Reading Assessments Part II

I have a giant box for reading assessments....everything you wanted to know and more. My job is to level the each student's reading...which means I listen to each child read a book from the giant box (and mark errors on a paper, time the reading then add and divide errors by self corrections and then figure words read per minute )... There are two books from each level; a non-fiction book and a fiction book. In the fall I used fiction books...generally easier to read and appropriate for beginner readers. 


This first grade reading stuff is all new to me...I didn't have texts or a reading program to use so every month I went to the library and checked out 70 books from a leveled book list online and we read...and read. I read Henry Huggins and Beezus and Ramona books aloud....Magic Tree House books (ghak!!!,) and every book about silk worms and caterpillars and the water cycle I could find....and hatching chick eggs and every Mo Willems' book at least 50x. We looked at books inside and out....where was it published?...when was it written?...Who was it dedicated to?...Does it have a table of contents? We learned to read the pictures...starting with Rosie's Walk...did you know the inside cover has a map of the farm? And you can follow her path by studying the each picture?

And consequentially, the kids learned to read....some of them so well that they surpassed the benchmark for end of year first grade and well into second and some at beginning third grade. I guess I did something right.

So here I am at the end of the year, listening to each child read to me from the non-fiction books in the assessment box. And that stupid bubble book is one that every child has read to me....it is actually a fun, factual book....but after hearing it read, 9 times in the two hours I had to assess on Thursday, I could feel the heat rising from the vapors in my brain- my cerebral cortex ready to explode- or spontaneously combust at any second. I do believe I heard it in my sleep Thursday night...I think the dog was reading to me....

But FRIDAY morning, when I opened the inbox of my work email I found wonderful news!! I was accepted into the Reading Institute at Columbia University in August! I was on the wait list since the end of March...I had been in contact with the person who does the admittance and I think that helped get me in. So I will be flying myself on airline miles to New York City!! I will be paying my hotel- since the dorm rooms are all booked- and my school will pay the $700 institute fees. I was able to attend two years ago when I was enrolled in the Kindergarten institute....but teaching reading beyond kindergarten is a whole different ballgame...and moving onto second grade in the fall I feel totally in need of assistance. I am sooooo looking forward to this....and I love New York City! I love the heat smacking me in the face when I leave the hotel in the morning and how the transit system can take you anywhere at anytime. I am very lucky to be returning to New York!!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*LEARN TO READ*