It’s been years since I read Donalyn Miller’s book, Reading in the Wild, and if asked, I’d probably even be a little rusty on what exactly her premise was, but lately, if I had to describe my classroom, that’s the phrase I would use. And it makes me absolutely giddy.
I know, from years of experience, that many students are experts in looking like they are reading, without actually doing so. I have spent countless hours trying to find ways to really engage my reluctant readers with books over the years and while I have had glimpses of it before, I have never felt so fully immersed in great reading as I do this year.
By the third week of school, I had assessed my readers in fluency and comprehension and had made initial groupings. I committed to novel studies with all but my most struggling readers and I only held off on putting them into a novel so I could spend the first few weeks building their reading confidence with shorter, more manageable texts. Today, in the sixth week of reading groups, I had to take a second and soak it all up.
My class rotates through a variety of stations based on their individual needs. Spelling is individualized, so kids spend one of their four stations working on their current spelling pattern. Every student has one station every day to read a book of their choosing. While reading, they are on the hunt for what we call VCWs, or “Very Cool Words.” They make a note of them as they find them and look them up and record them in their personal dictionaries later on, with plans to use the words in their writing when applicable. They are also currently paying attention to the theme in the books they read and are making note of any idioms they come across. Every student also meets with me for a smaller, leveled reading group where we address the standards we are focused on within regular chapter books. For their fourth station, students work on four vocabulary words each week, these words provided by me. They use the words appropriately in a sentence, illustrate each word and all the while practice penmanship, spelling, writing conventions and their imagination. (But don’t tell them, they just think they are drawing pictures and writing fun sentences!)
Today, while I sat at one table in my room with five of my students, reading a novel about wolves, I glanced around and saw two kids who had already passed a particular spelling pattern helping others who were currently learning it. I saw a small group of girls sharing their vocabulary sentences, darting glances my way as if I were going to scold them. Little do they know that looking at more sentences with the words only increases their understanding and there was no way I was going to put an end to that! I saw students who had earned the right through demonstrated effort and responsibility, sitting in comfy spots around the room, completely absorbed in books. Two boys on the sofa kept sharing something about their books with each other, another practice that I’m never going to put a stop to.
I saw some of my advanced readers collaborating on their higher-level vocabulary work. And, I saw a struggling reader writing a new word on her index card, a vocabulary word at her level, related directly to her own reading.
The group in front of me was completely absorbed in our wolf book. I don’t have to remind a single one of them to read together with us. We all read chorally and the kids love the texts so much they are on task without reminders. As we stopped to discuss a particular aspect of the story and how it relates to the larger theme, some students from other tables, chimed in to the discussion, despite not being in that particular group. We had to remind them that it was currently our discussion, but I winked at them to let them know that it wasn’t a punishable crime. Their listening comprehension was growing whether they realized it or not. My group also quietly whispered to one another when they stumbled across a VCW as index cards were whipped out and the word was quickly recorded, one boy said to me, “Don’t let them steal our word!” trying to covet the cool word he found. He wants to share it on Fridays during “Shout Outs” and I promised him the word was his to share.
My reading stations aren’t perfect, they are, afterall, student-driven, so there are lost papers and some wasted minutes and the occasional off-task behavior, but overall, my kids love this time. And frankly, so do I. Everywhere I look, I see kids engaging in text, excited over finding unknown words, sharing, laughing and discussing texts. It is, to me, what reading should look like no matter what age we are. But it is a delight to my soul to see it happen with ten year olds.
Teaching at 3am 