by Tom

I’ve always believed that preparation is the best way to compensate for an inability to improvise. Improvising in the classroom scares me. Which is exactly why I tend to be somewhat extreme in regards to lesson preparation. I still engineer every lesson to the minute, even after twenty-four years on the job.

That includes our 30-minute silent reading time. I carefully teach my students how to select books from different genres at their independent reading level. I make sure they have time to share and tell about their books, I make sure to give them lessons on decoding and comprehension strategies. I do everything I’ve heard I’m supposed to do to make the most of this 30 minute time. And it works pretty well.

Well, almost…

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