Independent reading is awash in partner reading and it is glorious. Davontae pulled together a group of 4, including Lashae,to partner read a Henry and Mudge book and then the group began creating a commercial for the book in the library. Meanwhile, Jaymon and Brandon tackled a picture book about Captain America on the rug. Deavion recruited Rashad to re-read the fairy tale that Deavion had read for guided reading. Josh and Olajuwon made their way to the hallway to read the Magic Treehouse; they'd end up finishing 4 chapters before independent reading was over. Kayla and Alex camped out by window to work on thought bubbles for their Book Nooks. Kayla was writing about the shared picture book we'd been reading, while Alex was comparing a prehistoric dinosaur's characteristics with those of alligators and crocodiles. At the guided reading table, Shimya, Brianna, and Sunshine read Ruby Bridges together, all the while asking and answering each others questions, building on one another's ideas. And of course there were others who preferred to sit quietly at their desks and read by themselves. I'm just glad that the kids who need reading to look a little different, have the options and space to create their ideal set-up. I know that all of those kids are reading so many more pages, with such greater depth and richness of thought.
What's more, the students' MAP scores have generally trended upwards when they took the test this week. Some students made huge gains. Validation! Independent reading can be flexible, messy, and even a bit loud! And students' reading performance improves all the more :)
Next steps: improve the book commercial template to make it more rigorous. Decide on how to create a scheduling mechanism for students to figure out when they'd like to perform their commercial. Also, should I dedicate a 10 minute space following independent reading once a week, for students to rehearse their commercials? Also, the possibilities with these commercials are endless. Costume design, props, plays, character impersonation...this could be very rich. I think I'll video tape as many as I can. I'm betting that the level of sophistication will rise exponentially: as students observe other commercials they'll steal, modify, and mix ideas and techniques. How exciting.
