Becoming an Effective Teacher of Reading

Chapter 1Tompkins, G. (2010). Literacy for the 21st Century. A

Balanced Approach. Boston: Allyn & Bacon

What is Literacy

Literacy…is not a prescription of certain books to read or concepts to devine. Rather…it is a tool, a way to learn about the world and a means to

participate more fully in the technological society of the 21st Century.

Principles of Effective Teaching

1. Effective Teachers Understand How Children Learn

2. Effective Teachers Support Children’s use of the Four Cueing Systems

3. Effective Teachers Create A Community of Learners

4. Effective Teachers Adopt A Balanced Approach to Literacy Instruction]

5. Effective Teachers Scaffold Children’s Reading and Writing Experiences

Principles of Effective Teaching (con’t)

6. Effective Teachers Organize Literacy Instruction in Various Ways

7. Effective Teachers Connect Instruction and Assessment (“authentic assessment”)

8. Effective Teachers become partners with parents

Effective Teachers Understand How Children Learn:Learning Theories

Behaviorism Constructivism Sociolinguistics Cognitive/Information Processing

Effective Teachers Understand How Children Learn:

Learning Theories

Behaviorism • teacher centered/teacher as dispenser of

knowledge

• reading is viewed as a conditioned response

• Children learn by learning a series of skills and subskills

• Teacher control –rewards and punishments

Examples: Basal readers, repeated readings, lectures, minilessons, etc.

Constructivism (Piaget)-

• emphasis on background knowledge/schema and prior experiences

• children actively construct meaning/knowledge (Dewey)

• Teachers engage students with classroom experiences

• Collaboration-students work together to construct meaning

• Engagement –engaged students believe they can succeed/have high self-efficacy (Bandura)

• Motivation-engaged students are motivatedExamples: KWL charts, DRTA, Lit. Focus Units,

Projects, Cooperative learning, etc

Sociolinguistics (Vygotsky)• Oral language provides the foundation for

learning to read and write

• children learn through language and social interaction

• Zone of Proximal Development (range between dev. level and potential level

• Scaffolding-support mechanisms• Authentic Literacy Activities• culturally and socially responsive• Critical Literacy (Friere)-Literacy as a means

of thinking about, questioning, etc… social issues (e.g., inequities and injustices in society

Critical Literacy As Highest Level (Luke and Freebody)

Code Breakers-decoding through phonics and word identification

Text Participants- students learn about structure and genre to understand what they read

Text Users-read and compare texts, genres, and write in a variety of genres

Text Critics-examine issues raised in texts

Cognitive/Information Processing

• unobservable mental processes

• compares mind to computer

• students are active learners using knowledge to solve problems

• Reading and writing integrated

• Meaning making processes

• Strategic reading and writing

Examples: Guided Reading, Graphic Organizers, Grand convwesations, reciprocal questioning

Reading as a Process: Interactive and TransactiveInteractive Reading and Writing are MeaningMaking Processes Readers use a combination of reader-based and text

based information to comprehend

Transactive/Reader Response (Rosenblatt) A two-way transaction between reader and text Readers interpretations are individualized because

they bring different background knowledge to the text and read for different (negotiate a meaning)

efferent stance-reading to locate information aesthetic stance-reading for pleasure

Effective Teachers Support Children’s use of the Four Cueing Systems The Phonological System-Sound-Symbol

Relationship-44 sounds and 500 ways to spell them (phoneme, grapheme, phonological awareness, phonemic awareness, phonics )

The Syntactic System-the structural system the structural system that governs how words are combined into sentences (syntax, morpheme, root words, affixes)

The Semantic System- The meaning system of English that focuses on comprehension (semantics, synonyms, antonyms)

The Pragmatic System –language varies depending on social and cultural uses

See Page 13

Classroom Community

Partner with parents

Home-school connection (or disconnection)

Reach out Build knowledge Home literacy activities (traveling book

bags, clubs, online reading, journals, etc)

Components of Balanced Literacy Instruction

Scaffolding Students’ Reading and Writing

Modeled Reading Shared Reading Interactive Reading Guided Reading Independent Reading See P. 21

English Language Learners

Explicit instruction Oral language Small group work Reading aloud Background knowledge Authentic literacy activities

Twelve Principles (Burns, Roe, & Smith, 2002)

5) Students should be taught word recognition strategies that will allow them to unlock the pronunciations and meanings of unfamiliar words independently

6) The teacher should assess each student’s reading ability and use the assessment as a basis for planning instruction

7) Reading and the other language arts are closely interrelated

8) Using complete literature selections in the reading programs is important

Twelve Principles (Burns, Roe, & Smith, 2002) con’t

9)Reading is an integral part of all content area instruction

10) The student needs to see that reading can be an enjoyable pursuit

11) Reading should be taught in a way that allows each child to experience success.

12) Encouragement of self-direction and self-monitoring of reading is important

A Balanced Approach To Literacy Instruction... A variety of instructional strategies A variety of instructional material Uses trade books, leveled books, and basal

readers Authenic Literacy Activities Develops Students Skills Knowledge

(decoding, comprehension, spelling, etc.) Includes word study and phonics within

authentic literacy activities Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing, and

Viewing (integrated language arts)