My Creed

I remember having to do this at one of our courses. I felt that this was a good time to revisit.

· I believe that all children can learn to read.

· I believe that all teachers are teachers of Reading.

· I believe that the new literacies will increase my enthusiasm for teaching and learning.

· I believe that I must step out of my comfort zone so that my students will benefit from my new found knowledge and experiences.

· I believe that I can scaffold instruction to support my struggling readers so that they can become striving readers.

· I believe that I can integrate technology into my classroom successfully and create a rich literacy environment for my students.

Multiliteracies

How have the multi literacies changed my perspective on Reading? The creation of digital books , the scaffolding of instruction and the ability to combine traditional and new literacies will no doubt remain with me.

We’ve come through so many phases in terms of new strategies and what it takes to motivate our students to read. Nothing compares to the multi literacies. Multiliteracies are the literacies we use today: technological, visual, media and information literacies. As educators we are impressed by what we have seen and the potential such literacies possess in terms of motivating our struggling readers to striving readers. We are excited and eagerly a wait the reopening of school so that we can introduce these multi literacies to our students and staff.

We need to keep abreast with the technology and its integration in the classroom. This course gave us the opportunity to empower ourselves and embrace the multi literacies. Let us use our new found skills to make striving readers.

“Struggling readers become striving readers when teachers scaffold instruction in the use of strategies that support learning.” Vacca R.,& Vacca J.,(2008). Content Area Reading. Boston : Pearson

Technology in schools

These sessions have all been eye openers. As Technology unfolds, we are all motivated by all we have seen and experimented/ practised. We are aware of the numerous challenges facing us.

· No Internet in schools

· No furnished computer labs

· No computer labs

· Teachers who are not “digital ready”

· Teachers who need to be trained

· Teachers who are not willing to keep with the times

· Administrators who are not willing to incorporate the technology for whatever reason

Sylvester R., & Greenidge W., (2008) list a number of challenges teachers may face using digital stories. They also stated that perhaps struggling writers may be motivated to use digital technologies because they are more literate in new literacies and use them to scaffold traditional literacy.( Reading Teacher 63(4)pgs. 284-295

Struggling Readers

I am aware that there are many factors contributing to our students scoring less than 30%. Reading seems to be the major issue in most cases. How then can we put into practice what we have been exposed to with these children at our school ( not only our class)who are underachieving?

· Is administration willing to listen to/ discuss your suggestions?

· What challenges do you perceive in administering support to our struggling readers?

For me , at my school the major challenges are

· Time management

· Teacher Support and Training

· Parental Involvement

However, we have been exposed to so many creative ideas that we must be able to share with our colleagues and struggling readers. It would be terrific to adopt one struggling reader and work closely with him/her for an academic school year implementing and monitoring these new literacies.

Digital Storytelling

I enjoy a good story. digital storyteling has takenthe art of storytelling one notch higher. imagine what this can do for Creative Writing. Our students will be eager to produce their own stories and share with friends. Our struggling writers can benefit from this exercise. They will be able to use the storyboard to help with the planning and then introduce the events in a logical sequence.
Digital Storytelling gives students a reason to write and incorporate their artistic and drama skills.

those wonderful Ebooks

Wow! those ebooks are really exciting. this would certainly make our struggling readers happy. I think this is a wonderful skill/ strategy that all teachers should be exposed to. It is simple yet a powerful learning tool.

As educators, our job is to motivate our pupils and also to share our knowledge with other educators, especially those teachers who are always willing to try new ideas with their class. I enjoyed this activity. Guess it would be fun to do this through the eyes of a child.

Reading Specialist

My passion is the struggling reader. This course has enlightened and empowered me at the number of novel strategies at our finger tips to help our struggling readers. As Reading Specialists, we are the guardian angels to those children who struggle academically, especially in reading. It is painful to see our children with a” Lost” look and no light in their eyes as they struggle each day at school. The combination of technology and the “50 Content Area Strategies for Adolescent Literacy “ Douglas fisher …et al (2007) (Hope you remember that book:)are strong tools for us to assist both the class teacher and struggling reader