Teaching Reading and Writing Using Mentor Text

Help inspire my students to write like published authors and think critically about books they read. I teach twenty-two 3rd grade students in a public school where funds are limited but expectations and demands are high.

My school system is very test driven. Administrators, teachers, families, and even students feel tremendous pressure to do well on our state mandated, standardized reading, writing, and math assessments. Even though I teach strategies to help my students do well on standardized, multiple choice tests, I feel it's more important to inspire my students to think critically about their reading and to aspire to writing quality pieces. If students can achieve those skills, they will be better prepared for being 21st century learners as well as will have gained needed knowledge to do well on state mandated standardized tests.

A colleague recently shared a resource with me that teaches students to apply taught, research-based comprehension strategies (ex. visualizing, making inferences, identifying the main idea, making connections and predictions, etc.) to authentic literature. To teach the comprehension strategy, I start by reading an authentic picture book as a shared read aloud. That books serves as a mentor text. I guide students to apply the comprehension strategy to that text. As the week progresses, students begin applying that same strategy to their self-selected independent reading books. Students utilize those taught comprehension strategies when reading increasingly difficult text. I will be teaching students strategies that real readers use! (Not just test taking strategies to pass a test!) This resource also includes a writing component. Similar to the reading, I use authentic picture books as mentor texts to demonstrate how real published authors use the writing strategies I teach. For example, students can see how Cynthia Rylant used sensory details to enhance the book, In November. They can then use the taught strategy to apply to their own piece of writing.

I purchased the teacher resource book with the school money that I had. However, I do not have enough school funds available to purchase the picture books that go along with the reading and writing lessons. I want my students to have access to these picture books in the classroom so they can revisit the books and gather ideas when reading and writing. Your help will ensure that not only my students will do well on the state mandated standardized tests, but more importantly will inspire them to be life long learners.