What Research Has to Say About Reading Instruction - International ...

• Instructional decision-making: Using data to determine student
needs and to implement appropriate interventions and activities
to support student achievement
Materials
For each participant:
✓ Chapter 1 of What Research Has to Say About Reading Instruction
(ensure that each participant has a copy of the book
✓ Three index cards
✓ Learning log
For you:
✓ Chart paper and markers
Session Activities
Initiating learning
Ask participants to think about best practice in reading instruction
and the components of effective teaching. Then, in a three-minute
conversation with a partner, they should consider what role research
findings play in determining best instructional practices.
Interactive group design
Save the Last Word (Beers, 2002; Short, Harste, & Burke, 1996) is an
activity designed to help learners summarize what they have read,
connect it to other texts or to their own experience, make inferences,
and draw conclusions.
1. Working individually, group members should review and
consider one section of Chapter 1: “What Is Research?” (pp.
10–13), “Reading Research: What It Is and Why It Is Valuable”
(pp. 13–16), or “How Research Is Used” (pp. 17–22). Ensure
that each of the three sections is covered by approximately the
same number of people.
2. Have participants record up to three key items of learning or
passages from the text that stand out and note each on an index
card. On the back of each card, they should write why they
found this passage to be important.
From the Professional Development Edition of What Research Has to Say About Reading Instruction
(3rd ed.), © 2009 International Reading Association.
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