The Big Fresh from Choice Literacy
October 25, 2008
Book Hospital
The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence. Dennis Waitley
I had the pleasure of visiting Carlene Bickford's lively 2nd grade classroom in Waterville, Maine this week. The first thing you notice about her students is how independent they are - within moments of entering the classroom, everyone is reading, writing, and chatting about books with almost no overt direction from Carlene.
It's only when you look more closely that you realize Carlene has put dozens of routines in place to foster that independence. New to me was the "Book Hospital" basket - it is here children place any books they discover while browsing the class library that have tears, are missing pages, or have become so worn it is difficult to read some of the pages or illustrations. There's nothing special about the basket - it's just a bin from the dollar store with a label and red cross image on it.
What a wonderful, simple way to teach children responsibility and independence - and what a terrific timesaver for a teacher. Instead of being interrupted a few times a week by a child passing on a book that needs repair, Carlene knows her students will set these books aside in the bin. The Book Hospital also saves Carlene the hassle of culling these "too well-loved" books from her library periodically.
It's a small thing, but all those small things that nudge children to take responsibility for the care of materials add up quickly, and make all the difference in the level of independence in a classroom. Quiet, peaceful, and purposeful classrooms always have at the center of them a teacher like Carlene, who is constantly adapting ideas she gleans by watching her students and listening to colleagues to foster more independence. I hadn't seen a book hospital bin before I spied it in Carlene's classroom, so I'm not sure if the idea is hers originally or borrowed from another teacher. But I suspect many more book hospitals will be under construction shortly in many classrooms far from Maine.
This week, we've got some advice on talking with parents about the difficulty of the books their children are reading, plus more as always. Enjoy!
Brenda Power
Editor, Choice Literacy
Free for All
If you're preparing for parent conferences, you'll enjoy Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan's new two-part series on talking with families about book selection. Parents understandably want their children to be challenged, but they may not understand a difficult book might not be the best instructional choice for a student. In Part I this week, Clare and Tammy write about how to share the research base and goal of producing lifelong readers with families in understandable terms. The article includes a handout to share at parent meetings:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/724.cfm
From the Choice Literacy Archives, Lisa Koch shares a parent's perspective of how much damage too much emphasis on levels in the classroom does to her young son. "My Son Clark Kent" has been a favorite article on the site for almost two years. It's a terrific article for a staff or team-level meeting on using criteria beyond book levels to match students and texts:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/224.cfm
Reading Rockets presents a succinct summary of the historical base of research into the "hi/lo" (high interest/low vocabulary) method of selecting texts for struggling readers in their brief essay, "Hooking Struggling Readers." The article itself is a terrific example of a short, focused read on a complex topic that might be copied and shared with parents or colleagues:
http://www.readingrockets.org/article/374
Participate in our new monthly survey - this month's topic is "How Literacy Leaders Find Support." Take five minutes to answer our quick survey questions online, and you're automatically entered in a random drawing with a chance to win 8 Choice Literacy videos you select (a gift valued at over $1000). We'll be sharing the results with our readers next month:
http://tinyurl.com/59476e
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Continuing with the theme of matching books to readers, Karen Terlecky shares her "book tornado" activity. By upending the classroom library and asking students to sort and reorganize it, Karen gets insight every year into the ways students categorize texts, as well as their emerging understanding of genre:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/721.cfm
Jennifer Jones and her colleagues are working hard to match books to readers at two different ends of the spectrum - first graders who are reading far above grade level, and fifth graders who are struggling with fiction. They find nonfiction texts are just the ticket for both groups, because of the high interest these books provoke, as well as the text features that require different skills:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/722.cfm
In this week's video, Katie DiCesare leads a read-aloud lesson on picture reading. Katie demonstrates how illustrations can tell a story, even when there are few words on the page:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/726.cfm
Finally, the new Choice Literacy Cluster focuses on strategies for working with young English language learners. Contributors include Ruth Shagoury, Andie Cunningham, Andrea Smith, and Shari Frost:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/725.cfm
That's all for this week!
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