Now that we're back from the Winter Recess, we've been, and will continue to, see what kind of progress students are making with their reading levels.
As a reminder, after each text, we always ask students to retell what happened. This includes characters, events, dialogue, and relating it back to the title. (If the story is about being hard working, then retells should relate back to that.)
We also ask about:
- What was your favorite part? Why was it your favorite part?
- Ideally, explanations relate back to the overall idea of the story (losing something and finding it again, finally finding time to do something, etc.)
- What connection did you make to this story? (What does this story remind you of?)
- Connections could be to a similar event or a similar feeling. Not everyone has the same experiences, but talk about the emotions - feeling upset and then feeling better, losing something and finding it again, being safe, etc.)
Some of us are also focusing on figuring out tricky words. Here are some of the strategies (ways) that our readers figure out tricky words:
- look for parts you know
- pen - I know "-en" in ten make /en/, so /p/ and /en/ make pen!
- look for words you know
- inside - I know the word "in" and the word "side", so together, they make "inside"
- stretch out the sounds
- tug - /t/ /u/ /g/ put it together and it makes "tug"
- check the picture/photograph - does it make sense?
- I drink milk every morning. Look at the photograph/picture. Does it make sense? Does the first letter look right? /m/ for milk
- try other sounds
- We know that vowels make a lot of different sounds. We practice fundations every morning!
Love,
Ms. Liang