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Mini Lesson: Choosing "Just Right" Books |
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| Using three different sized shirts, students voted on which of the three pieces of clothing was "just right" for a student in our classroom. We related shopping for clothes to "shopping" for books. It is important that students choose books that are "just right" for them. On chart paper, we created a list of things that made books too easy, challenging, and JUST RIGHT. | |||||||||||||||||
 (Too Small!) |
 (Too Big!) |
 (Perfect Fit!) |
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EASY * you can read the words fluently (smooth and with an interesting voice) *there often are not a lot of words on a page *you know how to say all the words *there are not a lot of pages in the book *you have a lot of schema for the subject *sometimes the book has a larger font *you totally understand the story *your reading rate may be quicker *your thinking comes easy as you read the words
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CHALLENGING *many of the words are too hard to decode (failed a five finger test) *you don't know what the tricky words MEAN *your reading becomes choppy more than it is fluent *you don't have any prior knowledge the subject *there are often a lot of words on the page *often the font is small *you lose focus as you are reading *you are not enjoying the book because you have to do too much word work *your thinking is confused *your reading rate slows way down |
JUST RIGHT *you can read most of the words *you can understand what you are reading *you enjoy the book *you may have some schema for the subject *you can read the book with smooth fluency but there are some choppy places *your reading rate is just right- not too slow and not too fast *you can figure out the tricky words and still get the meaning of the story
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| Mini Lesson: Categorizing Books by Genre | |||||||||||||||||
| As students record books in their reading logs, they are expected to categorize the books by genre. Since many students are unfamiliar with this concept, they were introduced to the different categories within fiction texts. To practice the concept, they were given genre cards and asked to hold them up as I introduced and described the features of books in our classroom library. | |||||||||||||||||
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READ MORE ABOUT GENRE STUDY
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| Mini Lesson: Asking Thick Questions | |||||||||||||||||
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Download Thick Questions Poster |
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When
students are in book clubs or reading partnerships, they ask questions
about the books they read. Readers are encouraged to ask questions
that cannot be easily found in the text. The answers to thick
questions are inferred. They require the reader to make predictions
or to formulate new beliefs and ideas.
