Independent reading is a valuable use of time because of the many benefits students realize from reading practice and volume: Students develop reading stamina, their vocabulary and background knowledge increases, and they acquire reading habits.

Readers who have time to read can grow their skills. Readers who do not have time to read or who are working on isolated skills may not be reading texts of their choice.

One cause for the difference between good readers and poor readers is the difference in the amount of time spent reading.

Research establishes that students with strong reading habits are more likely to reach their full literacy potential.

Comprehensive literacy instruction makes room for students to have time to read, write, speak, listen, and view many texts of their own choice during class time while teachers confer with students about their progress and check in on instructional goals.
1. Lourdes Ortiz’s Personal Reflection 

We, as teachers, have the responsibility, to put in our students the love for reading. Creating all the spaces appropriate for reading and giving them all the elements to create passionate readers. Also, it is important to understand that reading gives a lot of benefits, like: understand different topics, acquire an extensive vocabulary, and also open our minds to a new world. The reading habit may not be in all of our students, but if we are committed to them, we can make good readers.
2. Jessica Cruz´s Personal Reflection
I think it is very important to create the culture of independent reading because different skills are developed in which students increase their understanding of reading, writing, listening and speaking, because reading learns different grammatical structures and rules of each subject.
3. Josué´s Sánchez Personal Reflection

Getting to have students who are independent on their reading is a process that has to be developed since they are small kids. Teachers must spend enough time to model how reading is done. It called my attention that in order to be independent, students need to take time.

Building a Comprehension Curriculum with this overall model for comprehension instruction as a background to be used in teaching any useful strategy, we now turn to specific comprehension strategies that research has shown to be effective in improving students’ comprehension of text. These are the strategies we recommend explaining and modeling for students and then emphasizing in shared, guided, and independent reading, another proven instructional technique for improving comprehension is think-aloud. As its name implies, think-aloud involves making one’s thoughts audible and, usually, public—saying what you are thinking while you are performing a task, In this case, reading. Thinking aloud has been shown to improve students’ comprehension both when students themselves engage in the practice during reading and also when teachers routinely think aloud while reading to students.
Text structure emphasized the structural aspects of text organization rather than the substance of the ideas, the logic being that it was structure, not content, that would transfer to new texts that students would meet on their own. Visual representations of text a visual display helps readers understand, organize, and remember some of those thousand words.”
Summarization teaching students to summarize what they read is another way to improve their overall comprehension of text. Summarizing is a broader, more synthetic activity for which determining importance is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition. The ability to summarize information requires readers to sift through large units of text, differentiate important from unimportant ideas, and then synthesize those ideas and create a new coherent text that stands for, by substantive criteria, the original. There are at least two major approaches to the teaching of summarization. In rule-governed approaches, students are taught to follow a set of step-by-step procedures to develop summaries, other approaches to summarizing text are more holistic.
Effective Comprehension Routines In this section we move from individual strategies—highly specific processes that might be embedded into essentially any discussion of text and combined with other strategies—to what we have termed comprehension routines. Reciprocal teaching four comprehension strategies: predicting, questioning, seeking clarification, and summarizing—are the focus of the reciprocal teaching approach.
Students Achieving Independent Learning (SAIL) and other transactional strategies approaches, the emphasis is on helping students learn when to use which comprehension strategies. The program uses a range of different kinds of texts that are often quite challenging for students because they are at or above grade level.
1. Jessica Cruz Personal Reflection
As reading increases, different strategies are developed to carry out assignments in this topic We can know the practices that the teacher and the student can develop in reading such as text structure, summarization, and build a curricular understanding according to the teaching level .
2. Josué Sánchez´s Personal Reflection
Reading without comprehension is useless. Teaching students reading strategies help them to become successful in literacy. I agree with Summarization to emphasize comprehension because it demands students to pay attention to specific details.
3. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
Summarization is an effective tool to improve reading skills and the comprehension of a text. By improving the reading strategies we can create passionate readers and dedicate readers. Also I think being an active reader also help to develop reading strategies.

