Literacy is not something to put on an already crowded plate… Literacy IS the plate!

Literacy is not something to put on an already crowded plate…

Literacy IS the plate!

National Literacy Project

• Non-profit organization dedicated to improved adolescent literacy

• 10 years working with literacy teams and schools throughout the country

• Focus on middle and high school students

• Consistent, school-based support for improved literacy

You don’t have to be sick to get better.

The teacher cannot do it alone; the school makes all the difference.

“An excellent teacher without a well-coordinated program can do only so much. In these situations, even the best of teachers can offer students only isolated moments of engrossed learning and rich experience in an otherwise disconnected series of classes.”

Langer, J. (2002). Effective Literacy Instruction:

Building Successful Reading and Writing Programs. Urbana, IL: NCTE.

Defining literacy

Literacy

Definition (in your own words) Visual representation

Examples Non-examples

Frayer Model

Definitions of Literacy

1600-1900 Ability to sign one’s name to a document and own or borrow books

1930 Functional Literacy – moved to grade equivalents – 3+ years of schooling

WWII era 4+ years of schooling

1952 6+ years of schooling

1960 8+ years of schooling

Late 1970s High school completion

Literate adolescents are those who can read, write, find, present, discuss, think creatively, critically analyze information, and transfer their learning across multiple contexts. These literacy requirements are a far cry from a definition of literacy as basic reading and writing.

Taking Action on Adolescent Literacy

Why does literacy matter?

• …

Literacy for the 21st Century

Abilities required for student success: • Ability to seek information and make

critical judgments about information• Ability to read and interpret many

different kinds of text both in print and online

• Ability to innovate and apply knowledge creatively

Where Literacy is Headed, Kent Williams NCTE Executive Director, September, 2008

21st Century Readers and Writers Need to…

• Develop proficiency with the tools of technology• Build relationships with others to pose and solve

problems collaboratively and cross-culturally• Design and share information for global

communities to meet a variety of purposes• Manage, analyze, and synthesize multiple streams

of simultaneous information• Create, critique, analyze, and evaluate multi-media

texts• Attend to the ethical responsibilities required by

these complex environments

NCTE

Literary History

• List 2-3 positive or negative reading and/or writing events that affect the way you read and write today:– – –

Important Book

• Write down…– Title:– Author:– 2 reasons the book is important to you:

• •

What makes reading fun?

• …

The Art of Fly Fishing

Learning Something Hard

What Good Fly Fishers Do

• Relax• Feel the force• See the big picture• See what trout see• Always cast to a target• Wade safely• Never stop practicing

What Struggling Fly Fishers Do

• Avoid it• Blame other

factors• Rely heavily on

others • Refuse to try

anything new• Persist in images

of failure

What Doesn’t Help

• Tell me how but don’t show me how

• Tell me to try harder

• Encourage me to practice the same ineffective skills I already use

• Show me posters that highlight skills I don’t understand

• Give me mnemonics to help me remember what I don’t understand

What Does Help

• Motivation• Visualizing success• High expectations• Explicit instruction• Modeling• Guided practice• Independent practice

An Instructional Model

What does this have to do with reading?

What Good Readers Do

• Plan for the demands of different kinds of text• Make connections with prior knowledge• Evaluate understanding of the ideas in the text• Make inferences• Visualize• Ask questions• Determine what is important• Decipher the meaning of unknown words• Organize knowledge• Create connections between reading and writing

Taking Action on Adolescent Literacy, p. 59

What Struggling Readers Do

• Avoid reading

• Blame other factors

• Rely heavily on others

• Refuse to try anything new

• Persist in images of failure

What Doesn’t Help

• Tell me how but don’t show me how

• Tell me to try harder

• Encourage me to practice the same ineffective skills I already use

• Show me posters that highlight skills I don’t understand

• Give me mnemonics to help me remember what I don’t understand

Read between the LinesRead

between

the

lines

to

understand.

What Does Help

• Visualizing success• High expectations• Motivation• Explicit instruction• Modeling• Guided practice• Independent practice

Instructional Model

What Good Readers Do

• Plan for the demands of different kinds of text• Make connections with prior knowledge• Evaluate understanding of the ideas in the text• Make inferences• Visualize• Ask questions• Determine what is important• Decipher the meaning of unknown words• Organize knowledge• Create connections between reading and writing

Taking Action on Adolescent Literacy, p. 59

Plan for Feedback

• Meet in departments; member of Literacy Team will facilitate discussion

• Provide feedback on– Goal statements– Literacy Action Plan– Strategies

Literacy’s role in effective instruction

• Using Literacy Support in 5 Instructional Modes handout…– Underline descriptors of your teaching in

both columns– Read across the row completely– Self-assessment

PAS

• Preview the text and critical vocabulary

• Access prior knowledge

• Set the purpose

P: Preview the text

• Examine– Titles, headings and subheadings– Introductions and summaries– Bulleted lists– Pictures, captions, charts, graphs and

illustrations– Print in special type

P: Preview critical vocabulary

• Focus on understanding

• Examine vocabulary conceptually

• Use the words daily

• Post words around the room

Text Structure and the Struggling Reader

• Kinds of text they read

– Magazines

– E-mail

– Others …

Students should be reading…

• Textbooks

• Informational text

• Abstract, symbolic stories and poems

• Sophisticated diction

• Complicated syntax

Cumulative Experience

Words heard 1 hour 100-hr week

5,200-hr year

4 years

Welfare 616 62,000 3 million 13 million

Working class

1251 125,000 6 million 26 million

Professional 2153 215,000 11 million 45 million

Prefixes

• Anti- against• De- opposite• Dis- not, opposite of• En-, em- cause to• Fore- before• In-, im- in• In-, im-, il-, ir- not• Inter- between• Mid- middle• Mis- wrongly

• Non- not• Over- over• Pre- before• Re- again• Semi- half• Sub- under• Super- above• Trans-across• Un- not• Under- under

A: Access prior knowledge

• Identify the topic

• Think about what you already know about the topic

• Write or discuss what you know about the topic

S: Set the purpose

• Understand the assignment

• Read and analyze comprehension questions before you read the text

• Analyze text structure

• Read for different purposes