"Shared Reading"

The purpose of this blog is to share interesting ideas I have found in American professional publications dealing with the teaching of English at all levels, elementary, secondary and college.

Topic: “Shared Reading.” (Elementary)

Title: “Shared Readings: Modeling Comprehension, Vocabulary, Text structures and Text Features for Older Readers.” Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey and Diane Lapp. The Reading Teacher (April 2008), 548-556. A publication of the International Reading Association.

Question: What is shared reading?

Answer/Quote: “Currently shared reading is a generic term many teachers use to describe a range of classroom activities, including echo reading (students echoing the words aloud after the teacher reads), choral reading (students reading aloud while the teacher reads aloud), or cloze reading (teacher reads aloud and pauses periodically for students to fill in the missing words).” p. 548.

Comment: Shared reading is the teacher's reading aloud while students read along—aloud. In the article the authors emphasize the need to have a clear purpose for using shared reading techniques. Echo reading and choral reading (as defined in this article) would seem to have the purpose of increasing fluency. Cloze reading would seem to have the purpose of pronouncing and identifying unfamiliar words within the text. FYI. RayS.