2. Higher level processing involves those processes and resources that more closely align with strategies and resources for comprehension with more difficult texts: (a) form main idea meanings, (b) recognize related and thematic information, (c) build a text model of comprehension (an author-driven summary understanding), and (d) use inferencing, background knowledge, strategic processing and context constraints to create a situation model of reading (a preferred personal interpretation
One of the most important factors in reading comprehension abilities is how reading processes vary depending on the reading purpose.  It is clear that reading for entertainment is quite different from reading to learn information or reading to integrate information from multiple sources.  It is also clear that skimming a text for a very general idea involves distinct skill combinations from reading for main idea comprehension, the latter being by far the most common type of reading carried out by fluent readers.
A critical factor in teaching L2 reading is helping students understand that different tasks and different activities involve differing levels of demand on comprehension.  Some tasks require a high level of detailed comprehension.  Other tasks may involve the understanding of main ideas and some supporting information.
1. Jessica Cruz´s Personal Reflection
The knowledge of the morphology and syntax class helps to understand the reading because new words appear that are structured with the rules and designs that are provided in this class, some of the benefits that reading provides us is the knowledge to make phrases then sentences , paragraphs and finally gives us the knowledge to write a complete document with the correct grammatical structures.
2. Josué´s Sánchez Personal reflection
I strongly agree with the fact that reading information texts and reading for entertainment is not the same thing. Understanding this is key because students have to use different skills in order to comprehend the text depending on the case.  

3. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
I thnik that in order to have a good knowledge of what we are reading, we need to set a goal for our reading time. And for that we need to clarify the different skills that we need. It is not the same, reading a book just for pleasure, than reading a book for an insvestigation, for example.

When reading with young children, teachers often use pointer sticks to call attention to each word as it is read. Young learners enjoy using pointer sticks to find and read labels around the classroom. For beginners, finding labels on familiar objects helps them to improve their phonological awareness and notice the letters for initial sounds.
Graphic novels offer unique support for English learners. The visual nature of this genre provides detailed images that contribute to the understanding of characters, setting, and events. This activity helps students get to know characters while practicing communication skills through written dialogue
Cooperative Vocabulary Building and Early Writing With ELL and Monolingual Students This activity introduces house-related vocabulary and positional words to ELL students, and it encourages all students to practice phonetic spelling. As ELL students learn to read, having a wider English vocabulary will help them better understand and connect to texts. Because houses and home life are common topics for children’s books, this type of vocabulary is especially useful. Also, this activity encourages students to begin writing using phonetic spelling and to read what they have written. Encouraging them to practice and share their writing (even at this early stage) helps develop confidence in this form of communication.
Reading out loud in class is challenging for learners, especially for young learners who lack confidence and are shy. Those learners tend to refrain from speaking out loud because of a high level of anxiety. This activity allows learners to practice reading in a fun, game-like manner, which can serve to lower anxiety levels and motivate them to read out loud in class.
1. Jessica Cruz Personal Reflection
This topic teaches the teacher different methodologies and activities that can be implemented to develop the different classes, after reading, acquiring each methodology, students can develop the ability to analyze texts and most important characteristics of history, they can also create dialogues according to their level of comprehension and lexicon performing these activities motivates students because they get involved with their own learning.
2. Josué Sánchez Personal Reflection

What I like from this article is the importance of teaching vocabulary of frequent use. It called my attention that it mentions how books for early childhood education use vocabulary from the house. Teaching reading should not be a one direction participation but students and teachers must be engaged in the process through gamification. 
3. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
I agree with the article. Nowadays, there are many ways to make reading a fun activity, specially for the little ones. When they know their alphabet letter sounds, they get confident and they want to read and participate every time they can. Using puppets, being the actors of the stories, changing voices also make reading a fun activity for them.

