The Shared Reading of Big Books with English Language Learners

Tracie HowardKindergarten Teacher

Webb A. Murray Elementary School

Background/Introduction

I am in my thirteenth year as a regular education classroom teacher. During the course of my teaching experience I have noticed an increase in the number of limited and non-English speaking children entering my classroom each year. These children receive 30 minutes per day of inclusion ELL services with a bi-lingual teacher and spend the remainder of the day floundering through total immersion in an English speaking classroom. Statistics show that 30-40 % of K-12 students come from diverse backgrounds other than white mainstream or native English speaking. In a sharp contrast, only 15% of teachers come from diverse backgrounds. Native English speaking teachers are working every day in classrooms where many children are learning English as a second language (Wynn & Laframboise, 1996). These students are often just as bright as their classmates, but ultimately because of language barriers, do not make the same progress as most of the English speaking students. In order to address this issue, I will attempt to answer the following question:

Research Question

How will the Shared Reading of big books impact the oral language acquisition, book and print awareness, and phonological awareness of my limited and non-English speaking English Language Learners?

For the purpose of this paper, the following definitions will be used:Language acquisition is defined as the process by which language capability develops in a person to the point that the person is able to convey and understand messages and engage in meaningful interactions and natural communication in the target language (in this case, English). Book and print awareness is defined as an understanding of the characteristics of written language. This includes understanding how books work. They have front and back covers, a right side up, there are words inside that go in order from top to bottom and left to right, there are spaces between the words, and the words carry the meaning of the story. It also includes becoming familiar with print, what it looks like, and how it works; understanding that reading and writing represent our words and that print is where the meaning is; the knowledge that print is all around us, print is different from pictures, print has meaning, print has practical uses, print is organized, words are made up of letters, and print contains capital letters, lower case letters, and punctuation.

Phonological awareness is defined as the ability of listeners to distinguish phonemes, the smallest units of sound. Phonological awareness is the ability to hear, manipulate, and identify individual sounds (phonemes) in spoken words. This includes the ability to hear rhyme and alliteration, to perform segmentation, blending, adding, and deleting of phonemes and syllables.

Shared Reading is an interactive reading experience through which the reading process and reading strategies are demonstrated by an experienced reader, the teacher. It is based on the research that indicates that storybook reading is a critically important factor in young children’s reading development (Holdaway, 1979). Shared Reading is accomplished using an enlarged text (generally big books) that all children can see. Student interactivity is the feature that distinguishes Shared Reading from Read Aloud. It may include echo reading, choral reading, or fill in the gap reading. All of these ways of reading are ways to encourage early reading enjoyment and success with a high level of teacher support (Topping & Ferguson, 2005). As children are involved in the process of reading a meaningful text, teachers can demonstrate early reading strategies (Button & Johnson, 1997). Selected books must be suitable for students to join in the experience and must have the possibility of multiple readings for enjoyment. Selections that use predictable text are particularly recommended for emergent and beginning readers (Snow et al, 1998). Some books are predictable because there is a close association between the illustrations and the text in the book; others are predictable because of pronounced rhyme; and some are predictable because of recurring phrases. Predictable texts aid students in their attempts to recognize words and build their confidence as readers (Adams, 1990). During the reading the teacher involves the students in reading together by pointing to or sliding below each word in the text in order to provide children the opportunity to participate and behave like readers. The book is initially read by the teacher, and then in subsequent readings over several days, the children become more interactive. There are many learning opportunities during Shared Reading. The teacher may pause in the reading to ask for predictions as to what will happen next. Because many of the books include predictable text, the children often chime in with a word or phrase. Groups of children or individual children might volunteer or be invited to read parts of the story. Through repeated readings and the predictable text, children become familiar with word forms and begin to recognize words and phrases (Adams, 1990). Once children are familiar with the story, they can focus more closely on the text (Justice & Kaderavek, 2002). Students can hunt for certain letters or high frequency words. Students can find rhyming words or words that begin with a certain sound. Students can determine how many syllables or sounds are in a word. There are many benefits to using the Shared Reading model. Rich, authentic, interesting literature can be used right from the start with children whose word-identification skills would not otherwise allow them access to this quality literature (Mooney, 1994). Each reading of a text provides opportunities for the teacher to model reading for the children and provides opportunities for concept and language expansion. Awareness of the functions of print, familiarity with language patterns, and word-recognition skills grow as children interact multiple times with the same text. Individual needs of students can be more adequately met. Advanced readers are challenged by the interesting, natural language of the texts, while students who are more slowly acquiring reading skills experience success because of the teacher support (Wynn & Laframboise, 1996). This literacy teaching method, highly successful with English speaking students, is very effective with ELL students as well. According to McCauley and McCauley (1992), two important factors for enhancing language learning in all students, but in particular ELL students, are a low-anxiety environment and repeated practice. Shared reading provides for both. During

