1. art and entertainment
2. books and literature

What Educators Already Know
• Children who do not read over the
summer lose significant academic ground
when they don’t read much over the
summer.
• Any child who fails to read during the
summer break will lose some reading
proficiency.
Short Term Slide
“No matter what children accomplish
during the school year, if they don’t
read over the summer, their learning
stalls or regresses.”
(Cooper, Borman, & Fairchild, 2010).
Long Term Slide
Summer reading loss is cumulative and
creates an achievement gap . . . that
widens over time.
(Allington &McGill-Franzen, 2012)
Summer Success!
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Core Reading Skills
Pillars of Comprehension
Time to Read
Access to Books
Choice, choice,
And more choice!
Volume!
Core Reading Skills
• Decoding
• Fluency
(automaticity, parsing, prosody)
• Stamina
• Comprehension
Time to Read
Reading is a wonderful way to:
• Stave off summer boredom
• Increase vocabulary acquisition
• Improve fluency
• Create background knowledge
Provide Access to Books
• Encourage kids to borrow books over a
vacation.
• Consider going to Cranford Public
Library for a few hours a week over the
summer. They have lots of books to
offer and borrowing is free!
• Brainstorm with your kids a list of
reading opportunities over the
summer, such as car trips and
rainy days.
Choice . . .
“Choice is a powerful factor in
human motivation. Providing
children choice in what they read
fosters engagement and increases
reading motivation, interest, and
effort.”
(Gambrell, Coding, & Palmer, 1996; Worthy & McKool, 1996; Guthrie & Wigfield, 2000).
choice . . .
“Children who are given choices for
summer reading read more and
report higher reading engagement
and motivation after summer ends”
(Richard Allington et al, 2012).
. . . and more choice!
• When offering books for summer
reading, provide students free-choice
options.
• Celebrate children’s book choices.
• When we value all reading, we value
all readers.
Volume!
“We need to balance pleasure with
reading, increasing volume for all
readers and setting up an environment
that manages kids as they choose books,
set goals, and develop a reading habit.”
From Book Love (2013) by Penny Kittle
What Does the Letter Mean?
Guided Reading Levels K-5
5 Q-R-S-T-U-V-W
4 M-N-O-P-Q-R-S-T
3 J-K-L-M-N-O-P-Q
2 E-F-G-H-I-J-K-L-M-N
1 A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J
K A-B-C-D
K*L*M
PLOT: Problem/solution
Want a bike/get a bike
CHARACTER: Accumulating
things about them (they don’t
change much throughout the
book)
TRICKY:
Unknown words
N*O*P*Q
PLOT:
Problem/resolution
Want a bike/get a friend
More than one problem
“Issues” start coming up
CHARACTER: Accumulating things
about them, internal change, infer
about a character*
TRICKY:
*
Figurative Language
R*S*T
PLOT:
Multiple plot lines
Movement of time
“Issues” continue
CHARACTER: Minor characters matter
TRICKY: Setting and symbolism
Language/Description is more
challenging to follow
Recommended Weekly Volume
I and below: 10-12 books
J-K: 8-10 books
L-M: 4-6 books
N-O: 2-4 books
P-Q: 1-2 books
R-T: 1 or more books
U+: 50-70 pages per day
If your child is Level O
or higher . . .
In ____minutes
10
20
30
40
I should read __pages
6-8
12-16
18-24
24-32
Foster Engagement
“Research has proven time and
again that in order for students to
improve, they must read for
l o n g stretches of time, with
just-right material, enjoying their
texts.”
(Allington 2011, Serravallo 2010, Calkins 2000,.)
FLOW
“Flow is the feeling of utter stimulation
that happens when a person becomes
engrossed in a task. It's just like when
we say that we are "in the zone,”
performing some task that brings us
pleasure.”
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (University of Chicago)
Family and Community
Involvement
• Parents who read and share reading
with their children positively
influence children’s future reading
habits.
• Investing time reading aloud and
alongside children over the summer
offers huge benefits!
Reading Challenge
• Complete an entire series.
• Find an author you LOVE!
• Discover a genre you LOVE!
• Read comics or graphic novels.
• Read a book a day.
How Can You Excite
Your Child[ren] to Read
Read to an audience :
• parents
• younger siblings
• grandparents
• neighbors
• and pets . . . !
Make It a Social Event
• Encourage “book dates” as well as
“play dates.”
• Arrange book clubs with friends.
• Have Parent-and-Me clubs, too!
• Partner-read together using two books
with your child.
Engage Other Senses
• Turn on the closed captioning when
your children are watching television.
• Listen to books-on-tape in the car,
while walking, or at the beach! The
Cranford Public Library has a nice
selection. Download interactive and
e-books to smartphones and
iPads using Audible.com.
The Importance of Talk
• Real readers talk about books.
• Don’t jot!
Series Books
“There is a strong correlation between
series books and lifetime readers. No
one becomes a lifetime reader without
discovering a joy of reading, an intrinsic
joy. Almost always, one step in that joy
is the reading of series books.”
G. Robert Carlsen and Anne Sherrill:
Voices of Readers: How We Come to Love Books
“Since writing is the act of transmitting
knowledge in print, we must have have
information to share before we can write
it. Therefore, reading plays a major role
in writing. At the same time, practicing
writing helps children build their reading
skills. . . . The two skills reinforce and
strengthen each other.”
Writing Ideas
• Write letters in the sand.
• Write letters and post cards to family,
friends or teachers!
• Start a neighborhood vacation journal
with friends or a dialectic journal with
parent.
• iPads apps for letter practice and
recognition.
• Write and read jokes.
• Use mad libs to write silly stories.
Active games
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Sidewalk chalk: Spelling and Letter lD
Scavenger/treasure Hunt Using Riddles
I-Spy, Went to picnic… with Letters
Jump rope rhymes: fluency and phonemic
awareness
• Jokes (make Brown Es): letter recognition
• Short impromptu films: idea generation
• Puppets and theater: narrative technique
Lauren Antolino
Cranford Public Library
Children’s Librarian
Access hyperlink. Please scroll down to
see the online resources as well as
upcoming events.
Cranford Public School
Media Specialists
Pat Pavlak, Orange Avenue School
Beth Waxman, Hillside Avenue School
Arline McCloskey, Bloomingdale and Brookside
Sandra Romano, Walnut and Livingston
More Parent Resources
readkiddoread.com (for all levels)
Readalikes such as NoveList
Book Wizard (Scholastic)
Newsela
Barnes and Noble’s Summer Reading:
Imagination’s Destination