A Teacher's New Year’s Resolution: Read Aloud Daily

I was treated to a remarkable experience at my brother’s home this past Sunday, where the family was gathered for an annual holiday celebration. My brother came out to the family room where I was sitting taking in a football game and said, “You better look into the den, your granddaughter is holding court.” I went in to check it out and there I saw my twelve year-old granddaughter, Allison Rainville, reading aloud to a rapt audience of her younger cousins, ages ranging from one to nine. The book was The Polar Express, by Chris Van Allsburg. Allison’s reading was expressive, even dramatic. I thought, “Boy, this kid would definitely score high on a fluent reading rubric.” I was proud of my granddaughter and pleased that the read aloud of a book had captured the children’s attention away from all of the distractions that electronic games, remote control cars and new dolls can create at this time of the year.

So I got to thinking, what would be a great, easy to implement and educationally sound New Year’s resolution for all teachers to make? How about reading aloud to your students daily? I am taking the pledge, also. Even though I now teach in college, read aloud remains relevant and engaging to my 20 somethings. I resolve to read to them at each class.

In this time of Common Core implementation, runaway standardized testing and teacher evaluation based on student performance on these tests, I worry that the daily read aloud may become a casualty of education reform. The truth is, there will never be a time when reading aloud is not a relevant and effective instructional strategy for students. In case your supervisor does not think so, here are ten reasons that read aloud matters that you can put into your lesson plans.

1.    Read aloud helps children relate to reading as a pleasurable experience.

2.    Read aloud provides a rich aesthetic experience for students.

3.    Read aloud exposes students to different text genres and writing styles.

4.    Read aloud provides students with a model of fluent, expressive reading.

5.    Read aloud increases vocabulary.

6.    Read aloud provides opportunities for the teacher to model comprehension strategies.

7.    Read aloud helps young children make connections between speech and print.

8.    Read aloud engages students in more complex text. Typically, children can listen and comprehend text two years above their reading level.

9.    Read aloud helps second language learners become familiar with the sounds and shapes of English.

10. Read aloud helps students learn to ask and answer questions about text.

What should you read aloud? The truth is any text can make for a good read aloud, but I would encourage careful choices based on high quality or high impact texts. Texts for read aloud should be rich in the quality of language used to communicate a message. For younger children, high quality picture books that tell the story through words and pictures will make good choices. For very young children, cumulative stories like The Napping House, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly, or Brown Bear, Brown Bear are enjoyable and help students develop oral language. Poetry is written to be read aloud and makes a good choice for read aloud at any age.

You can follow this link to a list of great picture books for children in grades K-2.

You can follow this link to a list of great chapter books to read aloud to students in grades 3-5.

You can follow this link for a list of read alouds aimed at middle school readers.

When reading to high school students, poetry is always a good choice, but I would often find my read-alouds for older students in the pages of the newspaper. I would choose something of local interest or a well-written essay from the op-ed pages to read to the students and often to spur debate. The New York Times gathered a list of recommended articles from its pages for reading aloud to older students. You can find that list here.

So, what do you say? Will you join me in my resolution to read aloud to students every day? It is one of the most powerful uses we can make of our valuable instructional time.

Happy New Year and Joyous Reading to all!

Resource: http://www.education.com/reference/article/reasons-read-aloud-children/

The Need to Read Aloud

Recently, as I was cleaning out my office, I came across my copy of The Read Aloud Handbook, signed for me by the author, Jim Trelease. More than 30 years ago, I was doing a presentation at a reading conference in New York City. It was one of my first presentations at a large conference like this and I was quite nervous. My topic: The Role of Read Aloud in the Middle School Classroom. I had become a huge advocate of read aloud as an instructional strategy through my graduate work and through the reading of the Trelease book.

After the presentation, which I thought had gone rather well, a gentleman from the audience came up to me and said, "Hi, I'm Jim Trelease." I was floored. Jim Trelease, nationally known author and the country's biggest advocate of read aloud, was in the audience as I stole and shared many of his ideas. I think I stammered something like, "It's a pleasure to met you. I hope you liked what I had to say." In my mind I was thinking, "Oh my god, I hope I credited him appropriately."

He said kindly, "Absolutely, I think you were right on the mark. And thanks for plugging my book." He was very gracious, signed my copy of his book for me and gave me his phone number so we could stay in touch.

Over the years we ran into each other at subsequent conferences and he never failed to remember me and take a moment to talk about our work.

I bring this up now because I fear for the place of read aloud in our schools today. Only six years ago, with the encouragement of my then Superintendent, Sam Stewart, I had decreed that every student in every school in our district would be read to at least once a day. Now, I hear from many teachers that read aloud is being crowded out of the curriculum. Read aloud is an endangered species because of the creeping demands of accountability and testing. In an atmosphere where teachers feel under siege and where standardized test scores are high stakes, an apparent "soft" part of the curriculum, like read aloud, may get crowded out.

So perhaps now is a good time to revisit Jim Trelease and remind ourselves of the critical learning that results from children being read to every day.

• Read aloud conditions the brain to view reading as a pleasurable activity
• Read aloud builds background knowledge
• Read aloud builds vocabulary
• Read aloud provides a fluent reading model for children

The most skilled teacher would be hard pressed to design an activity that has that much bang for the buck. When an administrator asks you your goals for read aloud, recite the list above. Fight for the right to read aloud to your students. We must read to our students every day. To fail to do so is educational malpractice.