shared reading children are able to participate in the reading according to their level of ability, understanding, and confidence. Some children will participate with complete proficiency and others with approximations of the actual text. Shared reading allows children to feel safe as their individual mispronunciations are absorbed by the overriding voices of the group. Even children with the least facility in English can experience fluent reading. Repetition is especially necessary for ELL students to acquire their new language. The repeated readings required by the shared reading process help children to grasp the rhythm, pitch, volume and tone of English and reinforce language patterns for ELL students.

Participants

Although the entire class will participate in the Shared Reading process, the study will focus on four of my English Language Learners who began the school year with little or no English oral skills. This group consists of two girls and two boys who are all five years old. All four students were born in the United States. Upon entering school, the students were administered the Idea English Proficiency Test to assess their English listening and speaking ability. The four students scored as follows: Nicholas, the youngest of the group at age 5 years and 0 months, scored intermediate low on his listening level and novice high on his speaking level; Enrrique, age 5 years and 1 month, scored novice low on his listening level and novice low on his speaking level; Cynthia, age 5 years and 3 months, scored intermediate low on her listening level and novice high on her speaking level; Guadalupe, the oldest of the group at age 5 years and 10 months, scored novice low on her listening level and novice low on her speaking level. These scores indicate to me that Nicholas and Cynthia are able to understand some spoken communication in English, but are not as proficient at conveying their own messages to others in English, while Lupe and Enrrique have very little ability to engage in any English interaction at all. All four of these students are delayed in their literacy acquisition when compared to their grade level peers.

Instruction

The Shared Reading experience took place in the front of the classroom in our group time area. This large carpeted area includes floor space for the children to sit, a rocking chair for me, a big book cart, and a CD player for the big books that double as songs. Each week I selected a text which has a teaching point that met the needs of my students. For the purpose of my research project I chose to use big books, but I could also have used another text I had enlarged on chart paper or on the overhead projector. Over the course of a week, I engaged the students in multiple readings of the text. Our Shared Reading sessions lasted approximately 20-30 minutes per day. Each day I gathered the students in our group time area, making sure that the text could be easily seen by everyone. On day 1, I introduced the book, title, author, and illustrator. I activated prior knowledge through group discussion and encouraged students to make predictions based on the front and back covers of the book. I previewed the story with a picture walk, and then read the book for enjoyment, stopping at relevant points to check prior predictions and revise or make new predictions. I encouraged student

participation in the reading as well as personal responses to the text. On days 2 through 5 during subsequent readings, I directed the children’s attention to various aspects of the text, reading strategies, and skills such as concepts of print, picture clues, letter/sound correspondence, word recognition, intonation and expression, new vocabulary, story elements, sequencing, rhyme, building comprehension, and fiction/non-fiction texts. The following is an outline of the specific shared reading activities we engaged in over the course of the project:

Week 1- Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?Day 1- introduce, predict, and read for enjoymentDay 2- read and chart the number of leg on the book charactersDay 3- read and chart the number of syllables in the animal namesDay 4- read and chart real characters vs. make believe charactersDay 5- read and use animal picture cards to sequence the story

Week 2-Have You Seen My Cat?Day 1- introduce, predict, and read for enjoymentDay 2- read and locate periods, question marks, and exclamation marksDay 3- read and cut apart sentences from the text to arrangeDay 4- read and make cat pictures to act out the storyDay 5- read and discuss beginning, middle, end, characters, setting, problem, and solution

Week 3-I Went WalkingDay 1- introduce, predict, and read for enjoymentDay 2- read and compare/contrast to Brown BearDay 3- read and chart initial consonants of animalsDay 4- read and match tails to animalsDay 5- read and use animal picture cards to sequence the story

Week 4-Let’s Go VisitingDay 1- introduce, predict, and read for enjoymentDay 2- read and use animal picture cards to match babies to mothersDay 3- read and chart initial consonants of mother/baby namesDay 4- read and engage in rhyming word study with say, play, and hayDay 5- read and use animal picture cards to sequence the story

Week 5-It Looked Like Spilt MilkDay 1- introduce, predict, and read for enjoymentDay 2- read and go outside to observe and draw cloudsDay 3- read, make symmetrical fold paint cloud, and fill in cloze sentenceDay 4- read and chart living/ nonliving story objectsDay 5- read and use white paper cloud shapes to sequence the story

Data Collection

Over the course of this project I collected the following data: 1. The Catawba County K-2 Literacy Assessment Book and Print Awareness

scores- All students are administered this assessment in August. I used this beginning of the year score for my baseline data. I administered this assessment again at the conclusion of the five weeks to the four students included in my study as comparison data (see example in Appendix A).

