I have decided to blog about Readers' Workshop for two reasons. One is because I love to read and want to teach my students to enjoy reading too! Another reason I am blogging about Readers' Workshop is because it is an important part of my curriculum. I want to be able to learn from others to make Readers' Workshop an effective model for my students.
During Readers' Workshop, reading instruction takes place with the whole class, small groups, partners, and individual students. Guided reading in small groups or with individual students utilizes leveled books. During the independent reading portion of the workshop, students read Just Right Books - books they select that can be read without help. My classroom has a wide variety of books and poems for shared reading.
Development of reading strategies is the focus of Reading Workshop. Such strategies include:
- visualizing, imagery
- cause-and-effect
- five finger rule
- chunking
- reading for meaning
- character analysis
- setting
