Reading and Struggling Readers

Our 8th graders had to pass this year's state assessment to move on to 9th grade.  If they fail the first test, they receive two more chances.  Between the first and second tests, we pulled the students from electives to give them extra help.  I had the privilege of working with 12 ladies and gentlemen.

The first day, I had them do a reading interest survey to help me find out a little bit about them.  We actually did very little involving reading skills as I wanted to build relationships with them.  I learned that most don't have books in the home, and most had only read one book in the last year.  The more I read their answers, the sadder I got.

Over the next 11 days, we worked on various things, but the one that that repeated daily was their lack of desire to read and their absolute disdain for reading.  It saddened me.

On our last day together, I finally had a great idea.  I checked out a lot of children's books from our campus library.  We don't have a large assortment, but we had several and some great ones.  I showed the students each book, said the title, and told them a little bit about the book.  I had used to some sentence stems to create questions they could do with any book to practice the skills they needed.  They could work individually or in pairs.  Each student or pair chose a book.  Next thing I knew, they were reading.  Reading silently.  Reading to one another.  Listening to someone read to them. Working. Practicing.  THEY WERE READING!!  I nearly cried.  Why didn't I think of this sooner?  I will next year.