Secret Ways : Character Building

We can't overlook the power of possibility in the moments we share with our learning community at the end of a lesson.  It's easy as the clock ticks to not make time for the share, but this time is essential for our learning to grow.

Share allows us to:

• Check in with students:  Though digital tools allow us to see more of the work students do during their independent learning times, talking with students about their work during workshop allows us an opportunity to hear their thinking, consider their process, and think about next steps.  
• Reinforce the learning of the focus lesson:  Having students share can give us an opportunity to allow students to share attempts at new learning with peers.  It can also provide the opportunity to clarify, reinforce, and restate points from our lesson within the context of student work.  
• Build a common understanding (and common language):  By coming together as a community to talk about our learning, we can create a common understanding and build common language around new concepts.  Students often will share with peers important discoveries that can then be used to build an inquiry.  These lessons are always more powerful and carry more weight when shared by a peer instead of directed by a teacher.  
• Stretch the lesson:  Often during independent work time students stay in their comfort zones, and don't reach for the next step.  Share time allows us to build a bridge between students' attempts and the next steps in learning.  Sharing also allows us to hear from students who are pushing past the current understanding and working to socially construct learning at a higher level of understanding than might have been possible without utilization of this time.   
• Showcase new possibility:  By allowing time to share our learning, students can see new possibilities through the work done by their peers. 
• Celebrate learning:  Share is the perfect time to celebrate new discoveries and new steps in learning.  By lifting learners who have pushed to the next level, we open the door for others learners and shine a spotlight on the importance of our time spent learning.    

In the first weeks of our reading workshops we take careful and intentional steps to set the tone and develop routines for the work we will do as readers.  As readers, students will need time to read, think, and grow.  As teachers, we will need time to confer with our readers and work in small groups.  How do we build time for independence when the books students read can often be completed in less than five minutes?  As a teacher of readers, I value time, choice, genuine conversation, and opportunities to extend reading beyond the text.  Here are a few ways I find useful in stretching our time we spend with books and learning in reader's workshop:

Teach with Intention:  The focus lesson should set readers up for the work they will be doing.  The focus lesson starts our workshop and helps students to know what they will be thinking about as they go off to read.  Whether it is a new reading strategy or a way to think about the text, readers consider a plan of action that will help them to learn during this time.  Making time to share at the end reinforces this focus and celebrates the discoveries made during learning time.  Considering this focus and language to support new learning in conference conversations and small group work helps readers to make sense of new learning.

Develop Story:  Listen to students talk about the stories they are reading.  Do they point to pictures and discuss each page as a separate event or do they weave them together as a story?  Build story language in focus lessons, small groups, and peer conversations.  Help students learn to take the time they need to talk through the pictures when a book is too challenging, preview before reading, or to retell books they've read using story language.

Place Books Everywhere:  The less movement in a workshop the easier it is to work with readers.  Young readers haven't developed the stamina of their older peers and books take much less time.  Having baskets students can take with them for workshop and placing books all around the room will make it easy for students to find a place to nestle in to read.

Grow Book Conversations:  Help students learn to talk with peers about the stories they are reading.  Retelling, making connections, questioning, thinking about characters, comparing books, and learning to consider the author's message are all ways to build our understanding and engage in book conversations with our peers.

Value Thinking:  Allow flexible (optional) response.  The addition of digital tools has really grown the way we can respond to our reading.  Yes, we can use post-its, paper, or a notebook to draw and write about our thinking, but we can also share our thinking using digital tools that can be shared to expand the reach of our voice.  Blogs, creation tools (sketch noting, Educreations, Explain Everything, Pixie, etc.), and other digital spaces can help students expand their thinking beyond the text.  

Teach Balance:  We can't expect students to spend all of their time with leveled readers, but we also need them to be making smart choices.  If students understand balancing reading choices, they can not only spend time engaging as readers, but can begin to make intentional learning decisions.  I read books of a variety of challenge.  I spend the least amount of time with challenging books as I find I need time to think about them so I read in short bursts and spend much time thinking later.

Grow Possibilities:  Keep in mind the power of read aloud and shared reading for growing possibilities for young readers.  Choose books to read with students they will be able to return to and read independently after the whole class experience.

