Guided reading: getting organized and a freebie!

Hey everyone, Emily here!  Lauren has been so amazing and on the ball with her awesome units and classroom ideas she’s posting and I think it’s about time I stepped up my game!  So here we go! 

In Ohio we have a new monster lingering over our heads… the 3^rd grade guarantee.  Anyone else a little terrified of this monster??    If you don’t know about the 3^rd grade guarantee, it basically states that if a child does not pass the expected reading level at the beginning of 3^rd grade, then they will be held back a year. Talk about pressure! I have 7 students in my room who are on IEPs, most of which mainly struggle in reading and not to mention all the other 1^st graders you are trying to keep on track.  I know so many of you out there feel the same pain I do!

To make sure I am devoting as much instructional time to my kiddos during guided reading as I can, I need it to be organized and focused.  I have found so many awesome things in the blogging world that I used to help me, but also have created a few things of my own and thought I would share!

Here is how I organize my groups for a two week period.  I try to see 3 groups a day, 20 minutes each.  I rotate my schedule so one week I see a Mon, Wed, Fri and the next I see them Tues, Thurs. My lowest groups of students who are on IEPs will work on reading with my intervention tutor daily, so even when I don’t see them they are still getting extra support. 

Once I have chosen the book I am going to use for that group for the whole week I pull out the vocab, comprehension strategy we are working on, and phonics skill.  I organize my lessons like this.

This also gives me a place to take notes about students.

The last thing I wanted to share was my goal sheet I have for each kiddo.  When I take a running record at the end of each quarter to determine their new reading level, I plug all the information into this and then come up with one or two specific goals that we will really work on the next quarter. 

I share these goals with parents using pages from this awesome guided reading packet I found on Sarah's first grade snippets blog.  She has it as a free download on her TPT store here.  I have gotten some great feed back from parents, because they feel like they know what to work on at home when they are reading with their child.  I also make sure that parents know their child’s reading level (Guided Reading A-Z and DRA level) so that they know what kinds of books to look for at home.  I show them how to use the Scholastic Book Wizard tool on www.scholastic.com to search by reading levels so that they can find specific titles that are good fit books. 

If you would like you can pick up these guided reading resources in my TPT store here! 

Does anyone else have guided reading tips??  I am always looking for great ways to help my students grow as readers!