5 Ways to Get Your Students Reading to Boost Achievement!

Are your students reading 15 minutes a day? If not they should be! Research shows that 

reading for 15 minutes a day makes all the difference between a successful student and a struggling student. But why 15 minutes?

 

Importance of Reading

A study comparing the engaged reading time and reading scores of more than 2.2 million students found that students who were reading 15 minutes a day or more got a higher reading score than the national average. Growth in a student's reading skills only happens when that student reads for at least 15 minutes a day. 

In this same study it was found that students who read less than 5 minutes a day saw the lowest level of growth in their reading scores. Their scores were also well below the national reading average. Students who read between 5 and 14 minutes per day did a little better, but their scores were also below the national average. “15 minutes seems to be the ‘magic number’ at which students start seeing substantial positive gains in reading achievement.” Renaissance

 

Reading Linked to Student Success in School 

According to a study of the Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) scores of over 174,000 students around the world, there is a connection between a student’s reading practice and performance. Talentnook

So what is the difference between a student who reads for less than 15 minutes a day and a student who reads for more than 30 minutes a day? It can’t be that big of a difference, right? Wrong. There is actually a huge difference. The difference is 12 million.

By the time a student graduates high school, a student reading for 30 minutes or more a day will encounter 13.7 million words. And the number of words their classmates who aren’t reading 15 minutes a day will encounter? 1.5 million words. It is so important that our students are reading 15 minutes per day because it will greatly impact their success and achievement in school. 

SO WHAT SHOULD YOU DO WITH THIS INFORMATION?!

1. Encourage Reading in Your Classroom, in any way or form.  

It is so important that we encourage our students to read. Some of the ways we can do this is to invite them to reread, or read it again and again. Rereading builds speed and accuracy and helps students gain confidence in their reading skills.

For our youngest readers, teaching them that reading the pictures is also a form of reading. This will help them to feel capable of reading and begin a love for reading at an early age.

2. Teach Students to Find Just Right Books

Teaching students to find books that are a good fit is also extremely important. If students are reading books that are too difficult for them and/or not of interest, that is surely a way to discourage them from wanting to read more. By teaching them how to properly shop for books, we can help to build that love of reading.

When teaching students to book shop, have them open up a book and read through a few paragraphs. Can they read and understand most of the words? Is it too easy? Does what they are reading interest them? Is the type of book interesting to them?

If so- this is a good fit. If not, they can return it and find a new one. I also like to let students know that it's totally okay to start a book and decide that you don't like it.

 3. Organize Your Class Library to Make Book Shopping Easy

 Let's be honest- finding books in a library are rather difficult if you are just browsing and don't have a specific author or title in mind. I believe it's important to organize your own classroom library so that it's easy for students to find books they love reading. We don't wan't students to get discouraged from reading because it's too difficult to find a book!

Book bins are a great way to keep books organized and the best thing about it is that students can pull a bin out and easily look through to find a book they like. Students often check out books by looking at their covers. They are much more likely to pull out a book if they can see the cover versus just the spine.

The other great thing I love about the bins is that you can choose different ways to organize your books to make book shopping easier for students. In my own classroom library, I had my books sorted out by popular chapter series, favorite authors, and genre. This way, students could stick to the books they love, discover new books by their favorite author or even explore new books in their favorite genres. You can grab my library book bin labels here.

 

 

4. Host a Book Drive 

Another great way to make books accessible to students is to host a book drive at your school!

If you have never heard of a book drive, it is where students bring in gently used books and swap them out for a new one. The great thing about a book drive is that it provides new books to students and also makes reading more accessible to those who may not have books at home. It also helps to encourage reading at home. I held one at my school a few years ago and it was a total hit!

 

To ensure book swap inventory stayed up, I required children to swap for the same type of book they brought in (chapter book for chapter book and picture book for picture book). To keep track, when kids came to give their books, they would get a colored ticket (indicating picture or chapter book). They could then choose however many books for the number of tickets they had. 

If you have any questions for me about hosting your own book swap, feel free to DM me over on Instagram @teachinginparadise. 

5. Make Time for Read Alouds, Daily

I know that as teachers, you are always strapped for time. However, research shows how important it is for students to be reading daily. By Incorporating read alouds into your school day you are modeling fluent reading for students, introducing them to new books and authors, and most importantly, helping them to find the joy in reading!

