How to use student's choice reading and address standards to deepen their learning

1. USING STUDENT
CHOICE TO DEEPEN
STUDENT LEARNING
Teresa Bunner
Coordinating Literacy Teacher for HS
tbunner@wcpss.net

2. What Research Says About Choice in Reading…
 “Never lose sight that our highest priority is to raise students who become lifelong
readers. What our students read in school is important; what they read the rest of
their lives is more important…”
Kelly Gallagher Readicide (2009)
 New Zealand study found strong correlation between time spent reading and reading
achievement.
Elley, (1991)
 “Reading books is the only out of school activity for 16-year-olds that is linked to
getting a managerial or professional job later in life.”
University of Oxford (2011)

3. Connecting Student Choice to Student Learning
 First recommendation in Reading Next report on adolescent
literacy-
Teachers need to provide “direct, explicit comprehension
instruction”
 Often times, our teaching of a shared reading has us guiding
students towards our understanding and interpretation of the
text.
 Utilizing literature letters/metacog logs allows us to guide
students toward their own understanding and toward helping
us understand their thinking.
 Lit letters/metacognitive logs are formative assessment of
student thinking and comprehension.

4.  Smith and Wilhelm argue that as teachers, we need to help students
with transfer of knowledge in order to become more accomplished
readers.
Lit letters/metacog logs allow us to help students transfer
that learning
 Morgan and Fuchs showed a bidirectional relationship between “will
and skill”- as readers struggle (“skill”) , their “will” to read diminishes.
Conversely, as the “will” to read increases, the “skill” for reading
improves.
Choice reading is one tool for building the “will “ to read and
conversely the “skill” for reading
 Schoenbach, Greenleaf and Murphy cite reading research that “having
a sense of who one is a reader and learner is an important aspect of
motivation”.
Lit letters and metacog logs allow students to explore who they
are as a reader and learner through an ongoing dialogue.

5. Metacognitive Logs
Metacognitive process:
Thinking about thinking… helps all readers approach
increasingly complex texts and wide range of genres with
sense of efficacy.
Transfer of knowledge: taking metacognition and
applying it to our understanding of/thinking about text
Applying knowledge/deepening thinking: taking
metacognition and transfer of knowledge to begin
deeper understanding/analysis

6. A character I chose is Morwen. Morwen is a witch, but not like the normal witch. She's
young, clean, and pretty. Her personality is that she is a motivated person and driven
when something needs to be done. What motivates her is the people around her and her
annoying, yet brilliant, cats.
Melinda is still trying to find a friend. She spends time in an old janitor's closet to be
alone. She's very negative and doesn't believe in herself or anyone else. She's starting to
like art. She's getting used to her weird art teacher. She's getting used to high school.
I'm reading Harry Potter and one thing that I like about this book is the fact that Harry's
life is so similar to regular teenagers because, even though he lives in a magical world, he
deals with real life situations. This helps me better understand the book I'm similar to.
Just like me he worries about grades, school looks, teachers and friends.

7. Literature Letters
A more extensive response than the metacognitive logs.
Written every other week.
Teacher opportunity to help student deepen thinking, address specific CCSS standards.

9. My response can now
draw student’s attention
to craft and structure.
CCSS 4 and 5

10. Texts Cited
Biancarosa, Gina, and Catherine E. Snow. Reading Next: A Report to Carnegie Corporation of New York. Rep. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May
2015.
Elley, Warwick B. "Acquiring Literacy in a Second Language: The Effect of Book-Based Programs." Language Learning 41.3 (1991): 375-
411. Web.
Gallagher, Kelly. Readicide:How Schools Are Killing Reading and What You Can Do about It. Portland: Stenhouse, 2009. Print.
Morgan, Paul, and Douglas Fuchs. "Is There a Bidirectional Relationship between Children's Reading Skills and Reading Motivation."
Exceptional Children 73.2 (2007): 165-83.
Schoenbach, Ruth, Cynthia Greenleaf, and Lynn Murphy. Reading for Understanding: How Reading Apprenticeship Improves Disciplinary
Learning in Secondary and College Classrooms. Jossey Bass, 2012. Print.
Smith, Michael W., and Jeffrey D. Wilhelm. Fresh Takes on Teaching Literary Elements: How to Teach What Really Matters about
Character, Setting, Point of View, and Theme. New York: Scholastic, 2010. Print.
University of Oxford. "Reading at 16 linked to better job prospects." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 9 May 2011.
<www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/05/110504150539.htm>

11. Other Books and Resources of Interest
Book Love: Developing Depth, Stamina and Passion in Adolescent Readers by Penny Kittle
Heinemann 2013
The Power of Reading:Insights from the Research by Stephen D. Krashen
Heinemann 2004
The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in every Child by Donalyn Miller
Jossey Bass 2009
Reading for Their Life: (Re)Building the Textual Lineages of African Americam Adolescent Males by Alfred
Tatum
Heinemann 2009