LHightower

Chapter 1 describes what the reading workshop is and why it is preferable to teaching reading the traditional way. It also describes the importance of teachers reading aloud to their students. I feel that we do a very good job with reading. We make sure that our students have a large block of time to read independently, and we expose them to good quality children's literature that we read together every day in class. We are trying to figure how we can adjust our schedules to utilize some of the components or reading workshop that we are not currently using.

The second chapter focuses on the organization and management of your classroom if you are using reading workshop. There are some very good ideas, but we are definitely not ready to start this because we do not have the materials needed. The book stresses the necessity for a LARGE collection of books for every classroom, and this collection needs to cover all genres of literature. I can't imagine that the school system will have the funds to buy us these books for the fall.

The reading workshop is based on opening each daily lesson with a mini-lesson. The third chapter of this book explains how to construct these mini-lessons and what students are to do after the mini-lesson. One thing I am unsure about is how you arrive at a reading grade for students. It seems like it will be a very subjective, ambiguous process. I like many of the ideas of the reading workshop approach, but I also see the value of balancing it with a  more traditional approach.