I love to use Read Alouds to introduce new concepts that we are learning about. It's a great way to throw in a fun picture book. 

In addition, during the month of December, we read 1 Christmas/Winter story a day. The kids are so excited and look forward to these daily holiday read alouds. You'd be surprised how many students are not read to at home on a daily basis. 

So, no matter how old your students are, they all love to be read to! I've seen 6th graders in our school library so excited to sit on the ground for our librarian to read to them!

If you're a 3rd grade teacher, get my list of favorite Gr.3 Read Alouds here.

As educators, we want to do all we can to ensure that our students are successful in school and later on in life. One of the best ways we can do this is to make books accessible and ensure that they are reading the magic number of 15 minutes a day.

 

Until next time.
Aloha,

Sources:

https://www.renaissance.com/2018/01/23/blog-magic-15-minutes-reading-practice-reading-growth/

https://talentnook.com/blog/the-15-minute-magic-elevate-your-childs-reading

Classroom Theme Linky

Today was my very last day to tidy up the room and run off copies for the official first day of school with students! I posted some photos of my classroom a few days ago, but for those of you who missed it I'll repost some of the images. Here is a panoramic view of my classroom this year. Please excuse the poor quality photos, I keep forgetting my camera at home (I also didn't have all of the lights on). 

I'm linking up with the fabulous Corinna from Surfin' Through Second for her:

Head on over to link up with her as well as to get some great ideas!! 

Here are some quick photos from my previous post..

Attendance Cards are double sided. When students come to school they flip it over to let me know they are Ready to Learn!

Genre posters

Daily 5 Rotations

Love these pocket charts from Target dollar section! 

Ran out of room so I had to velcro these charts to my desk! lol

Homework Club

CAFE and Daily 5 Boards

Student Work Display

Class Library (Forgot to snap full view shot)

Cubbies. I use the baskets above to collect all student work/homework

Math Resource Storage

If you are interested in the labels I used for my storage bins, you can pick up an editable copy here in my TPT store. :) 

Behavior Chart

Love this new organizer from Target!! Excuse the mess in that unlabeled blue bin...Those are my kids book bags (ziplock bags). The two binders in the lower right corner are unfinished work binders. 

Character Trait Board. Love these beautiful posters! I was planning on having the kids do a quick write each month about how they demonstrated the character trait. 

Love these pom poms!

So as you can see, I have extremely high ceilings!! If any of you are like me and wondering how in the world are you going to get those pom poms up there....the secret is.....

Yes! Command Hooks!! My fiancé was actually the genius behind this idea, so I can't take credit for this one :) He used my window opener (that long metal stick in almost every classroom in Hawaii) hung the command hook from the opener and stuck it onto the side of the ceiling beam. He then tied a fishing line loop and hung the pom poms. It was SO EASY! lol. 

Monday Made It, a Peek into my Class, and a FREEBIE Bloghop Sneak Peek!!

Hello out there! 

Tomorrow is officially my first day back at work, but I've been working throughout the entire summer changing up my classroom theme and getting it all ready for the first day. We actually don't get our students until the 5th of August, but we begin PD training and have 2 teacher work days. I am so happy for this, because this if the first time in 2 years we are getting paid to set up and train for PD. We will be heading to the Okinawan Cultural Center, and Pearl City Country Club on Thursday and Friday to learn about our new Teacher Evaluation program that is being piloted this year!! 

The past two years I've had a beach/ocean theme going on in my classroom. You can check those pictures out here and here. 

This year, I decided to switch it up...I asked my students what they'd like to see for next years theme and it was pretty unanimous that they would like RAINBOWs! SO instead of actual rainbows, I decided rainbow colors! AND..because the MR and I are really trying very hard to save money for our wedding (hopefully sometime next year!), I decided that I would use my summer days to work on creating my own things for my classroom. I've spent many days and hours creating, editing, printing, laminating, and cutting. Here are some of the things I've made. Linking up with Tara at 4th Grade Frolics for her weekly Monday Made it!

These are my labels that I used to label pretty much everything around my room. Love how they turned out! 

This area is where students turn in all of their work. White trays are regular class work and pink trays are for homework assignments. 

