Rock Your Read Aloud (eBook)

Sparking Curiosity and Confidence in Little Readers

Matthew Hammersley, Melissa Hammersley (Autoren)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025
334 Seiten
Jossey-Bass (Verlag)
978-1-394-19728-6 (ISBN)

Infos

Help K-5 students experience the magic of reading by sparking amazement, wonder, and excitement through the art of the read aloud

It is not news to educators that kids have trouble paying attention. The allure and interactivity offered in televisions, tablets, and video games are tough to match. Consequently, reading scores have plummeted and educators say the joy has been sucked out of teaching. Rock Your Read Aloud brings back the joy and helps you create a read aloud experience that will have even the most reluctant of K-5 readers begging for just one more story.

A must read for every current or aspiring elementary teacher, librarian, and administrator, this book shows you why read alouds are critical to literacy education in today's media-saturated world. Inside, you'll find techniques for turning reading scores around in early elementary classrooms, so you can rediscover how rewarding teaching can be when students are engaged and learning. You can even link this book to the Novel Effect app to access a unique soundscape that will give you a taste of just how fun reading can be.

• Discover how reading aloud to kids can improve reading scores and outcomes
• Get tips for making your read alouds magical and igniting students' love of books
• Motivate struggling readers by creating a culture of reading together
• Learn about proven techniques like buddy reading and community read alouds

K-5 teachers, parents, administrators, librarians, and reading interventionists will gain insight and inspiration as Rock Your Read Aloud shows how to cut through the distraction and make reading fun again.

Matthew and Melissa Hammersley are partners in both work as the founders of Novel Effect and in life with two little ones Max and Willa. They've spent the last 10 years immersing themselves in read-alouds at home and in the classroom. They've appeared on the hit TV show Shark Tank and reached millions of kids, teachers, and parents in pursuit of their mission: to make reading together magical.

Textauszug

Introduction

“Reading should not be presented to children as a chore, a duty. It should be offered as a gift.”

— Kate DiCamillo

Every week across the world, around three billion people engage in the time‐honored tradition of reading aloud together. Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, caregivers, teachers, and librarians all take part. But at the same time, children are often glued to their screens, parents feel overwhelmed, and teachers face immense pressure to boost reading scores. The COVID‐19 pandemic has only worsened this decline in reading achievement, despite the valiant efforts of students and educators to adapt to unprecedented challenges.

Consider this: The average first‐grade teacher spends about 20 percent of their classroom instruction time reading aloud. Yet, how many college courses actually teach the art of reading aloud and storytelling? Similarly, parents are often advised to read to their children for at least 15 minutes a day—but who teaches them how to do it effectively?

Effective reading instruction encompasses several critical components: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. While these cognitive skills are foundational, metacognitive skills, such as comprehension, begin to develop during read‐alouds and are crucial for setting a complete foundation for literacy. These soft skills allow readers to grasp deeper meanings—understanding the author's intent, character traits, and motivations. Instilling a lifelong love of reading involves this combination of hard and soft skills, as well as fostering enjoyment and engagement. This is the art we hope to help all users of Novel Effect and readers of this book cultivate, so they can fully reap the rewards of reading.

The Current State of Literacy

It's no surprise that children are falling behind. Across the country, reading scores have dropped, and the test‐score gap between students in low‐poverty and high‐poverty schools has widened by approximately 15 percent. The pandemic disrupted every aspect of life, leaving teachers to conduct lessons virtually, learners to self‐regulate at home, and parents to take a more active role in their children's education. While children are resilient, they cannot wait for the situation to improve on its own, especially as school and public libraries are closed due to funding gaps while books are being banned from discussion and removed from shelves. We must guide them through these challenging times, especially in reading and understanding how to access knowledge, which is crucial for success in all subjects and forms the foundation for their future.

Our brains are wired to love stories. Early exposure to books and literacy fosters children's social, emotional, and cognitive growth. Before they can understand the text, the social and emotional connections made during read‐alouds are crucial. According to Scholastic's 2023 Rise of the Read‐Aloud reading report, eight out of ten children report loving or liking being read aloud to, and four in ten kids aged six to eleven whose parents have stopped reading aloud to them wish their parents had continued.

Reading achievement is closely linked to reading motivation and behavior. Research shows that read‐alouds benefit not only young children but also middle‐grade students, high schoolers, and even adults. When we consistently come together for read‐alouds, we create a shared joy that goes beyond the words and illustrations on the pages. It's about face‐to‐face connection, shared meaning, and understanding.

