Rainy day reading

Today was our second self-selected reading day--and the gray sky and pouring rain made it that much easier to tuck into a book. Throughout my classes, more students now have SSR books--yay! It's really a great opportunity for students to improve their reading skills, which I've told juniors is their biggest task this year. I'm not teaching them to read (or write)--they know how to do that. My goal is to give them plenty of reading, some difficult, and plenty of strategies they can use to make meaning of those texts. I saw students taking much more time yesterday with the Article of the Week; I was very encouraged by their commitment to settle down to work.

Here's a great article for you about the reading habits of teens (link). What can you do to help? Make sure they read several times each week for extended length of time at a level that's appropriate. Not an easy task considering the busy lives of today's kids ... but one that will be worth it in the long run.