Promotion of Reading: A WholeSchool Approach Maria Ng Ronica Chan Carmel Secondary School 1 Outline 2 whole-school approach integration of extensive reading into ELT curriculum - salient factors - impact on learning: Jazzy home-school cooperation feedback Background 3 an EMI school lower Band 1 intake students: - mostly from working-class families - little English language support at home - lack exposure to English in everyday life Whole-School Promotion of Reading 4 Past: the job of language panels Now: the job of all panels, librarians, students, parents & PTA Theme 2000-2002: "Broaden Horizons - Be Active Readers" Whole-school Promotion of Reading 5 reading schemes for students and parents book exhibitions seminars and workshops on reading conducted by teachers or local writers visits to public libraries reading camps reading-related competitions publication of a newsletter on reading: "Books for Keeps" "Ten Thousand and Beyond" Reading Competition 6 Competition: individual & class awards Collective Effort: the target of 10,000 books Parent-Child Reading Scheme (organized by PTA & school library) a student + family a log book student parent: share reading orally log book: date, book title and a grade (interest level), parent's/student’s signature 7 8 Books for Keeps Teachers, students, & even caretakers contribute Teachers as readers & role models Students as readers & resource persons 9 School Library 10 provides a comfortable reading area organizes reading schemes & readingrelated activities promotes reading to parents stocks books for students and parents arranges visits to book stores Student Empowerment as student librarians as resource persons – Books for Keeps select & recommend books for purchase "The selected books are screened by teachers, but the school usually buys the books we recommend because we know what other students want to read.“ (Gigi, an S.5 student) 11 Effectiveness: average number of library books checked out per day 1998-1999 1999-2000 89 112 2000-2001 2001-2002 2002-2003 217 224 192 (SARS) 243 Sept 2003Dec 2003 12 Integration of Extensive Reading into the ELT Curriculum 13 Formal Curriculum - ERS lessons - Project work on reading habits - Class readers - Home reading Informal Curriculum - Story-sharing corner Salient factors 14 teacher-student/ student-student dialogue: sharing stories orally & in writing integration of reading & writing: home reading meaning-making exploration of language use student-student dialogue: story-sharing corner Story-sharing is "interaction of ideas between students of different forms." (Gloria, S.2) "I prefer students to share their story with us, rather than reading from a script. There should be some interaction." (Vicky, peer-tutor, S.3) "I ask them to share the story, not just open the book and tell us what it is about." (Kaiser, peer-tutor, S.3) Student Empowerment 15 teacher-student dialogue: home reading 16 Jazzy’s home reading entry dated 25 November 1998 1st March, 1999 17 Meaning-making "When I was a story-teller in S.1, I felt nervous. I was afraid of making mistakes. I didn't know how to translate my thoughts from Chinese into English. I then tried to speak, disregarding the mistakes I made...I gained more confidence, and I became a peer-tutor in S.3.“ (Jennifer, S.5) "I learned to be less shy. I had to speak clearly in order to make others understand me. This also helped my oral skills." (Catherine, S.2) 18 Meaning-making 28th Dec, 1998 19 Exploration of Language Use 20 "Usually we don't have much chance to read out the vocabulary we have just learnt, but the story-sharing corner provides a place for us to try out the new vocabulary we've learnt and consolidates our knowledge of new words." (May, S.3) Exploration of Language Use 17th Nov, 1999 21 Impact on Learning: Jazzy Home-School Cooperation 22 Concluding remarks 23 Reading culture develops over time Schools can - create opportunities for it to develop - encourage students to interact not only with a text, but with one another about a text - integrate reading with writing (see also Exemplar 5) - explore, experiment, & evaluate excel (4Es)