Category: Reading Strategies

Decoding and comprehension strategies for beginning readers

  • GUIDED READING WARM-UPS: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

    GUIDED READING WARM-UPS: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

    Last week, I sent a survey out about my Guided Reading Warm-ups and am so thankful for all of your responses! There was a LOT of positive feedback (thank you!), as well as suggestions, and a whole lot of questions. I wanted to answer as many questions as I can, as well as let you…

  • How to Teach Making Inferences: Comprehension Strategy

    How to Teach Making Inferences: Comprehension Strategy

    There are few lessons I love to introduce more than making inferences! Kids love to be detectives so when I come out from behind my desk in my trench coat and detective hat, holding my oversized magnifying lens, and hum the Mission Impossible song as I furtively sneak up to the board, it’s always a…

  • How to Teach the Chunky Monkey Reading Strategy

    How to Teach the Chunky Monkey Reading Strategy

    By now, I think all educators can agree that phonics instruction is key in teaching kids to read. Decoding strategies should be phonics-based to ensure kids focus on the print first, rather than pictures or context clues. This will help them later on when pictures disappear with more advanced text. I’ve written about decoding strategies…

  • How to Use Guided Reading Warm-ups

    How to Use Guided Reading Warm-ups

    If you teach kindergarten through 2nd grade, you know that guided reading is an essential component of literacy instruction. The way I’ve conducted guided reading has changed over the years and some people aren’t fond of the term guided reading, but small-group reading instruction is essential in order to differentiate and meet your students’ needs…

  • Activities to Teach Self-Monitoring Reading Comprehension

    Activities to Teach Self-Monitoring Reading Comprehension

    In my previous post, I discussed using pictures as a comprehension strategy using Eagle Eye. As I mentioned, the more advanced kids become at reading, the fewer pictures their books will have. So, it’s important to teach other self-monitoring reading comprehension strategies. I’ll share some easy lesson activities you can do to model and teach…

  • Using Eagle Eye as a Comprehension Strategy

    Using Eagle Eye as a Comprehension Strategy

    Can you believe he was picking his nose?? Not what you thought? Pictures are a huge help to beginning readers when monitoring comprehension! Even when decoding accurately, factors such as figures of speech and background experience can affect a student’s comprehension. Some kids can decode an encyclopedia (do they even have those anymore??), but if they aren’t monitoring their…

  • Step-by-Step Decoding: When Kids Get Stuck on a Word

    Step-by-Step Decoding: When Kids Get Stuck on a Word

    I had a student my first year teaching who had a habit of waiting for help before making any attempts on his own.  He would start a sentence, get to a tricky word. . . and just stop.  As I sat by him one day while he read, he got stuck on a word and…

  • Guided Reading Lesson Components

    Guided Reading Lesson Components

    Guided reading is my favorite time of the day! It’s the best way to differentiate reading instruction to meet the needs of all your students. It wasn’t always my favorite, though. In fact, I used to dread it! I did not feel confident and always felt overwhelmed with planning my guided reading lessons. It takes…

  • Guided Reading Tools Every Teacher Should Have

    Guided Reading Tools Every Teacher Should Have

    These are must-have tools for guided reading in kindergarten and first grade! I keep drawers with my fun tools to keep kids engaged throughout guided reading lessons. Can you guess what’s in the drawers? Read this post to find out some new, exciting ways to use materials you likely already have in your classroom! #tejedastots…

  • How to Keep your Guided Reading Lessons Short

    How to Keep your Guided Reading Lessons Short

    One question that comes up often about guided reading is. . . How do I fit all my groups in? The struggle is real! It’s important to take the time you need with your students (part of teaching is loving on them!), but it’s also important to stay on track, so that you’re able to…

  • Warming Up For Guided Reading

    Warming Up For Guided Reading

    If you do guided reading, you know how hard it is to find great tools for teaching specific skills and strategies before or during a guided reading lesson. I found it especially hard to find resources that had great examples to model the strategies with. And when I did find tools, they were never in…

  • What To Do With Extra Classroom Magazines

    What To Do With Extra Classroom Magazines

    Do you have extra Scholastic News Magazines lying around your classroom? I hoard save Scholastic News magazines because I just love them and can’t imagine discarding them. However, we just never get to all of them and I always have a big pile by the end of the year. Well, I finally buckled down and…