Guided Reading: How it Compares to Other Approaches

Guided reading is an approach used by some schools to develop pupil reading skills.

Pupils are put into small groups according to their ability and they read the same text together. They are supported by a teacher or teaching assistant to help them to understand the meaning of the text, as well as the decoding of words.

Benefits of guided reading

1) It allows an adult to provide targeted support to pupils.

2) Develops reading fluency and comprehension skills.

3) Encourages pupils to apply reading strategies independently.

How is guided reading different to whole class reading?

With whole class reading, everyone in the class reads the same text together. This means that the teacher can pitch the book slightly above the class reading level to extend vocabulary. It can create a community like experience where everyone reads and chats about the same book. It is a great opportunity to expose pupils to texts they might not have otherwise read. It could be a novel, non-fiction, informational texts or whatever the teacher deems appropriate.

Pageticker and guided reading

On Pageticker, our online reading record, teachers can assign or recommend texts to pupils. On the parent app, pupils can choose to give a book a rating, or write a review, if they wish, so a teacher can quickly see how pupils are responding to a book.

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