It is finally here! The ultimate toolkit for guided reading that will simplify your life while improving your students’ reading comprehension skills at the same time. The best thing about this toolkit is that it works with absolutely ANY fictional text so you can use it all year round. The activities will remain fresh and relevant. Plus, there is a nonfiction task box included too for when you’re reading a nonfiction text with your students. These reading task cards cover everything you need and will soon become your newest teacher companion in the classroom.
What is The Guided Reading Toolkit?
The toolkit features 16 different task boxes that are organized by a specific reading area, skill or strategy. Each task box is filled with purposeful and engaging reading tasks that students can complete directly in their books. That means no worksheets, no running around trying to figure out what learning activities to give them, no waiting at the photocopier and NO PREP. It’s all in the toolkit, ready to go, at anytime.
The task boxes cover various reading areas which ensures that your students are being given a variety of diverse opportunities to expand their repertoire of reading strategies. It enables them to respond to reading in a deeper way and will give them the opportunity to explore the various facets of reading comprehension. Plus, the fact that students can choose which activities to complete in each task box can really EMPOWER them and provide them with a sense of ownership over their learning.
There are reading task boxes included for character work, setting, story structure, vocabulary, author work, before reading, nonfiction texts, character traits, higher order thinking skills, making connections (text to text, text to self and text to world), making predictions, inferring, determining importance, summarizing, synthesizing, visualizing, asking questions and parts of speech. It is packed full!
What Activities Are Included?
All the activities have been carefully selected to ensure they are engaging, relevant and purposeful. The activities range from basic recall to higher order thinking so that there are various options included that will suit your student’s abilities. The great thing is that you can easily differentiate what reading area or skill you want each group/student to focus on by simply switching up the task box. Super easy and no mess.
When Should The Activities Be Completed?
Most of the activities in the guided reading toolkit are designed to be completed after reading except for the ‘Before Reading’ task box as well as some of the making predictions activities in the ‘Reading Strategies 1’ task box. You might even like to use some of the task cards during reading and have students verbally respond to them. The reading task cards can also be used as a fast finisher activity throughout the rest of the week.
Does The Toolkit Include Higher Order Thinking Activities?
Yes! Every single reading task box includes activities that will get your students thinking creatively and critically. Also, there are two dedicated task boxes that are specifically ‘Higher Order Thinking’ task boxes and are filled with activities that your students will find engaging. Your students will literally be disappointed when guided reading time is over. Examples of the higher order activities include:
- Design a t-shirt for the main character. Why would they like this shirt?
- Choose a character. What are 3 things they would wish for. Why would they wish for these things?
- Write a list of things that one of the characters may have in their school bag.
- If you could enter the book as a character, which part of the book would you want to showup in? Why
- Design a bookmark that matches the story.
- Create a birthday card for the main character.
- Choose a character. If they went shopping, what would they buy? Give reasons for your answer.
These are just a few examples of some of the higher order tasks included in the toolkit. These tasks are also great to use as homework or as a project over the school break.
What Do I Do If I Have a Nonfiction Text?
There is a reading task box included which features activities that are specific to nonfiction texts, so when you’re students’ are reading a nonfiction text, provide them with this task box. It’s packed full of activities that will have them exploring the features of nonfiction texts, their purpose and more.
Where can I see more?
The toolkit is available in my store. Click below to check it out!
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