Many years ago my principal asked me to attend a conference and then train the staff at our school. I tried to learn more about what training the staff meant. Was this a common practice? It seemed intimidating to me. The train the trainer model, taken from the business world, was becoming a popular term in education. It did not work for me.

Yes, I attended the conference, had a good time, and learned some. What was not good for me? The faculty meeting I had to lead a month later where I was to “train” the staff on what I learned.  A horrible experience. I was not confident in the new information I learned while attending the conference and less confident to train a faculty where most were more experienced than me. Does your school or Division sing the praise of “train the trainer” models?  I hope not. I have rarely seen them work. Many times staff can be great in front of 25 students but not comfortable at all in front of peers who they need to teach. I propose a new method, well not exactly new, I propose ongoing professional development. Professional development meeting the needs of the school, occurring at the school, and for all staff in the school.

There are two ways to start ongoing professional development in a school: hiring a paid consultant or a school-wide book/professional study.  I will address both in two posts. In this post, I will give tips for using a paid consultant.

Assuming your school has access to professional support, the first step is to figure out what your faculty needs.  This can be accomplished through conversation, data analysis, and observation. Pick one focus area all staff can benefit from in all disciplines. As an example, in my school, our year-long focus is differentiating instruction.

Tips for successful year-long professional development:

• Know what you want to focus on and work with staff to build a commitment.
• Secure an educator who can meet with your staff at least six times during the school year. Add the dates and times to your staff calendar, so staff knows when each session is over the course of the year. I like to focus on professional development days or use time in the place of regular faculty meetings.
• Along with several staff members, meet with the presenter to grid out what topics will be addressed during each session. Know what the outcome should be at the end of all sessions and communicate this to staff throughout the year.
• I am a stickler that a consultant will let staff know at the start of the session what they will learn. Also, there must be collaborative opportunities during the sessions, and a task staff will try in preparation for the next meeting.
• It is critical for the principal and other administrators to be part of all sessions.  In my school all teaching staff, guidance staff, and administrators attend.

When reading this, you might think, O.K. it’s great, but it could be expensive.  My counter, it is not if you cut back on sending staff to conferences and training.  It is not costly if you consider the gain of all staff in your school receiving training instead of a few, or replacing “train the trainer” models which I do not feel are very successful.  Bringing on-going professional development to your school it is the best way to generate excitement and energy for a full year.  It is a positive and significant shift away from the one and done sessions and the false expectations that this method can bring change to a school.  You want positive change to impact students and staff. Choose a school focus that is inclusive and work on it all year long through purposeful professional development.

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Timothy Rasinski, Ph.D.

Enjoy our most popular post from Tim Rasinski! Tim will share a new post with the Robb Review on August 25!

For many of you, the title of this blog entry may sound a bit nonsensical — Why teach something and then not use it?  But let me ask you to think a bit more deeply about phonics.  If you are reading this you are likely a proficient reader.  When reading how often do you have to stop and analyze or “sound out” individual words?  My guess is that more than 99.9% of the words you encounter in reading are not analyzed or “sounded.”   Most words we encounter as proficient readers are sight words – they are recognized instantly and near effortlessly.  Phonics is hardly used at all when proficient readers read.

We need phonics and other word analysis skills in order to get words into our heads.  But after a few encounters with analyzing specific words, those words become “imprinted” in our brains as sight words.  We need phonics to get words into our internal lexicons.  But once those words are automatized or made into sight words phonics is no longer needed.

Getting words to the point of automatization is critical to proficient reading.  The problem in reading is that all of us have a limited or finite amount of attention or cognitive energy.  Analyzing words, as is done in phonics, uses up a lot of that cognitive energy.  And that energy that is applied to word analysis cannot be applied to the more important part of reading – comprehension.  So what often happens are readers who can read all the words correctly, but because they are spending their precious cognitive resources on word analysis their comprehension falters.

Carol Chomsky noted this phenomenon in her 1976 classic article entitled “After decoding: What?”  Working with struggling readers, she taught them to decode words. However, despite the fact that they were able to decode words accurately, “albeit slowly and painfully (p. 288),” they continued to struggle with reading comprehension and general proficiency in reading.  The answer to her question of “What?” was helping students develop automaticity or fluency in their reading.  She did this by having students read interesting and challenging materials while simultaneously listening to an audio-recorded version of the text.  In a 15 week intervention period (less than four months), her students made approximately 8 months of progress in reading!

