Your child will receive a Take-Home Reading Log
every Friday. It is important that your child reads for at least 20 minutes
each night. The goal is to read at least 100 minutes per week. On the sheet,
your child will record the book read and the book genre (refer to the "Genres
at a Glance" sheet for more information). In order to monitor your child’s
understanding of what was read, please ask your child to RETELL what he/she
read. Please return the Take-Home Reading Log to school every Friday.
Your child will also be receiving a Reading A-Z
paper book. Some stories are fiction and others are informational/nonfiction.
The books will be sent home in a plastic bag labeled with your child's name.
Your child should read this book MORE THAN ONCE in order to increase fluency.
This book is at his/her reading level. A book will be given to students on
Monday. The students should return the book on Wednesday.
HOW CAN I HELP MY CHILD TO
SELECT "JUST RIGHT" BOOKS?
A very informal way to determine if a book is "just right" is to do the "Five Finger Rule."
Simply choose a book.
Then begin reading a page in the middle of the book.
Hold up a finger for each word you are not sure of.
If you have five fingers held up, the book is to difficult and you need to say, "good bye" to the book.
Another way to find books that are appropriate is to use your child's MAP READING LEXILE SCORE.
Go to: http://lexile.com/fab/
Go to Step 1 and enter your child's Lexile Range (from the MAP test report).
Then select your child's INTEREST CATEGORIES (such as mysteries, movies, animals, art, etc.)
Finally, click SUBMIT. A lengthy book list will show up on the screen. You can preview the book,
add it to a Reading List, or look for the titles on the Roselle library website.
IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS, PLEASE ASK MRS. SABADOS!
WHY CAN'T I SKIP THE 20
MINUTES OF READING TONIGHT?
Let's figure it out - -mathematically!
Student A reading 20 minutes, five nights of each week.
Student B reads only 4 minutes a night...or not at all!
Step 1: Multiply minutes per night x 5 times each week.
Student A reads 20 min. x 5 times per week = 100
min./week
Student B reads 4 min. x 5 times per week = 20 min./week
Step 2: Multiply minutes a week x 4 weeks each month.
Student A reads 400 minutes per month.
Student B reads 80 minutes per month.
Step 3: Multiply minutes per month x 9 months/school year.
Student A reads 3,600 minutes in a school year.
Student B reads 720 minutes in a school year
Student A preactices reading the equivalent of ten whole
school days a year. Student B gets an
equivalent of only two school days of reading practice.
By the end of 6th grade, if student A and student B maintain these same
reading habits, Student A will have read the equivalent
of 60 whole school days and student B will have
read only 12 school days.
One would expect the gap of information retained
will have widened considerably and so, undoubtedly, will school performance.
How do you think student B will feel about him/herself as a student?
Some questions to ponder:
Which student would you expect to read better? know
more? write better? have a better vocabulary? be more successful in
school...and in life?
