Can I just say that I love skyping to classes in Canada?  Well, whether I can or cannot, I will.  This week I was in Danielle Maley’s grade 1 and grade 2 class.  I learned that in Canada first and second grade do not exist as far as terminology goes and that it is referred to as grade 1 and grade 2.  I just love this age.  These kids have so much enthusiasm and zest for life.  You can see how engaged they are in the pictures that Mrs. Maley took. 

The first thing that we talked about was how far away from each other we are.  We found out that we are 1,000 miles away.  Then we got to the important stuff like what is your favorite book.  One little girl happened to say that her favorite books are Franklin books.  Since I just happened to have a Franklin book I dedicated my reading of Franklin’s Halloween to Georgia.  The kids did not mind at all that it was a little past Halloween.  They were just mesmerized by the entire experience because they had never skyped with someone in one of their classrooms before.  I had the wonderful opportunity to be their first.

After skyping with Canada I quickly came back to Wisconsin to work with an adult that has struggled with reading her whole life.  She happens to live in Wisconsin and is only 30 minutes away from me, but working via skype makes it so much easier.  Neither of us has to travel for an hour and we get to get more done than if we were in person. 

This new student has mentioned that Skype has completely changed her life.  The fact that she can now get help with reading and not have to leave the comfort of her home just astounds her.  She loves the convenience and the new tools that she learns with each session.  She is continuing to get better and better every day and she brightens my day with all of her insights. 

I love that I can spread positivity around the world via Skype and in my day to day life.  It is a blessing, a calling, and for me a way of life.

This is such a remarkable class with a remarkable teacher.  Mrs. Jody Kelley met another teacher from Dublin, Ireland and the students have been using Twitter to learn about each other.  The class in Dublin sent a package containing items from Ireland.  Inside of the box was chocolate, tea, crisps (also known as chips), and a school jumper (also known as a sweatshirt).  Through this amazing interaction the students have been able to grow their knowledge in Geography and time zones.

Mrs. Jody Kelley’s class is planning on sending peanut butter and maple syrup because the student’s in Dublin have never heard of it before.  First however, the students need to find out if peanut butter and maple syrup can be sent over.  So, there is a little bit of research that needs to be done before they can make that happen.  Also, Mrs. Jody Kelley’s class got a donation of a build a bear and they are going to send that over with a school sweatshirt on it.  Before they send it, they are going to take a  picture of their own bear with the sweatshirt/jumper from Dublin.

The students in Mrs. Jody Kelley’s class love to read.  If you want to find out a good title of book, then this is the class to go to.  They are not only knowledgeable, but they have tried out a wide range of authors.  They suggested title like Deep, Dark and Dangerous, Amulet, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, and A-Z mysteries.

Today I introduced the class to a new series called Conspiracy 365.  This is a set of 12 books that is a high action packed thriller.  The father is on his way to discovering a major family secret that will be worth millions of dollars.  Unfortunately, the father dies and his son has 365 days to figure it out.  Check out the trailer to this series.  You will be hooked just like I am.  Each book gets you closer to figuring out the secret.  I am currently on May.

Here is my version of a book trailer below.  Enjoy!

This may sound far fetched to many of you, but it is reality for the children in Saskatchewan, Canada.  Last week I got to hang out in Ms. Elder’s class and she was explaining that many of her students have sports practices in Montana.  I was extremely interested in this, especially since I already knew she lived in Canada and that the class I was specifically talking with was in Canada.  To them it did not sound like a big deal, but to many of us who have never experienced that it is fascinating.

This is one of the reasons that I love volunteering in classrooms all over the world and reading to them.  I love learning and I love learning about different people and the way that they do things.

Ms. Elder and I met last year via Twitter and I was able to read to her class then.  She does a looping grade 1 and grade 2 split.  So some of the students had recognized me from last year.  It was really cool to pop into their classroom and have many of them recognize me.  One little boy said, “I know you”.  It was really sweet.

Ms. Elder asked me to share my favorite story with the class.  For me, my absolute favorite story is Thank You, Mr. Falker by Patricia Polacco.   However, I do not have an ebook version yet to share with the children, so I decided to go with my second favorite Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.  Ironically, the class had just taken down their Chicka Chicka Boom Boom tree and they were absolutely thrilled that I chose that book out of all of the books in the world to read to them.

I have read this book to several children all over the world and it seems to be a hands down favorite.  What are some of your favorite books to read with children?  I would love to know.

Watch this clip from a past reading of the book to a group of students in North Carolina.

Image via Wikipedia

Why? Why? Why? Why? I watch a 4 year old in the afternoons and this is his absolute favorite question.  This isn’t the kind of question that I am referring to when asking questions to increase reading comprehension.

