Audiobooks Aid Challenged Readers

I read this encouraging article in the April/May 2007 issue of AudioFile Magazine. I am an avid audiobook reader on my daily commute and I was gratified to see that educators are finding that the introduction of audiobooks to challenged readers has demonstrated significant improvements in oral fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.

An excerpt from Listen! It's Good for Kids by Susie Wilde:

"Children today are bombarded with visual images and may not have many opportunities to stimulate their auditory imagination. During Dr. Teri Lesesne's 2006 presentation on audiobooks for the American Library Association, she noted several benefits audiobooks offer such young listeners. 'Audiobooks can help start the movie in the head', she says, 'and allow children to form their own visual images'.

They also serve as models for oral fluency, building both vocabulary and comprehension. 'Kids often lack verbal endurance because they don't read enough. Listening to audio helps develop verbal endurance,' says Lesesne.

Series are a wise way to start for children listening to their first novels, because exposure to one often leaves a newly minted reader asking for more. Choose series that have stood the test of time, such as Beverly Cleary's Henry books or Jeff Brown's Flat Stanley series. Familiarity with a series often gives readers courage to branch out to new stories and unfamiliar characters.

In classrooms across America, teachers worry about ways to develop cultural literacy. Audiobooks help bridge cultural gaps and educate children about their own history. Parents and teachers can use them as departure for discussion. A great example is Blues Journey by Walter Dean and Christopher Myers, a father and son who share a love of blues that they express in pictures and words. Live Oak Media has paired the book with a CD read by Richard Allen that accents the rhythms and allows plenty of room to introduce blues recordings or to talk about how poverty, chain gangs, and persecution gave voice to some of the greatest blues music."

The article goes on to discuss the impact of audiobooks on ESL students:

"Those teaching ESL find that audio helps students pick up cues about phrasing, pronunciation, and intonation. Listening also improves concentration in ADD and ADHD children and can be of significant help to any learner who processes information more easily through listening than reading print. Students with learning disabilities benefit from the support of multi-sensory experience that provides auditory cues to aid in decoding written words."

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Using Class Time Well: Active Learning

Using Class Time Well: Active Learning

from the Center for Teaching Excellence, Kansas University

Teaching is developmental rather than directive or presentational.

Active learning involves the implementation of “learning experiences in which the students are thinking about the subject matter” (McKeachie, 2002). It is based on the premise that students must do more than just listen to fully comprehend new information. They must read, write, discuss, and problem solve. By employing active learning in your classes, you will increase the effectiveness of your teaching and your students’ learning.

Reading

One suggestion for encouraging active learning is the use of the Treasure Hunt technique (Magnan, 1990). This strategy is based on the premise that if you’ve assigned a reading, there must be something valuable for the students in it. Choose several pages or sections, and then ask students to find the most important point, idea, or argument and write it down, along with a sentence or two justifying their selection. If you choose assigned passages well, you can increase understanding and participation immediately.

Writing

John C. Bean suggests several ways to incorporate writing into a class, including:

*Writing at the beginning of class to probe a subject: Ask students to write short answers to a question that reviews previous material or stimulates interest in what’s coming.

*Writing during class to refocus a lagging discussion or cool off a heated one: When students run out of things to say, or when a discussion gets too hot, ask students to write for a few minutes.

*Writing at the end of class to sum up a lecture or discussion: Give students a few minutes to sum up the day’s lecture or discussion and to prepare questions to ask at the start of the next class.

Discussing

While the most common approach to encouraging active learning in the classroom is the use of discussion, not all discussions are created equal, and there are other methods in which to achieve the difficult task of drawing students into lectures, discussions, and readings. One suggestion for engaging students in active learning is using the Thumb’s Up technique (Ukens, 2000). To implement this technique, ask students to form groups of six to ten people, with each group sitting in a circle. Participants will discuss topics within their groups. To keep everyone involved, each person is to extend his or her fist toward the middle of the circle. Once discussion begins, each member is to share, in any order, one idea or piece of information on the topic. As each person shares, his or her thumb will go up. A person may not share again until all thumbs are up. Then, members can begin again and continue the process. After about five minutes, stop the discussion. If you wish, repeat with new topics.

Another method to employ asks the students to frame the discussion, or determine the direction of the discussion. Ask students to identify one question from their readings that they would like to have answered in class. Ask them to share their question with three peers, and then have the group pick one of the three questions to present to the instructor. Allow each group to ask its question.

Problem-Solving

Invite students to use Think-Pair-Share: To help them better understand a lecture, stop for a moment. Ask students to think about a question or problem that relates to the lecture material, turn to a peer, and explain their answer or solution. This is a great way to apply and reinforce key ideas.

Resources:

Bean, J.C. (1996). Engaging Ideas: The professor’s guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, and active learning in the classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

McKeachie, W.J. (2002). McKeachie’s Teaching Tips: Strategies, Research, and Theory for College and University Teachers. 11th Ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

Magnan, R., Ed. (1990). 147 Practical Tips for Teaching Professors. Madison: Magna.

Stocking, S.H. et al. (1998). More quick hits. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press