READ something each day!!

Did you know research states if you read something every day for  at least 15 minutes you will improve your fluency and become a better reader?

Also build your vocabulary bank. Each day add 3 new words to your vocabulary word bank!

Be scrupulous and vigilant about it! Here is what I have my students do in their binders.. they create a tab for vocabulary words.

vigilant vi/gil/ant Defn:  To be persistent and faithful in all you do about something. She was vigilant in her entries in her word bank, never missing a day!

By the end of semesters students have increased their vocabulary tremendously. They are instructed to pull the words from what they read in my classes, their other classes, their independent reading books, and also from news articles, what they hear on the radio, or read online. Word power is knowledge and knowledge is POWER! The more words you know, the better a command of the oral language and written process you will have! Reading begins to make sense the more you  are able to decode words. Every student needs a good collegiate dictionary and a strong thesaurus! What new words will you learn today?

Valrie

A Pink Labor of Love & Self Reward!

                  Is this READING DOCTOR CONNECTIONS or POEMS MY WAY?

How many of you have more than one blog and feel like you... umh, get a bit CONFUSED?

Here's the scoop today is all about my search for a new PINK ring!

AHHHH! So beautiful!

Happy PS & Happy  PINK Labor Day weekend PINK ladies and fellow bloggers, followers. Today I am honoring myself with a labor of love in pink! Pink Sapphires to be exact! I want a new PINK  ring and I want to design it myself. The first step is selecting the cut of the stone, then the carat size, the clarity, and the color of PINK! Oh my it has been so much fun surfing the web for styles and stone cutters, suppliers, natural gemstones or man-made. Natural just seem well, NATURAL! AS long as it is Naturally PINK!

SO for some fun, when you post your comments guess which one I chose and let me know your favorite too! Whomever has a correct guess of the one I chose goes into a drawing for a surprise PINK giveaway! Now this wasn't announced on Bev's blog today, so if you want to spread the fun, grab my button, and pass on the link! Everyone has until the end of Labor  Day at EST midnight to enter my pink surprise giveaway!

        Here they all are in no special order! Emeralds, ovals, marquis, and more! How to choose?

                                All gems featured here can be found at this website I am not endorsing       them,............................they  just are some of the prettiest ones I found while surfing!

AND since I chose my ring,  when it arrives, I am steppin' out with a hot pink dress, a beautiful boa, and  PINK platforms!

When the night is through painting the town PINK, I am going to slide into my favorite pink nightie and slippers and lounge awhile...

As my love blossoms, I grow beautiful pink flowers to wear in my hair!

Love like a bud blosssoms when it is nurtured!

A rainbow of flowers in  my field of happiness today!

SO I tip my cup to my followers, and fellow bloggers...

I hook up my cable and DSL, and time to surf my friends...

Shop  here this weekend for a 50% discount fo ALL your hard LABOR!

Congrats to SUZANNE! She won last week's giveaway! Please stop over to her blog  for some shabby cottage ideas all year through Her other blog Confessions of a Cool Mom, is inspiring too! Let me tell you she IS one cool MOM! Please stop in today or this weekend and leave her a comment, and let her know Valrie sent you! I think she would make a great PS blogger too!

Waiting to hear from you via email or a call!

SO PICK up your phone, Mine is PINK! AND call or email me with your order now and enter to  WIN a  FABULOUS PINKALICIOUS FREE makeover !                                                        

Do not forget to visit my other PINK blogging friends and enter their giveaways here!

Please visit my sister's blog Stitches'n Stuff and be sure to tell her too that I sent you for  a visit, she is my guardian angel and the reason I have survived! She is the most talented person I know!

I love your comments they make me smile!

Leave yours today and you are entered to win my PINK surprise giveaway!

In response to community colleges giving students who fail a second chance in life!

A recent article condescended to the students who are in college who do not "deserve" to be there! It incited me, so here is my retort, and logic to their obviously amoral judgement!

So many times I have seen students do a slow burn and then go OFF like a firecracker...and NO small wonder either! They may learn differently but they do learn! It is OUR job to teach them!

Essential Skills for Reading, English Composition  and Critical Thinking & Reasoning Skills,  are all developmental courses I teach for many of the students who would fall in this category (alternative learners, slipped through the cracks, and below ability level of ZPD, their zone of proximal development!). Believe me when I state, I have on average 25 students per course ALL who are  below their grade ability level or scored low enough to take these mandated  and the retraining in this poor economy, enrollment is at an all time high this fall semester. These students never received the differentiated instruction due them while in secondary education, were pushed through the cracks, and now it is up to community colleges and corporate America to be the gatekeepers of our youth and the future leaders of the United States. In most cases these are very intelligent students who have not had the benefit of differentiated instruction to meet them where they are at in order to get them where they need to be.