This is my cart that houses all of my copies for the week....

Some photos of my class library. I bought a TON of books this summer and also had a ton donated by some generous families who moved out of state. It took me so long to get them organized. I've finally found a set up on my bookshelves too that I like as well so that my students know exactly where to put the bins back on the shelf when they take them out to book shop. 

These are my two bulletin boards in the back by my library. My CAFE Board...totally in love with these colorful posters from Ginger Snaps. You can pick these posters up for free in her TPT Store.

The second board is where I will display student work. I love using scrapbook paper to display student work because you can easily put the work samples landscape or portrait and either way..it'll still have a nice border around it. 

My classroom doesn't have much wall space to put things up on...so I had to resort to using the door to display my Genre Posters by the amazing Beth Newingham! 

Speaking of having no room....I had NO ROOM AT ALL for my Daily 5 rotation charts! I was walking around my room today trying to figure out where I could hang my 3 charts and then I got a brilliant idea. 

I decided to velcro them to my teacher desk. This works out perfectly because 1. My desk is pretty ugly,  and 2. All students need to pass by here in order to go to their reading spots. 

This is what my charts look like. There are 3 charts, one for each rotation. The students will be dismissed by reading groups to go and make their daily choices. They will each have three of their name cards in their reading boxes/binders and will go and mark their choice on their way to their reading spot. 

Picked up those SUPER CUTE Daily 5 cards from Lori Rosenberg. I absolutely adore her work! You can find them in her tpt store as well for FREE! 

These charts fit perfectly across my desk!

I also hopped on the Homework Club bandwagon and decided to try this out. I've always had a difficult time with student turning in their  homework...so hopefully this will be some motivation! 

This is a board I set up for our character traits of the month. I was planning on having the kids do a writing assignment each month as to how they demonstrated that character trait. However, I found out that we weren't doing this this coming school year and just focusing on Habits of Mind instead. SO that means I'll be swapping this out tomorrow for my Math Rotations board. 

These are my attendance cards. They are double sided. When students come in, they flip their cards over to ready to learn. When they leave for the day they flip it back to the blank side. This will be an easy way for my attendance monitor to see who is absent. 

I'll be sharing some final pictures as I finish up my room in the next 2 days. 

Until then...please come back and visit me tomorrow for a bloghop that I have planned with some amazing bloggers who also live here in Hawaii. 

Daily Schedule Cards and Updated LIbrary Labels

Phew..I've been busy at work today since the boyfriend is not home. I made the choice today to buy a resale license from Thistle Girl Designs. Their graphics are so adorable! Before I got into blogging or TPT, ALL of my school things are done with DJ Inkers. Unfortunately, we cannot use them to resell so today I started converting some of my files using other fonts and clip art. I have a LOT of converting to do..but I guess this will be keeping me busy :)

These are the daily schedule cards I use in my classroom. I actually ended up typing and laminating my times since I didn't like how it looked handwritten. All the times stay the same throughout the week. All I did was laminate my cards then stuck magnets in the back. They have held up for two years and still look great!! Now, I can officially share it with everyone since I invested in that license!!

Here are the cards that I use!! I added some new ones and did different clip arts for morning and lunch recess. If you would like to grab a copy, head over to my TPT store.

Awhile ago, I also shared the library book bin labels that I had created when I was re-organizing my classroom library. I originally had my library organized by AR levels but I found that when my students were book shopping each Monday morning, it was taking way too long. They were searching in their leveled baskets but were having such a hard time finding books that they liked. After talking with my students, we agreed that having our library organized by genre, favorite authors, and chapter series would make it easier for them to shop for books. SO, I spent two WHOLE weekends reorganizing my library. This made book shopping much easier for my students. They quickly went in...looked for the type of book they wanted, checked it out and they were done. I'm so glad I switched over.

These labels come with a total of 32 different labels. If you decide to purchase these and you find that I am missing a category in your library, please let me know and I will be more than happy to create it and send it over to you! This is also in my TPT store, and is discounted until Wednesday!! You may also click on the pictures to be linked directly to my store :)

Last but not least, you all know the drill..the FIRST person to comment this post and tell me which file you would like, gets it for free!! Don't forget to leave your e-mail!!