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Title: The Art of Teaching Reading
ISBN: 0321080599
Author:
Lucy McCormick Calkins
Publicate Date: 2000-08-28
Publish: 2000-08-28
List Price: $47.90
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $22.98
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $12.99
Amazon Merchant Price: $39.65
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Great Resource for Teaching Reading
A fabulous book for teachers. Also highly recommended are two lovely pieces of children's literature with beautiful messages and invaluable 10-page teaching guidesLife's Little Lessons: An Inch-By-Inch Tale of Successand The Big Squeal: A Wild, True, and Twisted Tail with built in lessons, activities and comprehension questions.
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2: must have
This book is helpful for anyone working with children's literacy. Ideas are very clearly expressed and explained.
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3: Seminal work on Reader's Workshop, but poor introduction to the method
Reading the Art of Teaching, it becomes clear that Calkins is not only a wonderful reading teacher but a thoughtful and skilled writer about reading. However, looking over the reviews here a reader will notice a divergence of opinion with many lavishly praising this book while others express extreme disappointment. In the end neither of them are really wrong.
Calkin's goal of the is simple to get students to "compose lives in which reading and writing matter", but obviously difficult to achieve. She is of the opinion, and offers research to support this opinion, that a Reading Workshop is the best way of achieving this goal. She explains the ingredients for success in virtually all aspects of a Reading Workshop through her 500 plus pages. Her emphasis is on what to do rather than what not to do and she offers examples, normally quite entertaining, to demonstrate the theory she is talking about.
So in this sense the book is a large success. Calkin clearly understands the Reader's Workshop and is going to be able to help any teacher craft a framework for such a workshop.
However, this speaks to the great short coming of the book. While Calkin presents the philosophy the hard work of implementing it falls largely on the shoulder of the reader. When she works with teachers in person this is no doubt for the best, as she is able to give feedback on how various teachers implement the program. However, no such dialogue can be had with a book and so the reader can easily finish the book understanding just how important the Reader's Workshop is, without the skills needed to actually implement one.
This book is an important piece of writing for the Reading Workshop teacher, however it serves as a poor introduction to the method. Upper elementary and middle school teachers would be better advised to start with Nancy Atwell's In the Middle: New Understanding About Writing, Reading, and Learning (Workshop Series), and her recent addendum to that work The Reading Zone: HOW TO HELP KIDS BECOME SKILLED, PASSIONATE, HABITUAL, CRITICAL READERS which while suffering from some of the same problems as Calkin has far more specific methods to use.
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4: Great book for educators
This book is very helpful to any elementary teacher that is looking for ways to improve your reading curriculum. Lucy Calkins gives plenty of ideas and new approaches to try in your classroom. I also appreciate how she writes the actual scenario she used in the classroom with real kids. It is so much easier to comprehend through real life experiences. Another book that is similar, very informative and full of GREAT ideas is Reading Essentials by Regie Routman. This is a must read as an educator.
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5: Outstanding - holistic - approach to teaching reading
I read the first page of this book sitting on the floor of a book store. The next thing I knew it was 30 minutes later, and I didn't want to put the book down. I knew it needed to go home with me. Calkins takes Reading instruction, breaks it down into manageable parts that she used in her own classroom and shares with you realistic, artful and purposeful ideas for teaching reading. She speaks very openly and honestly with you as a teacher who believes in teaching reading not as a science, but rather as an art. It is an amazing book that will transform the way you think about reading instruction even in simple ways. You will love reading it and want to apply her teaching strategies immediately.
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