Keep Workshop Conversations about Learning:  If we're not careful, it can be easy to find ourselves talking about behavior over learning in our workshops.  When students are having a hard time engaging as readers we need to ask ourselves why and what we can do to help.  Is the task too challenging?  Are books available that match the reader's interest and ability?  Are students focused on learning and developing plans to grow as readers?  Does the classroom library need a lift?  Are students focused on new learning and thinking about books?  What do students need in order to be successful?


You Might Also Like:

• Getting Started with Reader's Workshop
• Tools for Reader Response
• Planning for Independence
• Real Reading
• Growing Our Community:  Learning from Older Readers (talking about books)

Helping readers to choose just-right books is always an uncomfortable conversation - especially with our youngest of readers.  Sometimes I feel like I am talking out of two sides of my mouth.  I want you to read everything, but....

I want you to choose, but...

Spending time with texts they can read significantly supports growth in reading.  How do we honor their interests as readers while they are still taking those very first steps into books?  How do we put books in their hands they will love and they can read?  How do we help them to find books that will help them grow as readers?  I want to honor their choices.  I want to see them fall in love with authors.  I want them to want to take home the book I read aloud to the class.  I want them to come back from the library excited about their new choices.  I also hope a significant portion of their reading time will be spent on books they can read instead of books which are too challenging.  What to do?

Self-selected reading is something I want my readers to have the opportunity to do.  At the same time, I know the importance of students reading books that are a good match for them as readers.  Experience has taught me if I can help students to make smart choices, they make faster progress as readers.  I do want them to learn to make these choices on their own.  I've never been one to want my students to shop for books from leveled baskets.  I want them to be able to select books from our classroom library so they can go to a library or bookstore utilizing the same strategies to find a book that works for them as a reader.

This is always a tough conversation because I want my words to be just right.  I want students to hear the love of reading in my voice.  I want them to know that I pick books for a variety of reasons.  I want them to know I sometimes choose books that are more challenging, but that I can't spend all of my time reading challenging books.  It's actually exhausting.

The conversation to help students self-select doesn't happen magically in a day.  It's a series of conversations woven together across time.  In the beginning days, there are picture books I love to read to help students understand there are books that fit us now and books we will grow into later.  To help them to begin to think about balancing their choices, I use a system where students determine who will read a book going home at night:

• me (I'll read it)
• you (mom or dad will read it)
• us book (there are parts I can read)?  

This has helped to honor their choices as readers a bit, but it has never felt concrete enough.

This week I was talking with a first grade teacher after school.  We began to talk about this challenge of honoring students hearts as readers while helping them to choose books they can read independently for understanding.  We don't want to limit our libraries.  How could we support young readers in this conversation?  As we talked we began to think about what we wanted students to be able to consider in these beginning steps.  As we talked we realized we wanted students to make choices based upon their heart, head, and eyes.

HEART:  A book should always feel good to our heart.  There's just something that made us pick it up.  Maybe we can relate to the character.  Maybe we love the author.  Maybe the illustrations are calling us.  A book that is a good match for our heart will be a book we want to tell other readers about.

HEAD:  A book needs to be a good match for our thinking.  When we read we are trying to determine what the author wants us to know.  This means paying attention to the text, understanding characters, inferring meaning, and thinking deeply about text.  A book that is a good match for our head will be one we can think, talk, and write about.

EYE:  A book needs to have readability.  We need to be able to use our eyes (and some good reading strategies) to read the book.  This is quite simplified, I realize, but we want students to be able to choose a book they can read independently.  I don't want students to think reading is about getting the words right, but I want a way to help them understand readability is one part to consider in making book selections.

As we talked we felt that talking about these three aspects of book choice with our readers will allow us to honor all students and their choices, while giving us a way to talk about the aspects of our selections we may need to think more about.

In this way, we can honor the choices readers make for a variety of reasons in our conversations.  We can talk more about the reasons for our selections and begin to help students to think about book choice in new ways.  It will allow us to also work toward finding the sweet spot for choice where books work for our heart, our head, and our eyes.  This will allow us to talk about balance in our reading lives.  It's okay as beginning readers to pick books that speak to our hearts as that is what readers do, but some days - and more and more days - we need to choose books that bring all of the pieces together.


Other Post of Interest
Catching Readers:  Leveled Books - Questioning Our Practice Part I and Part II
Reflect and Refine:  Home Reading: It's a Reader's Choice
Reflect and Refine:  Real Reading
Jennifer Serravallo:  Choice During Independent Reading:  What's a Teacher to Do?
Education Week:  Roadblocks to Reading:  An Interview with Richard Allington