Silent reading....making it work! - Southern Fried Teachin'

Some of my students struggle with reading. Looking around the room, looking at the back cover, looking at the front cover, looking around the room again, etc….sound familiar to any of your students?So we decided to create mini anchor charts on what reading looks like and what it doesn’t look like. They did great with it, and it was so simple to have them do. The only materials were a half sheet of white paper and their pencils and crayons. Easy peasy!

Here are a few of my favorites. We had a class discussion on it, and they came up with most of the descriptions themselves. I think they did pretty good!

I taught my students a couple of strategies to help them during silent reading. I had them try each strategy, and if one worked for them then use it.

Whisper reading – I taught my students to mouth the words or whisper them quietly enough so that only they can hear themselves and no one else.
Follow with their finger – I had noticed that students often lose their place and start looking around the room. So I taught them that sometimes following with their finger can help them stay focused.

We Are Teachers has some great ideas to help students during silent reading.

One of their suggestions is to have some pillows and cushions for students to use during reading. Although I am concerned that my students will play around or fall asleep, I might be picking up some pillows and cushions at Walmart today.

Here is another idea that I totally want to try! Every student would have to bring their own flashlight which if I demonstrated it once then I don’t think it would be a problem. I would love to give credit to the person that thought of this idea, but I can’t find it.

Ideas by Jivey has a great way to incorporate Flashlight Friday into the classroom and motivate your students to improve their reading strategies. Go check it out! I definitely want to try it in my classroom.