At the end of a story we are asked to answer some questions about what we just read.  But what if, instead of waiting till to end to find out if we understood what we read we used a self monitoring technique that helped us understand what we just read.

Yesterday, an amazing teacher with impeccable technology skills, Ms. Irene Kistler in San Antonio, Texas invited me into her classroom to enhance the students knowledge about snakes and incorporate the skill of asking questions when reading.  Her class was very knowledgeable about snakes and overall we all had a blast.

When teaching the strategy of asking questions, I always start with the first bit of information that I am given.  That is, the title.  The title is the best place to ask a question when I am reading non-fiction text.  Why you may ask?  Well, the whole book is about it so it gets us thinking about what might learn.  The title of our book yeasterday was Snakes, Long, Longer, Longest by Jerry Pallotta.  So I modeled  asking questions and came up with

1. Which snake is the shortest?
2. Which snake is the longest?

From that question the students made a prediction.  They were not sure about the shortest snake, but they thought possibly anacondas or the reticular pythons might be the longest.  The students that answered reticular pythons were correct.  Anacondas, by the way, are the fattest.  So our student that answered anacondas was not too far off.

As you continue reading your brain may automatically think of questions.  If this is you, then you are on your way to understanding what you are reading.  However, this may not be the case for you and you may need some guidance.  Before you begin reading check to see if your book has three pieces of information.

1. Table of contents
2. Glossary
3. Index

These are the most natural places to build additional questions.  Turn each chapter in the table of contents into a question and write it down.  Next flip to the index and see the topics that will be taught in the book and turn some of these into questions.  Lastly, find the words in the glossary that you have never heard of before and turn that into a question.  What does ______ mean?  This will guide you as you are reading and make sure that you tune into the things that you do not know the answer to.  If you think you do know the answer, then when you are reading you get the joy of confirming whether what you thought you was correct is actually or learning new information that helps you understand something a little deeper.

It is amazing how many students I run into in the tutoring business that do not have enough exposure to non-fiction text.  I often hear that my child seems to read just fine, but has difficulty with reading comprehension.  The parents do not understand what to do.  Many times a student is reading on grade level with fiction text, but that is not the case with non-fiction text.  By teaching some of these simple strategies and putting them into action, you will be able to increase a student’s non-fiction reading comprehension level.  He/she needs to be taught how to think in a new way to retain the information that he/she is learning.

Thank you to Ms. Irene Kistler and her students in San Antonio, Texas for allowing me to come visit them in their classroom and do some learning with them.  I thoroughly enjoyed my time.

Today I had the pleasure of reading to a group of Kindergarten students in Kernersville, North Carolina.  It is such a pleasure to meet so many bright smiling faces early in the morning.  I love it.  My own children had just gotten on the bus and these kids were already at school ready for their day. They were all seated patiently at the carpet waiting for me to come into their classroom.

They were amazed that we were talking to each other and were 815 miles away from each other.  Some of them had experience with talking to people via Skype and many others had not.  One little boy shared with me that he gets to talk to his Grandpa in Mexico via Skype.  That is the beautiful thing about Skype.  Never has there ever existed a way to talk to people far away without paying a ton of money.  Now, not only do people get to talk to love ones, but they can see them as well.

Today I read the story Dragon’s Halloween by Dav Pilkey.  It was very exciting because Halloween is right around the corner and many of the children in the classroom are experiencing the same dilemma that Dragon was experiencing.   Dragon was trying to pick out a Halloween costume but couldn’t decide which one he wanted to be.  So, he decided to wear them all.  It didn’t work out so well for Dragon, but of course it had a wonderful ending.  I love this chapter so much that I am going to share it with you as well.  Click on the video and enjoy.

Image via Wikipedia

On Friday, I had the wonderful opportunity to visit Mr. Snyder’s class in Dalmatia, PA.  He was the teacher last year that motivated his students to learn their spelling words, by putting money into a jar to buy a goat for a family in Africa.  They met their goal last year and were able to buy two goats.

Mr. Snyder is now teaching 4th grade and he has 11 of the same students that he had 2 years ago.  Those parents must be so excited.  Did you know that it can take a new teacher up to 3 months to figure out how a child can learn effectively?  Well, Mr. Snyder will not be needing to go through the learning curve with half of his students.

These amazing students are listening to the book Holes in their class.  Mr. Snyder had invited me into his classroom via Skype to read chapters 17 and 18 to his students.   Some of his students had prepared a summary of the book and information about the characters before I read to them.  They told me about the characters Stanley, Armpit, and Zero.

In chapter 18 Zero is looking over Stanley’s arm as he is writing a letter to his family and tells Zero, who he feels is a nothing, to stop doing that.  Zero asks Stanley if he can teach him to read, because he doesn’t know how to.  Stanley refuses because his life is just too busy digging holes and he doesn’t want to take the time to help him.

