From EARCOS conference in Kota Kinabalu March 2009. Maggie Moon is a Literacy Consultant from the Phillipines. She regularly visits ISB Bangkok as a Literacy Coach. It was really good to be able to sit down and listen to Maggie speak. As a newbie to Readers and Writers Workshops, I deliberately chose to attend all of Maggie’s workshops at EARCOS. I’m so glad I did – although in reflection this would have been a great way to be introduced to Readers and Writers Workshop on arrival at ISB. I finally feel like I have the missing pieces to the whole umbrella puzzle of my learning about these two types of workshops and student learning within them. Although my lessons are still no where near how I would like to be, I finally feel like I’m making some progress with the way they are running.
These are my notes from Maggie’s workshop: Maggie’s handouts here:
Interactive Read Aloud with Accountable Talk Thinking and Talking Deeply About Books
Kids like to read, kids like to talk – marry the two together.
Make them think talking about reading is cool
Read-Aloud important time of the day
Framework for Balanced Literacy
Interactive Read Aloud with Accountable Talk
Shared Reading,
Reading workshop
writing workshop
interactive writing/shared writing,
word study (phonics)
Reading Aloud to young children helps them to develop in 4 critical areas: oral language, cognitive skills, concepts of print, phonemic awareness
Different kinds of read alouds
Interactive Read Aloud – stop at places to think aloud, let students talk to a neightbor often have whole-class conversations
Content Area Read Aloud – texts that support leanring in science social studies, math
Story Time – get lost in stories
Chose what read-aloud suits your grade level
Read Aloud Book Choices:
High Interest – ask kids!
Can be finished within a reasonable time frame.
Match “Units of Study” or theme work when possible
(get their feet a week or so before you start that unit – expose them to that genre)
15-20 minutes everyday
OR
2-3 times a week, 20 mins
2-3 times across a 6 day cycle, 25 minutes
Try to schedule it – the more regular it is the more students come to expect it
Proficient adult reader – good for kids to hear one read.
Do you happen to have Maggie Moon’s email address? I want to have her do a workshop for our school. thank you!
I’ve passed your email onto Maggie! Keep an eye out for a reply!
I am also looking for Maggie Moon’s email address. I am a literacy coach at a large international school in Bangkok Thailand and our school initiative this year is writer’s workshop and we are looking for someone of Maggie’s caliber to do a workshop for us. We saw her at EARCOS. We thought it may be possible to combine her visit with one at ISB.
Thank you!