Guided Reading in reception

[Guest]

Hi! I am looking for advice to help improve our guided reading sessions in reception as we have recently been criticised for the way we do it. Currently the teacher sits with a group for 10 to 15 mins while the TA has the rest of the class on the carpet doing phonics games. Anybody got any better ideas that work well? Any ideas appreciated!

[Guest]

we used to split the class and each have 15 children, half in class and half in corridor - big corridor and set up with areas not able to fit in class, e.g. construction, sand. then each do group of 6, with 9 playing maximum. and children knew it was reading day so had to work quietly to help readers. otherwise had to come to adult!!!! they were brilliant. had activities that did not need adult support, and this way no one missed out on teaching time. we'd do a second read with ones not read with at home at story time at end of day. so ta would take 1/2 out to practise words/book or whatever

[Guest]

Oh thanks that sounds good. I need to do something otherwise I can see us having do a formal guided reading time with all children at set activities which we have done before but it just didn't work. I will go back to my reception teachers and see what they think!

[Guest]

We used to have a lot of dead time. When 2 groups were Guided Reading other children looked at books independently or 'played' with holding activities. We Guided read with each child twice weekly and felt that this was too much dead time. Now, one group reads with teacher or TA whilst teacher/TA has the rest of the class for an input. Then at a later time in the day the second group reads and the remaining children have a whole class input. Inputs are varied and often practical and active. It has meant more focused time for us and allows the adult reading to concentrate on just their children so the quality of our guided reading session has really improved.

[Guest]

Thank you! This sounds good too. Can I ask what kid of practical things you did with the whole class?

[Guest]

This is going off topic slightly - sorry. How often do you hear children read independently? Do you only change books after listening to a child read? Thanks for any help/advice

[Guest]

We only listen to children read in their groups once a week at the moment, we would like to increase this though. Yes the children are given new books once the teacher has listened to them.