Carnegie Read Aloud

Today in class we watched a video of a teacher conducting a read aloud to her classroom.
Ms. Meyers conducts the read aloud sitting in a chair in front of her students who are on the rug. The teacher begins by engaging the students with the book selection of an author previously heard in the classroom. The teacher reads Strega Nona by Tomie dePaola. Ms. Meyers probes the students to make text-to-text connections as well as predictions about the story. As the teacher reads she observes the students who are making connections. She pauses from her reading and gives the students an opportunity to share ideas. The students quickly make connections to other books by the same author and have lots of ideas to share. After resuming the reading she again pauses and asks the students to discuss ideas with a partner.
The students really benefit from this interaction with other students. Although the video did not show responses from all the students individually when they were talking in partners all the students were involved.
Although these students were elementary age read-alouds can be a beneficial, and engaging for all grade levels.