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Ask the Expert
Expert: Kathleen C. Perencevich
Question 4:
I have one child in my class who is really struggling. He is very sensitive about the fact that he’s reading below level. Do you have any suggestions for keeping him motivated, but not singling him out in front of his peers?
Answer:
This is an issue that many teachers face. There are some very good struggling reader trade books available these days (Children’s Press publishes Rookie Readers and True Books, and the Wright Group has the Sunshine series).
If you are studying a particular theme in your classroom, make sure there are interesting texts available for all students to read. Have books that are at least two grade levels above your class and two levels below your class. Then you can provide teams with multiple texts to learn about a particular theme. Because all students are learning information about a common theme, such as animal survival, and all the books deal with the theme, there is much less awareness about who is reading which book. Of course, struggling readers will still need direct instruction on reading skills, but if they are working from books that are related to the theme, they will be still feel knowledgeable.
Also, long-term projects wherein students are working in flexible groups can help struggling readers feel like part of the whole group. Rather than always having stable reading groups (e.g., high, medium, and low), sometimes you might want to group by interest (e.g., students who want to study monarch butterflies) or have students practice particular reading skills in need-based groupings. For example, one day a group can practice summarizing while another group practices graphic organizing. The next day, the groups can switch roles. On some days for some activities, it may be conducive to learning if students chose their own reading groups.
Another idea is having the whole class practice expressive reading each day to help all of the students gain some fluency. Pairs of students can practice reading a poem expressively. In this way, students become very familiar with a particular poem. Instead of oral reading being a chore, it becomes an exciting event to anticipate. Some great expressive reading books are Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices by Paul Fleischman, Insectlopedia by Douglas Florian, and The Tree in the Ancient Forest by Carol Reed-Jones.
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