When To Start Guided Reading

[Guest]

I have timetabled slots throughout the week for Guided Reading. But was wondering when is it best to start this? I will be working in a very middle class village church school where there is a lot of pressure from parents, but I don't want to start something too early.

 

My daughter started hers after xmas-but I thought for a child of her ability this was too late.

 

The first 2 weeks are settling in, so I won't be doing any guided reading.

 

In addition I will be changing home school books on a mon and a Fri. My aim if resources permit are to send home each child with a fiction and non fiction book. The previous teacher use to change them every day-but whilst watching I saw it was done in a fluster with no real thought into the process, especially as none of the books were banded-she just had a feel for them.

[catma]

It is really important to have banded books for successful guided reading!! Is that a school thing that they are not? Or were they story books rather than "reading" books per se?

We would advise our schools to be approaching guided reading in different ways depending on the childrens phonics skills so if most are sarting phase 2 with you, you can start straight away but have a small group shared reading approach to build in the routines and when the children have got some phonemes under their belts then start on pink/red level books (from memory that aligns with phase 2, would need to check!!). It goes in tandem with the phonics phases really. Once children have phase 2 i.e.can blend, segment and know the common words then the guided reading can be matched to that, but book bands help!!!

 

There was a brilliant dvd from the national strategies a few years back called "Early Reading curriculum CPD resources" which modelled different ways to manage guided reading. I've attached the transcript of the shared reading group. The DVD may still be in school somewhere!

 

Cxclld_erc_03_es_guide_rdg05308.pdf

Edited August 31, 2012 by catma

[Froglet]

I don't really have anything to add - Catma's reply is pretty much what we do but I wondered if anyone had any tips on how/what to do with Reception Guided reading. I always do it but realised that last year I tended to focus more on my Y1s. The YR guided reading became somewhat more haphazard and I think less valuable. This year I want to review and refresh what I do and make sure I 'do it right' but I've also lost my way a little with how. Any ideas?

[Susan]

I used to love Guided Reading in Reception. I worked in a high EAL area so taught book skills and vocabulary, word recognition and phonics etc etc and consolidated what the children knew.

[Guest]

It is really important to have banded books for successful guided reading!! Is that a school thing that they are not? Or were they story books rather than "reading" books per se?

 

they have reading schemes but very old ones. Fortunately I am the English coordinator so it is something that needs completely revamping and will be top on my action plan!

 

Thanks catma, I thought as much with the shared reading approach with the less able, getting them familiar with how books work etc.

[catma]

That sounds like a big spend coming on!! Did you get the DfE matched funding??

[bgfrancis]

Hi everyone,

 

We start Guided Reading off very early in the term with basic skills such as locating the front and back cover, holding the book correctly, turning one page at a time, talking about page numbers etc. My school has children coming in with low levels of attainment so we find these activities are really useful.

 

We tend to start off in groups with a big book, encouraging the children to talk about the story, character, setting etc. Once we have a better understanding of where each child is, we begin differentiating activities. We tend to alternate between fiction and non-fiction books as this helps them to understand the difference betwween the two genres - something ours have found difficult in the past.

 

At the end of last year we started using a brilliant website http://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/ to look at the books on the IWB. Each ebook has activities linked to the book for the children to have a go at and can be left on the board during child initiated times. This was very popular!

 

We don't really like the 'everyone sit in a circle and take turns to read a page' approach as we found the children not reading lost focus and they were not able to talk about what they had read or the book as a whole at the end of the session. Obviously this is an important skill but we try to arrange for each child to read one to one with either a TA or volunteer at least once a week.

 

I hope this is some help!

[Guest]

That sounds like a big spend coming on!! Did you get the DfE matched funding??

I'm not sure if the school has spent it. This is something I will have to check once I've sat down with the new head and looked at the budget. But if they haven't spent it I will prob use it for an updated bank of reading schemes. The school is having a massive change-new head, new deputy (me) and another new teacher

[catma]

Sounds fun! I was DHT and EYFS lead - it's like 2 jobs! when I went into Nursery the parents thought I'd stopped being DHT because clearly you can't teach the youngest children and be responsible for the whole lot!!!

