There is no doubt that reading at home is one of the best ways children can stay on track and even get ahead in on their learning path. The "reading at home" research is well-documented, and where books are abundant in the home, this is not a problem. Creating a Home Reading Program in your class, grade level, K-2 classes or even schoolwide, really levels the playing field and eliminates disparities about the number of books in the home.
When I taught first grade at Swift Creek Elementary, I had been teaching about 15 years and I had acquired a lot of books over years....both children's book and little leveled readers. Using websites like
Scholastic Book Wizard, I was able to level most of the little readers and many of my children's book to create a Home Reading Book Cart. I would then solicit parent volunteers to come in daily, usually I had a Monday parent, a Tuesday parent, etc. that would come in on a weekly basis, or bi-weekly basis, listen to kids read and trade out home reading books each day.
You can do Home Reading INSIDE your classroom, with Moms....
with Dads.....
or right outside the classroom, in the hallway, where it's a little quieter.
Uponing opening Lake Myra, getting a Home Reading program started in every K-2 classroom was one of our first priorities. For the books, we purchased several classroom licenses to
www.readinga-z.com. We printed and copied 15-20 single titles from the leveled books available on this site.
I purchased plastic totes/baskets from the Dollar Store..( 9 per cart/classroom), available in the store or online from
www.dollartree.com.
I purchased 15 storage racks from
www.amazon.com to be the Home Reading Cart.
The Kindergarten team opted not to use the plastic envelopes but used gallon size ziploc bags instead, and taped these labels to the inside of the bags.
Inside the folder is a letter explaining Home Reading to parents.
Here is letter soliciting parent volunteers to help with Home Reading.
You can also include a Reading Strategy card or bookmark for students.
In our second year, we added another feature to the Home Reading program, and this is Parent Read-Alouds. In Kindergarten and 1st grade, in addition to a leveled book for students to read each night, students also take a Parent Read-Aloud book for parents to read to their child. This book is typically one to two years above their reading level....at the child's listening comprehension level. Each year in Wake County, our library has Friends of the Library Sale, however, the day before the sale opens to the public, they offer the books to Wake County teachers for free...as many as you want, or in my case, as many that could fit in my van.
Now, when students take turns reading to parents in the hall, they choose a new leveled book each night and a new book for their parents to read to them.
And on most Monday - Thursday mornings, this is what the first grade hallway looks like. :-)
Happy Reading! - Jennifer
