Literacy in the Content Areas - Outcomes Reflect on Call for Change follow up tasks. Identify text features. Identify the readability statistics for a.

Literacy in the Content Areas -Outcomes

Reflect on Call for Change follow up tasks.

Identify text features.Identify the readability statistics

for a text.Generate a definition for

disciplinary literacy.Reflect on session at the Wiki site

LITERACY IN THE LITERACY IN THE CONTENT AREASCONTENT AREAS

According to NAEP, the reading skills of America’s 4th graders have increased significantly in recent years with the strongest gains made by low-income and minority students.


At the secondary level, scores have remained flat since the 1970’s when NAEP was created.


Performance of the nation’s 12th-graders in reading has declined in comparison to 1992 (NAEP, 2005)

60% of 12th graders read at basic or below basic (NAEP, 2005)

42% of college students take remedial classes (U.S., Dept of Education, 2007)


Today, more than two-thirds of all eighth and twelfth graders read at less than a proficient level, and half of those students are so far behind that they drop off the scale entirely, scoring below what the U. S. Department of Education defines as its most basic level.


Even college-bound students often struggle with more advanced literacy skills. A major study of high school juniors and seniors taking the ACT college entrance exam found that only half were ready for college-level reading assignments in core subjects like math, history, science, and English. (ACT, 2005)


Reading Strategies for All Types of Text

Self-monitoring Visualizing

Rereading Summarizing

Questioning Predicting

Previewing vocabulary Identifying text features


Though well-meaning, a sole emphasis on generic reading comprehension strategies may lead students to believe that all academic texts are more or less the same.


As students move into different content area classes, they must:

read to follow instructions explicitly.read to evaluate an author’s style.read to question an author’s

assumptions.read to respond to an author’s claims.read to access facts and details.


Becoming competent in a number of academic content areas requires skills, knowledge, and reasoning processes that are specific to particular disciplines.


BEYOND Content Area Reading

Common Core ELA Standards


Content Area Reading

focus on learning from textknow how to study books, not to read

like a chemist (including chemistry books)

emphasize text features and literacy learning toolsExit notes Advanced organizersResponse journals DictionaryInternet Readability analysis


Disciplinary Literacy

focus on the specialized problems of a subject area

disciplines represent cultural differences in how information is used, the nature of language, the demands for precision


Disciplinary Literacy

not just a hip new name for “content area reading”

specialized ways of knowing and communicating in the different disciplines

distinct routines to be taught


Sources of new research in Disciplinary Literacy

Studies that compare expert readers with novices (Bazerman, 1998; Geisler, 1994; Wineburg, 1998, etc.)

Functional linguistics analyses of the unique practices in creating, disseminating, evaluating knowledge (Fang, 2004; Halliday, 1998; Schleppegrell, 2004, etc.)


History Text

There Is To Be No WarDecember 4, 1860


Skills for reading historical text include

Sourcing: considering the author and author perspective

Contextualizing: placing the document within its historical period and place

Corroborating: evaluating information across multiple sources

Wineburg, 1998


http://www.cleanvideosearch.com/media/action/yt/watch?videoId=kWcVag7X8MA

Teaching Students Important Skills


Science Reading technical, abstract, dense, tightly

knit language (contrasts with interactive, interpersonal style of other texts or ordinary language)

nominalization (turning processes into nouns)

suppresses agency (focus on causation not intention)

Schleppergrell


Math ReadingGoal: arrive at “truth”Importance of “close reading” with

an intensive consideration of every word in the text

Rereading a major strategyHeavy emphasis on error detectionPrecision of understanding essential

Schleppergrell


Chemistry Readingprovides knowledge that allows

prediction of how the world worksunderstanding needed of

experiments or processesconnections among prose,

graphs, charts, formulas (alternative representations of constructs)

major reading strategies include corroboration and transformation

Schleppegrell


History Readinginterpretative, sourcing central in

interpretation (consideration of bias and perspective)

seems narrative without purpose and argument without explicit claims (need to see history as argument based on partial evidence; narratives are more than facts)

Single texts problematic - no corroboration

Schleppegrell


Read the selection you’ve been given.

With your group, brainstorm difficulties students might have reading and fully comprehending this text.

Record a reflection as the Theory to Practice Task.

Literacy in the Content Areas - Outcomes Reflect on Call for Change follow up tasks. Identify text features. Identify the readability statistics for a.

Documents

content areasaccording

content areasat

content areasperformance

content areastoday

content areasas students

content areas outcomesreflect

different content area

advanced literacy skills