March is Reading Month- SSR

Hello O. L. Smith Community,

For bellwork, students will no longer be doing spelling tests. For the fifth card marking, students will be working on sustained silent reading and metacognitive logs.

For sustained silent reading (SSR), students will come into class and read silently for five minutes. Once reading time is over, they will write one sentence in their metacognitive logs. For these logs, students will write, for example, if they were engaged in their story, distracted by something else, or what they did if they got stuck on a word.

As you can see, these are different than the typical types of questions and five minutes of reading is not very long. We are challenging students to do the most they can with that five minutes and analyzing how to maximize reading strategies during that short time in order to read better. When students learn about HOW they read, they learn more about themselves. “I do like to read in this way” or “I don’t like to read using this other strategy.” This way, students know what works for them and are more prepared for everything from standardized tests to high school to learning how to focus in the workplace.

Our goal is not just to help them understand what they are reading but also to understand themselves and how their brain processes information.

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please feel free to contact me.

Ms. Timpf