From Birth to Pre-School, When we Learn to Learn!
4th Grade to Adult, When we Read to Learn!
Sustained Silent Reading (SSR) is that part of a school day where students read silently for 20 minutes with a book of choice, in hopes that reading comprehension is the focus. It’s pretty much the only time of the school day that students can choose their own books from the school library or bring a book from home to read. The rest of the day academics is closely monitored and instruction is based on their learning ability.
According to Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory SSR has not yet been proven to increase fluency and overall reading ability (2007). So why is SSR being used as part of the instructional day? The goal of SSR is to give students a chance to read for comprehension and enjoyment. Okay, so sometimes SSR is done after recess, so everyone, including the teacher, have a chance to unwind after running around for 20 minutes.
So what happens when 32 - 42 fifth graders from one classroom are making their own choices on books? Well, this is what I’ve seen, as a special education teacher: students bring books like “Twilight” by Stephenie Meyer, and their reading level according to Accelerated Reader (AR) is 2.1. (AR is a computerized assessment tool with a purpose to accelerate learning in every student by giving each a student a reading level and baseline for choosing books.) For 20 minutes the student is pretending to read “Twilight”, heck, half of the girls in the class are reading it too! (But probably not struggling to read it.)
AR is a great resource to use to get that reading baseline. But this program is primarily purchased by school districts. Parents and parent models cannot afford this type of program. So where do parents go to check that their child is making the right choices on SSR book titles. One way to give their children the reading advantage is to know what to look for when choosing the right books.
Parents can give their own Informal Reading Inventory (IRI) to give an initial idea of a child's reading level. It will also, measure the Independent reading level, Instructional reading level, and Frustration reading level. These assessments are simple to give and easy to find. Look toward reading club websites such as read2meclub.com, where parents will learn simple steps in giving their child or any child an IRI. And it can be done while you’re at a bookstore or standing in front of a book display and your child is begging you to buy them those popular book titles.
The website also provides support for starting a reading club at home, which could be closely monitored by the parent with strategies their child can take into the classroom as a student to be used during SSR. With this simple plan, parents can help their children make wise choices for reading books. This is the purpose of “Sustained Silent Reading”, without relying on research that takes years to compile, while our struggling readers do not get any closer to the achievement gap.