[MOSAIC] TV/reading skills, upcoming plans

[Tammy Bellinger]

Thank you for the comments.  It is reassuring to hear.  We have to work with 
our kids and their families where they are at.  Yes, I think reading is 
becoming more and more involved with media besides books.  However, kids 
still need the same skills to make sense of what they are reading, wherever 
it may be!

I was thinking through where all my students are at tonight and what I need 
to do next with them.  I think we will be spending a lot of time on 
comparing stories, both fiction with fiction and fiction with non-fiction. 
This is turning up more and more on our TAKS testing and is so hard for them 
to do. We will start over the holidays comparing various Christmas and 
Winter holiday stories.  I think after the first of the year, we will spend 
some time on comparing fairy tales (various Cinderella stories or 3 Little 
Pigs, etc).  I am self-contained, so when we start the colonization unit in 
History, we usually read Little House on the Prairie and look for 
similiarities between it and our History textbook.  There are quite a few 
there.

I have a wide range of readers as usual, every level from 1st/2nd up through 
7th in my Fourth grade classroom.  One of my highest readers is the least 
motivated and doesn't want to put any effort into it.  So, keeping them all 
headed in the right direction is challenging!

Thanks for sharing all your ideas.  I don't always respond, but I always 
read what everyone is chatting about!

Tammy
4th, TX