Dialogic reading is a strategy where a teacher and learner communicate by using dialogues. This means they talk with each other. In this method, the teacher helps the students to become the storyteller.
There are many strategies used in dialogic reading. One is by asking specific questions such as “Wh” questions. For example, “Who is this?” and “When did he come?” Later on, the teacher can ask more open or abstract questions like “What happened during the party?” and “Why did Maria leave the town?”
As the dialogue between the teacher and the student takes place, the teacher can expand what the student is saying. When the students begin to answer, expound on what he/she is saying. This can encourage him/her to investigate more on the story being discussed and to reflect more on what is transpiring between the characters.
It will also help to connect the story with the students’ personal experiences. For example, “What were your experiences during our own field trip to the science museum? What captured your attention there?”
This strategy provides students the opportunities to develop many factors crucial for language skills and school success. Some of these factors include experiences found in books, structure of stories, vocabulary, print awareness, attention, and pleasure of learning. As the teacher uses this strategy, students begin to find reading as pleasurable. Reading together means memorable moments of your interactions.
Dialogic reading can be used for learners at almost at any age. Knowing the alphabet or knowing how to read is not a prerequisite to this strategy. Students of younger age or those who are just starting out with reading begin to realize the opportunity to learn that every book has a title or a name on the cover and the pages are turned from right to left.
In addition, the learner acquires the learning and is oriented of the book in space and how to find a beginning and an ending. Finally, the learner can use the native language in a significant context and learn literate language and vocabulary that are critical for school success.
McLaughlin et al(1992) posited that the quality of communication in language is more important than the amount of time spent speaking it. It is crucial for teachers, and even parents, to communicate with their children in the language with which they are most comfortable and to give their children meaningful and emotionally positive contexts of communication.
References:
Dickinson, D. K., McCabe, A., Clark-Chiapelli, N, & Wolf, A. (2005). Cross-language transfer of phonological awareness in low-income Spanish and English bilingual preschool children.AppliedPhycholinguistics, 25, 323-347.
McCardle, P., Kim, J., Grube, C., & Randall, V. (1995). An approach to bilingualism in early intervention. Infants and Young Children, 7, 63–73.
McLaughlin, B. (1992, December). Myths and misconceptions about second language learning.ERIC Digest [Online]. http://www.eric.ed.gov/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=ED350885
By: Ms. Mary Ann B. Calma | Teacher III | BEPZ Elementary School | Mariveles, Bataan
