-
Growing Up
Growing up before I was in school I can't recall my parents ever sitting down and actually reading a book to me. My dad is an avid reader and seeing him read all the time caught my interest to start picking up books. -
2nd Grade
My 2nd grade teacher had a huge impact on how I thought about school and was always doing interactive read alouds and encouraging us to read independently afterwards. I can remember having a certain amount of time to just read wherever you wanted in the room and were allowed to grab any book that caught your interest just to see us engaging and trying to read. -
Scholastic Book Fair
Third grade was the year I was finally able to buy a book from the yearly book fair. After my teacher read one of the Harry Potter books I had to have the next book in the series! After that year my parents always let me get a book from the next series I was interested in at the time to help me continue my interest of reading. -
3rd Grade
My third grade year I had to go from learning to read to reading to learn. Now being a third grade teacher I can see the huge jump that students are having to make in order to comprehend different types of genres and how it can be a struggle for some. One of my best memories from my teacher is her reading out loud a chapter from a Harry Potter book each day, which I now do for my classes. That really interested me in larger chapter books and got me reading my first book series. -
Period: to
Accelerated Reading (AR)
Beginning in fourth grade through sixth grade Accelerated Reading was the program our reading teachers used to find our levels and created an overall goal for us as readers. This program made me want to finish books quickly and take a test so I could go back to the library and get another. The teachers would plan AR field trips and if we reached our goal we could attend. Even the students who weren't really big readers got involved and read books in order to go! -
Period: to
Junior High
Junior high is when I stopped checking books out from the library and reading for fun. Checking out books from the library wasn't encouraged like it was throughout elementary school. Students like me that loved to read before junior high stopped reading overall unless it was required. -
Period: to
High School
In high school our english classes started having novel studies that got the whole class reading and collaborating together. Now I think the concept was good for us even though some of the novels were old and brought no interest to the class. A good experience with a novel was reading "The Outsiders" and having class discussions that lasted the entire period because we were so interested. If I ever taught HS English I would use this book in my class! -
Children's Literature (College)
In college I had to take Children's Literature and this class helped me realize how important books come into play in the classroom. I was refreshed on all the different types of genres and taught how to incorporate them into lessons to reinforce a concept. I still use majority of the things I was taught in this class in my own classroom today. I was able to explore hundreds of books and spark a whole new interest for reading overall. -
Student Teaching (College)
During half of my student teaching I was placed in 4th and 5th grade reading. This experience let me use all the skills I was taught prior to student teaching in my children's literature class. I had a mentor teacher that did interactive read alouds and showed me the importance of guided reading. After the end of student teacher I felt like I had a book for almost anything and couldn't wait to show my own class. -
Present
I just finished my first year of teaching 3rd grade reading and writing in McCamey, Texas. I spent my year trying to prepare our students for STAAR in order to get us out of IR status. The first thing I implemented was guided reading and used a book each day to teach or reinforce needed skills. My class did novel studies to help tie in several different skills whenever they weren't in guided reading stations. After this year I believe my students have a love for just like me!
