Lehua's Chapter 9 Reflection

This particular chapter was very much made for kindergarten teachers. Kindergartners are the very ones who are starting to sound out words phonetically. At first, when I heard my teacher doing modeled writing with the students and they would spell out words in the way that they sounded, I wondered, "Why have them learn the wrong spelling? Why not just tell them the correct way?" After learning a little more and observing how they read, write, and converse everyday, I now understand why the teachers do so.

Chapter 9 talks about the difference between guided reading groups and word study groups. I like the word study groups because it is very informal, as she says. They aren't picked strategically according to their abilities. And, the teacher doesn't have to constantly take notes (on paper or mentally) about each student and his or her progress. That also takes some tension off of the students. Taberski talks about having the students who need extra help, especially those who are ESLL, in these groups to help them out by a smaller group.

I liked how she listed the kinds of questions that she'd ask for each word. For example, she would ask, in the case of monosyllabic words, "What words are grouped by length? Combined letters? Common sound? Spelling pattern?" These questions would be ones that you would definitely introduce to a kindergartner because they are just learning the visual part of reading and writing.