Week Five

A word I hear a lot during the teacher meetings for the 5th grade is frustration--the frustration of trying to get students to read and, therefore, improve their reading. They desparately want to help their students succeed, but no matter what they try, they can't get them involved or motivated. I think this is a common problem for schools everywhere. My teacher allows students to use their study guides on tests in Social Studies, and they still get the wrong answer. They just won't take the time to find the answers. Many students don't get support or encouragement from home to do well in school. Lack of parent involvement and excessive absences only add to the problem of students' apathetic attitudes toward school.

A main concern is that students just do not read. This year students are supposed to read 25 books independently under the STAR reader program. During a team meeting this week, one teacher stated, "I know I need to teach differently but I don't know how." I think this is a frustration felt by many teachers. From all of these factors, I finally decided that my Action Research project will be on using different activities and methods to increase student motivation for independent reading. One activity that immediately sprang to my mind was Book Talks. We learned about these in a C&I course. They are kind of like a preview of a book that students give to encourage the rest of the class to read that particular book. I'd like to develop some sort of chart to measure if students are more likely to read a book that was reviewed by a fellow classmate. If anything, I'm hoping that this inquiry project can produce some new methods of encouraging students to read.