The Reading Teacher articles from September 2002

The Reading Teacher archives from September 2002

Exploring sixth graders' selection of nonfiction trade books: when students are given the opportunity to select nonfiction books, motivation for reading improves.
September 1, 2002... In recent years, more and more teachers have given middle graders the opportunity to choose trade books for in-class reading. Inspired by the work of Atwell (1998) and others, many teachers have become convinced of the value of providing...

Speedwriting: a teaching strategy for active student engagement. (Teaching Ideas).
September 1, 2002... A historical view of teaching would have us believe that students are passive learners: Teachers pour knowledge into students' receptive minds. In the past, the teacher's role was to provide knowledge from external sources, and students were...

Using QARs with charts and graphs. (Teaching Ideas).(question-and-answer relationships )
September 1, 2002... "Well, they know the content, but they can't answer the questions," Emily (pseudonym) explained one day after school. Having worked steadily for a year to help prepare her fifth-grade students for the impending statewide science assessment,...

Children reading for UNICEF. (Teaching Ideas).
September 1, 2002... What started out as a simple suggestion has turned into an annual event with positive effects on our reading program. A good friend of mine, Nancy Klaus, is Director of the Philadelphia office of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF. One day last year we...

The power of a story.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2002... Stories have always been important to me because they evoke so many human emotions. I have found myself caught up in these emotions many times through the stories that I've read, but what impresses me even more is the depth of emotion that a...

Sentence by sentence self-monitoring: students engage in independent work with sentence units, requesting assistance when necessary and receiving feedback from the teacher.
September 1, 2002... According to Clay (1991), learning to read may be conceptualized as a process of gaining increasing strategic control of numerous subprocesses so that they may be brought to bear on the essence of reading; that is, making meaning: "It...

ABCs for reading tutors.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2002... Busy teachers who want to invite tutors to work with their students may not have the time to peruse the 475 ERIC documents, 970,035 websites, and thousands of books and articles about tutor training. As a coordinator of a university-based...

Philadelphia freedom. (Politics of Reading).
September 1, 2002... The events surrounding the governor of Pennsylvania's takeover of the Philadelphia public schools are unfolding as I write this column during the early part of 2002. By the time you receive this journal, a committee of five people (three...

... Because I love to.(books and reading)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2002... Growing up in Monterrey, Mexico--where reading was just for homework, where children were not exposed to a huge variety of attractive books, and where parents rarely read to their children because they were not read to by their parents--it is...

Approaching texts in school: students understand texts in many ways that may not match the "standard".
September 1, 2002... Karen: What are books for? Denzel: Books make you read more. Karen: Books make you read more. But what do you do with them? Why do we even have them? Denzel: So you can learn how to read. You look at the books, and so that you...

Good beginnings! (Instructional Materials).
September 1, 2002... When this issue of The Reading Teacher arrives at your home or school, some of you will have been teaching for quite some time; others will just be beginning a new school year. The start of a new year is always exciting and full of...

They love words: teachers implement a spelling-decoding strategy within a first-grade language arts curriculum.
September 1, 2002... "They love words!" This was Lisa's initial reply when I (Adel) asked her "Why do you suppose your first graders are more attentive to using this spelling-decoding strategy than you expected?" Then she added, "And the scaffolded prompts...

Reading enhancement for Deaf and hard-of-hearing children through multicultural empowerment: learning to read can be difficult for Deaf students, but the task is even harder for Deaf minority students. This article explores strategies to inspire an interest in reading and multicultural acceptance for Deaf and hearing students alike.
September 1, 2002... I awoke in a hospital room where my roommate sat near her empty bed weeping softly. "Are you okay?" I asked. She did not respond. I sat up and asked the question again, this time with a bit more determination. "Excuse me, Miss, but are you...

School stories. (Children's Books).(Hello School!: A Classroom Full of Poems)(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2002... School Books Wakes up early. Closed shut... Just can't wait Secrets to hide? To see who's coming. Or waiting for you to say Don't be late! Open wide! From Hello School! A Classroom Full...