There are a few things to take into account when working on shared reading. First, there must be a place arranged for students to gather every time they do shared reading. Second, the space must be equipped with resources that will help the teacher to point specific things during the process. Third, there are plenty of materials that teachers can work with in order to achieve the class objective and to fulfill the academic needs of the students based on their age. fourth,  There must be a process to follow that consists of pre reading when students can get a glance of the story or text. This helps students to engage into the coming section which is reading. This is made only for enjoyment. The after reading helps the teacher to review the main parts of the story that supports the teaching and learning process.

In order to reinforce the content, the teacher can use materials such as a pointing stick that can be used to point at every single word while reading. Another material can be a highlighter that helps to notice meanings and ideas.The teacher can also use a board to develop more ideas. The important thing about shared reading is that the teacher can do other activities that involve students participation  in general.

I consider that this experience is very important in order to help students to get into loving reading. It is possible because the teacher models reading while pointing at words. The teacher can show how exciting reading can be while doing a class activity.
2. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
I think that the steps for Shared Reading are very important. I liked when I could give the children a book, and asked for reading with their friends. Even when they did not know how to read yet, they could infered what the text said just by watching the pictures. And because they were learning they sight words they could find them in their readings.
3. Jessica Cruz Reflection

In shared reading, children can share the experiences they have in reading, share knowledge, strategies and basic concepts to see themselves as readers. In this strategy the teacher can practice reading more fluently so that the students learn the correct pronunciation.

This article is about an investigation carried out at the university of Oviedo. It aimed to measure the metacognitive awareness of reading strategies. They choose a group of eighty-eight non English native speakers to read a text . They were students of Industrial engineering and english learners at a basic level. 

They were asked to read a text and to solve a questionnaire regarding strategies and reading proficiency. The results show the following: first, prior knowledge played an important role in understanding the text and kept on trying to comprehend. Second, students express the importance of focusing on the assignment in order to apply the strategies. Third, students were not influenced by content (local)  or on the metacognition preference. The study says that the reason for this finding is that the text was not wide enough to evaluate what was expected. Students understood the whole text so maybe the lack of complexity did not help that much. Also, local strategies were noticed because students do not know a lot about global strategies. 

This study supports the fact that  foreign language students can become autonomous by implementing reading strategies. With this, they can set up goals and somehow control their learning.
1. Josué Sánchez Personal Reflection

I agree with the idea that metacognition helps students develop their own learning when it comes to reading. Reading works as an input and if it is appropriate, students can have excellent results.
2. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
Metacognition and reading comprehension can work well together. It depends on the topics, vocabulary, and interests of the children. If we can find a book that can meet all this features, we can finde the relationship between metacognition and reading comprehension.
3. Jessica Cruz Personal Reflection

metacognitive knowledge is the knowledge that students have and the factors are developed in this method in teaching and learning the language. One of the most important strategies is the local strategy because it is used to read more efficiently and autonomously, so students are able to identify the objectives of each goal.

The main idea of reading as an essential part of the English Learning is key in this text. For reading to be developed students need prior knowledge. The reader is constantly trying to match what is already known with the new information that is being presented.  The study also remarks the difference between reading and literacy. While reading is a thinking process, literacy is the way of using spoken and written language in a culture or context. It is important not to assume that being good in L1 determines the success of L2.

In order to be a good reader students need to start thinking in the L2. Also, some  of the get to read well in English students need some skills such as developing the idea that reading is not translating but thinking, extensive reading for pleasure, learning reading skills, and acquiring vocabulary, among others. 

Extensive reading is an approach that aims to help students to find pleasure in reading. In this approach students choose their own books guided by the teacher. There is no evaluation and students read at their own pace.

There is group of cognitive reading skills that teachers need to transmit to students among them there are: 

Each one of these skills must be developed in class. There is a process to teach each of them. For example, teach one at a time, Guide students through the process, Discuss students answers, evaluate, etc. 

Reading fluency not only refers to the reading rate but to the comprehension of a text. For it to be developed it is necessary to teach vocabulary. According to the text there is a list of 2,000 words that can be found in the 80 percent of a text in all books.

