The Importance Of Reading

When Mr. Smith is not reading aloud to the class and the class is not popcorn reading during Literacy Block, the students are participating in silent reading. “Reading silently allows students to experience things they may never be able to do, but through the lens of novels students can go anywhere at any time. Reading also allows students to see how writing works in the real world; it is not formulaic. Students can discover what voice sounds like through reading a variety of genres. Students can rediscover the joys of reading, but for some it may be a first discovery” (Flores, 2015). When students get the opportunity to read aloud, they see how words work together to form a sentence, build up their vocabulary and really start to put their

Smith would frequently stop and make sure everyone understood what they just read. Mr. Smith would direct the question to mostly the ELL students, especially James; a Puerto Rican who just moved to the United States with his family less than a year ago. If James or another student does not comprehend what was read, Mr. Smith asks the student what exactly they don’t understand or where they “got lost”. “Once students acknowledge that they can and should be in control of their reading, they need to know when they are confused. There are indicators that help readers know when confusion or mind wandering is setting in. Many students don’t recognize they are confused until it is too late. If students can recognize signals that indicate confusion, they can stop temporarily and decide how to help themselves” (Tovani, 2000. p.

The students were told to write an opinion essay about what they thought was going to happen in the next chapter of the book “Woods Runner”. Mr. Smith informed me that although it was fifth grade, the classes handwriting as a whole was very poor. Before the students started on their essays, however, Mr. Smith did a mini-lesson on how to write an opinion piece. Mr. Smith provided the students with the examples of a fact and then an opinion; he then gave an example of both. Then he passed out a little worksheet for the class to do silently. The worksheet was a list of opinions and facts and the students had to star the ones they thought were opinions and place an “X” by the facts. Once the students completed the sheet, Mr. Smith asked for volunteers to tell decided if the sentence was an opinion or a fact. With each answer, Mr. Smith made each student explain why they believed their answer was