Daily 5 Chapter 4 Book Study

One of the first parts of Daily 5 that I teach after picking out good fit books is how to read a book. Kids seriously get this when you model and it is great for students who think I can’t read! You totally can kiddo because there are 3 ways to read a book!

The 3 Ways to Read a Book:

Read the pictures.

Read the words.

Retell the story.

This is great for primary classes that have varying levels of reading abilities and great to see how kids interact with book at the beginning of the year.

For modeling reading the pictures I use the book Pancakes for Breakfast by Tomie dePaola.  It is a wordless book so I go through the book thinking aloud and “reading” the pictures. Then I have the kids try to do it with the book as well. They love it and get that you can read pictures and make up your own story and rely on the pictures to tell a story. This is important in early reading stages but once students are actually reading I encourage them to look at reading the pictures in a different way. I usually teach in small group taking a non-fiction book with pictures and we read the captions under the pictures and look at the pictures to predict what the book might be about.

For modeling reading the words I of course read a book aloud to them and show them how to correctly read a book during Read to Self in Daily 5. I model strategies you can use when reading.

For retelling the story I try to use a fairy tale or fable that the students will know. We talk about well-known stories and then pick one most of them seem to know. Last year we retold the story of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears another year it was The Gingerbread Man. They easily get the picture of how to retell a story and then continue to practice with every book we read.

Then I introduce Read to Self and make an anchor chart of how this should look in our class.

Choose a good fit book.

Get started right away.

Stay in one spot.

Read the WHOLE time.

Check for understanding.

Use your strategies.

Build stamina!

Teacher is working with kids!

We model the correct and incorrect way to  act during Read to Self. I get the kids pumped up about reading on their own for their first time and tell the we will be building our stamina each day. I ask them if they think they can read for 20 whole minutes and most of them say “No way!” but I tell them that is are end goal and we’re building up to it. Then I ask them if they can do 3 minutes and I hear “yes, I can do that!” Then I review again what is expected during Read to Self and let them begin reading. Everyone will always start off really well but around 3 to 4 minutes someone will always either move to get something (another book, water, sit near a friend) or stop reading. At that point I ring them bell and sing their praises for reading and then I gently point out what they can improve on. We model the correct and incorrect way to Read to Self again. Then I tell them we will keep building our stamina/time every day until we meet our goal. They get excited the closer they are to their goal. This year I’m going to pass out coupons that Mel D has made from Suessatasic Classroom Inspirations to help my kids stay motivated and focused on their reading.

An added bonus to all the independent reading is having Accelerated Reader (AR) put in place too. After having my kids take the STAR reading test they pick out good fit book on their level, read them, and take a quiz on them.  I have my students read the book 3 times before they take a quiz. It is a rule I try to monitor but basically have to take their word for it. The first time they don’t do well on a quiz and feel the disappointment of knowing they didn’t read the book like they said they usually keep to reading the books 3 times. For students who read chapter book I only make them read it once but they have to either thoroughly retell the story to me or write a summary of the story before taking a quiz.  This was my first year using AR so I’m still working out the kinks. I think it helps the students pick books on their level and makes them feel proud of their progress when they move up in points. (I could go on and on but I’ll save it for another post another summer day!)

I hope you are following along with all the Daily 5 blog readings and getting some good ideas for next year! Read what these other fabulous teacher bloggers are doing in there Daily 5 classrooms!