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Vicki's Literacy Experiences
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"Bells" Reading Group
In Kindergarten, I was assigned to the "Bells" Reading Group. The group read through a phonics/reading textbook together one story at a time in order. I always felt the stories were boring, and was jealous of the other groups because I never had access to any of their stories. -
Memorizing Green Eggs and Ham
Also in Kindergarten, I memorized all of the words to Green Eggs and Ham. I "read" the story to my Mom without making any mistakes. She was very proud and made a very big deal about this accomplishment. Even though it was memorization and not reading, this is the day that I felt like a "reader" -
Reading Charlotte's Web
The summer of 1998, I spent with my Grandmother who is an avid reader. Each night we read part of Charlotte's Web together. There were no test questions or comprehension checks, just reading a great book and having some conversation about it. It was the first book I read that I enjoyed! -
6th Grade Reading Projects
In 6th Grade, I was placed into Gifted/Talented Reading. Our class read lots of books together, but at the end of each novel we always had to do a huge art project. There was never an option (like project or paper) it was always an art project. Being somebody who is horrible at anything art-related, I used to dread every new book because I knew it would end in a culminating Art Project. -
Reading in Social Studies
My Middle School Social Studies Teachers incorporated a lot of novels into their classroom content. In Social Studies, I read books like The Giver, and Night. I loved making literary connections to the historical content I was learning because it added meaning to the things I was reading about and gave emotion to the history. -
Nicholas Sparks
I believe Nicholas Sparks books are what defined reading for pleasure and reading for school for me. In general, as a young teenager, I enjoyed reading Nicholas Sparks books. In 8th grade, my English teacher assigned "A Walk to Remember" to our class, and even though I had read it before and enjoyed it, I hate it the second time through. She made us answer 12 comprehension questions at the end of every, single chapter and I found the process to take away from the book. It was miserable. -
Rebecca
In 9th Grade, I was assigned to read Rebecca. I never finished the book (answered all comprehension questions using SparkNotes!) because I found it to be tedious. Over winter break, I was bored one day so I picked it up to read again. Without the pressure of comprehension questions I actually really enjoyed the novel. -
Book Reccomendations
College was the first time that my peers began to reccomend really good books to me. We would read and discuss novels in a very informal way and make reccomendations based on our interests. We didn't all read the same books because we had to, but because we wanted to. -
Columbia Teacher's College: Reader's Workshop
In 2012, My school selected me to attend the Columbia Reader's Workshop in NYC. This week long professional development conference inspired me to use Guided Reading in my classroom to not only develop skills but also a love of reading in my students. -
3rd Grade Reading
This year was my first year teaching 3rd grade. This age offers a wide discrepancy in where children fall in reading (some still working on phonics while others are well into novels). Everything I've learned about Reader's Workshop and my own beliefs about instilling a love of reading made establishing a culture for reading very important in my classroom.