Phonics is important, no question about it.  It is a tool that readers use to get words into their internal lexicons.  However, proficiency in phonics should not be the goal. Rather the goal should be to get students to the point where most of the words they encounter are automatically recognized so that their attention can be devoted to making meaning.

The way to get young readers to the point of automatic word recognition is the same way a person develops automaticity in any activity – practice.  However, the practice needs to be the kind that allows children to move to proficient reading.  Two of the best ways of providing proficient practice is through assisted reading and repeated reading.

Assisted reading is what Carol Chomsky used with her students.  Students read texts while simultaneously listening to a fluent reading of the text.  This can occur by reading with a more proficient partner, reading with a group of others, or reading while listening to a recorded version of the text.  In all of these situations, the assist of another reader provides students with a scaffold that allows them to approach fluent reading on their own.

Repeated reading simply involves reading a text multiple times until a student can read it at a level that approaches proficiency.  When students who struggle in reading read a text, the initial reading is not proficient.  However, when they read it a second, third, and perhaps even a fourth time their proficiency improves until they are able to read it much like a proficient reader.  The “magic” behind both assisted and repeated reading is that the improvement that comes from reading one text with assistance and/or repeatedly transfers to new texts that students have not previously read.  In essence, students begin to pull their reading up by their bootstraps.

While I don’t want to get overly technical in this blog, I do want to mention that, in this age of scientifically based reading instruction, a good deal of research supports both assisted and repeated reading, especially with students who find reading difficult.  In a recent review of research related to fluency interventions Stevens, Walker, and Vaughn (2017) conclude that “Results showed repeated reading,… and assisted reading with audiobooks produced gains in reading fluency and comprehension” (p. 576). My own research on the Fluency Development Lesson (Rasinski, 2010), a lesson that integrates assisted and repeated reading consistently results in improved performance in word recognition automaticity and comprehension.

While it is critical that we provide students with solid instruction in phonics or word decoding, it is equally important that we keep in mind that we need to take students to that next level word reading—fluent, automatic, and proficient reading.

References

Chomsky, C. (1976). After decoding: What? Language Arts, 53, 288-296.

Rasinski, T. V. (2010).  The fluent reader:  Oral and silent reading strategies for building word recognition, fluency, and comprehension (2nd edition).  New York: Scholastic.

Stevens, E., Walker, M., & Vaughn, S.  (2017). The effects of fluency interventions on the reading fluency and reading comprehension performance of elementary students with learning disabilities:  A Synthesis of the research from 2001-2014. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 50, 576-590.

You can find resources for teaching accurate and automatic word recognition (i.e. fluency) at Tim’s own website – www.timrasinski.com

Daily Word Ladders by Timothy Rasinski

Follow Tim on Twitter @TimRasinski1

In grades four and five many teachers have a large block of time for reading and can organize instruction into three or at the most four guided reading groups.  Once students enter middle school, many teachers have 45 to 60 minutes to teach reading, therefore, meeting frequently with guided reading groups becomes a challenge or it is impossible.

Whether your curriculum is based on guided reading, reading workshop, or a more traditional model, three teaching, and learning practices should be an integral part of instruction: Instructional Interactive Read Aloud, Instructional Reading, and Independent Reading.

INSTRUCTIONAL INTERACTIVE READ ALOUD

Reading can be taught.  The teacher can model in a think aloud how he/she applies a reading strategy and/or enlarges students’ mental model of how a strategy works.  For this aspect of instruction, I suggest that the teacher models with a short text that matches the genre and/or theme that ties a reading unit together.  Short texts can include a picture book, an excerpt from a longer text, a folk or fairy tale, myth or legend, a short, short story, or an article from a magazine or newsletter.

Once you’ve modeled how to apply a strategy such as making inferences, add the interactive component. The goal is to involve students as soon as possible for two reasons:

1. You can observe students’ thinking process. You can also identify students who don’t respond and confer with them to explore their reasons for not participating. Once you know why active involvement is minimal, you can help them gain the confidence to participate by helping them prepare to answer a question.
2. You’ll involve students in the lesson and make it interactive instead of passive. Involving students in the lesson can lead to engagement and an investment in the learning.

Here are some skills and strategies that you can model in interactive read-aloud lessons:

• Making inferences
• Identifying big ideas and themes
• Identifying central ideas and themes
• Locating important details
• Skimming to find details
• Author’s purposes
• Purposes of informational texts (nonfiction) and literature (fiction)
• Literary Elements and how each supports comprehension: setting, protagonist, antagonists, plot, conflicts, other characters, climax, denouement
• Informational text structures and how these support comprehension: description, compare/contrast, cause/effect, problem/solutions, sequence, question/answer
• Word choice as a guide to pinpointing mood or tone
• Vocabulary building with an emphasis on general academic vocabulary, figurative language, and comprehension, using roots, prefixes, suffixes, discussing concepts, diverse word meanings, and different forms of a word.

