Reading and Writing

    First off, I thought it was interesting the author mentioned how reading and writing were typically taught in two different classes. I am sure my students think that since I teach communication arts and reading (they see me twice a day).  Sixth grade teachers often have to explain the difference between the two, even though there really is not a difference, at least not in seventh grade. When I get asked about the difference, I usually say no a whole lot, just a little more reading in reading and writing in CA. CA is just focuses a bit more on language arts, and reading focuses more on comprehension. However, all students should be writing in every class. Our new thing at our district is "writing to learn" activities, which I do on a daily basis but never realized nor purposely planned for-it just made sense to write before, during, and after reading.

   Which leads me to the second item I found interesting- book reports. Now, I have never had my students do book reports, but I know in sixth grade (which is what I will be teaching this fall) I think has at least one a quarter, and it's usually over a specified genre. I am on the fence about book reports. One side I see it as a way for students to share what they read, and maybe interest others to read the book. Yet, the problem I see is that more than likely there are going to be students who didn't read and are going to make the whole thing up using Google (if they're smart). Plus, if I haven't read the book, I will have no clue whether the student is telling the truth or not. I guess I will have to talk with my friend/job alike about this and see what she thinks! Anyone have other options to suggest if I have to shoot down her book report plans?

   Last topic I want to address is summarizing; it always seems to be a huge problem with my students. By the time I get my students some have been taught to summarize,while many of them have not. When I ask for a summary, I often get the retelling of the whole story not just the main points/purpose. Summarizing isn't just a problem for seventh grade, but it was something that all grades seemed to struggle. Last year, we made it a point to focus on summarizing in every class so we could better help our students. It became one of our SMART Goals. The problem was that teachers would ask their students to summarize (like I had done) and no one was really teaching it. It was my fault for assuming the students had learned to summarize prior to coming to seventh grade. Honestly though, I do not ever remember being taught how to summarize; we were always told to just write two to three sentences about what we read. There are a lot of things that I teach now that I never remember learning, and I was a good student! I guess things have changed in the last fifteen years. Now, I will try to make more of an effort to ensure that my students know how to summarize.