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By Erica

Hi Julie and other Teachers as Readers;
At my last weekly meeting, using newspapers and other non-fiction texts within the Reading workshop was modeled. The strategies included getting children to extract the key words
or phrases within each paragraph (hilighting/underlining them) and then (in another mini lesson) teaching the students how to synthesize the key points from the paragraphs. The Lit. coordinators modeled by synthesizing information from 2 paragraphs and putting them into 1 sentence. This is quite interesting and the students enjoy reading nonfictional texts, especially when the topic

is one that they have some prior knowledge about and is interesting to them. These skills have been helpful lately when teaching note-taking strategies when researching for a report. We actually have 2 of the local papers delivering to the fifth grade a few times a week. This is great, if you can set it up where once you have modeled the strategy on the overhead the students can choose an article (weekly or biweekly) and use the strategies learned. Another strategy that I have taught them as part of the Report writing is to take double-entry notes; writing your notes from the research, but also responding to what you have read. This strategy can be helpful in many ways and one that students don't get enough of. Anyway, I feel that using the newspaper can vary the work that is normally done in Rw. I hadn't thought about incorporating it into Guided Reading, but it is definately something that would benefit the students as they have closer interaction with the teacher. Guided Reading is a great way to monitor the progress of students when it comes to some of the Reading strategies being taught. You really get a better glimpse of who is understanding what, as well as how they have used the strategies. Good luck and let us know how it goes!- Erica