Library Idea of the Week
March 14, 2005
Cathy Belben, Librarian, Burlington-Edison High School

Library Idea of the Week
Our school is trying to focus on helping students develop reading skills. One area of focus is reading in the content areas. To that end, I have begun distributing a "reading across the curriculum idea of the week" to staff members each Monday.  What follows is a list of the ideas I'll be handing out for the last ten weeks of the school year. Please note that some refer to "attachments" which are photocopies that I can't provide here; I think the basic idea is clear just the same. Feel free to use the ideas any way you wish, and contact me if you have questions.

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #1
Use Post-It Notes:
A great way to help readers identify key ideas in reading material is to hand out small sticky notes (5-10 per kids, depending on the length of the material) and have students mark places where they:

1. Have a question
2. Found an answer
3. Need help with a word
4. Have an observation or comment to make

Marking text in this way helps students:

1. Interact with the writer’s message and meaning
2. Hold their thinking
3. Remember what they’ve read
4. Return to important ideas
5. Read with a purpose
 

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #2
Read Aloud to Your Students
Even if you just set aside a few minutes at the beginning or end of the period to read a short news article about your topic or something from the internet, reading aloud to teens can have a positive impact on their reading abilities.

Advantages of Reading Aloud:
Models good reading strategies
Models enjoyment of reading
Gets information to auditory learners
Provides everyone in class with a piece of information or an idea that can be discussed right away
Introduces concepts or facts in a different format

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #3
Fold-Over Study Method
The attached explanation shows students how to create their own study sheets for better remembering and learning from what they read.

This method is fairly easy to model and have students do for some of their reading assignments—and it’s easy to check, too.

Another benefit is that it allows you to check kids’ understanding of what they read, but THEY do all the work!  You don’t have to come up with questions for a chapter or whatever.  It also teaches students how to take notes.

ActivaReading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #4
Activate Prior Knowledge

Prior knowledge helps readers make sense of new material by attaching new ideas to old ones. Good readers tend to have more prior knowledge about a wider variety of topics, making reading easier because they have more “pegs” on which to hang new material.

Activate your students’ prior knowledge before having them read something by:

Asking what they already know about the topic

Giving them opportunities to verbalize connections between their experiences and the topic

Having them write what they know to be true about a topic

Having them write down what they want to learn about the topic

Preparing a graphic organizer which provides an overall picture or “schema” of the topic.

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #5
Use Prediction Sheets
Attached is an example of a prediction sheet you might see in a science class. Students are simply asked to think about the material before they read.

Benefits of prediction sheets:

Reading Across the Curriculum  Idea of the Week #6
Anticipation Guides
Before a new chapter or unit, ask students to complete a KWL chart—a chart in which they identify what they already Know about a topic and what they Want to learn about it. During and after reading, they can write in the Learn column as they gather information and ideas. These charts are great for post-reading discussion, too.

Benefits of Anticipation Guides

activate prior knowledge
set a purpose for reading
prepare students for discussing material
 easy for teacher to check and see if kids thought about topic and reading material
easy record of reading for students to keep

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #7
Know Your Struggling Readers

The three main barriers to content-area reading comprehension are:
1. Difficulty or inability to understand text features and construction.
2. Limited prior knowledge, content-area knowledge, and thematic knowledge.
3. Deficient content-specific vocabulary.

FORTUNATELY, you can do something about every problem except prior knowledge.
You can:

1.       MODEL reading strategies—how to read a textbook, for example.

2.       PRESENT content-area and thematic knowledge in a VARIETY of modes to read different learners.

3.       TEACH and USE content-area vocabulary (a few words a week is best for retention; posting “sight” words for your content area is highly recommended.)

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #8
Event Map

In history and literature classes—and in subject where you study events—have your students create a graphic organizer (see attached example) to help them organize the information they read about. This note-taking strategy is a good way for visual learners to process information, and it’s easy for teachers to check.

Reading Across the Curriculum Idea of the Week #9
Think Alouds

For some reading assignments, it’s useful to provide students with photocopies  they can highlight or mark.

The attached example shows a technique called “think aloud” in which the reader writes comments and questions next to specific items in the text (not the large margins). These notations can be used later in discussion or to help the student clarify concepts with the teacher.

By collecting these think aloud sheets afterward, the teacher can get an idea of how the students processed the material.

Reading Idea of the Week #10
Use Current Events

Use newspapers,  magazines, and online news to practice reading and comprehension skills.  Short news articles can be used to introduce topics, generate discussion, practice read-aloud skills, and share information about a topic in a way different from textbooks. When students read newspaper articles, ask them to: