BALANCED LITERACY IN THE ELEMENTARY CLASSROOM
THIRD GRADE
SUGGESTED DAILY LITERACY INSTRUCTION
WITHIN THE BALANCED LITERACY FRAMEWORK
Daily schedules should include a 2 ½ hour to 3 hour literacy block of time (uninterrupted time when possible—not to be broken into more than two segments). The content areas such as Science, Social Studies, Math, and Health should be integrated into the Literacy Framework of Reading, Writing, Listening, Thinking, and Viewing. Balanced Literacy Framework (Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening, Thinking, and Viewing)
TO CHILDREN | WITH CHILDREN | BY CHILDREN |
30-40 minutes | 90-100 minutes | 30-40 minutes |
| | |
Phonics and/or Word Work can be incorporated into all three areas
This framework should be used in conjunction with the following document set up by grade level and the components of the Balanced Literacy Framework. In addition to the components of Balanced Literacy Framework, the standards are on the Cobb County website and they will have an updated coding system as follows: I-introduction of standard; D-development of standard; M-mastery of standard; and R-reinforcement of standard. (These standards have been aligned with Georgia QCC’s, NCTE standards, and MCREL standards. All standards that are coded M-mastery are correlated with the performance indicators of each balanced literacy component.
READ ALOUD
Definition: Teacher reads selection aloud to the whole class or small groups. A carefully selected body of children’s literature is used; the collection contains a variety of genres and represents our diverse society. Favorite texts, selected for special features, are reread many times.
Values: Involves children in reading for enjoyment; demonstrates reading for a purpose; provides an adult demonstration of phrased, fluent reading; develops a sense of story; develops knowledge of written language syntax; develops knowledge of how texts are structured; increases vocabulary; expands linguistic repertoire; supports intertextual ties; creates community of readers through enjoyment and shared knowledge; makes complex ideas available to children; promotes oral language development; establishes known texts to use as a basis for writing and other activities through rereading.
SHARED READING
Definition: Using an enlarged text that all children can see, the teacher involved children in reading together following a pointer. The process includes: rereading big books, poems, songs; rereading retellings; rereading alternative texts; and rereading the products of interactive writing.
Values: Explicitly demonstrates early strategies, such as word-by-word matching; builds sense of story and ability to predict; demonstrates the processes of reading extended text; like reading aloud, involves children in an enjoyable and purposeful way; provides social support from the group; provides opportunity to participate and behave like a reader; creates body of known texts that children can use for independent reading and as resources for writing and word study.
GUIDED READING
Definition: The teacher works with a small group who has similar reading processes. The teacher selects and introduces new books and supports children reading the whole text to themselves, making teaching points during and after the reading.
Values: Provides the opportunity to read many texts and a wide variety of texts; provides opportunity to problem-solve while reading for meaning (“reading work’); provides opportunity to use strategies on extended text; challenges the reader and creates context for successful processing on novel texts; provides opportunity to attend to words in text; teacher selection of text, guidance, demonstration, and explanation is available to the reader.
INDEPENDENT READING
Definition: Children read on their own from a wide range of materials on their independent reading level (95%-100%).
Values: Provides opportunity to apply reading strategies independently; Provides time to sustain reading behavior; Challenges the reader to work on his/her own and to use strategies on a variety of texts; Challenges the reader to solve words independently while reading texts well within his/her control; Promotes fluency through rereading; Builds confidence through sustained successful reading; Provides the opportunity for children to support each other while reading.
SHARED WRITING
Definition: Teacher and children work together to compose messages and stories. Teacher supports process as a scribe.
Values: Demonstrates how writing works; provides opportunities to draw attention to letters, words, and sounds; enables children’s ideas to be recorded; creates written language resources for the classroom.
INTERACTIVE WRITING
Definition: As in shared writing, teacher and children compose messages and stories that are written using “shared pen” technique that involves children in the writing.
Values: Demonstrates concepts of print, early strategies, and how words work; provides opportunities to hear sounds in words and connect with letters; helps children understand “building up” and “breaking down” processes in reading and writing; provides opportunities to plan and construct texts; increases spelling knowledge; provides texts that children can read independently; provides written language resources in the classroom.
GUIDED WRITING/WORKSHOP
Definition: Children engage in writing a variety of texts. Teacher guides the process and provides instruction through minilessons and conferences.
Values: Helps writers develop their voice. Provides opportunities for children to learn to be writers. Provides chance to use writing for different purposes across the curriculum. Increases writers’ abilities to use different forms. Builds ability to write words and use punctuation. Fosters creativity and the ability to compose.
INDEPENDENT WRITING
Definition: Children write their own pieces, including (in addition to stories and informational pieces) retellings, labeling, speech balloons, lists, etc.Values: Provides opportunity for the independent production of written text; provides chance to use writing for different purposes across the curriculum; increases writers’ abilities to use different forms; builds ability to write words and use punctuation; fosters creativity and the ability to compose
K-2: Phonemic Awareness/Phonics; 3-5: Word Work
Definition: Woven through the activities in the framework teachers have opportunities to help children notice and use letters and words; knowledge is further fostered through the use of alphabet centers and word walls.Values: Helps children become familiar with letter forms; helps children learn to use visual aspects of print; provides opportunities to notice and use letters and words that are embedded in text; provides opportunities to manipulate letters and make words; provides a growing inventory of known letters and words; helps children link sounds with letters and letter clusters; helps children use what they know about words to solve new words.
