4-7 Reading Workshop

"It is not enough to simply teach children to read; we have to give them something worth reading. Something that will stretch their imaginations - something that will help them make sense of their own lives and encourage them to reach out toward people whose lives are quite different from their own."
Katherine Patterson

This full day reading workshop for years 4-7 classroom teachers examines the teaching of reading in the middle years. Strategies for reading and the approaches for teaching reading are the focus of this workshop.

Workshop Topics:

Participants will learn about the important role of reading aloud to the older student. Why should we do it, what is gained, and what can be taught from the read aloud text? The vital role of this instructional approach within the daily program will be explored.

Teaching for strategies often occurs during read aloud and shared reading. Specific teaching strategies using both types of texts will be demonstrated and discussed. Participants will view and discuss a variety of material to determine a range of teaching opportunities that can be drawn from texts.

Guided reading and guided reading/reciprocal teaching provides students with opportunities to independently solve texts at the instructional level. The conversations fostered during these sessions encourage readers to search for deeper meanings in narrative texts, enhance comprehension of nonfiction texts, and extend understandings beyond texts. A variety of visual organisers that support readers to extract and organize information will be discussed and provided to workshop participants.

Group strategies which involve students in cooperative or collaborative learning are highly motivational teaching techniques. A literature circle is a group strategy that supplements the classroom reading program. This reading model promotes enhanced comprehension of texts and extension opportunities for better readers. Readers will deepen their understanding of texts, engage in rich conversations around texts and develop an acceptance of the views and opinions of others. This is an excellent tool for improving comprehension, building leadership and independence, and is highly engaging for students of all ages.

Developed by:

Angela Ehmer M.Ed, B.Ed, Dip.T.

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