Picking out the right graded readers?for your young learners?takes a little thought.?There are thousands and thousands of stories out there. Not only do you have to find the right level but also a?range of?books?that will keep them captivated?as they learn to read.
In this brief guide, I¡¯ll be helping you to choose the right Disney Kids Readers for your students, so they can participate in guided and independent reading in class and at home.
Let¡¯s delve in.
First, what¡¯s the difference between guided and independent reading??
In class, students typically read aloud in a small group with a teacher. The teacher supports the children as they decode the words, navigate elements of pronunciation, and make sense of the meaning. At home, a child reads aloud to a parent or caregiver. This is a terrific way to involve parents in a child¡¯s path toward reading fluency.
Independent reading, on the other hand, is when students read silently to themselves. These students?are?already?reading?with some confidence. They can?decode common words and have a good handle on sight words.?Their reading speed is fluent enough to focus on the meaning of?the text.
So, how do you know which reader to choose for your students? Well, graded readers are already organized?by level. They also often provide metrics to help teachers make informed decisions about what reading level a child is at.?
Let¡¯s?take a look?at Disney Kids Readers as an example:?
Disney Kids Readers have six levels. The number of words per page and the number of pages per story are consistent in each level.
For example, Level 3 stories have up to 40 words per page and 20 pages per story. As a child moves up through the reading levels, the books become longer and more?complex.??
To write the stories, authors use lists of common, high-frequency words. Level 1, for example, has a word list of 200 words. Level 6 has a word list of 1,200 words. These are called ¡°headwords.¡±?
In this way, the vocabulary load is manageable for learners. Even better, learners?come into contact with?the same words again and again throughout the readers, which builds their vocabulary.
Of course, it¡¯s difficult to write an engaging story for children using only headwords. So, the readers also include a few low-frequency, high-interest words, like ¡°lantern¡± or ¡°tower.¡± These words then go in a Picture Dictionary or Glossary at the back of the book to support student understanding.?
From Level 3, Disney Tangled,?Picture Dictionary?p.?23
The authors write using a grammar syllabus for each level. For example, regular past simple is introduced in Level 3 readers, around the same time that students are learning this verb tense in their general English lessons. As children read, they see examples of the regular past simple within the stories.
Teachers can?use the?Disney Kids Readers¡¯??Scope and Sequence?to see which language structures are covered at each level.
Every Disney Kids Reader is assigned a Lexile? measure. This is a global standard for measuring text complexity. Generally, longer sentences and more low-frequency words in a text lead to a higher Lexile? measure. This gives teachers and parents a way to compare these readers against any other book with a Lexile? measure.
It also means that you can arrange the graded readers from the lowest to the highest score. You can be confident that the readers you choose are gradually becoming more complex as your young learners become more skilled at reading. ?
The?Global Scale of English?(GSE) is a standardized, granular scale from 10 to 90 that measures English language proficiency. It¡¯s aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR).?
Every level of Disney Kids Readers sits within a band on the GSE. For example, the range for Level 1 is 16¨C27, while Level 6 is 36¨C48. If you know the GSE or CEFR level of your students¡¯ general English coursebook, you can match the graded readers to the same level.
Each reader includes a handy chart on the back cover.?
Independent reading: Reading the text should be easy¡ªwith almost every word familiar to the student. In this way, they can focus on enjoying and understanding what they¡¯re reading.?, a leading expert on teaching and learning vocabulary, suggests that two new words for every 100 words is the right fit for comfortable, independent reading.
Guided reading: Reading the text should help the student practice the reading skills they¡¯re learning, such as using context to understand words, language structures, letter-sound relationships, and reading comprehension.?
Tips for working out the comfort level:?
We want?reading to be?enjoyable?for?our young learners.?If they are?given?books?that they can understand and that they?find interesting,?there¡¯s?a?much?better?chance?that they¡¯ll develop?a love of reading.
Tips?for?making reading enjoyable:
Whether you¡¯re a?seasoned school owner, teacher, or parent,?you can use?these?tips?to get your children reading with confidence?and?developing?a love of reading to last a lifetime.?What could be better than that?
Extensive Reading and Vocabulary Learning, Paul Nation, Victoria University of Wellington, YouTube, 2020? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ??
Learning English with music can enhance learning and create a more engaging and dynamic classroom environment. In a previous post, we discussed if music can help you learn a language; this post looks at how music can be incorporated into the classroom.
Using music in your classroom can help improve student motivation, focus, and retention of information. Here are some ways you can use music to enhance your classroom teaching:
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Have you considered studying abroad? Moving to Canada to study? With more than 100 world-class universities across the country, there¡¯s good reason to. From coast to coast to coast, it offers many international students a safe and supportive learning environment and the opportunity to work after graduation.
Want to learn more? In this guide, we cover ten things you should know about studying in Canada:
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There are lots of resources available to English teachers today: from textbooks to online teaching tools, they can all aid and enrich English lessons. Many ESL teachers also introduce authentic English material into their lessons to expose learners to the language as it is spoken in the real world.
Authentic material is any material written in English that was not created for intentional use in the English classroom. Using this content for teaching English can make the teaching experience even more engaging, imaginative and motivating for students. It can also be useful to elicit genuine responses from English language learners.
The great thing about using authentic material is that it is everywhere, which makes it easy to find, and simple for learners to practice English in their own time. Remember that it isn¡¯t limited to articles from newspapers and magazines. Songs, TV programs and films, radio and podcasts, leaflets, menus ¨C anything written in English constitutes authentic material.
The best content to select depends on the learners, their level of English and the course content the English teacher wishes to focus on. It¡¯s also a good idea to find out the learners¡¯ interests ¨C after all, there¡¯s no point trying to get students fascinated by a text on the latest sci-fi movie if they¡¯re all fans of action films.
The materials should reflect a situation that a student may face in an English-speaking environment ¨C this will help them transition into a world where English is the norm. In this world, people use abbreviations, body language is important and they¡¯ll use 'filler' sounds ¨C such as 'ummm' ¨C when they are speaking English ¨C and learners will encounter these in authentic material.
It¡¯s important not to overwhelm learners with the first piece of authentic material. So, choose articles, songs or sections of TV programs or movies that aren¡¯t too difficult to understand or take too long to get through.
