What is Shared Reading? Funny you should ask! Because I would love to tell you!
Shared reading is precisely what it sounds like, it is a whole group lesson, in which a teacher shares a book with students! Through sharing this book, a teacher is able to model, think aloud, and teach many different standards. This happens because students are able to see an enlarged version of a book, and “read along” with their teacher. That “read-along” practice might look a little different depending on the student’s grade level.
What does shared reading teach?
Some of the standards that can be taught in kindergarten through Shared Reading are concepts about print skills, foundational skills, literacy comprehension skills, and informational comprehension skills.
At the beginning of kindergarten, we love to use nursery rhymes! We start with some very familiar ones like The Itsy Bitsy Spider and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. With these nursery rhymes, we are learning what a title is, and how to track print from left to right, and top to bottom. This all happens with me, the teacher modeling on a large text that students are able to see.
As students become proficient with these skills, new ones are introduced! Shared reading then becomes a time to learn literary elements like the setting, characters, problem, and solution. We also get to explore nonfiction text features like table of contents, and facts vs. opinions.
By October, we are working hard on our comprehension skills such as recalling. There are so many fun books that help students learn to recall! There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly anyone?
Another book I love for shared reading, especially during October, is The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Megan Lloyd
My fellow kinder teacher introduced me to this book, and as soon as I laid eyes on it, I was hooked! Basically, a little old lady is walking through the woods and finds many different pieces of clothes, that go “clomp, clomp, shake, shake, clap, clap.” How fun!!! And in the end, these clothes all come together to make a shall we say new friend?! for the little old lady.
I grabbed my copy on amazon. I linked it above if you want to check it out.
How does this shared reading lesson look?
First, introduce the text and being to read it to students. Model any standards you are working on, and think aloud about all the tricky stuff. I also like to front-load any unfamiliar vocabulary words.
It won’t be long until students know the pattern and you are reading the text together.
Then, discuss the text. Review the book, and help students practice their focus standard, such as recalling.
If you want to, read it again! You can read it again right then for fun or even later in the week to work on fluency with the text.
I love this book for practicing recall! So much so, that I created this cute little page to provide my students with visual support as they recalled the story. Grab it for FREE right here! The Old Lady Who Wasn’t Afraid of Anything Retelling Activity
Students can color, cut, and then put back together as they retell this fun, spooky story! Here’s a tip, if I run out of time to complete this shared reading activity during class time, I will put it in my retelling center! This gives students a chance to practice their retelling skills while I work with small groups!
This post was short and sweet, but I hope it was helpful to you, and that you were able to grab a freebie or two!
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