During class, the teacher can continually circulate among students to observe and offer quick, desk side conferences.

INSTRUCTIONAL READING

Instructional reading should happen during class. Students need to read materials at their instructional reading level—about 95% reading accuracy and about 85 % comprehension.  Organize instructional reading around a genre and theme—for example biography with a theme of obstacles—permits students to read different texts and discuss their reading around the genre and theme.

The reading workshop model is ideal for this type of reading instruction.  The class opens with an interactive read-aloud lesson that lasts about ten minutes and occurs daily. These lessons include vocabulary and word building.  You can find books for students in your school library, your community public library, and in your class library and school’s bookroom (if you have one).  Instructional reading books stay in the classroom, as students from different sections will be using the same materials each day.

Teachers have students chunk instructional texts by putting a sticky note at the end of every two to three chapters.  When students reach a sticky note, they stop to discuss their books with a partner and then a group of four.  During this stop-to-think time, students can write about their books, connect the theme to the book, and apply strategies and skills the teacher has modeled during interactive read-aloud lessons.

Partners should be no more than one year apart in reading levels so they have something to contribute to each other.  Students reading far below grade level learn with the teacher.

INDEPENDENT READING

Reading forty to sixty self-selected books can become the achievement game changer, especially for students who read below grade level.  Students can read graphic novels, comics, magazines, e-books, and print books.  By encouraging them to read accessible books on topics they love and want to know more about, you develop their motivation to read, read, read!

Have students keep a Book Log of the titles they’ve read and reread.  Do not ask students to do a project for each completed book, for that will turn them away from reading. A book talk a month and a written book review twice a year on independent reading is enough.  Trust and a personal reading life is what you’re building.

Students should complete thirty minutes of independent reading a night, and that should be their main homework assignment.  Try to set aside two days a week for students to complete independent reading at school.

Follow Laura on Twitter @LRobbTeacher

Check out Evan’s blog posts on ScholasticEDU!

Learn more about Laura’s ideas on reading- check out- Teaching Reading in Middle School

I have just invited eighth grade students to select books and find comfortable places to read them.  During the first ten minutes, Adam does everything in his power to avoid my request. He goes to the bathroom, gets water from the fountain in the hall twice, sharpens a pencil, considers three books, chooses none, and instead, hastily leafs through a magazine. Clearly, Adam has a lot of energy.  He also has the ability to concentrate while playing sports and talking to friends.  But invite Adam to read, and he becomes exhausted after ten minutes, often complaining that his eyes and head hurt.  These are all common symptoms of students who lack the stamina to read for extended periods of time.

Reading stamina is having the energy and the concentration to focus on reading for at least thirty continuous minutes a day.  For students who lack stamina, reading is a frustrating and unpleasant experience, so they tend to read as little as possible.  However, today, reading is a life skill needed for college and career success, as well as for the joy that a personal reading life brings. The good news is that you can help students boost their reading stamina at school and at home by using the ten tips that follow.

Have students start small.  Have them gradually build stamina by reading self-selected books in five-minute intervals–then ten minutes, and so on, until they reach one hour.  Remind students that developing reading stamina is like training to run a mile in less than ten minutes.  Both require regular practice to increase energy and concentration.

The Surefire Tips for Maximizing Reading Stamina

1. Value Independent Reading. At school, this means setting aside twenty minutes at least three times a week for students to read self-selected books.  Teach students how to choose books that they can read with ease by showing them the two- finger method. Students read a page in a text.  If they encounter more than two words they can’t pronounce or whose meaning they can’t figure out from context, they save the book for another time and choose a different one.  Teaching students to choose books that are accessible and enjoyable will also motivate them to read at home.
2. Use Classroom and School Libraries. Students of all ages need access to books. Seventh-grader, Lucas, put it this way, “ Having a classroom library means I can find a book when I need one right away.”  Continually work on enlarging your classroom library: Aim for 1,000 to 2,000 books at a variety of levels, on a range of topics, and in multiple genres.

Schedule a weekly school library visit for your students—and be sure to accompany them so you and your librarian can suggest great reads.  If your classroom library is still a work-in-progress, encourage students to check out several books whenever they visit the school library and store them in their class cubbies or lockers, so they have enough to read until their next library visit.

