Growing in Self-Efficacy

Growing in self-efficacy...this is about being able to self motivate oneself to become better at something. In regards to reading, self-efficacy would see my students thinking and believing that they were all capable readers. I want them to read for enjoyment and escapism, not just because I have told them that they have to read a specific text. I guess, the big question is....how can I best teach and foster a love for reading and self-efficacy in my students?

Repeatedly, research confirms that student motivation is a key factor in being a capable and successful reader. If I want my students to be self motivated, I need to allow them to have more autonomy and ownership over what they read. One way I am doing this is by simply making sure that I take my students weekly to the school library and give them time to read their chosen text in class. Another way to support my students with this is with a T-Shaped Literacy approach. Having a number of multi-modal texts, related to a theme or topic, allows students to have a little bit more choice over what they can read independently or after a workshop.

Another way that I can help my students to be more confident readers and in turn, grow in self-efficacy, is to design more engaging and rich ‘Create’ tasks and experiences. Giving them choice over these tasks would be even better. It is sometimes difficult to provide a lot of choices that will meet all my students' interests, when you are creating tasks based on specific learning goals. With that in mind, I need to note that reading is an area where there are so many skills required and you can access learning goals at one time.

Something that I know that I need to be better at is being up to date with what my students are reading and popular authors that they enjoy. Creating time at the end of the day to read a novel is something that I started the year well with, but I definitely need to pick this up again.