This part of the book made me reflect on how children who struggle with reading really do feel about themselves.  They feel less than, like everyone else is better than they are, and stupid.  Louis Sachar did a great job when developing the character of Zero, because it helps us understand about how people’s self concept of themselves shapes who they are.  Zero feels like a zero and a nothing and all he is asking for is a little help.

We don’t want our children feeling this way.  So, if your child is struggling, the help them now before their self concept becomes too low and the gap continues to get bigger for him/her.  Click on the video and hear an excerpt from this chapter.

Cover via Amazon

Teaching a child to read and to love reading is perhaps the most important learning related thing you can do for your child. Reading is necessary for nearly anything your child might want to do with his or her life, and a strong reader can use reading to learn about anything they might wish to learn about. Give reading the priority is deserves in your home and you will raise a competent reader who loves to read.

Make your home reader friendly. Be sure to take the time to read things that you enjoy and let your children know about it. Leading by example is much more effective than lecturing your child on the importance of reading. Make a wide variety of books available to your child right from the start. Simply having books in your home for babies and young children to look at is an excellent start. If finances are an issue for you, a visit to your local library is in order. You will be able to check out lots of great books for children and adults for free. Even if you have books at home already you have purchased, consider using the library to add more variety to your collection of books.

Read to your children everyday from birth. As your child grows older you can read together as he or she learns to read, and eventually have them read to you. But when you have babies and very young children, the best thing you can do for them is read to them and make it a fun experience. Your local library can also help with this. Many libraries hold regular story times for children of all ages. Attending story time is another chance to expose your child to more reading, and good children’s librarians will read books in a very animated and engaging way.

The books you or your child choose are important. Share favorite books you loved reading as a child and your excitement will be evident to your child. Just as important as reading to your child is impressing upon them the joys of reading. Allow your child to visit bookstores and the library and choose books about the things that they love. What you read about isn’t as important as simply reading, and choosing books that you and your child enjoy will make reading something your child looks forward to doing.

Partner with your child’s teacher and choose books that relate to what your child is learning in school. You will be helping your child do well in school by reinforcing the concepts they are working on, while simultaneously practicing reading skills.

Be sure to allow your baby or child to participate in reading the story. When your baby or toddler points to pictures in the story be sure to encourage them by talking about what they see and asking questions. Ask young emerging readers to participate in reading familiar stories, perhaps asking them to fill in when they have read the story many times before. You will know your young child is beginning to understand what books are all about when they begin to follow along with the story and can take you through their favorite books and tell you about the story.

Raising a reader is not complicated. All it takes it a commitment to make reading a part of every day life, and making sure books are always available to your child. Once you get into a routine of reading often, it will become second nature to you, and you will be on the road to raising a great reader.

Submitted by Sarah Morris of Primrose Schools- child care with high early education standards.

Cover of Everyone Poops (My Body Science)

Parents often wonder how they can engage their boys in enjoying reading.  They are looking for books that aren’t too girly and that their sons will enjoy.  Therefore, it is no surprise that one of the biggest questions that I get is, “What books do you suggest for a __year old boy?”  This question has inspired me to make a list of books from my favorite book publishing company, Usborne Books and More.  Below you will find a list of books that tend to be boys favorites along with the age that they are appropriate for.

Boys tend to like books that fit into 6 different categories. Of course this is just a brief list of the most popular and not all inclusive.

• humor
• non-fiction
• Suspense
• Hands on
• Sports
• How to

Baby Boys 0-4

Animal Board Books

Noisy Touch Feely

That’s Not my Monster

Glug, Glug, Glug Bath Book

Lift and Look Board books – Books include topics about construction sites, tractors, trains, and dinosaurs

Boys Ages 4-6

Everyone Poops

Engaging phonics Readers

How Big is a Million

The Gingerbread Man

There’s a Mouse About the House

Very First Reading Program

Boys 7-10

Beginning Non-fiction Readers

Illustrated Stories for Boys – includes the following

The Masked Pirate
Robot Racers
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Jon and the Green Troll
The Tale of the Haunted TV
The Band of Robbers
Sinbad the Sailor
Victor Saves the Village
The Terrible Tidybot
The Story of Shiverham Hall
The Pesky Parrot
Sam and the Giants
The Tale of the Kitchen Knight
Attack of the Swamp Monster
Robot Robbery
Treasure Island

Jack Russell Dog Detective

The Team Series

Boys 10-15

Moby Dick

Tom Sawyer

David Copperfield

Conspiracy 365

These are some suggestions for boys to engage them and get them excited about reading.  Usborne Books has many many titles that boys love.  You can check them all out at www.popularbooksforkids.com.

This topic was discussed tonight as well on the Totoal Education Network, where I was a guest.  Check it out and learn what some of Neil’s favorite books for boys are as well.