2. The Catawba County K-2 Literacy Assessment Phonological Awareness scores- I administered this assessment to the four students included in my study at the beginning of the five weeks for baseline data and again at the conclusion of the five weeks for comparison data (see example in Appendix B).

3. Pre and Post Book Tests- I created a book test for each of the five shared reading books used during the study. Each book test consisted of a list of items found in the books (usually animals and colors) that I wanted my ELL students to be able to identify in English by the end of each week. The book tests were administered to the four ELL students each Monday, prior to any interaction with the texts, and again each Friday, after multiple interactions with the texts (see example in Appendixes C-G).

4. Observational notes on video-taped shared reading lessons- I video-taped shared reading lessons during weeks 1, 3, and 5. As I viewed the video-tapes, I took observational notes on the four students included in my study. I watched specifically for level of engagement and quantity/quality of responses.

5. IDEA English Proficiency Test scores- The IPT is administered to all ELL students at the beginning of the year by the ESL teacher. I obtained the IPT scores from the ESL teacher for the four students included in my study as background information on their ability to listen and speak in English.

Data Analysis

In order to analyze the data, I made photocopies of each student’s pre and post book and print awareness assessment and phonological awareness assessment from their Catawba County K-2 Literacy Booklets. I kept the information organized by storing the copies in folders labeled Book and Print Awareness and Phonological Awareness. Each Monday and Friday, when I completed administering the pre and post book tests, I stored the forms in a folder labeled Language Acquisition. This folder also contained the IPT scores of the four students in my study. After taking observational notes from the three video-taped lessons, I made three copies of the notes and used three different high-lighter colors to code the information as evidence of book and print awareness (blue), phonological awareness (pink), and language acquisition (yellow). These copies were placed in the Book and Print Awareness folder, the Phonological Awareness folder, and the Language Acquisition folder, respectively. I compared the pre and post test scores of the book and print awareness assessment, the

phonological awareness assessment, and each book test, and created bar graphs to organize the results.

Results

In examining the graphs, I found that overall, shared reading had a positive impact on the book and print awareness, phonological awareness, and language acquisition of my ELL students. One area that indicated significant growth was book and print awareness as shown in the graph in table 1.

All four of the students were able to identify the front, back, and title of a book, and could demonstrate the left to right directionality of print with a return sweep. Three of the four were able to identify a period and where to begin reading. On most pages of the test book, Lupe, Nicholas, and Enrrique could not give an exact recount of what had been read to them, but rather approximations of the text; and therefore were not able to demonstrate one-to-one correspondence. Cynthia, who showed the most growth, mastered the book and print awareness assessment by demonstrating one-to-one correspondence, as well as identifying four sight words in the text. Students are considered “on grade level” if they can master the book and print assessment by the end of the second nine weeks of kindergarten. Mastery is achieved with a score of at least 14, with 16 being the highest possible score. An example of the book and print assessment can be found in appendix A.

All four students showed gains in the area of phonological awareness as indicated on the graph in table 2. The gains were small, but significant in that kindergartners usually do not take the initial phonological awareness assessment until December, and mastery is not required in kindergarten. An example of the phonological awareness assessment can be found in appendix B.

Of the four students, most demonstrated some understanding of counting the number of syllables in a word, rhyme recognition, and beginning sound recognition. Areas of need for all of the students included counting the number of words in sentences, rhyme production, deleting initial and final words and sounds, and ending sound recognition. In examining the areas of need, I noticed that these skills were not addressed in the five weeks of shared reading and follow-up activities.

The remaining four graphs shown below give the results for four of the five weekly book tests. One book, Have You Seen My Cat?, did not contain enough information to display on a graph. Examples of the book tests can be found in appendixes C-G. After the first week of research, I was very excited by the results of the Brown Bear book test (table 3). All four students demonstrated some growth, with the two students most limited in the English language, Lupe and Enrrique, showing the greatest gains in language acquisition. The results of the other three book tests (tables 4, 5, and 6) continued to indicate small gains in most of the students; however, no growth was shown by Nicholas on two of the book tests after multiple interactions with the texts (table 4 and table 6). Although Cynthia demonstrated a higher

degree of English proficiency throughout the study, the discrepancy between her and the other three students decreased during the five weeks of research.

