Reading Tools for the SBP Literacy Toolbox

After doing a large amount of reading over the summer, I have gathered the framework for a possible Literacy Toolbox for use by SBP teachers.  The framework begins with understanding that literacy instruction (that is: reading and writing instruction) is a responsibility that can be embraced by all content-area teachers, and not just those of the English department.  By incorporating literacy instruction in all the content areas, we can work to meet our Middle States student performance objectives of increasing the writing skills and the critical reading skills of all our students at SBP.

In Critical Reading, we ought to include in the framework the four ‘anchor standards’ that we have adopted (from the Common Core) as our definition of critical reading.  By laying out what ‘we’ mean as critical reading, we can all better understand what it is that we would like our students to be able to do in the area of critical reading.

Next, we should include the realization that the ability to read words (called in literacy research as “decoding”) is not the same as the ability to create meaning from those words (in research, this is called “comprehension”).  The ability to create meaning includes the reader’s ability to make inferences (using evidence from the reading), the ability to understand the author’s viewpoint and to question it (called “dialogue with the text” in research), and the ability to use the new knowledge gained from the reading (called “integration” in research).  This is a more detailed definition of reading comprehension, and this definition is expanded by the anchor standards we have adopted.

Within the framework of the Toolbox, critical reading must be acknowledged as a process that is continuing throughout the time that a student is in school.  We cannot rest on the notion that the high school student has “already” learned this, or perhaps “should have learned this” before they arrive in high school.  Teachers must accept the research-based evidence that comprehension (as defined above) develops even (and especially) during high school, during adolescence.

It's time to assemble our Literacy Toolbox.

The SBP literacy toolbox will contain the instructional routines that will allow teachers to incorporate more reading into their respective content areas.  The toolbox will also contain routines for allowing more writing in the content areas.  These routines may already be familiar to some teachers, while they will seem foreign and strange to others.  But just as one may be bewildered upon entering a craftsman’s workshop and seeing all the various tools, it is with familiarity with those very tools, careful instruction in their use, and in seeing wonderful products that one’s bewilderment can be turned into satisfaction.

Please read my full post here.  "Building A Literacy Toolbox for SBP" 

Show them how you became a good reader.

Of the books that I have read so far during this vacation, I have been most struck by the thoughts of Cris Tovani, a reading specialist and classroom teacher who wrote I Read It, but I Don't Get It: Comprehension Strategies for Adolescent Readers.  I knew it was going to be a good read; this is one of those rare cases where the good cover and title were as good as the content of the book.  Her writing is easy to understand, as she shares her personal experiences in real classrooms, describing students who we will easily recognize in our own classes.

This is a relatively short book, with its 107 pages that bring excellent lessons without being too 'preachy.'  Each chapter starts with a short vignette, followed by a thorough review of the comprehension strategies used in the scenario, and then capped by a summary of specific techniques and suggestions for their use.  The introductory pages and the final chapter lay out Tovani's particular beliefs (beliefs which are supported by scientific evidence in numerous scholarly studies on reading comprehension):

"Teachers don't have to be reading specialists to teach comprehension strategies.  Teachers simply have to be aware of their own processes as readers.  They can notice their own thinking as they read, determine what they do to make meaning, and pass these techniques on to their students"

We can learn how. We can learn.

I am grateful for the amount of research that exists about strategies/routines that have been shown (backed by scientific evidence) to help improve reading skills in adolescent learners.  Several authors have taken advantage of the research to write guidebooks that teach the teachers how to employ these strategies/routines in their classrooms.

A few years ago, as SBP teachers prepared to transition to block scheduling, we sat through an in-service presentation where certain strategies were demonstrated by a public school administrator who had helped other schools make the successful transition to block.  The presentation involved the strategy called 'jigsaw', where groups of students were asked to read different articles written about the general topic being discussed; each student within a group read a different article.  After reading, the group members shared what they had learned with the rest of the students in the group.

I wrote in my notes that day: "where did these articles come from?" since I was amazed with the positive feedback that the students offered about their participation in the demonstration.  This week, I found a book that describes the process of finding appropriate articles for such a learning routine.  It even goes one step further: the book contains reproducible articles that can be used as 'starters' for classrooms looking to improve reading and writing skills.  Learn more about the book after the jump.

Reading shoud be Fun, -damental

Thanks to Latest News from the New York Times available on my Kindle, I read about a game played perhaps by well-read adults, something that the author would have done to pass summer nights by the shore.  He describes 'the paperback game', where a player reads the sensational description on the back of a book, then the other players write on slips of paper what could be the first sentence in the book.  The slips are collected, then players vote on which one they feel is the 'correct' one.  A player receives one point every time their 'sentence' receives a vote.  (Click this link/sentence to read the NY Times article.)

It would not be difficult to believe that such a game could be played by certain populations of people.  I leave it to your imagination to decide what that population looks like.  To me, it seems a summer pastime that I hope some of our students might be able to play someday, and to enjoy.

This 'game' is a variation on a reading strategy that is described in some of the books that I've been reading this summer.  The strategy is called "Anticipatory Guides", where prospective readers discuss among themselves before reading a selection what they anticipate they will learn from doing the reading.  Research has evidence that such a reading strategy improves understanding/comprehension of the selection, and with consistent use also bolsters reading skills.

I wrote earlier that I never took courses that would teach me how to be a teacher.  Part of my growth in this profession is to engage myself in that kind of learning.  As much as I owe it to my students, I owe it also to myself.  It was enjoyable to see how some of the routines that I'm learning about can actually be made into a form of fun.  Some might argue that making learning fun is a gimmick to get students to do what a teachers is asking of them.  Gimmick? Strategy? Routine?  Get them reading, whatever it takes.