 I call myself a "boot camp" instructor, but one who will instill in them a variety of strategies for reading and writing comprehension fluency; a  rigorous class with total immersion in the langugae acquisition process. My courses are student-centered with their learning outcomes as the focal point instruction. At the end of this week's first classes I have students petitioning to be allowed into my sections. Unfortunately I am unable to honor their requests. Too many students per class in a developmental (intervention) clinical diagnostic course, where  immediate feedback, authentic and diagnostic assessments  by the instructor requires lower student to teacher ratios to procure successful student learning outcomes. Accepting petitions would defeat the learning objectives and the outcomes, thereby promoting further lack of success. The goals of these courses is in 15 weeks to have our learners on pace and ability level to begin courses in their majors with the age approprate writing, reading, and critical thinking skills indicative to a "college student" who has developed these in their prior education!


Our nation continues to fail to meet the needs of its students in the public and private sectors at all levels. To complicate this there remains a huge shortage of highly qualified educators as well as a lack of strong professional staff developmental workshops aimed at teacher and student retention regardlesws of socioeconomic and racial diversities of the community cultur. This indicates a need for extensive research, and restructuring of the mindset of curricula design and its implementation nationwide. The only constant we have is change and change we must or risk becoming extinct as forerunners in global ranking of higher education.



Valrie A. Verhoeven

MSE REading SPecialist

Doctoral Candidate Teaching & Learning

Please leave a comment!

On the go!

NEWS COMING SOON

Hello,

This is a very new blog and I am balancing a great deal right now. I just finished two doctoral courses and finishing up orientation to a new college where I teach  developmental courses for adult students.

My question today for you is one of critical thinking, reasoning skills, and opinionated to a degree...

Whose responsibility is or was it to educate and assure students have truly earned the passing grade and rite of passage to enter college with a high school crtificate?

Posit this:  You are not able to take college courses in your fielld of major until you pass the developmental courses on English composition, Crritical Thinking & Reasoning Skills, and Essential Skills for Reading. You pay for these college course by the credit hour, BUT do not earn college credit for them. This equals a total of 11 credit hours at the average of say $200-$300 per credit hour... do the math!

Now, who claims the blame? You as the student? You project it on the teachers or administrators? Or it is your parents' fault? Or all of the above?

This happens every day. It is a shame regardless who is responsible. It increases the cost of a college education, costs employers a great deal of money too! And you or your parents or those AWFUL student loans!

Posit this: What will you do differently today to change? You cannot keep doing the same things and expect different results!

DO YOU WANT TO CHANGE? IMPROVE YOUR BASIC SKILL SETS? STAY TUNED FOR

• resources to help you
• web links
• lesson plans self taught
• enrollment in on-line courses geared directly to YOUR success
• information on corporate workshops
• information on professional development workshops
• conferences, consortiums on language acquisition
• literacy volunteer groups
• parent groups
• student groups
• educator groups

TIP FOR THE DAY!!!  Read every day at least 15 minutes. Vary the type of texts you read and the purpose. Share what you read with others. Join a reading group and study group. I will be developing reading forums here!

THAT'S all for now!

Please leave comments, they make me smile!

I am waiting to hear from you!

Your comments make me smile!

                         EMAIL me here with ideas and suggestions for discussion topics!

First Post!

I have been asked to develop a blog focusing on reading instruction, comprehension, teaching and learning aka LANGUAGE ACQUISITION. SO here is the first post to get it up and running. I network all over the world. My MSE is in Reading with  a Reading Specialist Endorsement and El. Education. Currently I am about 2/3 done with my doctoral in Teaching & Learning. I have a passion to teach and improve while positively impacting the lives of those I teach.

Stay tuned for links, networking and threaded discussions. Lesson plans, Q&A, ask the expert... I or one of my colleagues will respond.

I am a professor at a community college in upsate NY. I live in historic Cooperstown. I have been a reader since I was 4, and am now proudly 55. I am bilingual, speak Spanish since I was 11. I have traveled to many Spanish speaking countries. Currently I also work with migrant workers and love teaching these children and parents!

This is a late night early morning post to get the blog up. I wil be doing graphics to make it more interesting. Under construction and my mid-life baby coming to life!

Email me here! wiprotocol you want used, your Title, position, where you work, earned your degrees, etc.th your questions, ideas, suggestions and I will respond! Be sure to leave your name and email address or URL! If you want to be added to the blog roll of experts be sure to let me know that too and the

It will be a few days before I post again, but stay tuned! Feel free to leave comments and suggestions for topics you would like discussed and researched!

Have a wonderful day!

Valrie... the reading doctor! Quote for the day! "Your mind is like a parachute, it works best when opened!"

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