Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Miscues: Reading Strategies

Has this happened to you when you listen to a beginning reader? The text says, "Dad cooked a meal and the rain came down," and your child reads, "Dad cooked a mill and the rain comes down." You might be thinking, "oh no what do I do she missed two words in the sentence." But don't worry this ok. Beginning readers often have many miscues while reading. Miscues refer the he readers' unexpected responses to written text.

When listening to children read, many teachers and adults refer to miscues as errors. Errors are perceived as negative and teachers often correct these errors for children. It is believed if teachers don't intervene and correct these errors then children will continue to make them all their lives. "However,after a half century of miscue analysis research and practice,there is no doubt that ALL readers make miscues and that reading development CANNOT occur without them (Brown, Goodman, Marek 1996). Also, we must trust the child's learning process. Their miscues will change over time with practice and as the child learns from the text as they read. Children will develop reading strategies and their miscues will become more sophisticated.

Some ways to support children's growth are demonstrate reading strategies and demonstrate what a miscue is and what you did to make the miscue and how you learned from it. When teachers model this they instill confidence in their students and it helps students see that everyone makes miscues even teachers. Another way is to record a child as they read a text. Then have the child listen to the recording of themselves with you. They can hear their miscues and both the teacher and the child can work together to develop strategies. It's a team effort and the teacher is not correct the miscues they are working with the child so that the child identifies their own miscues and develops strategies to prevent and improve miscues.

References: Owocki, Gretchen and Goodman, Yetta. 2002. Kid watching: Documenting children's literacy development. Portsmouth: NH:Heinemann.

No comments:

Post a Comment