Guiding Readers during Guided Reading

I have found this one of the hardest things to get under my belt as a teacher. I know we are expected to just 'learn' a lot of things on the job but this is one I continually struggle with.

I have tried lots of things and have tossed a lot out, never to be repeated again!

But I stumbled onto some great ideas, courtesy of a colleague and I finally feel like we have found a groove in guided reading.

I usually get to read with all groups twice in the week. I get my support teacher to help me with orientations to the text on a Monday for all groups but I have done 5 different orientations by myself in 35 minutes before (I know, what a machine lol)

I grab the group and I read the book. I take out the tricky bits. I am trying to make it an experience in which they can engage with the text, rather than struggle through every hard, unknown word. I often stop just before the end of the book to get some predictions going.

Then we read together. I encourage the following with fingers and we say the words out loud. Often I stop and listen for words and if the group struggles or substitutes the word, we go back and read it over again.

After the group read through, the kids sit back to back. They read the book out loud to themselves, at their own pace. This gives me a chance to listen to the kids individually. This is now the 3rd (or more if they are quick) reading of the book so most kids are feeling comfortable with the sentence patterns or tricky words. It also gives those more introverted kids a chance to read out loud without feeling threatened. I am definitely putting whisper phones on my to do list after reports are finished!

I have been introducing "reading aids" and those are very loose inverted commas, for some groups to encourage the 1 to 1 correspondence as well as to build engagement in reading. Who wouldn't be engaged  reading by finger lights or with a dinosaur head pointing at the words?

What do you do during guided reading?