[Guest]

The year 5's at my new school want to know why I am not teaching them in year 6 this year as the previous DHT did. Some parents see it as a demotion! Although the reception parents are very pleased their child is going to be taught by the DHT! I'm working closely with the HT to make sure my profile is raised as being down in reception with a different curriculum and timetable you can get very lost!

[catma]

It's true you have to keep your DHT role higher than your EYFS role really! I was responsible for stock, attendance, EMA and assessment too so I did have quite a large role in the whole school but even then it was diffficult sometimes. I always wore my DHT suits on days I was out of class to set the tone for what I was about - in class I was usually wearing stuff I could get paint on obviously! My office was also nearer to the key stage 2 classes so I was often the first port of call for pencils!

cx

[lbarwell]

I have to agree with bgfrancis- the www.oxfordowl.co.uk website is absolutely fantastic!! We got match funding last year, and have brought a whole new set of home reading books for across the school that are oxford owl books and are also banded and linked into our inschool reading scheme. As the person in charge of reading this year, myself and the Literacy co-ordinator will be holding a reading workshop to introduce the new reading books and to demonstrate how to use the guidance pages and also the oxford owl website to support reading at home. The books are fab, really worth having a look into!

[lbarwell]

Oh and as for guided reading, this is something I am also interested in- I started it for Reception last year in my school as they had never done it with them before, but did it very late on in the year. Would like to start it earlier this time, but not too early! Do you guys have any sheets that you record on? Years 1-6 at my school using APP sheets for their different groups.

 

Lx

[Susan]

Lancs had sheets that we used in my last school. Look at the literacy area, maybe with APP but were colour/book banded so appropriate for reception.

[Guest]

Where do we find the literacy area?

[Guest]

It's true you have to keep your DHT role higher than your EYFS role really! I was responsible for stock, attendance, EMA and assessment too so I did have quite a large role in the whole school but even then it was diffficult sometimes. I always wore my DHT suits on days I was out of class to set the tone for what I was about - in class I was usually wearing stuff I could get paint on obviously! My office was also nearer to the key stage 2 classes so I was often the first port of call for pencils!

cx

You had your own office! Wow. I haven't. I will wear my suit on my mgmt day too and have a jacket hanging in my cupboard for those days when I may be meeting parents and so on at some point in the day. I have put myself forth for my own assembly once a week and will be leading the whole school Friday assembly alongside the head. The new head is pleased with this as the old head took the fri school assembly on her own while the teachers had PPA.

[chocisgood]

Guided_reading_record_sheets_with_level_specific_objectives_R-61.doc

 

I found these sheets useful for recording GR. Used them in small groups. They have book bands on them as well.

Edited September 16, 2012 by chocisgood

[Guest]

Mine only started last week and are part time for another 2 weeks yet so I usually start guided reading the week after they are all full time. I have a 20 minute slot each day and I have the children in 5 groups which rotate over the week and all children are engaged with reading/phonics activities. I have the guided reading group, my TA does phonics/word practice and the the other 3 groups do a variety of things independently eg listening centre, reading area, story telling, phonics games etc. I send read write inc ditties home to read to begin with as home readers as we have so few lilac readers, not enough for the whole class. When the children are blending, I put them on pink a books most children are reading home readers by oct half term.

Deb

[Froglet]

Deb, during your guided reading time are you assigning groups to each area or do they get to chose from those?

[Guest]

what is match funding?

[Guest]

Deb, during your guided reading time are you assigning groups to each area or do they get to chose from those?

Helen I assign them groups and direct them to the activities and have all 30 doing literacy acitivities it takes a bit of training but by the end of the year I just say it's guided reading time and the children just make their way to the table/area with their group colour on it and get on with what is there.

 

Match funding is when there are grants or schemes available which match what you spend on books so say you spend £5000 as a school, you get another £5000 to spend on books.

Deb