6 Reasons to Use Reader's Theatre in Your Classroom

Reader's Theatre: not just for beginning readers! 

I just love using reader's theatre in my classroom! Reader's theatre is defined as a group of readers who "perform" a grade-level text for an audience, usually without scenery, props, costumes, and most importantly, without the stress and pressure of students memorizing their lines.

Here are 6 reasons why you should be using reader's theatre in your classroom too!

1. Increases Reading Fluency

Research shows that students who read with fluency have better comprehension of the texts they read. Reader's theatre scripts help increase oral reading fluency as students need to practice their parts numerous times before they perform them to their audience.

2. Encourages Reluctant Readers

You will find that reader's theatre is a great motivation for your lowest readers. Mine tend to choose to take on major roles (narrator, main characters) and have truly risen to the occasion. Seeing their faces when they perform in front of their peers and their grown ups makes my teacher heart soar! I've even had a few parents come up to me after the performance, thanking me for helping to build their child's confidence.

3. Encourages Fluent Readers

Fluent readers benefit too, as they can focus on the expression in their dialogue and are able to dig deeper when exploring the genre and their characters.

4. Allows Students to Perform and Practice Public Speaking Skills

Do you have any actors and actresses in your class? Or maybe you do, but they just haven't been discovered yet! Reader's theatre allows students to be dramatic and "ham it up" in front of their classmates and grown ups. We also used our performances as an opportunity for students to practice projecting their voices and not holding their scripts in front of their faces!

5. Increases Student Focus and Engagement

In order for reader's theatre to be successful, all readers in the group need to be paying attention, ready to read when it's their turn. Nobody wants to be put on the spot when they aren't ready to say their lines.

6. It's Easy and Fun!

OK, so I know that sounds like a weak reason, but really it's not. Who has time to create scenery, costumes and props for a play? I sure don't! Reader's theatre is super easy to implement. You'll also find your students are so excited to perform their script in front of their audience. It's so fun to watch your class take ownership and lead their groups through the performances.


Now that we know why, let's talk about how.

I typically take about a week and a half for our reader's theatre unit. I like to use reader's theatre at the end of the school year (when teaching seems more like crowd control) due to reason number 5 above :) Here's a brief breakdown on how I implement it:

DAY 1

I first start by introducing the drama genre and the characteristics of the genre. I consulted a friend of mine, who is a theatre director at my local high school for a list of characteristics. I was also fortunate to have a student this year who performs in the plays at the local chidren's playhouse, so I let her do most of the talking :)

DAY 2

Then we talk about the difference between a play and reader's theatre. I introduced the four scripts we were going to use and gave a brief synopsis of each. Then I picked names at random for students to choose their parts.

DAY 3

We discuss the importance of fluency and expression and using a loud, sharing voice (level 4 voice in my room). We also talk about making sure you're following along when it's not your turn to speak, so that you are ready when it IS your turn.

DAYS 4-8ish

Then it's time to practice! I assigned each group a corner of the room. We practiced two times a day for 5 days. I also let them read their parts in the script during Read to Self. Gauge your class to see if you need more or fewer days to practice.


A few days before the performance, we sent out invitations. We invited our families to come in to see us perform.

Click HERE if you want a freebie copy of the invite

PERFORMANCE DAY!

On the day of the performance, we decided on the order in which the plays would be performed. I just picked student names at random, and if I picked a group member's name, then that whole group would go. I set up the chairs at the front of my classroom. Students picked a chair ahead of time, so that there wouldn't be any confusion or two kids going for the same chair. Before our families came, I pushed all the desks to the back of my classroom and pulled as many chairs as I could for the grown ups. Then my students sat on the floor in front of them.

The trickiest part of implementing reader's theatre... finding reader's theatre scripts that are appropriate for your readers. I've found that most reader's theatre scripts are meant for beginning readers (K-1) who are working on fluency and expression. And the ones that are written at the 2nd-3rd grade reading levels are ridiculously long! I bought a 2-3 grade reader's theatre kit and each script was about 10-15 minutes to perform. Multiply that by the 4-5 groups I have.... #aintnobodygottimeforthat And not only that, but the scripts were super boring.

So last year I decided to write my own!

I love that these scripts take approximately 4-5 minutes to perform, are funny and engaging, and the storylines are relevant to what our students are experiencing and are interested in. You can see all my reader's theatre scripts in my TpT store HERE!

