Free Voluntary Reading is super important to me as a teacher. I save the last ten minutes of every class period to allow my students the opportunity to read to self. My students love it, too! I wrote a post a couple years ago on how I organize my classroom library and reading program. You can check it out by clicking the link.
Just like anything else as a teacher, you tweak and revise things over the years. I made a couple changes to my FVR time this year that have proven to be successful. I want students to read books of their choice for fun/ not an assignment, but I also want to ensure they have actually read them. Here is my first tweak: I used to pick up the books they would bring to me and ask about 5-6 comprehension questions verbally. Now, I hand the students a die, and they roll to see how many questions I will ask them. They enjoy this more and since it is random, they still have to be prepared. This saves us a lot of time.
The second change I have made is to do away with the students writing down book titles they are reading in a student log. They always hated that part. It was also double the work, because I write down their book titles to keep up with what books they are checking out. I found a freebie on TPT that has adorable monthly reading logs where students just color in a small picture for each book they have read. After we have a quick roll and retell, students color in the next picture on their sheet. Once they have a whole row colored in, they can visit my candy bin. When the whole sheet is completed, they can visit my prize box. And... when the whole group finishes a sheet, we have a reading celebration with board games and treats.
The last change is that my school has moved to using F & P reading levels so I have added the letter that corresponds to the Lexile that I already had labeled on my books. I give my students a small range that they can choose their retell books from and then they can pick another book of any level to read for pure enjoyment.
The things I haven't changed: getting my students involved in selecting the books I order to put on my shelves, having a set aside non-negotiable time for reading every day, assessing my students with running records peridocially and watching them move up in their reading abilities.
Happy Adventuring,
Heidi
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