Rebecca Welch- Examine Guided Reading- Routmann

Throughout my time at Clemson, I was trained on teaching reading using Guided Reading, having different groups and centers where the groups have a certain text they are reading based on their reading level. Then I came to Roebuck, where we teach reading using Independent Reading and conferencing. I was lost. I had no idea what I was doing. I still do not feel as though I am good at reading conferencing. So I was very interested in the chapter on Guided Reading. 

What I have first realized while reading this chapter is that "students want and NEED to be in mixed-ability groups." I found this really interesting. In my student teaching experience, I was in second grade and the students were in groups by ability. Routmann does go on to say that ability grouping up to second grade is acceptable, but that after that students need to be grouped differently. I thought about when I did book clubs and how I grouped my students. I let them give me their top 3 choices of the 7 or 8 books I had chosen. I then grouped them partially based on their interest, and partially by their ability. I think this is actually a good way to group students because they can help each other and they have a book they are interested in.

I would like my reading time to look more like this all year. That was only a 2 week unit, but I want to do that more. I know it is not totally independent reading, but I want to be able to meet with groups more and know what they are reading. When looking at the example schedule for grades 3-6, it fits right in to our ELA block schedule. I would really like to do more of guided reading book clubs next year. I think that works better for me as a teacher, which will help the students grow more as readers.