As my highly active students walk through the door of our reading classroom, I wonder to myself what their behavior will be like for the next 45 minutes. Will today be a time where great strides are made in learning? Or, will today be a battle of classroom management? As it turns out, these questions are a struggle for many seasoned teachers. We have been blessed with leveling students based upon his or her reading abilities and needs in my classroom. Many of the needs are highly dependent upon behavioral issues ( the inability to sit still for an extended amount of time ). So, how can I fix this monster of a problem? Literacy centers seem to lend a great hand in making a classroom run smoothly. This turns an unhappy teacher to a happy one!!
Literacy Centers- What does that even mean?
The idea behind having centers in the classroom is simply this: keep students engaged and motivated within academic regions. Centers allow for students to be challenged in different aspects of literacy. Instead of giving 45 minutes of direct instruction to the whole class, students are challenged to think in small group situations, or individually. Whole group instruction is an easy way to monitor students and be sure that each student is receiving the same instruction. However, many times a student will "check out" or become bored with the concept and bother his or her neighbor.
Centers- What do they look like?
Each week students are given new vocabulary terms to work on. These words typically go with the anthology story of the week. These words are then tested on Friday. During this center, students are also working on their weekly spelling words. Spelling work may be done by using a manipulative to spell out the words and then copying the word down on paper. Or, students may work on spelling by using the words correctly in a sentence.
This is a time when students work on building stamina for reading. During this center students work on reading "good-fit" books. The words, pacing, concepts, and length of the story fit the reader.
Reading to someone helps students work on fluency while reading. Each student may be provided a decoding strategy bookmark to help each other when a work is challenging. As students progress in the year they may move into prompting comprehension questions. In my class, the students love partner reading. The books they love most are You Read To Me, and I'll Read To You. Students stay on task as they read these books and I cannot keep them on my shelf!
This is an essential time for all students. Listening to reading allows for students to work on comprehension activities. Students are also listening to how fluent reading sounds. Listening to reading may be done as a whole class while a story is read or it may be done while listening to a book on CD.
"Just like reading, the best way to become a better writer is to practice writing each day." The Daily Five by Joan Moser and Gail Boushey. A great way to work on writing is to write words from the week in story form. During this time, students are also learning Daily Oral Language ( D.O.L.).
Let's Do It!!!
These centers allow for the teacher to work smarter, not harder, in the classroom. Students are on task and engaged in the activity that he or she is working on. Mini-lessons and warm-ups are still essential for whole group exercises. However, centers can be tailored to specific needs of students. During the time of a center a student may be asked to work on high level thinking activities. The more experimentation I do with high level thinking activities, the more I see students rise to the occasion and push each other to new levels in academics.
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