Total Education Network Radio 08/18 by Total Tutor | Blog Talk Radio.

Image by pirate johnny via Flickr

Many people love to debate whether we should or should not have standardized tests like the WKCE, FCAT, Terranova, AIMS, TAKS, or Regents.  The unfortunate reality is that for a long time to come, our schools will be judged based off of test scores.  I personally believe in a teaching style that allows me to teach to the student and whatever his/her needs are.  If students are to take these standardized tests, then, if I am to accurately meet the child’s needs, I need to make sure that he/she is prepared to do so through proper test prep.

Many people are against teaching to the test.  Since no one really knows what will be on these tests it is absolutely impossible to teach to it.  However, it is our responsibility to teach students the medium in which they will be measured.  I like to compare it to cooking and throughout the rest of this article I will be using cooking as a metaphor.  I wouldn’t expect a child to cook a meal without understanding how to read a recipe.  There are certain skills that are needed in order to do so.  In order to do so properly he/she needs to be taught or understand how to read and follow the recipe.

Test Taking Skills that are Similar to Reading a Recipe

1.  Vocabulary - There are certain words in recipes that a reader needs to understand in order to cook effectively.  It is important to decipher between T, t, tsp., and tbl.  If a cook does not understand these terms, you better believe the results will be different from the intended recipe.  The same is true for taking the test.  There are words imbedded in tests that are not normally used in speech.  For example, “The passage is mostly about.”  We do not usually refer to things that we read as a passage, therefore students need to understand the meaning of this word in order to answer the questions with it correctly.

2.  Multiple Choice – In order to make a recipe you need to understand the format of the directions.  First there are always ingredients listed and then there are directions in the order that they need to be followed.  For multiple choice questions there are always 2 right answers and 2 wrong answers.

3.  Short Essay – If I have a fantastic recipe, then I  need to be able to know how to write a recipe in order for someone else to follow it and make it correctly.  Short essay questions are just like this.  I need to follow a certain pattern of including the question in my answer and backing it up with three reasons why I believe what I believe.

4.  Time limit – When one is cooking there is a time limit.  If you cook it too long it will not turn out the way that you want.  Time is important.  Time is important on standardized tests as well.  You only have a certain amount of time, so if you spend too much time on one answer you may not be given the time to answer the questions that you do know the answer to.  If you don’t know an answer you can skip it and go on.  When you are given your 5 minute or 1 minute warning, then it is time to go back and fill in a guess for the answers that had you stuck.

Whether you agree or disagree about the value of testing, the reality is our students need to be prepared to take them.  You don’t want to eat the results of someones cooking that didn’t follow the recipe of your favorite dish and you certainly don’t want to judge schools or students who did not know how to take the test in the first place.  Below is a blog talk episode where I personally talk about test taking with Adam the former teacher and Neil Haily the host of the Total Education Network.

Image via Wikipedia

Every Thursday the Skyping Reading Tutor, Joanne Kaminski, is a parenting expert on a blog talk radio show called the Total Education Hour.  I have an entire week to think of a great question.  My question this week was, where can you find great books to read for your children over the summer.

There are so many fantastic places to go to get great books and I am going to list my top ten here.  My first suggestion is to take a look at the summer reading list that your school or current teacher may give you.  This will give you a good starting point of books to look for.  Once you have that list you can go to the following places to get them.

1. The library – Who can beat free?  Some libraries are connected with other local libraries and all you have to do is go to your computer, request the book, they call you when it is ready, and you pick it up.
2. School library – many school libraries are open in the summer and allow you to check out books.
3. Ebooks – Reading an e-book doesn’t feel the same as reading a regular book and some kids enjoy this.  Many books come for free in an ebook format.  Check it out.
4. Local Bookstore – Support your local bookstore.  These wonderful little treasures are becoming less and less due to bigger stores like Barnes and Noble and Amazon.
5. Bookswap with a friend – have your child make a list of all of the books that he/she has and switch lists with a friend.  The kids can recommend books to each other and enjoy books for free.
6. Bookswap online – These are great fun.  If you list 10 books you get free credits.  People start asking you to send books to them and all you pay is media shipping, which is less than regular shipping.  Whenever you want a book, type in the title and see if one of the members has it.  It is as easy as that.
7. Rummage sales – you will always find bestsellers at rummage sales because that is what people are reading.
8. Goodwill – Many people just donate their books to the Goodwill.  Check out their selection.
9. Amazon – I usually try looking for books in all of the other places first and if I can’t find there, then I go to Amazon, put it in my shopping cart and pay for my books after I have reached the $25 mark.  I rarely need a book immediately and it is always a sweet surprise to see what I have selected when I reach the point to purchase.

Enjoy this great tool for where to get great books for the summer for your child (or yourself).  Happy Reading and listen to The Total Education Network.