Listening Center in First Grade
Using Audiobooks to Foster a Love for Reading (Virtual Tour)
Stage of Literacy Development:
Stage 0: Foundation for LiteracyStage 1: Beginning Literacy
Ages:
4-8
Grade Range:
K 1st 2ndFood Groups:
Primary: Motivation for Literacy Secondary: Oral Language & ELL
Transcript
One of the centers that is part of Daily Five is Listen to Reading. It's the opportunity for my students to come sit here with a partner and use the CD player with headphones so nobody else can hear what they are listening to. One of the things that I recommend to have in this center is a bin with just a few of these books, five perhaps, no more than that, which allows them to quickly find one that they would like to listen to as opposed to having a bin with many of them. Which is what I used to do before and then I realized that my students were spending the whole time just trying to find a book that they wanted to listen to. Since there is two of them, sometimes one found something but the other one didn't like that. "No, let's keep looking". When it's time to tidy up, they never got to listen to any of the books. That way, you keep it to a minimum of five. They will tell you when it's time to listen to all of them, it happens in obviously a few weeks and then you replenish them with the other big bin that I have full of these audio books or books that come with a CD.
Related References
Additional Links:
Reading Rockets: Benefits of Audiobooks for All Readers http://www.readingrockets.org/article/benefits-audiobooks-all-readers
Activity Objective
The goal of Listening Center in First Grade: Using Audiobooks to Foster a Love for Reading (Virtual Tour) is to develop early readers' motivation for literacy by listening to audiobooks during the Daily Five. Students listen to an audiobook with a partner and choose from a small selection of books chosen by the teacher. This provides students with much of the excitement of a read aloud while freeing up the teacher to work with other students.
Quick Tips
Additional Comments:
- Sharing books with a partner at the Listening Center helps students focus and also provides them with an opportunity for follow-up activities using props to support them in acting out the story or in discussing new information they learned from nonfiction texts. - Providing students with fewer book options prevents them from endlessly searching for a book. - Change the book options every week or so to keep students engaged in the material. - Well-selected illustrated books at the Listening Center can also extend ELL students understanding of language and vocabulary.
Other Recipes by this Teacher
What are We Doing in Class Today?: Motivating Beginning Readers with a Daily Schedule (Virtual Tour)
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Literacy CAFE in First Grade: Fostering Independence using a Menu of Strategies (Virtual Tour)
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The Daily 5 in First Grade: Engaging Students with a Balanced Literacy Approach (Virtual Tour)
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Predicting and Inferring: Scaffolding Comprehension Strategies using an Explicit Framework (Virtual Tour)
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Revising and Editing in First Grade: Using Success Criteria to Focus the Writing Process (Virtual Tour)
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