Read to Self

Read to Self is the first component of the Daily 5 that I teach. We began working on Read to Self on the very first day of school.

The first thing we did was create a sense of urgency by brainstorming reasons why Read to Self is so important. Here are the reasons our class came up with:
* It's fun
* It helps us get better at reading
* Comprehension
* To learn new things

After we understood why Read to Self was so important, we listed things that the students and the teacher would be doing during read to self (see picture).

Using the chart we created to guide us (we call it an I chart), we started building stamina by practicing Read to Self for very short periods of time. After we practiced Read to Self, we returned to the I-chart reviewed the ideal behaviors and reflected on things that went well and areas in which we need to improve. Then, we went out and did it all again! By Friday afternoon, we were reading for 4-5 minutes. Before long, we'll be reading for 20-25 minutes!