Parent Support

The link below teaches parents how to support their children in the area of reading.

https://www.readingrockets.org/audience/parents


http://www.readingrockets.org/literacyapps


OISE Balanced Literacy Diet
https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/balancedliteracydiet/Home/


Starfall
http://more2.starfall.com/n/level-a/learn-to-read/load.htm?f

Please read one of my posts to a course I took.

One of the first items that were interesting to me was the reference to the “Matthew effects” in the reading. The “Matthew effect” is taken from the biblical passage that describes the “rich-get-richer and poor-get-poorer phenomenon” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998). Applying this concept to the reading, I have had many experiences in multiple socioeconomic areas. One thing I noticed was that in high socioeconomic areas, students do more work and they are reading more often during their free time. 

Reading is extremely important and the fact is that boys are not reading at the same volumes as females. Last year I participated in an initiative in my school board, which was called “Real Men Read”. Having read the article, it raised my concern for the boys in our education system because a lot of boys are not reading. One quote that solidified my concern with low socioeconomic status and boys in the education was, “the bulk of vocabulary growth during a child’s lifetime occurs language exposure rather than through direct teaching” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998). Kids need to read more often, as reading often increases student’s word exposure. The numbers from the study in the article are significant  “the average child at the 90th percentile reads almost two million words per year outside of school, more than 200 times more words than the child at the 10th percentile, who reads just 8,000 words outside of school during a year” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998).

In the article, I was very pleased to see that increasing reading volume can make you smarter, “In other words, ability is not the only variable that counts in the development of intellectual functioning. Those who read a lot will enhance their verbal intelligence; that is, reading will make them smarter” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998). I was very surprised when I read that the more you read the more general knowledge you will have. As I have always associated reading with only intellectual knowledge, I now look forward to sharing this information with my students. Often, in schools, I hear kids talk about how they can speak English, so why bother studying language. I would explain that verbal language is not the same as academic language. We speak using simple language, but in text, language can be and often is, far more complex and “conversation is not a substitute for reading” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998). 

As an educator, I recognize the importance of providing support for students who struggle with the early stages of reading. Since providing support for these students is vital, “Early success at reading acquisition is one of the keys that unlocks a lifetime of reading habits” (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998), I will be focusing on supporting students who struggle during the initial stages.

• Cunningham, A. E. & Stanovich, K.E. (1998). What reading does for the mind, American Educator, 22,(1–2), 8–15. The American Federation of Teachers.

Additional readings

• Tracey, D. H., & Morrow, L. M. (2012). Chapter 2: Early roots: Early theories and models applicable to reading (400 B.C.E. – 1899). From Lenses on reading: An introduction to theories and models (2nd ed., pp. 17-39). New York: Guilford Press.
• Houston, S. E., & Prentice A. (1988). Schooling and scholars in nineteenth-century Ontario, Toronto: University of Toronto Press

• Di Mascio, A. (2012). The idea of popular schooling in Upper Canada: Print culture, public discourse, and the demand for education. Montreal, QC: McGill-Queen’s University Press.