Children make progress in reading by spending time independently reading while applying reading strategies. For younger children it begins with the decoding strategies. Decoding strategies help students know what to do when they come to a word they don’t know.
Such strategies consist of:
- Get your mouth ready
- Look at the picture
- Say all the sounds
- Ask: Does it look right?, Does it sound right?, Does it make sense?
- Look for chunks
However, in order for students to be applying these strategies they need to be reading a "just right" book. In her book, Reading With Meaning, Debbie Miller says, “It’s difficult to apply strategies when you know every word and understand everything; it’s equally difficulty when you know hardly any words and understand very little.” However Miller suggests that students are still provided with a choice of just right books. Since your goal is to create independent readers, then why not teach children how to choose a "just right" book?
The Goldilocks Method
If students will be expected to choose "just right" books, then teachers need to model what a reader looks like while reading a book that is too easy, a book that is too hard, and a book that is "just right". Demonstrate each of these and ask the students to tell you what they noticed about how you read the book. Tell them to think about Goldilocks and the three bears. She wanted things that were “just right”.
The Five Finger Rule
Tell your students that if they are not sure if the book is "just right" or not then they can use the Five Finger Rule to help them decide.
- Open to a page of the book.
- Begin reading.
- Each time you come to a word you don’t know, hold up 1 finger.
- After you finish reading the page, check to see how many fingers you are holding up.
Too Easy: 0 - 1 fingers
Just Right: 2 - 3 fingers
Too Hard: 4 - 5 fingers
Use Your Schema
Schema is what you know. If you’ve heard about it, experienced it, or seen it then it’s in your schema. Explain to students that activating your schema for a book will also help you decide if it is a "just right" book. For example, if you know a lot about reptiles, then you have a lot of schema for reptiles. This means that a book on reptiles might be a "just right" book for you. However, if you choose a book that you’ve never heard of the topic before, then that book will probably be too hard and it will be a book that you will need to read with someone.
Students need to spend time practicing independent reading while applying reading strategies. However, in order to effectively apply these strategies they need to be reading books that aren’t too easy or too difficult. Reading a "just right" book will give them the right amount of unknown words to practice applying decoding strategies. And by teaching students to choose a "just right" book is getting them one step closer to becoming a successful independent reader.
Mandy Yates - Mandy is a Literacy Coach in Virginia Beach as well as an adjunct instructor at Old Dominion University. She holds a masters degree in ...
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