Struggling readers

        In this first chapter D&Z wrote about how in order to get close to struggling readers and do  research they needed to hear from students who haven't had it easy.  They about how students are unfamiliar with the content and lack background knowledge of the reading. When students read and construct of picture in their minds they still need to be able to understand how to search through the paragraph for information that might help solve the problem (.p234) 
          The authors interviewed students who weren't going to tell the researchers what they wanted to hear but rather the truth. The students who were interviewed were very clear about the mental tools they had been given. D&Z outline strategies that are effective for all students and they're crucial for students who see themselves as not being good readers and for those who have felt failure in school (235). Turning the the words they read into mental pictures (p.233)
           In the chapter they noted that teachers say I'm the math or physics teacher not the reading teacher (p.234) When I read this I thought about teacher education and I thought about what in the world do colleges and university teach teacher candidates. In 406/407 and at RIC we learn about how ALL teachers teach literacy and how no matter your content reading/writing skills are important. I do agree that teachers sometimes get caught up in the content and forget that they have to teach students how to write a lab report or an argumentative essay but that's the catch of being a teacher, you kind of have to do everything.
             D&Z list the key strategies for helping struggling readers; building supportive relationships (p. 236) modeling through thoughtful reading and activities that build engagement (p. 239 promoting student's self monitoring and using materials students can successfully read (p.240  providing books and articles on tape (p.242). The strategies I found most interesting was building supportive relationships, activities that build engagement and providing books on tape.  Building supportive relationships with students seems easy, but it really is hard to show students you care about their reading and believe they can succeed. Especially because you may think you're showing you care but in actuality it might look like something different. I thought it was helpful when they said that we can always find ways to signal our encouragement and support like thinking of a catch phrase as soon as you see a student starts to daze while reading. Activities that build engagement are key in my eyes because in order to remember something you have to do something meaningful.  Answering simple fact based questions at the end of section reading isn't meaningful, instead of questions that are meaningful and ask students to do higher level blooms taxonomy questions. One of the activities explained in the chapter is sketching my way through the text (p.120-121) where students draw simple pictures of diagrams to help them conceptualize  ideas from the reading. This is extremely helpful for visual learners. Another activity is writing a paragraph about the topic to help clarify the students thoughts. Lastly, those infamous books on tape! I remember being in elementary school and being able to read books while having the voice narrator reading the story to me. I loved that. To me I was following along and words I couldn't pronounce, narrator was and I was able to learn from it.