Shared reading

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Shared reading is an instructional approach in education, during which the teacher explicitly teaches the strategies and skills of proficient readers. Students have an opportunity to gradually assume more responsibility for the reading as their skill level and confidence increase. Shared reading provides a safe learning environment for students to practice the reading behaviours of proficient readers with the support of teacher and peers. Shared reading may be offered to the whole class or a small group of students and may focus on needs indicated in assessment data and required by grade level curriculum expectations particuarly in Canada. The text is always chosen by the teacher and must be visible to the students.

Although shared reading does not promote being the end all and be all, it is a strategy that can be put into practice as an educational tool. This strategy allows students to participate in an enthusiastic and active way, while at the same time helping them to be successful in the area of reading.

[edit] Specification for texts

When selecting texts for reading, teachers typically look for text that is appropriate for the reading level of the students, that is also cross-curricular and relevant in its nature. The text should be of an appropriate length for study and be adequately complex. The text should also be powerful or impactful.

[edit] Method

The teacher reads the text aloud, states a focus, and then re-reads the text, asking questions specific to the focus of choice (and may ask students to join). The focus may include things like: analysis, predictions, drawing inferences, grammar and punctuation, vocabulary development, questioning, literacy elements, critical thinking, phrasing, fluency, intonation, character and plot Development.

[edit] Supports and references

Allan, Janet. Yellow brick roads: shared and guided paths to independent reading. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers, 2000

Booth, David. Guided reading process: techniques and strategies for successful instruction in K-8 classroom. Markham, ON: Pembroke Publishers, 1999.

Booth, David. Literacy techniques for building successful readers and writers. Markham, ON: Pembroke Publishers, 2004.

Brown, Susan. Shared Reading for grades 3 and beyond: Working it out together. Wellington, NZ: Learning Media Limited, 2004.

Cunningham, Patricia M. Classrooms that work: they call read and write. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon, 2003.

Fountas, Irene C. Guided Reading: good first teaching for all children. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1996.

Holley, Cynthia. Warming up to big books. Bothwell, WA: The Wright Group, 1995.

Kaner, Etta. The class that reads: best practices for teaching primary reading. Toronto, ON: Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario, 2001

McTeague, Frank. Shared Reading in the middle and high school year.. Markham, ON: Pembroke Publishers, 1992.

Ontario. A guide to effective literacy instruction. Grades 4 to 6 Ministry of Education, 2006.

Parkes, Brenda. Read it again! Revisiting shared reading.Portland, ME: Stenhouse, 2000.

Peetoom, Adrian. Shared Reading: risks with whole books. Richmond Hill, ON: Scholastic-TAB, 1986.

Powell, Richard. Come back, bouncer! Toronto: W.H. Smith, 1990.

Slaughter, Judith Pollard. Beyond storybooks: young children and the shared book experience. Newark, DE: International Reading Association, 1992.