Advanced Reading through Electronic Readers (K-3)
The Need
Kelly Elementary School is the home of approximately 600 students, kindergarten through third grade. So much of our instructional time at this level is focused on teaching students the basic skills necessary to be a successful student throughout their educational careers. We have designed several safeguards for students who struggle grasping the basic concepts. We have title one reading programs that have been designed to provide interventions to students who are below grade level. We pull students daily to provide them with small group learning opportunities to meet their individual learning styles and levels. We are successful in our endeavors with this particular kind of student, but we often leave our higher students to fend for themselves.
Innovative Program
The third grade reading schedule is set up within a 90 minute block of time. We provide 30 minutes intervention and scaffolding for groups of students either first thing or at the end of the scheduled time. This leaves 60 minutes of reading instruction for each teacher with every student in his or her room. The schedule for the “Electronic Reading Group” would operate the same way. The four teachers who receive intervention at the beginning of the reading schedule would now be asked to send two or three of their students to a separate location to participate in an advanced small group activity. This activity would be project and participation based and led by one of the regular classroom teachers. The readers would be asked to read chapters, participate in book talks, design alternate endings, act in a reader’s theater, write summaries and much more. The electronic readers would give us an exciting way to present information to our advanced students and begin to prepare them for the future. As our world continually changes, the need for technology continues to increase, and we believe this is one way we can start to embrace this change.
Equipment and Support
Electronic readers such as IPAD or Kindle.