1-Being that Im a Middle School Language Arts teacher, I initially was not very excited about this course;

however, once I met Wendy and heard her present the material we would be learning about in RLR 501, I decided to keep an open-mind. It ends up that I learned a great deal of information relating to developing readers, and because I teach middle school aged students, they can all be classified as developing reader, so the information was and will be pertinent to my practice as a reading teacher. 2-First and foremost, I learned what Balanced Literacy is and why it is important, especially in the Middle School language arts classroom. Balanced literacy begins with creating a genuine appreciation forgood literature... It is a comprehensive program of language arts acquisition and contains all of the components necessary for students to master written and oral communication. It includes teaching phonics, grammar skills, reading and comprehension strategies, and writing forms and skills. Additionally balanced literacy includes direct and indirect reading instruction, shared reading, and independent reading experiences, which I personally learned the most about in this course. The overall idea of Balanced Literacy is that as teachers, we need to help our students learn to read in the way that works best for them, and through this course, I became well-versed in an array of theories and strategies that I can use with my students for many years to come. 3-One of the first strategies we learned about was Word Study, in which Words Their Way was introduced. The book had a wealth of information, including phonics, vocabulary, and spelling instruction. One strategy that particularly resonated with me was spelling inventories. Spelling inventories consist of lists of words specifically chosen to represent a variety of spelling features at increasing levels of difficulty. The lists are not exhaustive in that they do not test all spelling features; rather, they include orthographic features that are most helpful in identifying a students stage and corresponding planning instruction. Students take an inventory as they would a spelling test, and then the results are analyzed to obtain a general picture of their orthographic development. For me, spelling inventories proved to be a good baseline for word study. It was rather surprising to me that the majority of my students (in 8 th grade) were at the transitional spelling level. Prior to assessing the students, I truly thought they would be in the Intermediate or Advanced Stages. This told me that we really needed to focus on word study in order to improve their overall literacy. 4-The next strategy that stood out to me was running records. Running records Monitor student progress in reading. They also help us (as teachers) learn what skills/strategies students use when reading. They focus on specific needs of individual students and/or can be used to group students with similar needs. Most importantly, running records help students or teachers choose books at the appropriate Lexile level for the appropriate purpose. They are an excellent way to assess what level a student can read at and more so comprehend. This is extremely important to know, because if a student is reading a text that is too hard, it is likely that he or she will not understand the text. So far this year, I have assessed all of my students using the Benchmark Assessment

System, which is commonly referred to as BAS, in order to identify their instructional and independent reading levels. Moving forward, I intend to BAS my students each semester in order to see how much they have improved as readers. 5-Another beneficial component of the class was learning about book talks. The purpose of a booktalk is to "sell" a particular book. As the presenter, one wants to give enough of the plot to interest the audience without giving a summary of the book and certainly never giving away the ending. The main purpose of a booktalk is to grab the audience's interest and make them want to read the book. I feel that booktalks are a great tool to use with middle school students, especially in the urban setting, because they need to discover engaging books that will keep their interest, and what better way to grab their attention than by engaging them from the start. I actually did a booktalk on The Most Beautiful Place in the World by Ann Cameron, and one of my audience members went out and bought the book that night, so it was a success in my eyes! 6-Independent reading is another theory that we studied in this course. Research shows that independent reading is a vital component of student success. Studies have found that the amount of time students spend doing independent reading was the best predictor of reading achievement and also the best predictor of the amount of gain in reading achievement made by students between second and fifth grade. Among the many benefits of independent reading is building fluency. Research suggests that unless students can accurately and effortlessly deal with the word-identification demands of reading, difficulties will result in comprehension and overall reading achievement. Additionally, one of the best-established relationships in the field of reading is the very significant relationship between vocabulary development and achievement in reading (Baumann & Kameenui, 1991; Nagy, 1988). There is also evidence that shows that independent reading is probably the major source of vocabulary acquisition beyond the beginning stages of learning to read. Independent reading also builds background knowledge by linking students' reading ability to the amount of interrelated information they have about the topic about which they are reading. Needless to say, when I have my own classroom next year, independent reading will be a daily routine. 7-Overall, I learned a great deal in this course, and Im very excited to start implementing many of the theories and practices in my own classroom. In utilizing everything I learned in RLR 501, its going to be very important that I continue educating myself and staying current on the research and practices, and I plan to do so by attending various professional development courses and of course by reading (no pun intended!).