reading/teaching

Quick reflection on teaching reading so far this year

Posted on by Mark Isero

I unveiled to my students The 1,000,000 Word Challenge this year, a focus on independent reading. So far, the results are mixed. While it’s been hard moving to a reading workshop model, there have been some successes.

Good So Far

  • My classroom library is growing. Thanks to DonorsChoose, I have 300 books. And the students like them.
  • Students are reading more than ever before. I gave out a poll yesterday, and more than 80 percent of my students reported that they’re reading more this year than in the past.
  • Students are talking about books on Goodreads. It’s also clear, from book reviews, that students like the books they’re reading.

Not Good So Far

  • The students aren’t reading enough, especially for homework. The question is, How do I encourage students to read outside of school, to hold them accountable to doing homework, but maintain intrinsic motivation for reading? My reading bookmark idea didn’t much work.
  • It’s hard to conference with students. My students are easily distracted, and my ineffectiveness in classroom management has meant very few conferences. This means that it’s hard to intervene with struggling or unmotivated readers.
  • I’m not doing enough reading responses and other parts of the reading workshop model. Of course, I don’t have to copy what others have done, but I do think that I’m doing things just halfway.

We Don’t Know Yet

  • Is this approach improving student reading? We’ll see in a week when the students take another reading assessment. Next semester, I need to be more clear about what improvement means and do a better job figuring out where students stand.

Over Winter Break, I’ll do more analysis of my progress thus far and create some goals for second semester. Overall, I’m happy with my shift in this direction, yet I know I have a lot to learn. It’s been fun to get excited about reading and to start sharing that excitement with students.

teaching/technology

Listening to my students using Google Voice

Posted on by Mark Isero

How often and for how long do you truly listen to your students?

I don’t mean listening to an answer they give or a comment they make in class. I mean listening more deeply about who they are: their interests, their goals, their problems, their needs as a student.

With more than a hundred students and daily public school chaos, it’s nearly impossible to find the time and peace to sit down and listen to a student without an immediate interruption.

Before this year, I “listened” to my students mostly through letters. When I had the time and energy, I even wrote personal letters back to each of my students, a herculean task. Although this was effective, it was impossible to do more than once a quarter.

That’s why this year I’m trying something new: The Weekly Voicemail Assignment.

On Thursday nights, students call me on my Google Voice number (set to Do Not Disturb!”) and answer some prompts. On my own time, I listen to each message and quickly respond with a quick personal text.

Even though each voicemail averages only one minute (much faster than reading and responding), I’m finding that the weekly assignment is helping me build positive relationships with my students. They know that I’m listening. They get to talk to me without worrying about what others might say. It’s like we’re having a private meeting — except we’re not in the same room.

I’m looking forward to tracking these voicemails (they’re all archived!) and looking at them more closely over the year. 

technology

With students without computers, GroupMe keeps you in touch

Posted on by Mark Isero


As a teacher, I’m always looking for better ways to communicate with my students. We know they don’t check email. Many don’t have access to a computer at home.

Thankfully, most students have cellphones. In my last post, I wrote about Google Voice Mass SMS, which allows you to send texts easily to groups of people.

But what if you want to have a conversation together among students? Sure, Edmodo is the best option, but that takes a computer. Twitter is blocked in schools, and even if it isn’t, my students think Twitter is weird.

Because my students love their phones — and because they love texting — GroupMe is perfect. Instead of sending individual texts, you text to a common phone number so everyone in your group sees everybody’s texts. It’s like a chat room on your phone.

It’s very simple to get started. You don’t have to sign up, you don’t need to maintain a contact list, you barely need to do anything. All you do is type in your phone number then go from there. Every command is done on your phone beginning with the pound sign (#).

The biggest limitation is that students need to have an unlimited text plan in order for GroupMe to make sense. There’s also a worry that students will overtext, but because you get every text, that’s easy to regulate.

I’ll be trying GroupMe with my junior advisees. We’ve been working together since their freshman year, so there’s enough trust. My hope is that a group conversation will spread accountability and encourage my students to help each other instead of to rely just on me.

Update: I just unveiled GroupMe with my junior advisees, and they loved it! We had a little talk about appropriate texting, and now we’ll see how we use GroupMe.

technology

Finally, an easy way (for teachers!) to send group texts

Posted on by Mark Isero

My students don’t check email. Texting is the best way to reach them. But Google Voice allows me to send only five messages at a time. That’s not going to work.

Sure, my Palm Pre’s TXT Group app does a great job, but I’m not interested in sharing my personal cellphone number.

After more than a year of searching, I’ve finally found a solution: Google Voice Mass SMS. It’s only about a week old, and it’s very simple, but it works.

Run the desktop application, type in your Google Voice username and password, choose a group you want to text, and you’re on your way.

Google Voice Mass SMS is by no means fancy, but it’s the only thing out there that I’m aware of that works and does the job for free.

reading/technology

A Kindle is coming to my classroom

Posted on by Mark Isero

A fun new toy is being delivered in just a few weeks. I can’t wait. My students are getting an Amazon Kindle.

Over the summer, I wrote a proposal on DonorsChoose to get a Kindle for my classroom.

Why not, right? After all, I’ll try anything this year to get my students excited about reading. Even though I’m getting only one Kindle, I predict that my students will love playing around with it. No, it doesn’t have a touch screen or any fancy games, but that’s the whole point: It’s all about reading.

Disclosure: I own a Kindle, too, and I love it. It might be the main reason I am a voracious reader again after a long hiatus. (As a result of having a Kindle, I’m finding I read many more paperbacks and library books, too.)

In the classroom, I’m especially interested to see if the Kindle motivates students with reading disabilities. The Kindle’s text-to-speech is a much cheaper alternative than having to purchase an audio book to complement a paperback. Although the electronic voice does not match a human’s, the Kindle’s text-to-speech does follow along with the text, so a student won’t get lost.

I also appreciate the Kindle’s ability to change font size. There are many books that are inaccessible to students just because their typeface is too small. Larger letters may lead to more fluency and therefore more confidence.

I’ll let everyone know when I receive the Kindle and what effects it has on my students and their interest in reading. Until then, I’ll be figuring out logistics, like, Who gets it first? and, What if they buy a book with my credit card?