Blog 5 Chapter 5 of Readicide

Testing, Testing, Testing.  That seems to be the hot topic in schools today as it seems we are obsessed with monitoring progress and I think to a fault.  We are so desperate for quantifiable evidence of improvement that we alter the tests to give us the results we so desperately need as Gallagher states in this book.  I think the whole system needs to calm down.  Rome was not built in a day and improvement in schools is going to take time.  The deadline of 2014 for all the schools to be up to speed seems quite ridiculous to me.  That doesn't give enough time for any of the changes to show results.  The finding that progress was more pronounced in elementary and middle schools kind of proves my point.   The path to literacy for a student is more easily altered the younger they are in the same way that it is much more difficult to learn a foreign language the older you get.  Its going to another 8 more years for todays first graders to be entering high school and we have to look at it in that way.  The sad fact is that for todays 11th graders the ship has already sailed and there is little we can do to make them readers.  I know that by that age, I hated books and my mind was made up and nobody could change it.  Lets continue to improve and let the results come instead of forcing the results.  Everybody just needs to chill out so to say and quit testing these kids like crazy.  School is stressful enough without shoving test after test after test down their throat and because the teachers job depends on the scores undue pressure is being put on the students to do well.  Come on!  Let them read at their own pace and we need to emphasize learning not test taking!

Blog 4 Readicide 99-109

In this chapter in the book Gallagher talks about how to analyze text and introduces the "big chunk/little chunk" approach.  He talks about how we can over analyze by segmenting the book into to small of portions and therefore disrupting the flow of the students.  Gallagher talks about allowing the students to read a large chunk and then going back over it with the students to analyze it more in depth.  As I have stated before, I am not an avid reader nor an English teacher but this strategy seems to make sense to me.  We need to be able to see the big picture before we can go back and analyze something smaller.  Gallagher also talks about enabling the students to feel okay about struggling through text and the importance to show the students how me the teacher gets through a difficult text.  I think this is important because students from the classrooms I have been in are quick to give up and feel defeated.  Gallagher also talks about the 50/50 approach in which only 50% of the reading is difficult text and the other half is enjoyable reading that does not require multiple drafts and analyzation.  I wish this was implemented when I was in school.  I remember virtually no "fun reading" and because of this I began avoiding books all together.  We need to keep it fun if we want the students to get into reading.