“We read to know we are not alone.” |
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Whenever I am alone, I can always find comfort and a companion when I read a book. It is always nice to know, and reassuring every time organizations like the IRA or educators in general get together that, all these people gathered have one goal in mind: to read. Most of all, read to understand. As teachers sometimes we claim students are not reading enough. However, sometimes I feel, students are reading, but they are just not reading the appropriate materials, or they have been so conditioned to "memorize". As educators, we need to teach student how to think/apply what they have read, which is the greatest/hardest task to accomplish.
The presentation given by the company, "Teacher Created Materials Publishing," was a great refresher. All of the strategies of building fluency, like choral reading, repeated reading and reader's theater being presented was very familiar to me. The presenter mentioned, it isn't enough to just have students read with accuracy and speed, but to read with meaning/expressiveness. I think expression is most important, because when students read with meaning/expression, it is also an indicator they understand what they are reading. I have learned in all of these strategies in my courses, and when I was sitting there listening to the presenter, it was only a reaffirmation, I am on the right track, I understand completely what the presenter was talking about. I was well prepared with the Reading Specialist Program, understanding completely what was going on today!
I enjoyed my day at the IRA meeting, to kick off the read-a-thon. The cheers, honor choir presentation was wonderful, and most of all inspiring.
I remember this video by Dr. Rasinski, when I was with Dr. Stoicovy, when we were going over fluency. I just thought I'd share it again...
Quote Taken From: http://www.readfaster.com/readingquotes.asp
Image Taken From: http://damyantiwrites.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/reading-books-longing/
Joe,
ReplyDeleteDr. Rasinki's words were truly spoken. When words are read with expression, it's an indicator that the reader had to have understood the meaning of the text, otherwise how would they have known how to convey it appropriately? I agree with you that today's IRA meeting was mainly a refresher course of concepts that we already know. That kind of gave me a small but meaningful boost of confidence knowing that we know those things, don't you think?