As I reviewed the video to make my anecdotal notes, I noticed several points of interest. During the first week of research we used Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? During the shared reading I noticed that Enrrique and Lupe usually just sat and observed the lesson, while Nicholas and Cynthia participated according to their ability, chiming in occasionally on words they knew like “cat” and “looking at me”. Oddly, during student questioning and discussion, it was Cynthia and Enrrique who were able to give correct responses, while Nicholas and Lupe shrugged or gave no response.

By the second video-taped session, which took place during the third week of research, I began to notice increased participation on the part of all four ELL students. Enrrique and Lupe began contributing to the shared reading with the animal names they knew. Nicholas, although extremely squirmy during the lesson, had his full attention on the big book and was participating with approximations of the text, as well as using hand gestures. Cynthia, by this point, was able to participate in the reading with complete proficiency. I noticed all four of the ELL students watching and listening to their English-speaking peers during the questioning, discussion, and follow-up activity. After hearing several peer responses and teacher ideas, the four ELL students felt comfortable enough to participate by choosing one of the answers they had already heard. This option for participation allowed the four ELL students to experience success.

The third video-taped lesson took place during the fifth and final week of the research. We were using It Looked Like Spilt Milk as our shared reading text. I observed all four of the ELL students actively engaged and participating in the reading with few or no approximations. Cynthia and Nicholas even volunteered to “read’ a page of the text to the class independently. During the student questioning and discussion all four students were able to identify valuable concepts of print like front, back, and title of the book, and most were also able to identify a period and where to begin reading.

Discussion

Analysis of the data indicates that participation in shared reading positively influenced my limited and non-English speaking English Language Learners’ literacy knowledge in the areas of book and print awareness, phonological awareness, and language acquisition. Shared reading promoted positive attitudes toward literacy in the ELL students. By participating in shared reading, the students experienced an increased enthusiasm for books and a growing self-esteem as readers. The predictable texts and choral reading provided support for the ELL students at their individual levels of literacy and language acquisition and allowed the students to progress at their own rates. The shared reading process promoted a non-threatening and low-anxiety environment where the ELL students felt free to take risks in interacting with the texts and trying out their new language. The repeated readings of the highly predictable texts with rich, lively language invited participation and positively impacted the ELL students’ nonverbal (pointing to print) and verbal (reading and discussing print) involvement in the activity which helped stimulate and shape their emergent knowledge

about written and spoken language. During shared reading I was able to use engaging texts and authentic literacy experiences to demonstrate reading strategies and model expressive, fluent reading to the ELL students, which is especially important for these children who have had very little book and language experience. Through my research I found that, as in the case with shared reading, literacy strategies that are effective with English speaking students are also effective with English Language Learners when scaffolding and support are provided by the teacher and peers.

Future Directions

I plan to continue to use the shared reading method in my classroom; however there are a few changes I would consider in order to improve the effectiveness of the instruction. First, I would like to go back through each post shared reading activity from the five weeks of research to evaluate the individual effectiveness and impact on student literacy growth. This would allow me to continue to use successful activities, while leaving room for the adaptation and/or replacement of less effective activities. Second, I would like to devise a time-effective method of including the whole class in the weekly book tests. I feel this information would be useful in my planning to re-teach or move on to other concepts and in my grouping of students to teach specific deficiencies. Third, I would like to create a data-base of effective post shared reading activities categorized by book and print awareness, phonological awareness, language acquisition, or other areas (maybe alphabet knowledge/principle). This data-base, although time-consuming to establish, would be easy and efficient in the long run when selecting lessons or activities to meet specific objectives or goals. Fourth, I would like to increase the time spent on each big book from one week to two weeks in order to increase the benefit of the repetitive texts and repeated readings. I believe this would be one way to foster the acquisition of sight word vocabulary. I would also use that additional time to make class books based on the format of the specific big book being used. Fifth, and finally, I would seek to implement specific activities targeted toward improving language acquisition and sight word vocabulary. After my research had concluded, I came across an article (Whole-to-Part Phonics Instruction: Building on What Children Know to Help Them Know More by Moustafa and Maldonado-Colon) describing a shared reading approach followed by explicit word instruction in order to build on children’s prior knowledge of language and words to help them learn new and unfamiliar words. Regrettably, I found this method too late to include in my research; however I am excited about examining its impact on my students’ literacy growth.

Resources

Martin Jr., B. (1996). Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? Orlando, FL: Henry Holt & Co.

