Back to Special Reading Fun for Read Across America Day Lesson Plan

Round-Robin
Reading Quiz

Subjects

• Arts & Humanities
  --Language Arts
  --Literature
  

Grade

• K-2
  
• 3-5
  
• 6-8
• 9-12
  

Brief Description

This cooperative reading comprehension strategy engages students of all ages, in all subjects.

Note: Some teachers object to round-robin reading as a teaching tool. This is a decision we choose to leave up to each classroom teacher. You know your students best.

Objectives

Students will

• work cooperatively in small groups.
• read text in round-robin style.
• answer comprehension questions about the text.
• share answers with other group members.
• edit answers and pass them in for a group grade.

Keywords

comprehension, round robin, reading, cooperative, group

Materials Needed

• reading selection(s)
• index cards
• comprehension questions (see Before the Lesson section of the lesson plan)

Lesson Plan

A Note About This Lesson
This lesson has cross-curricular applications; it can be used in science and history classes, as well as in reading classes.

Before the Lesson
Before the lesson, make appropriate reading selections for your class or for groups within your class. For younger students, the selection might be a short story from a basal reader. For older students, the reading might be a short story or part of a chapter from a content reading book. Or you might use one of the On-line Literature Sources listed below.

For each reading selection:

• write 9 comprehension questions (different levels of comprehension, not necessarily all literal questions).
• write each question on a different card.
• arrange the 9 cards in groups of 3.
• place each group of 3 cards into a small envelope.
• place the three envelopes in a larger envelope labeled with the title of the reading passage, story, or book.

The Activity
Arrange students into groups of three. Provide each student in each group with the same text selection. (Students can read the text to themselves, or they might read it in round-robin style, reading a paragraph or page at a time.)

Another idea: If students are reading in round-robin style, identify a "Poison Word" for each story. The poison word is a word that appears fairly regularly within the text. When the student who is reading aloud comes to the poison word, that student stops reading and the next student picks up from there until that student comes to the poison word. And so it goes.

When students finish reading, provide each group with the envelope containing the comprehension questions and have each student in the group choose one of the small envelopes inside the larger envelope. Students work on their own to answer the questions in the envelopes. They then discuss their answers within the group and make any necessary changes. When the group's work is done to their satisfaction, they tape together their cards or glue their answers to a sheet of construction paper and hand them in for a group grade.

On-line Literature Sources
You might make use of story sources available on the Internet, including the following:

• Absolutely Whootie: Stories to Grow By
• Tales of Wonder
• Aesop's Fables On-line
• Children's Storybooks Online
• Long Long Time Ago: Stories for Children
• Fables and Fairy Tales
• Stories for Children
• Classic Fairy Tales
• Children's Storybooks Online

Assessment

Grade students on their correct responses. Assign more importance, however, to student evaluations of their group's effort. Have each student create a personal evaluation and a group evaluation. The following rubric resources might be used or adapted for this activity: