Avenues for Reading

AVENUES FOR READING

TEACHING READING

by Libby Hixson

November 3rd, 2011 – If you’ve ever had the pleasure of working with young children, you’ve probably seen one little three year old pretending to read a book to another little three year old. Children understand intuitively that reading is a “magic” portal, and it is a school’s responsibility to utilize best practices to help them acquire the skill to enter that door.

But what are the best practices? Decades ago, researchers investigated what good readers do, which led to identifying the developmental steps in learning to read. Teachers use frequent assessments, not to pigeonhole children but to improve and inform instruction. Ultimately known as literacy or balanced literacy, the practice has expanded to weave together reading, writing, phonics and vocabulary to help children become fluent readers and writers.

Using a process called guided reading, the teacher provides support for small groups of children as they learn to use various reading strategies—letter and sound relationships, context clues, word structure—so they learn to read accurately and understand what they read. Over time, they can read increasingly difficult books on their own.

The crucial component in literacy is providing adequate time for children to read texts of high interest that they can read with fluency, accuracy and comprehension. Children should be reading constantly, both fiction and non-fiction. The classrooms should be awash in books. Each child should be challenged but not frustrated through the use of books that have been selected to match both the student’s independent reading level and his instructional reading level.

Reading should permeate every corner of a school’s curriculum. Students learn to examine and analyze text while working in small groups with a teacher, whether in a “reading class” or during story time. Science and social studies provide additional opportunities to learn to read and evaluate non-fiction as...