Do you use reader's theatre in your classroom? Tell me about your experiences in the comments below!

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MADE IT MONDAY!

I'm so excited to FINALLY be linking up with 4th Grade Frolics:

I haven't had a whole lot of time this summer to make things, due to the hubs-in-the-hospital fiasco. In fact, I'm supposed to be laying on a beach in Cabo right now... Today is our anniversary (seven years!), and even though I'm bummed we missed our trip, I'm glad that he still has both legs (just a joke; amputation was never even an option!) and we can spend the day together. We went out for dinner and a movie yesterday because I have a hockey game tonight. Check out my Instagram to see pics of our night last night!

OK, wanna see what I made?

We have three rules that we use school-wide: Be Kind, Be Safe, Do Your Job. I love that all classrooms, kindergarten through sixth grade have the same rules; it makes a teacher's life in the cafeteria, playground, hallways, etc. much easier!

I decided I wanted to pretty up my rules posters and include my hippo theme. Here's the finished product!

Too bad you can't really see the ribbon. It's a pretty turquoise with white stitching on the edge. And side note: the cardstock is one of the prizes I won from Ideas by Jivey's Bloglovin' giveaway! There was a ridiculous number of amazingness in that package!!! The hubs was like, "Did you go shopping AGAIN?" and I said, "Nope! I won a giveaway!!!!" WOO! I can't wait to hang this up!!

My teammie loves frogs almost as much as I love hippos, so I decided to make her a frog set. She doesn't know that I'm doing this... SURPRISE, MEGAN!

Click HERE for a FREE copy of these rules with the frog theme. And if you're interested in the hippo themed ones, just shoot me an email and I'll send them to ya!

This year I will be beefing up my Word Work station for Daily 5. Spelling word practice can get really old! One of the first things I will be adding to my Word Work station is Making Words

 I've made 48 printables, four for each month. I've included June, July, and August as well, for those of you who are year round teachers or go back earlier than I do.

 There are no religious references to Christmas or Easter, although two of the words are "Santa Claus" and "costume," in reference to Halloween.

 Want to win a free copy? Leave a comment including your email address by tomorrow (Tuesday, July 9th) at midnight, and I'll choose a winner at random! You can also try to win a copy over at my Facebook page! Make sure you "like" the page first, then leave a comment on the giveaway post with your email. That giveaway is super speedy; it ends at midnight TONIGHT!

This is a freebie! Click on the pic and download the preview on TPT.

My last thing isn't school related, but awesome nonetheless. I have a small business where I crochet hats for babies and kids (click here if you want to check it out!). Well, the girls on my hockey team have asked me to put my crochet talent towards.... other things. Like a Milwaukee Brewers hat made with beer cans...

Awesome, no? Although totally NOT appropriate for my CHILDREN'S hat making business! No, I will NOT make you one for your toddler :)

It feels good to be creating and crafting again! I already have a few ideas in mind for next week! Stay tuned :)

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Fiction Frenzy!

We've been studying fiction this past week: the kinds of fiction and fiction story elements. We've also touched on the skill of retelling and will continue to practice and develop that next week. Retelling such an important comprehension skill!

I tried something different this year: I taught the kinds of fiction during my Read Aloud time, rather than taking time during my reading block. It was nice because we could do some learning in a causal, relaxed way. Here's the anchor chart we created:

My anchor charts aren't pretty works of art (a la Pinterest), but hey, they get the job done!

This post contains Amazon Affiliate Links. Clicking on these links adds NO extra expense for you; however, I earn a small commission from each purchase that I use to buy books and supplies for my classroom. To see my entire disclosure policy, click HERE.

These are the books I used to introduce each type of fiction:

Realistic Fiction: Up North at the Cabin. Not only is this book great for my Midwest friends, the word choice and envisioning are AMAZING!

Fantasy Fiction: Pumpkin Soup. If you follow my blog, you already know how I LOVE this book! Read all about it HERE!)

Mystery: Miss Nelson is Missing. No explanation needed :)

Science Fiction: Moo Cow Kaboom! This book is SO funny!

Historical Fiction: Encounter. Great connection with Columbus Day.

