Balanced Literacy - Method

Method

In Reading Workshop skills are directly taught to students during interactive read alouds. While the teacher reads the selection, s/he stops periodically to model the internal dialogue a good reader uses to help comprehend the work. For example the teacher might relate an event in the story to something that happened to him/her in real life (Schema/Text to self), make a connection to a similar event in another book (text/text), or a connection to the wider world (Text to world).

Shared reading is when the students read from a shared text. Often this is a big book, a book on screen using a website or documents camera. If possible students should have their own copies also. Students and the teacher read aloud and share their thinking about the text. During both interactive read alouds and shared reading the class will create anchor charts. These anchor charts remind students how and when to use different skills and strategies.

Guided reading is a small group activity where more of the responsibility belongs to the student. Students read from leveled text. They use the skills directly taught during interactive read alouds and shared reading to increase their comprehension and fluency. The teacher is there to provide prompting and ask questions. Guided reading allows for great differentiation in the classroom. Groups are created around reading levels, and students move up when they note that the entire group is ready. During guided reading time the other students are engaged in reading workstations that reinforce various skills. They often work in pairs during this time. Stations can include library, big book, writing, drama, puppets, word study, poetry, computer, listening, puzzles, buddy reading, projector/promethean board, creation station, science, social studies.

Independent reading is exactly what it sounds like students reading self-selected text independently. The reading level of the text will often be slightly lower than the instructional level used in guided reading.

Sharing time after independent reading time students should be given an opportunity to share interesting things from their books.

Writing Workshop

Writing workshop follows a similar pattern as Reading Workshop. Skills are directly taught through the teacher modeling how to write a sentence, then a paragraph, a finally a whole paper. The next step is interactive writing where the class or small group writes together. Finally students write independently.