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Reading Matters

Teaching Matters

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Reading Matters | Volume 16 • Winter 2016 |

scira.org

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41

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A very simple variant of

Five Little Ducks

using animals

and numbers that are familiar and interest children or

that comes from their own ideas could be developed:

Seven little lambs went out one day,

over the field and far away.

Mother sheep said,

“Baa, baa, baa, baa.”

But only four little lambs came back

.

Again, such chart stories or class-created Big Books can be

illustrated by the children—young learners take great pride

in sharing and reading such class-created texts. Smith (2000)

and Jalongo and Ribblett (1997) offer many familiar songs

and song book titles that can be used to create variations.

As suggested by the text variant above, creations of their

own texts through shared or interactive writing can encourage

learners to look carefully at the print and develop a variety of

sight words. The rhyming words, in this case,

day

and

away

can

also be used to teach analogies or word patterns. Thus, another

area in which music instruction can benefit reading instruction

is word identification. Young readers must learn to recognize

letters and words automatically, much like music students must

learn to recognize notes and groups of notes, in order to adjust

vocal placement. This action allows both readers and musicians

to demonstrate fluent reading/singing. As indicated by the

–ay

pattern of

day

and

away

in the

Over in the Meadow

text, children

must also develop orthographic/spelling awareness. Teachers

can use familiar songs to help learners understand that letters

grouped together (in vowels, blends, diphthongs, and digraphs,

as examples) form a range of sounds that can change according

to their position in a word and that these groups can represent

patterns of onsets, such as the

d

in

day

and the rime,

-ay

in

day

.

The rhyming patterns in many songs promote such phonological

and orthographic awareness. Finally, Hansen and Bornstorf

(2002) affirm that music instruction benefits students in the early

stages of reading because music students and reading students

alike must acquire an ability to listen for whether something

“sounds right.” For readers, this involves syntactic, semantic, and

graphophonic considerations, aiding the understanding and

development of cueing systems as learners read and sing the print.

Music and Songs in the Elementary

Years and Beyond

As children become older, their interest and knowledge of music

grows. Relating reading to something children hold valuable such

as popular music supports motivation to read; hearing the song

and reading the lyrics makes reading a delightful and engaging

experience. Often in our university summer reading clinic, when

we have upper-elementary and middle school reluctant readers,

we will ask them to name some of their favorite popular songs,

and we then collaborate with them on locating the lyrics and

putting together a notebook of songs that they can read, sing, and

enjoy. As lyrics are repetitive, using songs in classroom instruction

supports students as they read the lyrics. Song structures allow

students to hear and anticipate when lines are repeated; predicting

particular language syntax or a word that makes sense in context

is an important strategy for reading as well as a resource for

decoding unknown words and monitoring comprehension.

Julie experienced the power of such activities during her

recent student teaching. Capitalizing upon what she had learned

about music and reading, she decided to take advantage of every

opportunity to incorporate music into classroom instruction. While

teaching a unit on poetry to a group of fourth grade students, Julie

was amazed at the shift in attitude that using music had in her

classroom. To support students’ interest and literary interpretations

skills, she invited students to listen to the song “Home” by Phillip

Phillips. Students wrote what they thought the song meant in

their reading journals before sharing their ideas with the whole

class. What a difference! Julie was amazed to see the increased

number of students wanting to share their perceptions of the

song as compared to the few raised hands the day before when

asked to share their thoughts on a poem! Frequently, students

would groan when handed a poem or a text that they thought

they could not understand, complaining, “It’s too hard!” or, “I don’t

get it!” Julie realized that interpreting the song required basically

the same skill set as the poem, but the tools were different—

adding the component of music gave the experience elements of

familiarity, fun, and light-heartedness that the students needed.

The songs they allowed them to take risks and to feel free to share

their ideas without fear of having the “wrong” answer. Analyzing a

song that contains inferences or literary themes requires the same

level of interpretation and higher level thinking as poems and

similar types of texts, but familiarity reduces learners’ anxiety and

processing demands (Almasi & Fullerton, 2012). They are already

familiar with the words of the song, so they do not have to decode.

They know the rhythm of the song, so aspects of fluency such as

phrasing, tempo/pacing, rhythm, pitch, and stress are supported;

and because it is something they have prior knowledge of and

can relate to, they are more likely to interpret the meaning.

Because her first lesson using music went so well, Julie decided

to continue with that approach throughout the poetry unit. She

was pleased to see these fourth graders singing along with Katy

Perry to the lyrics of “Roar” as they read the words on their sheets.

She noted that many of the students who were singing rarely

volunteered to speak in class, so seeing them participate in a new

way, through song, was a valuable reminder that, as educators,

we need to constantly look for ways to involve students and

provide different ways to learn so that they will be successful. The

students already knew the lyrics by heart just from hearing it on

the radio, but using their eyes to read the words through shared

and repeated readings was a valuable reading support for them.

One of the most interesting displays of increased student

motivation Julie saw was when music was incorporated into

a writing lesson. As the culminating task of the poetry unit,

each student was required to share an original poem, choosing

from many that they had written throughout the week. Julie

suggested that one of her students, Janie (pseudonym),

write a song to perform in the poetry slam since she sings

competitively. Janie and a classmate wrote a beautiful song

with a set rhyming pattern, metaphors, similes, and imagery,