Teaching Literacy Across Content Areas

This book is written primarily for pre-service and in-service teachers of Literacy/English Language Arts, school administrators, literacy graduate education students, and literacy education researchers, and addresses the myriad of questions regarding the implementation of the Common Core State Standards. Classroom teachers and pre-service teachers are currently confronting questions such as how they can teach the Common Core State Standards to make sure they are fully addressing them; how they can have the time to teach students to have deeper understandings of the skills and concepts addressed in the Standards; what they can do to meet the learning needs of diverse students such as English language learners and students with learning disabilities; whether teachers of content areas are required to add reading instruction to their teaching responsibilities; whether the Standards tell teachers what to teach; and whether the document tells teachers how to implement the Standards in the classroom, among others. This book is designed to answer these questions and many others. Each chapter contains instructional practices, examples, vignettes, and illustrations that connect the Common Core State Standards to classroom practices, and thereby provide pre-service and in-service teachers with meaningful, relevant, and practical teaching strategies to prepare culturally, academically, and linguistically diverse students in California and other states of the nation for both career and college. In this regard, readers of this book will find that the authors have provided a pathway to better understand the Common Core State Standards, and will be able to use what they learn in the pages of this book to provide more effective instruction for their students across the disciplines to read, analyse, and critique complex texts and apply knowledge to solve practical, real-life problems.

"We often hear middle and high school teachers are frustrated because their students can′t understand the textbooks or can′t write effectively about their particular content. This book will provide both the framework for solving this dilemma and the specific, practical classroom practices that teachers can use each day to help students become more competent readers and writers." -Douglas Johnson, Assistant Superintendent Kane County Regional Office of Education, IL "Every middle school and secondary teacher should have a copy of this book. It not only provides the theoretical basis for each strategy, but it also provides effective instructions for use of the strategies in the classroom." -Dorothy Giroux, Program Director, Initial Teacher Preparation Program School of Education, Loyola University Chicago Eager for proven methods to strengthen your students′ content literacy? Then this book is a must-have for your classroom! Using a step-by-step approach that makes the strategies easy to understand and implement, the authors provide updated research-based strategies that will help increase your students′ reading comprehension, strengthen their writing skills, and build vocabulary across content areas. Expanded coverage of content literacy, additional reading and writing strategies for exploring content, and suggestions for working with struggling readers are included in this revised edition. This rich resource also offers: Tips for using trade books in the classroom Graphic organizers to help students recognize text structures Assessment tools Technology activities in every chapter Real classroom examples of how the strategies have been implemented More ways to evaluate the "readability" of textbooks Over 40 ready-to-use reproducibles Whether you are getting ready to begin teaching or are a veteran teacher, this accessible, invaluable handbook will give you the tools you need to help your students become lifelong learners!

What does it mean to teach reading in the context of the middle and high school classroom? Don’t students already know how to read by the time they get to secondary school? And how can a busy teacher take time away from the packed curriculum of science, history, mathematics, or language arts to teach reading? This book presents a linguistic approach to teaching reading in different subjects; an approach that focuses on language itself. Central to this approach is a view that knowledge is constructed in and through language and that language changes with changes in knowledge. As students move from elementary to secondary schools, they encounter specialized knowledge and engage in new contexts of learning in all subjects. This means that the language of secondary school learning is quite different from the language of the elementary years. While in the elementary years the subject matter of reading materials is often close to students’ everyday life experiences, the curriculum of secondary school deals with knowledge that is removed from students’ personal lives and everyday contexts. The language that constructs this more specialized knowledge thus tends to be more abstract, technical, information-laden, and hierarchically organized than the more familiar and “friendly” language that students typically encounter during the elementary years. Students need to develop specialized literacies (literacy relevant to each content area) as well as a critical literacy they can use across subject areas to engage with, reflect on, and assess specialized and advanced knowledge. This functional language analysis approach is shown using actual secondary social studies, science, and math textbooks and using a literary text.

"In Tools for Teaching Content Literacy Janet Allen put a wealth of research-based instructional tools at teachers' fingertips to help students make connections with information resources and to read critically. More Tools for Teaching Content Literacy extends this treasure trove with twenty-five new instructional strategies - from Expert Groups to Point-of-View Guides to Wordstorming - using the same compact tabbed flipchart format. More Tools is a handy reference that provides instant access to succinct description, practical strategies, and manageable assessments, allowing teachers to save time and be more flexible and confident in meeting students' needs."--BOOK JACKET.

Based on interactive elements that apply to every reading situation, the authors explain instructional strategies that work best in the subject areas and how to optimize those classrooms for reading, writing, and discussion.

The book, Teaching ELLs Across Content Areas: Issues and Strategies, is a unique, useful text written for K–12 teachers. This book is the culmination of the professional knowledge, expertise, and experience from the distinguished authors who represent the entire range of the content areas, including: language arts, science, mathematics, technology, arts, psychology, and Hispanic studies. The ELL school population has reached 5.3 million with the increase rate of 51 percent from School Year 1998-1999 to 2008-2009 (NCELA, 2012). By 2025, one out of four K-12 students will be ELLs (NEA Policy Brief, 2013). The NEA data states that the ELLs are the fastest-growing student population group in our schools and providing them with high-quality services and programs is an important investment in America’s future (NEA Policy Brief, 2013). With the fast growth of the ELLs in schools, basic information and strategies are needed by all K-12 teachers. This book provides useful information and strategies for all K-12 teachers in content classrooms. This book has three significances. First, the book provides the most needed information for K-12 teachers with issues and strategies that are important in content areas to help ELLs’ success. With the fast growth of the ELLs in schools, K-12 teachers need this information in content classrooms. Second, the book fills the gap related to teaching ELLs in content areas. There are some existing books with titles on teaching ELLs across content areas; yet, these books provide general information with fewer books that really address specific content topics. This book is unique because it has the dedicated chapters for specific content areas, e.g., Language Arts, Science, Math, Social Studies with issues and strategies in these respective contents as well as general information, e.g., L2 theories for teachers to know and work with ELLs. Third, the book is reader-friendly with carefully crafted chapters. Each chapter begins with a scenario to catch the reader’s attention, is followed by issues and strategies, and ends with a summary. A scenario begins with each chapter for teachers to get to know the ELLs with the content that focuses on the related information and teaching strategies. With the continued increase in the ELL school population, this book is intended helping all K-12 teachers in content areas have knowledge and strategies to better serve their ELLs.

Forty evidenced-based strategies for integrating literacy instruction into the content areas Providing unique content on assessment, differentiated instruction, technology, and reflective practice, Developing Content Area Literacy, Second Edition is designed to help busy middle school and secondary teachers meet the challenge of addressing the literacy learning needs of all students, including English language learners. Each of the 40 evidence-based strategies is organized around eight essential areas of literacy instruction: academic vocabulary, reading fluency, narrative text, informational text, media and digital literacies, informational writing, critical thinking, and independent learning. Each topic has five strategies from which to choose, giving teachers ample variety to meet the diverse needs of the classroom.

Discusses the premises that guide the teaching of reading in content areas, the vast array of reading strategies available, and how to use this information to impact all learners.