I have my largest class ever 26 students. I am trying to figure out how to have reading groups with this many students. I have always had three reading groups that were grouped by ability. I know this will not work with the number of students that I have. I am interested in knowing how other teachers are grouping. I'm thinking by learning style or by concept.....or maybe not seeing every group every day? How do you group your students? How often do you see them and for how long?
I group my students based on reading strategy that they need to work on. I meet with my lowest group every day (sometimes my lowest two groups---depending on needs). I may only meet with my highest group once a week and then have individual conferences with them at least one other time during the week.
I have 30+ students. I have 2 low groups, 2 on grade level and 2 above grade level. I have to have 5-7 in a group and no I don't meet with everyone every day. It's impossible with the amount of time we have AND 2nd graders can only be engaged for so long....
I always give a pre-test on the skill we will be working on and then group them according to how they scored on the pre-test. I usually have 3-4 in a group and meet with 2-3 groups per day that we do guided reading.
I group more by the skill they need to work on and then by ability level. For example-if 1/2 the class needs to specifically work on comprehension-I would then split those groups by whether we could use a higher or lower level text. I see every student at least every other day. My groups are no larger than 4 kids, but it's not very long about 10 minutes each. We review a phonics/spelling skill and then do choral reading with the text, typically. I know it's not possible for many to work with every group every day. But please don't forget about those high kids. They need practice and guidance one-on-one with you too.
Thanks for all the responses. I'm thinking about working on skills with my lows and mid students and doing readers workshop with my highs....Let me know what you think.
We are encouraged to organise mixed-ability groups, so I mix them up as much as possible. When they are together it is possible to pitch your lesson to support all ability levels and the more advanced students gain a lot from helping the students who are still learning the concepts.
I only have 18 students for guided reading, but I make four groups because they are such a wide spread of abilities. I group mine by DRA, and meet with all of them everyday (I do 20 minute lessons).
