READER’S THEATRE CONNECTING CONTENT AND LITERACY

1. READER’S THEATRECONNECTING CONTENT AND LITERACY THE MARRIAGE OF ENGAGEMENT AND PERFORMANCE

2. AGENDA • The Literacy Research Base for Reader’s Theatre. • Improving Student Fluency Skills Utilizing Choral Reader’s Theatre and Voice! • Utilizing Language Repetition to Improve Student Fluency; • Integrating Content Concepts, Phonics and Vocabulary in Reader’s Theatre Scripts • Utilizing Authentic Literacy: technology to Motivate Students in Performing Reader’s Theatre. • Tying Literacy to Content Area Subjects Using Reader’s Theatre. • Fluency Lesson Model by Rasinski • Deep Reading, Wide Reading and Read Alouds • Integrating Original Source Material and Poetry • Differentiation Aspects • Professional and Teacher Created Scripts • Teach research-proven reading comprehension strategies using gradual release of responsibility approaches.

3. THE FIVE IDENTIFIED AREAS AND RESEARCH! • TAKE THE QUIZ

4. WHICH IS AN IDENTIFIED AREA BY THE NATIONAL READING PANEL? • sustained choral silent reading; • simultaneous oral and silent reading, • repeated reading without comprehending, • reading nonsense words with at least 89% comprehension, • fluency,

5. NCLB SPOTLIGHT • NCLB EXAMPLES OF FLUENT READING BY 1ST GRADERS!

6. GET KIDS TO READ FAMILIAR TEXT:REAL FIRST GRADE SAYINGS! A miss is as good as a ................... You can't teach an old dog new ......... Don't bite the hand that ................... Don't put off till tomorrow what ..... It's always darkest before...................

7. THE REAL DEAL! • A miss is as good as a ................... Mr. • You can't teach an old dog new ......... math. • Don't bite the hand that ................... looks dirty. • Don't put off till tomorrow what ..... you put on to go to bed. • It's always darkest before................... Daylight Saving Time

8. READER’S THEATE ANDLITERACY IMPLEMENTATION GUIDANCE FOR THE ELA Common Core State Standards Involve content area teachers in teaching the disciplinary literacy Standards. The CCSS guidelines on text complexity encourage teachers to engage students in reading at least some texts they are likely to struggle with in terms of fluency and reading comprehension. Teachers must provide significantly greater and more skillful instructional scaffolding—employing rereading, explanation, encouragement, and other supports within lessons.

9. “So what’s all this about the National Reading Panel Report and Fluency?”

10. THE NATIONAL READING PANEL REPORT • Competent reading requires skills that extend beyond the single-word level to contextual reading, and this skill can best be acquired by practicing reading in which the words are in a meaningful context.

11. DOES FLUENCY AFFECT COMPREHENSION? • It appears that oral reading practice and feedback or guidance is most likely to influence measures that assess word knowledge, reading speed, and oral accuracy. Nevertheless, the impact of these procedures on comprehension (and on total reading scores) is not inconsiderable, and in several comparisons it was actually quite high.

12. FLUENCY INSTRUCTION FOR WHICH GRADES? • “A growing number of studies are demonstrating that fluency is a major concern for students in grades 4 and 5, in middle school, and in high school.” (Rasinski 2012).

13. WHAT ELSE DOES RASINSKI SAY? Through repeated readings of a particular text, students increase their fluency and comprehension of the passage practiced. What is more important, however, is that the repeated readings also lead to gains in fluency, comprehension, and overall reading on other passages not previously encountered. In other words, student practice on certain passages generalizes to improved performance across all reading. Repeated or practiced reading is best accomplished through performance activities. When students are asked to perform for others, they have a natural inclination and desire to practice the passage to the point where they can read it accurately, with appropriate rate, and especially with meaningful expression and phrasing.

14. DO YOU NEED SPECIAL TRAINING? • There is clear and substantial research evidence that shows that such procedures work under a wide variety of conditions and with minimal special training or materials.

15. EFFECTIVE SCHOOLS STUDY BY PEARSON AND TAYLOR

16. SCAFFOLDING • Oral reading can be the scaffolding tool from modeling to independence. • Techniques: Choral Reading Paired Reading Echo Reading

18. You can divide up “speeches” among groups or students. • You can set up different groups to read different parts of a role. • Feel free to adapt part of a book for Reader’s Theatre. • Write the script to develop what you want to stress: character, content, vocabulary, sight vocabulary, etc. • Pre-teach harder words or terms. • Keep it simple. Your first scripts should be easy to manage and learn.

19. WRITING THE SCRIPTS • Make the scripts easy to read. Use a large readable font. • Too many words creates too much confusion. • Finish a part on the same page. Don’t have carry-over of a part to the next page.

20. STAGING THE SCRIPTS • Do a read aloud first. Let them follow along. • Groups should be talking to each other. • Narrators can address the audience. • Make the scripts available and easy to read for students. • Gesturing and miming are encouraged. • Uniform dress for groups can be used. • Small props can be used. • Sound effects are great! • Rehearse! Rehearse! Rehearse! (lines and mimes) • Be a facilitator!

21. LET’S SEE SOME SAMPLES • Professionally Written Scripts • Teacher Created Scripts