Maggie Delaney September Blog 2

In Section 2, "Why Not? What Works?", Barbara Moss dives into Independent Reading.  She notes the benefits of IR and gives lots of research that proves it.  In discussing how much IR time is just the right amount of time, I found it interesting that the "just right" amount can vary from student to student.  I have always been under the assumption that IR should be at least 45 minutes, but as Moss describes, that is not always true.  In a study she presents, good readers benefited more from the 40 minute IR time on all measures than poor readers, but poor readers gained more on all measures from the 15 additional reading minutes than better readers did!  Wow!  I had no idea...I always thought more was better.

"Self-selected reading is twice as powerful as teacher-selected reading in developing motivation and comprehension."  Choice is everything and when you let students choose their books, it is so obvious the difference in their reading motivation!  Letting students choose what to read motivates them to read even when it is not required!  And, isn't that the goal?  We want kids to CHOOSE to read on their own and discover the joy in reading!!!

"Students need to talk about what they read."  Moss suggests several ways to allow students to share what they read.  This is not something I currently have going on in my classroom, but would like to implement this year.  I think peer discussion and instructional conversation (teacher led small group) would really help students become more accountable and improve their comprehension.

So, after reading this section, I took away several ideas and thoughts that I would like to try to implement into my reading groups this year.  I am going to play around with the amount of IR time, let my students have more freedom in choosing their books, and allow students more time to share what they have read.