Julie Brown's August Blog Post 1: Making Time for What's Important

     I continued to go back to a sports analogy as I read Chapter 1 from Miller's book.  We are all familiar with the concept of practice makes perfect.  When children first begin to play a sport, coaches don't just send them out on a field/court and say, "Go play ball."  No, they spend countless hours teaching the fundamentals of the game and how to play different positions.  Of course, they do practice a lot, but not without the individualized instruction that goes along with the position.
     We as teachers can't just have kids practice reading.  They need to be instructed in the strategies of reading.  This is continuous.  Even professional teams have coaches because there are still things to learn and better ways to attack certain situations.  Therefore, to think that after the first few fundamental years of reading instruction that our job as teachers of reading is over and students just need to practice is misguided.  I, for one, was guilty of this for many years as a middle school language arts teacher.  Then I realized, just making students read isn't making them read better.  I had to look at my job differently.  Just as we have all come to realize; we are all reading teachers.
      Miller also brings up the concept of time.  I know schedules are busy and hectic and trying to fit another thing into the day seems impossible.  However, I believe Miller is right.  We have to prioritize things and find time in the day when we are doing things that may be redundant, unnecessary, or routine.  When looking at what a child needs to succeed in this school and beyond, I think we all would agree that reading is foremost on that list.  So much else cannot be accomplished without the ability to read.
       If we all jump in together and see this as a team effort, we may realize we have more time than we thought.