3. Read Self-Selected Books. Educators such as Donalyn Miller, Richard Allington, and Steve Krashen agree that choosing their own books is the key for students to become motivated to read at home and in school.
4. Diminish Distractions. Reading is social.  There will be times that a student wants to share something he or she just read which is terrific because it shows engagement with the text.  But it can also be distracting to classmates.  So encourage students to use a soft voice while sharing with a classmate.  Keep the door to your room closed to diminish noise from the hallway.  The fewer distractions, the easier it will be for students to concentrate.
5. Create Comfortable Reading Spaces. Think about the places at home where you read.  Most likely it’s in a comfortable chair, on an oversized pillow, or in bed.  Visit a carpet store and ask the owner to donate small remnants that students can sit on while reading.  Carpet remnants are easy to store; they can be stacked in a corner or closet.  Avoid requiring students to read for pleasure sitting at their desks.  Instead, invite them to find a comfortable space in the classroom.  Some will sit under desks or lean against the wall. If you have a limited number of beanbag chairs and large pillows, create a rotation system so students take turns reading on them.
6. Advertise Great Reads.  Students respect and value suggestions from peers.  So set up systems that foster sharing book suggestions. Here are three:

• Teach students to book talk and have them present a talk each month.  The benefit of consistent book talking is huge! Over ten months, a class of twenty five students will hear about 250 books from peers.
• Set up a graffiti wall by posting a large piece of construction paper on a bulletin board.  After completing a book that they enjoyed, have students write the title and author on the graffiti wall and one sentence explaining why they enjoyed the book so much.  Then, a few times a week give students several minutes to browse the graffiti wall to discover peer-recommended books.
• Teach students to give a 60 second elevator talk about a book they enjoyed reading.  Their goal is to convince peers to read it.  When a student’s desire to present an elevator talk strikes, schedule it during that class or as soon as possible.
• Set Monthly Goals. Share with students the research findings by Donalyn Miller and Steve Krashen–that reading 40 books a year independently can ramp up their reading achievement by enlarging their vocabularies and expanding their knowledge base. Negotiate monthly reading goals with students to help them meet the 40-book challenge. Books of 500 or more pages should count as two to three books. Students who can read books of that length presumably have stamina, and you want to encourage them to continue reading long and complex texts.

7. Take Brain Breaks.  A seventh grade class lobbied their teacher for “brain breaks”– time to chat and stretch after they had been reading deeply for thirty minutes.  Brain breaks offer students a few minutes of down time to relax, re-energize, and yes, gain stamina.  Tell students that when they plan to read at home for an hour or more, they should take a break, walk around, have a snack, and then return to reading.
8. Hold Small-Group Discussions.  Organize into small groups students who have completed different books that are in the same genre. Students discuss such things as literary elements in fiction or text features and structures in informational materials. As such, they not only expose their peers to a range of reading materials within a genre, but they also tend to become better at clarifying their thoughts and become more reflective when they share their thinking.
9. Have Students Self-Evaluate. Four times throughout the year ask students to review their reading logs and reflect on the number of books they completed, favorites books, books they reread, and the amount of reading they completed at home.  Then, ask students to use their self-evaluations to set reasonable independent reading goals which might include: extend reading time at home by fifteen minutes, read longer books, try a different genre, add a book to the graffiti wall, or read other books by a favorite author.

You can also give students a checklist to measure their reading stamina as part of their self-evaluation.

My Reading Stamina Checklist

Name_______________________________Date___________________

Checklist for Evaluating Reading Stamina: check items that apply to your reading.

____I quickly found a comfortable space to read.

____I concentrated on my reading and met my goal of _____minutes.

____I read for_____minutes beyond my goal.

____I can read and concentrated for all of silent reading time.

____I read without jumping up, getting a drink, or moving around the room.

____If I was distracted, I worked hard to avoid distracting others.

____I recognized I was distracted and was able to return to my reading on my own.

____I have a reading stamina goal and use it to increase the amount of time I read deeply at school and at home. [end checklist]

Final Thoughts

Showing students how to self-select “just right’ books is a giant step toward improving students’ reading stamina. Choice creates engagement and engagement nurtures students’ desire to read.  As they improve their stamina, commend students. Celebrate small but consistent improvement as well as big improvement.  Keep in mind that all students will not improve their reading stamina at the same rate.  In fact, some students might need more than one school year to be able to read for long periods of time. That’s okay. Coordinate your efforts with other teachers, celebrate progress, and give students the gift of time.

Learn more about Laura’s ideas on reading- check out- Teaching Reading in Middle School