Reading Comprehension

Justification

 

At the beginning of the school year I was drowning in data. I felt as if I was in charge of understanding where each of my students stood on the educational spectrum in all subject areas. All I had was the information from last year to get a glimpse into what the beginning of the school year would look like. Thankfully, my school district adopted the NWEA MAP assessment. This was a great way to see where my students were at in a variety of reading and math areas right at that moment instead of where they left fourth grade. I understand that not all students need additional support so I  focused on helping students who were low and/or barely meeting the standard because I felt they could benefit the most.

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After the MAP assessment and text leveling all of my students at the beginning of the year, I noticed that reading was the content area that I did not feel as confident in based on my students’ scores and their excitement for the subject. Based on the new NeSA specifications,  revised standards, and what is being asked of students on selection tests I felt that reading comprehension was a  major struggle. Reading comprehension is a skill students will use throughout their entire life, which brings importance to the building blocks that are solidified in the elementary education system. Engagement strategies during reading may also play a role in the improvement of reading comprehension.

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My role as a teacher was to provide the needed support and let students know that I was there to help them. I wanted to provide the needed support and scaffolding to help them increase their comprehension along with making mini-lessons engaging and meaningful. At the beginning of the year I started to provide my students with rubrics and sentence stems to guide them when answering text dependent analysis prompts. I modeled these responses beforehand, and also provided graphic organizers and engagement strategies.