Assigned Reading

Just before the school year began, I read a NY Times article about reading workshop.  I implemented reading workshop in my classroom more than ten years ago, after reading Nancie Atwell’s groundbreaking text In the Middle.  Progressive teachers, eager to inspire their students to read, have switched from buying 25 copies of a single book title to buying single copies of many titles.  We’ve filled our classrooms with books of all topics, genres, and reading levels, and have spent weekend mornings reading books that might interest our students.  We introduced students to the concept we adults enjoy: the freedom to select our own reading materials.  Those who understand and implement the concepts of reading workshop see first hand the impact it has on students in the classroom.

Above all else, I take pride in the number of students I’ve helped become readers.  By the time students are in fifth grade, they know how to read.  But the knowledge doesn’t make them readers.  I want my kids to become lifelong readers.  I want them to enjoy selecting books, talking about books, sharing texts with others.  I want students to read because they want to, to discover new authors that excite them and characters with whom they can relate.

I can’t think of a better way to prepare a fifth grader for secondary education than to make him or her a reader by choice.

So when I read the NY Times article, I chuckled.  The Times was only now discovering this “revolutionary” approach that was “catching on”?

What I hadn’t expected was the controversy that followed.  Some disagree with the reading workshop approach.  Critics worry that it fails to provide a common thread among students, or that students will avoid the classics if allowed to choose, or that only gifted students can be so self-motivated.  My experiences as a reading workshop teacher suggest otherwise.

Nancie Atwell offers a video response to the controversy, dispelling the myths put forth by the critics of reading workshop.

I am a strong supporter of the workshop approach, and believe Nancie Atwell is a gifted teacher who has transformed the way we view and implement reading instruction. A bit of anecdotal evidence: a parent once approached me and asked what I had done to her son. She was stunned one day during baseball practice to overhear her son, once a non-reader, talking to another player and fellow classmate, about the book he was reading. The two boys chatted about books while tossing the ball around in the outfield. These fifth graders discussed plot, character, and conflict…on the baseball field…after the school day was long over.

I can’t think of any better measure of success.

Elementary schools are often dominated by female teachers, and this creates unique problems when teaching and encouraging boys to read. Within the past decade or so, much attention has been brought to the disparity in reading ability between boys and girls. Fictional narratives favored more by girls filled classroom libraries and where more often chosen as whole-class reads.

Today teachers are more aware of the need to instruct using books from a variety of genre and subjects, and to fill their classroom libraries with books attractive to boys as well as girls. The struggle, then, is to help female teachers understand what types of reading will interest boys, and how to provide male role models to recommend books.

Mary Ann Zehr reported for Edweek on a Virginia conference that focused on boosting boys’ interest in reading. Most of the presenters were authors, such as Jack Gantos, Jerry Pinkney, and Jon Scieszka. The article is worth reading. Scieszka is passionate about the subject, and maintains the Guys Read website that can assist teachers with finding books for boys.

The Math Wars continue, and rightly they should.  In Debra Saunders recent column, she writes about the battle in Palo Alto, California.  Parents have reacted negatively to the district’s decision to adopt the Everyday Math program as its math curriculum, and have petitioned district leaders.  The Textbook Adoption Committee made its decision after the district piloted Everyday Math and Investigations.

Our district followed the same path.  Only these two programs were piloted, and we were left to choose between the two.  I piloted Everyday Math for a year, then reported on its strengths and weaknesses.  My overall opinion was negative.  My complaint was the same as just about all other content driven curricula revisions:  the program attempted to cram too much content into a single year of instruction.  Instead of focusing on a number of major concepts, Everyday Math attempts to touch upon everything, but not offer much repetition.

In our fifth grade text, for instance, long division is taught for the first time in a single lesson.  Once several weeks of lessons, beginning with simple problems then moving to larger dividends and larger divisors, Everyday Math includes one- and two-digit divisors in a single lesson.  For a ten-year-old, it’s too much to learn in such a short amount of time.

Everyday Math designers ensure teachers that the spiraling curriculum addresses this concern.  We move quickly through the lessons, and those who do not learn the concepts and algorithms will do so next year, when the topic is reintroduced.

Based on my experience using Everyday Math for more than a handful of years, it doesn’t seem to work.

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