READ ALOUD

1
READ ALOUD

• Beyond Bedtime Stories

2
From Katherine Patersons The Spying Heart

• And, of course, the best way to cultivate their
  childrens taste is to read to them, starting
  at birth and keeping on and on. Let me hear you
  read it is a test. Let me read it to you is a
  gift.

3
Reflection

• Think of a person whether it was a teacher, a
  parent or a relative who read to you, remember
  the feelings of comfort and the sense of
  adventure in losing yourself in a good story?
  Who was this person? What did they read to you?

4
Concepts Today

• What are some foundations of read alouds for all
  age levels?
• Considerations for quality pieces of literature
  and thinking about curricular connections?
• What do effective read alouds consider?
• How do you read a read aloud?

5
Concepts Today

• What do we do after reading a piece of
  literature?
• How do you design opportunities for students to
  engage in more sophisticated discussions?
• Informational Text strategies for read alouds

6
Why Read Aloud? The single most important
literacy event

• Provides opportunities for literacy learning
• Teaches us about ourselves and the world
• Builds community
• Promotes gains in confidence
• The more they hear the more they can use in
  their own writing (settings, endings, vocabulary,
  character)

7
Why Read Aloud

• Lets students in on the teachers thinking by
  modeling think alouds
• Models how good readers read
• Stimulates imagination
• Enhances listening skills
• Offers many new friends since characters can
  become quite real
• Students learn that the language of books is
  different from spoken language

8
Read Alouds to Older Students

• Increases test scores
• Introduces new genres and text structures
• Provides opportunities for extended discussions
• Facilitates language growth for ELL students
• Teachers demonstrate that content topics have
  connections to pleasure reading
• Demonstrates that teachers want to share personal
  interests with students

9
Read Alouds to Older Students

• Allows teachers to move beyond the secondary
  resources of textbooks to original or primary
  resources
• Helps students build and use vocabulary in their
  responses
• Helps make content come alive
• Use expands a different way to lecture to students

10
Effective Read Alouds

• Have established rituals, designated times and
  places
• Occur numerous times during the day
• Include high quality literature
• Establish connections with other works and
  curriculum
• Promotes discussions before during and after

11
Effective Read Alouds

• Supports a variety of student responses
• Facilitated by knowledgeable teachers
• Revisits past favorites and classics
• Takes advantage of the teachable moments

12
Selecting Literature to Read Aloud

• Have you read the book?
• Did you enjoy the story and can share your
  passion?
• Does it tell a good story?
• Does it represent high literary and artistic
  quality?

13
Selecting Read Alouds

• Will it encourage further reading and inquiry?
• Is the book not more than one or two grade levels
  above their present grade? (listening level is up
  to two years beyond reading level also age
  appropriate materials stay in scope)
• Do your choices over time reflect a variety of
  cultures both in content and illustration?

14
John Dewey The experiences we have today
should build upon the ones we had yesterday and
lead to the ones we have tomorrow

• Are the characters well developed and delineated?
• Is the content of the book appropriate for the
  audience?
• Will you be a successful as a storyteller in
  reading?

15
What to Read

• Humorous
• Serious
• Fanciful
• Realistic
• Fables
• Folktales
• Myths
• Books by same author or illustrator

• Different version of the same story or topic
• Poetry
• Content area/information text or storybook
• Magazine articles
• Teachers own writing
• Picture books
• 50 fiction 50 non fiction

16
Getting Started

• EARLY GRADES
• What they might know
• Gradually add a few new
• Gradually add more complicated texts

• OLDER STUDENTS
• Engaging
• Read above the independent reading level
• Vocabulary that is new and interesting
• Pieces of interest to you that you share

17
When to Read Aloud

• FREQUENTLY each day
• A consistent time for more extended read alouds
  or chapter books
• When introducing a class project
• Part of content subjects mini lessons
• First of the day build tone for the
  day/character traits
• After lunch or recess to re establish class
  routines

18
When to Read Aloud

• At the end of the day (re creates the atmosphere
  of a bedtime story good for primary kinder and
  1st grade or a calm dismissal
• Spontaneous times to provide rich literacy
  learning transitions, before specialists,
  settling down, celebrations

19
How to Read Aloud or performing

• Ad Lib vs. straight text
• Creating voices
• Use your eyes widen, narrow, think, shock
• Make the author or illustrator part of the read
  aloud
• Use your minds eye to read the details
• End the store akin to living happily ever after
• Anticipating the story vs. interrupting the story

20
Reggie Routman

• Reading aloud is a powerful technique for
  promoting story enjoyment and literature
  appreciation and for noting what authors do in
  the writing process so that students can make
  similar choices for themselves.

21
Teacher as Docent

• Re reading same books to young students
• When to stop along the way
• Introducing the book

22
Where to Read Aloud

• Criteria to have students be able to hear the
  story/information
• Place where kids can see the pictures or use of
  technology to enhance the visual
• Have a place for the consistent/formal times you
  have chosen to establish ritual
• Symbolic acts to focus attention

23
Response Experiences

• Activities vs. experiences or response strategies
• Relevance
• Connections to curriculum and events in the class
• Share a purpose to allow all students to
  understand the lesson
• Support multiple viewpoints

24
Strategies to Assist Thinking

• Questions
• Compare and Contrast
• Conversation Creation
• Stories from headlines
• Time Line Mapping
• Sketch journals or fine arts

25
Discussion Strategies for Older Students

• Chapter chat
• Discussion perspective positive, pessimist,
  emotional responder, creative
• Literature circles might have to have a few
  extra copies of the book for the groups

26
Questions

• Provide range of answers
• Make connections to self and experiences
• Promote further discussion
• Asked in response to students ideas

27
More Considerations for Questions

• 20 questions use as a parlor game only
• Questions should have integrity
• Questions should help students explain or justify
  their ideas
• Help students notice things in the text and in
  their lives that they wouldnt notice on their
  own
• Make statements instead of questions share
  reactions

28
Selecting Quality Informational Books

• Authority of the author
• Accuracy of the information
• Appropriateness for scientific terms
• Artistry vs endless facts
• Appearance of text, graphs, boxed facts

29
Reading Informational Books

• Might not be appropriate to read the whole book
• Enhance the topic by reading several
  informational books
• Read several selections by the same author to see
  how they present information in the books
• Read books of distinction NCTE Orbis Pictus
  Award, ALA Sibert Informational

30
Informational Read Alouds

• Take time to build content understanding
• Requires stamina so build on read aloud
  strategies that facilitate concentrating on
  details and concepts
• Informational read alouds are excellent for ELL
  students due to realia
• Build vocabulary that is conceptual

31
Informational Text

• Responding strategies can include text features
  that facilitate content text books (bold print,
  information under pictures, charts and maps)
• Strategies to respond to read aloud chunks I
  remember, Say Something, pair with music and
  rhythms to elevate the motivation
• Students can re read to music for their own
  fluency

32
Modes of Responding

• Engaged/Involved
• Associative/Intertextual
• Reflective/Evaluative

33
Where do you go from here?

• Increase your knowledge of childrens literature
• Read Aloud every day for one month
• Share resources with parents
• Try some invested discussion ideas
• Try thinking aloud
• Rethink the notion of Main Idea
• Understand the complex nature of the reading
  process

34
Walk Aways Be thinking about

• Intentional plan for read alouds
• Frequency of read alouds (when)
• Where you do read alouds
• Incorporating Informational text material
• Responses to read alouds

35
-

• You may have tangible wealth untold Caskets
  of jewels and coffers of gold. Richer than I you
  can never be- I had a mother who read to me.
• -Strickland Gillian from The Reading Mother