Student aims to improve literacy through group reading

Sometimes when students enter college, they know they want to get a degree, but they’re not sure what they want to study. With guidance from faculty and advisers at Missouri State University and some poking and prodding by her family, Iyshia Smith finally decided to focus her studies on educating others.

“I never thought I’d want to be a teacher,” said Smith. “I knew I wanted to work with kids and with numbers, but I didn’t know I wanted to teach. But everyone else seemed to know, and they weren’t surprised when I finally decided to be a teacher.”

Smith, a recipient of a Graduate Scholarship for Enhancing Diversity, has spent her time at Missouri State improving the literacy of young children in the area. She developed a choral reading project at Bowerman Elementary after learning about how students can strengthen their reading skills by practicing a piece of literature and performing it for others.

“During my student teaching I really got into literacy because I realized that it’s really the backbone of every subject,” said Smith. “It’s really important to diversify the way we teach and challenge the students but not overwhelm them so they can learn in the best way possible.”

Smith and one of her literacy professors, Beth Hurst, wrote a proposal for and received a College of Education Dean’s Research Grant to buy multiple copies of a children’s book so each child could have one. In order to receive the grant, the students had to prove their desire to read by performing a successful choral reading of a book.

“We practiced choral reading for a month,” said Smith. “We split the class into two groups and had one group read the dialogue while the other group read the narration. It was really neat to see them kind of coach each other and help each other as they learned the book and practiced together.”

Smith received her undergraduate degree from Missouri State and will graduate with a master’s degree in education-literacy in December. She plans to stay in Springfield to get her doctorate in education administration. She currently teaches second grade at Bowerman Elementary, a Title 1 school, and looks forward to many more years of teaching.

Story by Shay Stowell, university communications student writer