I taught the story elements during my Daily 5 minilessons. This week I introduced them, and we practiced identifying the elements orally. Next week I'm going to introduce the Writing station (no, I don't follow the Sisters' guide for setting up Daily 5), and the bunnies are going to be writing about story elements in their notebooks. Here's my Fiction Story Elements anchor chart:

After we learned about the fiction story elements, I introduced the comprehension skill, retelling. Retelling is so, so, SO important... it's the first question I always ask when doing running records! And it drives me nuts when the bunnies retell every.single.detail of the story! "and then..., and then..., and then...."One way we learn about retelling is with a Retelling Rope. Each student gets a "rope" (I just use yarn) with 7 knots. Each knot stands for a step in the retelling process:

knot 1: characters

knot 2: setting

knot 3: conflict or problem

knot 4: event 1

knot 5: event 2

knot 6: event 3

knot 7: solution

As they retell the story, students move their hand along the Retelling Rope. They keep the rope in their book box. It makes a great book mark too! Here's my anchor chart for retelling:

What tips and tricks do you use to teach retelling?

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Expanding Vocabulary: Up, Up, and AWAY! {and a giveaway!}

The "E" on the CAFE board stands for Expanding Vocabulary, and I always feel like this is the area where I struggle the most. It's just easier to focus on comprehension and accuracy. Today's strategy was "Tune into Interesting Words," so here's what I did.

I got a balloon.

I said, "My baby girl is almost one year old. She can say three words: Mama, hi and her name. She doesn't have a big vocabulary because she's just learning how to talk. Her vocabulary is like this balloon. Empty."

Then I blew one breath of air into the balloon.

I said, "My son is three years old. He has a bigger vocabulary than the baby. His vocabulary has expanded as he's gotten older."

Then I blew another breath into the balloon.

"This balloon is like you. You have an even larger vocabulary than a three year old. Do you think you can expand it even more?"

I blew another breath into the balloon.

"Raise your hand if you have an older brother or sister. I bet they have an even larger vocabulary than you do. As you get older, your vocabulary grows and grows."

I blew a few more breaths into the balloon so it was all blown up.

"This balloon is like a grown up's vocabulary. Your goal is to expand your vocabulary so that your balloon is blown all the way up like this one, or even bigger, like a hot air balloon! How do you think you can expand your vocabulary?"

By reading books of course! I shared the first few pages of the book Tulip Sees America.

It's a cute book about a man and his dog, Tulip, who travel across the US. I usually use this book during Writer's Workshop to illustrate zooming in on a single idea, but it also has great word choice! As I read the book, I told my students to put two hands on their head when they heard a new and interesting word. Two words we found were homebody and serene. Awesome words, right?

OK, so now it was the kids' turns. During Read to Self, their job was to tune into new and interesting words. I gave each of them 3-4 sticky notes, and they wrote down words that they found. When Read to Self was over, I collected everyone's sticky notes and picked out a few words that I thought the kids would enjoy: levees, siesta, loon, and panoramic. Of course, some of the words I got weren't new or interesting, so I was able to sift those out. In keeping with the balloon theme, I made paper hot air balloons to write the new words we find in our reading. We will add more balloons as the year goes on.

I can't take credit for the balloon analogy at all... My awesome teammate Megan came up with this fab idea and shared it with me. I'm trying to convince her to write some posts for my blog, but she keeps dragging her feet. If you could leave her some words of encouragement in the comments section, that would be great. Because I KNOW YOU'RE READING THIS, MEGAN!! :)

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Building Stamina

We're 8 days in and up to 10 minutes for Read to Self. Being that this is my fourth year using Daily 5/Cafe in my classroom (as well as K-6 school-wide), this is par for the course. I don't have to spend a ton of time going over expectations for Read to Self because they've done it the past two years, which is SO nice!

This year I did something different though. My class this year is very visual, more so than in years past. They also seem to be a competitive bunch... liking to be "challenged" to do something. My lesson on stamina was always a one-and-done, but with a group that needs frequent reminders and practice, I knew that wouldn't cut it. I was inspired by this and this to create these:

I wish I could do more than 15 minutes for Read to Self, but I only have 75 minutes for Daily 5. Once we have Word Work and Listening down pat, I plan on introducing a new way to do Writing. I am super pumped about that, but it will cut into my time even more. However, seeing and discussing these anchor charts on a daily basis is really motivating and keeping the bunnies focused. I'm going to keep riding this wave as long as I can!

Oh, and I'm TOTALLY changing my lesson plans and doing THIS tomorrow! I seriously love you bloggy world! What would I do without you guys???

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