Toodles to Reading Logs...

Wow, it's 11 p.m. I'm still up, I'm not sleepy...

I love summer vacation!

Of course I can't turn my mind off ...doesn't matter if it's January or June, I'm still thinking about my classroom.  Here are my latest thoughts and I was hoping you'd weigh in with yours.

I've always wondered about reading logs.  I've sent them home ever since I started teaching.  Never really gave it much thought for the first 6 years or so.  Then my own little guy started school and I encountered the "READING LOG" {said in booming voice} from the other side of the school bus...as the mom.  My once voracious reader was limiting his reading to the prescribed twenty minutes.  No more. No less.  This bugged me, but I figured once he got used to the idea of having to fill out a reading log nightly he'd forget to watch the clock and would go back to enjoying a good read.

Friends, it never really happened - he's going into fifth grade!  What really got me where it hurts was seeing my youngest, who's going into second grade next year doing the same darn thing!!!!  I'm sure this can't be said for all kids. I'm sure there are kids out there who could log in more hours than their reading log would fit...but my kids are bound hard and fast to that twenty minutes a night that their teachers have deemed "enough".  {ETA: I love my kids' teachers!  Hi Mrs. P - who I know reads this - I'm a reading log teacher too..I'm only rethinking things professionally}

I read this article some time ago and revisited it tonight...

{click here to read}

...and I really think I may do away with reading logs next school year.  I'm at least willing to give it a try.  I don't know what I'm afraid of??!  Going against the norm? My students to stop reading at home entirely?  Maybe it's the reading log that makes them the readers they become at the end of the year?

Really, I'm 99.999999% sure I'm going to do it.  I'm going to let the parents know that I don't need a reading log to tell me whether or not they're reading at home nightly with their child.  I'll know just by how they read in class.

I send home two books nightly - one that's at their instructional level that we've read in class in a guided reading group, and one book of their choosing from their "bookshelves".  This book is at their independent level.  This one should be super easy to help build fluency and expression.  If my kiddos come to school the next day sounding as if the re-read is a cold read - I'll know they didn't read.  I won't need an unsigned reading log to tell me that.  Right?

I'm curious what your thoughts are....

I'm still thinking....

But I'm pretty much decided....

Like 99.9999999% sure.....

Hmmmm......