There are thousands of
instructional materials available for teaching reading. These materials serve
many purposes from teaching curriculum to review games. Some are geared toward
beginning readers, and others challenge advanced readers. Instructional reading
materials can range in price from hundreds of dollars to completely free. In
this paper I will critique five instructional reading materials based on their
usefulness, targeted reading level and cost.
Printable
Leveled Readers from Reading A-Z
Reading A-Z is a website that offers printable leveled
readers. There are hundreds of books to choose from. Each book comes with a
chart explaining the appropriate age and grade level for the book as well as
the Lexile, DRA, Reading Recovery, and Fountas & Pinnell levels. The
available books range from Preschool through Fifth grade. A few books in each
level are marked as “benchmark” books, and there are a variety of both fiction
and non-fiction books available. The books can be printed and put together,
projected onto a SmartBoard, or downloaded onto e-readers. There are lesson
plans that correspond to each book. These include worksheets that can be
printed and/or projected onto a SmartBoard with vocabulary, word work,
comprehension, discussion group questions, and assessments. Reading A-Z could
be used as a classroom curriculum or as a supplement for reading enrichment or
tutoring purposes.
Reading A-Z books and lesson plans can be found at http://www.readinga-z.com.
There are a few free printable books available, and teachers can sign up for a
free trial period. If a teacher decides to use Reading A-Z the cost for the
complete curriculum is $99.95/ 1 year. This is a significant amount of money to
spend on supplemental reading materials, but it could be used as a classroom
curriculum. The potential to print each student a copy of the book and the
worksheets, and also be able to project the book and worksheets on the
SmartBoard make this product very useful in the classroom. However, the
additional time and cost of printing all of the books should also be taken into
consideration. Reading A-Z has a lot to offer for teachers and tutors who have
the resources to print, project, or download the materials.
Syllable
Whiteboards
Mrs. Rickwood, my mentor teacher, teaches a phonics
reading enrichment class in the afternoon. One of the materials her students
use every day during that time is 3” x 5” whiteboards. Whenever a child comes
to a word that they cannot sound out, they use these whiteboards to break the
word into syllables. They begin by counting the vowels in the word in order to
decide how many boards they will need. Each vowel is written on its own board.
They then look at the consonants around each vowel and decide which board to
put the consonants on. They read each syllable individually as they touch the
board. Then they sweep their fingers beneath the boards and put the syllables
together to read the multisyllabic word. From observing Mrs. Rickwood during
her phonics enrichment time, I have seen how very effective the use of the
boards can be.
Zykerra, the child I am working with is in a fluency
enrichment group instead of Mrs. Rickwood’s phonics group. Mrs. Rickwood
allowed me to borrow a few of the syllable boards to use with Zykerra during
one of our tutoring sessions. I asked Zykerra to read the poem “Jabberwocky”
which is filled with multisyllabic nonsense words. In the first stanza, Zykerra
really struggled to decode the nonsense words. I followed Mrs. Rickwood’s method
of using the boards, and Zykerra was able to successfully break the nonsense
words down into syllables and then put the word back together. After using the
syllable boards with a few words, Zykerra was able to start decoding the
nonsense words without the need of the boards.
Syllable whiteboards are a wonderful tool. Mrs. Rickwood
says she has had the same ones for years. Unfortunately, I was not able to find
a place that sells this size of whiteboards, but I asked Mrs. Rickwood where
she bought hers. She said she bought a big sheet of whiteboard at Lowes and
they cut it for her into the size she wanted. I found at http://www.homedepot.com that a 32 square ft. sheet of white board can
be purchased at Home Depot for only $13.38, and an employee there can cut the
sheet at no additional expense. Dry erase markers can be purchased at Walmart,
Staples, Office Depot, and tons of other stores for only a few dollars. In my
opinion, syllable whiteboards are an inexpensive and useful instructional
material for teaching reading.
Starfall.com
There are a lot of apps and websites that can be used to
encourage reading. Starfall.com is one of my favorites. Starfall.com is an
educational website. It has fun songs and games to teach phonics. It also has
leveled stories for children to read. The leveled readers are great. Each story
focuses on a phonics rule. If the child who is reading cannot figure out a
word, he can click on the word, and the computer will sound out the word and
read it to the child. Startfall.com is useful for preschool through first
grade. The only thing I do not like about Starfall.com is that it does not have
anything for more advanced readers. It could be used during learning centers
time in a classroom. Students love it because of the songs, games, and fun
stories. Teachers and parents love it because children can play and read
without needing help from an adult. While a membership can be purchased to open
more games and activities, many of the activities and stories are free.
Sight-word
Ring
Sight-word rings are another tool that Mrs. Rickwood uses
in her classroom. Mrs. Rickwood simply purchased binder rings and cut cardstock
into 2”x 2” squares. She has her students write sight words or vocabulary words
on the cards, and uses a hole punch to attach the cards to the ring. Every
student in her class has a sight-word ring. They can attach their ring to the
inside of a binder or they can put it on a belt loop or lanyard. Mrs. Rickwood
gives them time to choose a partner and drill each other on their words, or
they can go over their words on their own if they have extra time. This is a
great alternative to flashcards because the ring helps students keep all of the
cards together. The weakness of this idea is if a student loses his ring, he
loses all of his words as well. I looked on http://www.staples.com,
and 16 binder rings can be purchased for $3.49. Staples also sells packages of
50 sheets of cardstock for $9.99. These purchases could be made at the
beginning of the school year, and could last and be used all year. They would
be great for all ages and reading levels as well.
Common
Syllable Cards
Many children feel overwhelmed when they see
multisyllabic words. They may have a good understanding of phonics, but when
they see a big word they do not know how to break it down into smaller, easier
to read chunks. Zykerra, the child I am tutoring, struggles with decoding multisyllabic
words. In an effort to help Zykerra recognize that big words are made up of
small syllables, I gave her cards with common syllables printed on them. I
found a chart of the most common syllables at http://www.teacher.scholastic.com/reading/syllabication.pdf.
I printed the chart onto cardstock and cut the syllables into individual cards.
I gave Zykerra the cards and we played a game where we tried to make
multisyllabic words by putting the cards together. This activity helped Zykerra
recognize that she can easily read multisyllabic words because they are made up
of small syllables that she already knows. This instructional material was
free. The chart was free to print, and I already had a piece of cardstock. Syllable
cards could be used with beginning readers all the way to upper elementary
students.
As I have researched instructional reading materials, I
have found that teachers could potentially spend their life’s savings on
materials such as books, curriculums, apps, flashcards, and games. However,
there are tons of free and inexpensive instructional materials available.
Luckily, there are many veteran teachers, like Mrs. Rickwood, who are happy to
share their creativity and ideas with new teachers. Mrs. Rickwood has shared
with me tons of inexpensive, creative, and useful instructional materials for
teaching reading, that I am sure will be invaluable as I take them to use in my
own classroom.
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