I liked the fact that students need to learn to think in English in order to be successful in reading in L2. It is key to understand that reading cannot be separated from culture. I consider that learning how to develop reading skills in students will determine the success of comprehension.
2. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
I think that this article shows us about what we daily live in our classrooms, having non english speakers. Following the process for reading, will help the children understand what they are reading. Respect their pace and not force them just to fill a grade in the report card, is what can make confident children.
3. Jessica Cruz Reflection 

 In conclusion, reading is important or essential in the acquisition of a second language since with this strategy we can develop all our skills such as writing, grammatical structures, vocabulary and things like that. As the student reads different books, it is easier to develop understanding of different texts. 

According to schema theory, readers understand what they read only as it relates to what they already know.  The more students read and write, the more their prior knowledge grows, which, in turn, strengthens their ability to construct meaning as they read.
2. Effective reading instruction can develop engaged readers who are knowledgeable, strategic, motivated, and socially interactive.

To be engaged readers, students must recognize the value of reading and their own potential as readers and learners. Teachers can help students develop this recognition by providing them with access to multiple sources of reading and resources for learning.
3.Phonemic awareness, a precursor to competency in identifying words, is one of the best predictors of later success in reading.

Phonemic awareness helps children learn the letter-sound correspondences needed to read and spell words. Effective beginning reading instruction contains a balance of activities designed to improve word recognition, including phonics instruction and reading meaningful text. Writing and spelling activities are also part of effective reading instruction because they affect overall reading ability in a positive way.
4. Modeling is an important form of classroom support for literacy learning 

As children develop literacy skills, they need careful guidance and support within their reading, writing, listening, and speaking experiences during instruction.Teacher modeling, a form of scaffolding, is a way of showing students how to approach a task such as finding the main idea of a story.
5. Storybook reading, done in the context of sharing experiences, ideas, and opinions, is a highly demanding mental activity for children.

Children’s stories, both oral and written, have been the subject of important research on the development of children’s ability to construct coherent text. As children hear stories told and read, they learn the structure as well as the linguistic features of stories or narrative text.
6. Responding to literature helps students to construct their own meaning, which may not always be the same for all readers.

Responding helps students develop their metacognitive skills, which are important to constructing meaning. Teachers must be prepared to expect, respect, and accept a variety of student responses and to accommodate them within their literacy instruction. Students’ personal responses can be expressed through a variety of means such as oral discussion, debate, role playing, and graphic illustration.
7. Children who engage in daily discussions about what they read are more likely to become critical readers and learners.

Children who rely on each other for help learn more than children who work alone. Instruction can be organized in a variety of ways to facilitate discussion. One way is to form a cooperative learning group of students with varying abilities to read, discuss, or respond to a piece of text.
8. Expert readers have strategies that they use to construct meaning  before, during, and after reading.

These strategies are: inferencing, identifying important information, monitoring, summarizing, and question generating. 

Inferencing: is the process of reaching conclusions based on information. Identifying important information is the process of finding critical facts and details in narrative or expository text. Monitoring is a metacognitive or self-awareness process that expert constructors of meaning use to help themselves overcome problems as they read. Summarizing is a process that involves pulling together important information gathered from a long passage of text. Question generating involves readers asking themselves questions they want answered from reading that require them to integrate information while they read.
9. Children’s reading and writing abilities develop together.

While reading, readers reread and modify meaning accordingly. While writing, writers think about the topic and the more they think, the better developed their writing becomes. The process of reading and writing not only unfold in similar ways, but they also tend to be used together. This is natural because in everyday life reading and writing frequently occur together.
10. The most valuable form of reading assessment reflects our current understanding about the reading process and simulates authentic reading tasks.

Changes that are moving assessment closer to simulating authentic reading tasks include: using unabridged text directly from the original source for assessing meaning construction; using questions that require written responses rather than only multiple choice items; asking important rather than trivial questions; and setting contexts or giving background for reading passages and questions. 