In today's world, where distractions are endless, and screens often dominate our attention, we need to create magical moments with our children that support their curiosity and increase their interest in literacy and learning. Our favorite childhood memories often involve being snuggled up with a loved one, reading our favorite books repeatedly. We want all children to experience that same joy and connection with their community of friends and the grown‐ups in their lives, with books at the center.

Reading aloud has a profound impact on children's development. It enhances vocabulary, empathy, and attention span. It helps children understand the world around them, shows them the value of reading for pleasure, and fosters a lifelong love of reading. As caregivers, we have the power to make every read‐aloud session a magical and memorable experience. This not only benefits our children emotionally and academically, but also creates lasting memories that they will cherish and pass on to their own children.

Building Connections Through Reading Aloud

This is a challenging time for read‐alouds. A vocal minority of “concerned parents” has created chaos around the availability of diverse and inclusive books in libraries, schools, and classrooms. Despite this, educators, parents, and children report that diversity in literature is one of the most important decision‐making factors they consider when choosing a book from the shelf. According to the same Scholastic report mentioned earlier, 68 percent of parents want diverse literature to read to their children, and 54 percent of children want the same.

We stand firm in our commitment to inspiring a love of reading in every child through diverse and inclusive stories. We celebrate the authors and illustrators who share their experiences and imaginations through their work. We support the librarians, teachers, and educators who awaken a lifelong love of learning in their students in the face of mounting distraction and mistrust.

Every child deserves to see themselves reflected in the pages of a book and to know that their experiences are valid and valued. Books open our minds to new places, experiences, and perspectives. They help us discover who we are and chart our own paths. A well‐crafted, well‐told story can change lives, and the way you read those stories aloud to a child can have a lasting impact.

How to Read This Book

This book is divided into two parts. Part I explores the science, power, and methodology behind an effective, engaging, and overall joyful read‐aloud, whether you are reading to your own child, a child in your care, or a classroom full of eager, emerging readers. It looks at reading aloud as one of the most important foundations for supporting not only literacy achievement in children, but a lifetime love of reading.

We look at the power of the picture book, a genre of literature that is nowhere near as simplistic as it may appear at first glance, but an invaluable resource to introduce the youngest readers—beginning at infancy—to the wonderful world of stories, sharing, and discovering, and, ultimately, learning to read and love books.

Because the soundscapes that accompany our Novel Effect library play such a big role in how the app helps you rock your read‐aloud, we've included a chapter on why we think sound enhances emotional understanding during a read‐aloud, amping up the big feelings—excitement, sadness, joy, sometimes a bit of fun fright—that readers experience while hearing a story.

Finally we delve into approaches to achieving the goal of this book, and Novel Effect as well: rocking your read‐aloud. We offer tips and advice for holding your readers' attention, for increasing engagement and comprehension through open‐ended questions and play while you read, as well as other strategies to help both you and your young listeners connect with each other and have fun as you share a book together.

Part II offers book‐specific read‐aloud lessons that provide suggestions for discussion or activities before, during, and after you read a selected book from our Novel Effect library. Novel Effect app users can scan the QR code on each lesson page to quickly access the soundscape and corresponding worksheets for each title. Alternatively, you can download all the worksheets from www.noveleffect.com/rockyourreadaloud.

Although we intend this book to serve anyone who reads aloud, whether they use Novel Effect or not, we also hope it will spark a curiosity for all to discover the magic of enhancing their regular storytime routine with a soundscape!

While this book focuses on adults reading aloud to children, the benefits are universal across age, race, and other demographics. We invite you to join us in making every read‐aloud session a magical experience, enriching the lives of children, creating memories that will last a lifetime, and building motivation so they become avid readers themselves. In fact, as we've seen countless times from children after experiencing their first soundscape, emerging readers will want to read on their own, often right away, to drive the storytelling experience!

Our goal with Novel Effect is both simple yet profound: We want to make reading aloud together a fun activity that children and adults will enjoy and through which they will develop deeper connections. By encouraging and developing a lifelong love of reading in children, we will foster their social, emotional, and cognitive growth, and prepare the next generation to tackle the challenges that undoubtedly lie ahead. We are a team of experts in various fields—including educators, librarians, actors, singers, musicians, engineers—who all share a genuine love and appreciation for children's literature and a commitment to this shared goal...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 24.3.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Pädagogik
• Schlagworte: elementary reading • elementary reading education • K-5 reading • K-5 teacher book • literacy education • oral literacy • read aloud • read aloud book • reading activities • Reading education • Reading intervention • reading lesson plan • Teaching reading
• ISBN-10: 1-394-19728-4 / 1394197284
• ISBN-13: 978-1-394-19728-6 / 9781394197286