What is Reader's Workshop

Each day we spend an hour of our morning in Reader's Workshop. At the beginning of Kindergarten, this time is a little shorter due to the length of time young children are able to work independently. In the workshop, we begin with a 10 minute mini-lesson where the children come to the floor and I teach them a reading strategy. For the first couple weeks of school, our mini-lessons revolve around the rituals and routines of our workshop such as "What Good Reader's Do" or " How to Read a Book". This is also the time that we start introducing our Literary Stations which we will begin this week. After our mini-lesson, the students return to their seats with his/her own book bin and read for about 10 minutes quietly. At the beginning of Kindergarten the book bins contain books that are simple ABC books, books from home, nursery rhyme notebooks, and maybe a favorite book from the room. We also include one of our Star Books in each child's bag so he/she can practice retelling familiar books (especially with the puppets we made in class). Although most children at this time are unable to read, they mimic reading practices by what has been modeled for them such as predicting what the book will be about, pointing to the words, looking at beginning sounds, and looking at the pictures. As the year progresses the books will become books that are "just right" for them individually. After independent reading, the students work in Literacy Stations. Once again they are reading during this time. The last 10 minutes of our workshop is our closing. Here they are able to discuss what they learned from our mini-lesson that day and how they applied that during their reading time. The closing is very important to our workshop because it provides students the opportunity to discuss their own learning and how that impacts what we are doing in the classroom. Ask your child each day what he/she did in Reader's Workshop. You will be amazed!