Carle, E. (1997). Have You Seen My Cat? London, England: Aladdin Books.

Williams, S. (1990). I Went Walking. San Diego, CA: Gulliver Books.

Williams, S. (1998). Let’s Go Visiting. New York, NY: Gulliver Books.

Shaw, C.G. (1992). It Looked Like Spilt Milk. New York, NY: HarperTrophy Books.

References

Adams, M.J. (1990). Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning About Print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Button, K. & Johnson, M. (1997). The Role of Shared Reading in Developing Effective Early Reading Strategies. Reading Horizons, 37 (4), 262-273.

Holdaway, D. (1979). The Foundations of Literacy. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Justice, L.M. & Kaderavek, J. (2002). Using Shared Storybook Reading to Promote Emergent Literacy. Teaching Exceptional Children, 34 (4), 8-13.

McCauley, J.K. & McCauley, D.S. (1992). Using Choral Reading to PromoteLanguage Learning for ESL Students. The Reading Teacher, 45 (7), 526-533.

Mooney, M. (1994). Shared Reading: Making it Work for You and Your Children. Teaching PreK-8, 25, 70-72.

Snow, C.E., Burns, M.S., & Griffin, P. (1998). Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Topping, K. & Ferguson, N. (2005). Effective Literacy Teaching Behaviours. Journal of Research in Reading, 28 (2), 125-143.

Wynn, M. & Laframboise, K. (1996). Shared Experiences to Scaffold Second Language Learners’ Literacy Acquisition. The New England Reading Association Jornal, 32 (2), 3-9.

Appendix A

Appendix B

Appendix C

Brown Bear, Brown Bear Cynthia Lupe Enrrique NicholasWhat Do You See?

Sight word recognitionwhat ____________________________________do ____________________________________you ____________________________________see ____________________________________I ____________________________________a ____________________________________looking ____________________________________at ____________________________________me ____________________________________

Picture recognitionbear ____________________________________bird ____________________________________duck ____________________________________horse ____________________________________mouse ____________________________________frog ____________________________________cat ____________________________________elephant ____________________________________dog ____________________________________sheep ____________________________________fish ____________________________________

Color/color word recognitionbrown ____________________________________red ____________________________________yellow ____________________________________blue ____________________________________gray ____________________________________green ____________________________________purple ____________________________________pink ____________________________________white ____________________________________black ____________________________________gold ____________________________________

Appendix D

Have You Seen My Cat? Cynthia Lupe Enrrique Nicholas

Sight word recognitionhave ____________________________________you ____________________________________seen ____________________________________my ____________________________________this ____________________________________is ____________________________________not ____________________________________

Picture recognitioncat ____________________________________

Appendix E

I Went Walking Cynthia Lupe Enrrique Nicholas

Sight word recognitionI ____________________________________see ____________________________________what ____________________________________went ____________________________________did ____________________________________you ____________________________________saw ____________________________________a ____________________________________at ____________________________________me ____________________________________looking ____________________________________walking ____________________________________

Picture recognitioncat ____________________________________horse ____________________________________cow ____________________________________duck ____________________________________pig ____________________________________dog ____________________________________

Color/color word recognitionblack ____________________________________brown ____________________________________green ____________________________________pink ____________________________________yellow ____________________________________

Appendix F

Let’s Go Visiting Cynthia Lupe Enrrique Nicholas

Sight word recognitionLet’s ____________________________________go ____________________________________visiting ____________________________________what ____________________________________do ____________________________________you ____________________________________say ____________________________________is ____________________________________ready ____________________________________to ____________________________________play ____________________________________

Picture recognitionfoal/horse ____________________________________calves/cow ____________________________________kittens/cat ____________________________________piglets/pig ____________________________________ducklings/duck ____________________________________puppies/dog ____________________________________

Color/Color Word Recognitionbrown ____________________________________red ____________________________________black ____________________________________pink ____________________________________green ____________________________________yellow ____________________________________

Appendix G

It Looked Like Spilt Milk Cynthia Lupe Enrrique Nicholas

Sight word recognitionsometimes ____________________________________it ____________________________________looked ____________________________________like ____________________________________a ____________________________________but ____________________________________wasn’t ____________________________________

Picture recognitionspilt milk ____________________________________rabbit ____________________________________bird ____________________________________tree ____________________________________ice cream cone ____________________________________flower ____________________________________pig ____________________________________birthday cake ____________________________________sheep ____________________________________great horned owl ____________________________________mitten ____________________________________squirrel ____________________________________angel ____________________________________cloud ____________________________________