Reading Workshop

Reading Workshop is a powerful way to structure your reading class. Using this model involves encouraging your students to choose their own books as well as providing significant amounts of time for them to read independently. By allowing your students to choose their own books, you can foster a love of reading that will last a lifetime. Research shows that when children spend more time reading, they become better readers. With a little guidance and encouragement from a teacher who loves to read, students can learn to select appropriate books and discover joy in reading.

Laura Candler's Power Reading Workshop: A Step-by-Step Guide is a resource for teachers who want to learn how to get reading workshop started quickly and easily. The book also includes information about how to differentiate instruction with a dozen "Power Reading Tools." Take a peek at the 62-page preview version to see the table of contents and format.

Laura Candler of Teaching Resources shares her easy to make and use reading response journals for elementary and middle grade teachers. This multi-step video shows the journal as a whole-class or individual tool that you can customize with her ideas and downloadable pages.

When teachers work together and share ideas, they rock the educational world! This chart was compiled by Shauna Nero and based on theresponses to a question Laura Candler posted on Facebook (www.facebook.com/TeachingResources): What’s one of your favorite read-aloudbooks and why do you like it ? Shauna has compiled the responses and organized them loosely by grade level preferences. Thanks Shauna!

Hot Spots are a great way to see what your students are struggling withwhile reading independently. Students use hot spots to "flag" any wordsor parts of a selection/book that are causing them difficulty.

Read the selection and write aresponse. Begin each responsewith the book title and the dateof your journal entry.

Reading Workshop Webinar Recording

Write five adjectives that describe your book. For eachadjective, state one supporting detail from the book.

This reference guide is designed to be used with the conference chart describedin The CAFE Book by Gail Boushey & Joan Moser. This freebie is intended as ahelpful supplementary resource and is not endorsed by the 2 Sisters.

Graphic Organizers for Reading: Teaching Tools Aligned with the Common Core is appropriate for grades 2 through 6.

I recently received a great idea from teacher Lauren MacDonaldthat I had to pass along. She uses free "WhisperSync" Kindlesoftware on her classroom computers to provide more flexibilityin her reading program. She doesn’t even own a Kindle herself,but she discovered that if you download the free software toyour classroom computers, you can buy one copy of a Kindlebook and your students can read the book on differentcomputers as well as Ipads and laptops. To find the software,search online for "WhisperSync Kindle Software" and you’llfind it, or go directly to Amazon.com. You may be able to usedo something similar with other eReader software, but I’m not sure.