphasized in our program to steer away from the textbook as the curriculum, but use it as a resource only. When reading a book in the classroom, we must be careful to make it a resource or as a connection to the topics or themes we're teaching and not to make it the curriculum itself. The flow of reading is also another important aspect of reading in the classroom. While we must be careful not to sacrifice the flow of reading a novel in a class, we must be sure to not leave the slower readers behind. While you might not break the book up into single chapters, there must be some sort of benchmarks that students must either meet or succeed in order to scaffold the book for slower readers. This way, students who read faster can go ahead and progress and not have their flow interrupted by having to wait on other students. The use of a novel in a classroom, especially a social studies classroom can be really beneficial when used the right way. It takes careful planning while taking all of your students strengths and weaknesses into consideration. While all students won't read at the same place, when things are spaced out in ways that don't affect flow, it can still be beneficial to your students to read novels that are course related in order to spark students' reading.
I think that using some sort of a benchmark to help the slower readers, but not impede the fast readers is a good idea. It always used to bug me so much when teachers would tell me, “Don’t read ahead.” At least I was reading and comprehending the book, and usually enjoying it, who cares if I read ahead? I also like the idea of incorporating novels into the social studies curriculum. My 8th grade social studies teacher used to do that with us. For each new unit we started we could read a novel from a list she had dealing with the material for extra credit; also, if we wanted to read a book not on the list, we had to pitch it to her explaining how it dealt with our unit material. Then to get the extra credit we had to write a book report on it, connecting it to our social studies class. I like this a lot because generally in a social studies class you get so caught up on events and wars, and novels usually gave you very good insight into the culture and ways of life for the people of the time period you were studying. It was using literacy in the classroom to really enhance her social studies lessons.
ReplyDeleteI agree about the benchmark, too. I was like Heather, in that I always was reading ahead of my group. I think reading texts as a resource is a beneficial strategy in a social studies classroom. Through individualized readings, students are making their own connections to these books and relating them to the history curriculum. There are so many historically relevant books, fiction and non-fiction, that could be used as a resource in our classrooms.
ReplyDeleteI think that reading some fiction books could be a good way to create empathy in our clasrooms. The book "Number the Stars" for example would be a good tool to allow our students to envision the holocaust through the eyes and feelings of a character in a book, rather than reading the shortened overview in a textbook. I also think having readings with the curriculum would be a good basis of classroom conversation about the book that could then transfer to the historical content.
I agree, Josh, that we can use these books as a scaffold to transfrer knowledge across the content. I could see this strategy being beneficial in any history classroom.
I like the idea of bench marks but how would you enforce it? One problem i noticed is that if you do have slower readers in the classroom accommodations must be made. Usually this means making other assignments available for students who finish early. See in the classroom that trying to set a standard does not always work. According to my host teacher if you tell the student alright if your not here by such and such a time you are just behind is not acceptable you must allow that student to work at their own pace. If it takes them a week to read a chapter you have to give them that week. Now I am not saying it is right, but it is what it is. It is happening. I think we need to hold higher levels of accountability, these students can do better but they have learned not to.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your post Josh. I like the idea of bench marks but i agree with Didier: how do we enforce them? We are hurting both the fast readers and the slow readers. I wish that there was a way we could fix this problem. I've seen this in my placements that the students are largely not held responsible for their actions. I like Heather's idea about including a book to go along with the material.
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