Group items tagged

Hedin, L.R. & Conderman, G. (2010). Teaching students to comprehend informational text through rereading. The Reading Teacher, 63(7), 556-565. Doi: 10.1598/RT.63.7.3 "Striving readers may view the purpose of reading as decoding an assigned section rather than building knowledge." When I read this quote, I knew that this article would be of interest to me. As my building continues to examine the ramifications of the Common Core, informational text is something of concern. Should other content teachers be required to teach reading strategies using informational text? (Here, I am hoping, my readers reply with a resounding "YES!") This article gives specific strategies to use with students, with a focus on encouraging rereading. Below is an email that was sent to my colleagues:  Subject: The Secret to Informational Text  Perhaps my subject line was a bit misleading... Attached may not be "The Secret" to our informational text woes, but the article details strategies we can use in our classrooms now that will help our students with comprehension. After reviewing our NWEA scores, we have all seen the difficulties our students have with informational text and comprehension. The Common Core has a significant focus on informational reading and writing. In order to prepare for this shift in instruction and curriculum, I have found this very useful article. "Teaching Students to Comprehend Informational Text Through Rereading," details key ideas like helping our striving readers set the purpose for reading, identify text features, and strategies we can use in our daily instruction to strengthen their comprehension of texts. It questions whether our students are simply great "decoders" (they can read the words because they understand sound/letter relationships) or are they truly constructing meaning. The role content teachers play in the development of successful readers is HUGE! Many of these strategies seem basic, but because of that, they will be simple t

This packet contains colorful posters to teach 14 non-fiction text features! -guide words -title page -table of contents -index -glossary -heading -keywords -illustrations & photographs -captions -diagrams -labels -text box -maps -charts

Free downloadable posters to teach text features!

Journal #1 I really like this article because it spoke to my content area, social studies. I think it is important that students understand how they read a novel for English will be different than reading a history textbook or a newspaper article, and therefore require a different strategy. I use primary and secondary documents, as well as text books, and so students sometimes struggle with comprehension of these different materials. I also use Supreme Court case documents and students have difficulty with those especially. Part of it is vocabulary, but part of it they really don't have a strategy for figuring it out. I think providing them with a strategy of how newspaper articles are structured vs. text books would be very helpful for those learners who have difficulty understanding what they are reading. I was also happy to find out that there is a website that I can access that may assist me with helping teach literacy for social studies. Yea!

This article also provides concrete examples of students reading history like historians, which is really important. And text structure and features defintely plays into this as well. I am so glad you found something meaningful for you as a teacher and learner! Nice use of tags! (Is this for your Journal #1?)

LeAnn, I also think it is very important that students read a textbook differently from the way they would read a novel. Having students take on the persona of a Historian I believe would help them better understand history and how it went about developing our country and our pasts as well. That is wonderful that you are searching for ways to make a more meaningful connection between the students and history textbooks.