Accelerating Language Skills and Content Knowledge Through Shared Book Reading

by Deborah Simmons, Jorge Gonzalez, Leslie Simmons

Overview

Students in early childhood settings don't always get the benefits of shared book reading—a strategy proven to boost language skills and content knowledge. Prepare the next generation of teachers to make the most of shared reading with this accessible textbook, a complete guide to building vocabulary-rich science and social studies lessons and discussions around storybooks and informational texts. Field-tested with children in high-poverty school settings, this instructional approach is valuable for any young learners at risk for comprehension difficulties.

This concise book presents the authors' proven, empirically based "Project WORLD" (Words of Oral Reading and Language Development) framework for integrating shared book reading into the classroom. Offering both big-picture curriculum design principles and specific instructional strategies, this text gives teachers the know-how they need to accelerate language skills, vocabulary development, and high-priority science and social studies content knowledge for all young children. Ideal for preservice teacher education courses and in-service professional development!

GET TEACHERS READY TO:

• Use the most effective shared book reading and vocabulary practices
• Teach new vocabulary while introducing key science and social studies concepts
• Align vocabulary instruction with content standards and objectives
• Stimulate and expand children's oral language abilities via interactive book discussions
• Implement a framework tested in collaboration with Head Start and preschool teachers
• Choose their own books and vocabulary words to teach
• Design lesson plans that get results
• Build a strong foundation for children's future success in science and social studies
• Advance learning with proven teaching techniques, such as multiple exposures to words and connected concepts and strategies
• Successfully teach both English language learners and native English speakers

PRACTICAL MATERIALS: A step-by-step Shared Book Reading Instructional Unit Planner, sample vocabulary words with child-friendly definitions, real-life classroom vignettes with embedded instructional techniques and suggestions, examples of appropriate storybooks and informational texts paired by science or social studies themes, and tools to support teachers' content vocabulary instruction.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781598572575
Publisher:	Brookes, Paul H. Publishing Company
Publication date:	02/16/2015
Pages:	192
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Coordinator of Education Outreach, Department of Pediatrics, Center for Academic and Reading Skills, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, 7000 Fannin, Suite 2443, Houston, TX 77030. Dr. Pollard-Durodola coordinates two projects in the 5-year program study, “Oracy/Literacy Development in Spanish-Speaking Students,” funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Institute of Education Sciences. For Project III, she conducts interrater reliability checks across sites, coordinates classroom observations of students in kindergarten through second grade, and provides training to classroom observers. For Project V, she assists in the development of a supplemental, intensive proactive Spanish curriculum and intervention program and in the ongoing training and professional development for intervention implementers.

Table of Contents

About the Authors
Foreword
Susan Neuman
Preface
Acknowledgments
About the Forms

Chapter 1. Shared Book Reading Research and Content Learning

Chapter 2. Design and Development of the WORLD Shared Book Reading Approach

Chapter 3. Aligning Vocabulary Instruction with Content Standards and Objectives
Selecting and Organizing Book Reading Content

Chapter 4. Creating Multiple Exposures to Words and Connected Concepts
Selecting Complementary Texts and Vocabulary

Chapter 5. Opportunities to Dialogue: Word and World Connections

Chapter 6. Instruction in Practice: Teaching Strategies in Action
Appendix A: Instructional Unit Planner

Appendix B: Lesson Design Figures
Chapter 7. What Lies Ahead: Inspiring a Paradigm Shift in Thinking and Teaching

List of Vignettes

List of Storybooks and Information Texts

Index

Editorial Reviews

“Provide[s] explicit guidance on how to craft high-quality book readings with children that will elevate their language and literacy skills. This book fills an important gap in the early-childhood field!”

Laura Justice