Guided Reading Program - Introduction Lesson
The Bugalugs Bum Thief.
This week we were given the opportunity to plan an introductory lesson for a guided reading program. The book selected for our group was 'The Bugalugs Bum Thief' written by Tim Winton. We thought that this book would be suitable for years 3/4 as the text is not very complicated and the humour throughout the book would engage the students.
Our group talked about what we would do before we started reading the book to our class.
Our group talked about what we would do before we started reading the book to our class.
- Show the students the front/back cover.
From this ask them what the images show us. What do they think it is about? Where do they think it is set? Questions like these require the students to act as text-participants and code breakers, combining their prior knowledge and understandings with their ‘decoding’ skills.
From this ask them what the images show us. What do they think it is about? Where do they think it is set? Questions like these require the students to act as text-participants and code breakers, combining their prior knowledge and understandings with their ‘decoding’ skills.
- Read them the blurb.
What do they know think it is about? What do we know that we didn't before?
This type of question, once again requires readers to act as text-participants (bringing their own knowledge to the text; particularly the knowledge they just gained from observing the front cover). The other roles of the reader are also utilised, for example students act as text-analysts when they consider the reasons for particular language use in the blurb (eg. to make the book sound appealing, to interest readers without giving too much away etc.).
What do they know think it is about? What do we know that we didn't before?
This type of question, once again requires readers to act as text-participants (bringing their own knowledge to the text; particularly the knowledge they just gained from observing the front cover). The other roles of the reader are also utilised, for example students act as text-analysts when they consider the reasons for particular language use in the blurb (eg. to make the book sound appealing, to interest readers without giving too much away etc.).
- Relate the book to the students.
E.g. - Have they been to a small town with a beach? How old is Skeeta? Is he the same age as the students in the class?
-Who's perspective is the story from? Who narrates the story?
-Present the scenario to the students and get them to think about what the problems would be if we didn't have bums. E.g. - would we be able to sit down?
- Ask the students what kind of story they think it might be? Is it a mystery..? etc.
Relating the book to children is a useful way to help them act as successful text-participants. This in turn, helps them to become more effective code-breakers, text-users and text-analysts as it enables them to access inferential meanings in text, learn about text structure (and how it influences meaning) and become more proficient at information-gathering from text.
I found this workshop useful because it helped me to distinguish between independent, shared and guided reading that would be found in the classroom and in reading programmes. Seeing my group members' examples and hearing their thoughts helped me to clarify my own understandings.
ReplyDeleteThis weeks workshop was very rewarding, there was a particular focus upon guided reading programs within classrooms. Furthermore the workshop focussed on various methods of reading these included shared/modeled, indepndent and guided reading. The examples provided peers was influential and clarified misconceptions. It was particularly interesting how within the workshop that as a teacher you need to have questions focussing on text, sentence and word level. And that when we do this we focus on what they can do and built on that, thus a inclusive approach.
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