Applying these ten principles, we can make Reading an enjoyable activity for our children. The more we change our minds up to reading, the funnier it will be. It’s in our hands to change the children’s view towards reading, so they can become effective readers when they get older. 

In this topic we can know what is the knowledge that the teacher must handle to develop their skills and be able to share their knowledge with the students. A committed reader acquires the basic knowledge to obtain information, is motivated by reading and develops the ability to interact as he acquires knowledge and vocabulary.
3. Josué Sanchez's Personal Reflection
What stand out to me in this article is the teacher's role. The development of correct instruction in a class can lead to succes while students become independent readers. Teacher must constantly asses and provide feedback in order to ensure the effectivenes of these 10 principles.

Literacy acquisition determines the relationship between cognitive skills and reading skills. In recent years, children have become more technological. Because of this, schools began to equip their classrooms with computers, and gradually encouraged their use in all subject areas. 

92% of students have access to a computer when they are not at school. 

The students’ comments were that they are not learning much from using the computer for their use of vocabulary is changing. Especially, when they are chatting electronically to people around the world they use abbreviations like u instead of you, 4 rather than for; many other words are abbreviated in this manner.

Some teachers are also finding their students are reading less than they used to. The students are more interested in playing games.

 If schools do not adapt to meet the needs of reading and writing, a growing number of parents will feel alienated by the inadequacies of schooling. The lack of talking and listening, of oracy, will also create problems in a classroom situation.

The important part of human life is when basic skill learning occurs in the early years. The emphasis of learning today has shifted from literacy to technology, based on the current trends of society and the global economy. We have to create a balance to succeed in the teaching of both computer and language literacies. 

As teachers, we have to be updating our knowledge, because children are born almost with an electronic device in their hands, so we need to catch on these devices and also take advantage of them. Using them in the best way we can to create skills, such as reading and writing. Having a balance is also important, to help children develop their reading time in the best way. 

In this topic we can see what are the basic aspects of literacy and what are the benefits that study through computers provides in the acquisition of a second language, develops literacy skills because students remain motivated to use this method I practice through technology for learning at different levels.

3. Josué Sánchez's Personal Reflection
The reality of this article is so evident in our society. Teachers must be careful while using technology because kids are good at playing video games and chatting but when it comes to education they need more spcific instrucions in order to achieve the goals. 

Resilience is the ability to cope with adversity and come back or rebound from extreme hardships or events. Using children’s literature, caregivers can help children bounce back by intentionally placing resilience-building experiences and skills in the curriculum that serve as protective factors.

Books that tell stories of characters faced with challenges or problems to solve are best because they can become the background for talks about the elements of resilience. 

Choose books that have the following attributes: 

After using books for a while to build resilience, allow children to identify the protective factors that the books may highlight.

Teachers can play an important role in fostering resilience by intentionally placing it at the forefront of the curriculum. Although we can’t prevent adversity or unpleasant experiences from happening to children, we can minimize the distress they feel by teaching them a vocabulary of emotions with the use of children’s books. 

The following children’s books can be used with preschool and early school-age children. They are examples of how books can anchor discussions about resilience. 

We can see the ability of children to adapt to different environments and recover from some loss, children create the capacity for self-reliance. To help children develop this strategy it is important that children choose their books for the optimal resilience experience. Children at a very young age understand challenges and create behaviors that help them respond correctly.
2. Josué Sánchez's Personal Reflection
Resilience should be the main characteristic in every individual during this hard times. Teaching kids resilience will help them to be succesful in the future as active agents in the society. There is no way to avoid challenges but we teach kids how to face them.
3. Lourdes Ortiz's Personal Reflection
On this current situation of pandemic that we are living thorugh, not only children, but we, as adults, can be having a hard time. Finding the resilience in books, is very helpful, because we can see what is going on with the pandemic for example. I have seen many books that talk about covid19, to show to the children, that they don't have to fear.