Schoenbach answers a very important question in this reading: Why is reading important? In my middle school, reading was just that, reading. The teacher did not really put much emphasizes on it, our English class was spent more on ISAT prep, or writing. Here, Schoenbach argues the importance of reading, that it is more than just a skill. Reading is complex, and uses parts of your memory that you think that you have long forgotten. That is the magic of reading, why those who argue that young children should read usually say that it "transports the child to another world" or something like that. That is because in a way it does. A good book will trigger memories in a child, some long forgotten, some that are new. When reading something more complex, you work to understand. You can try to relate it to your existing knowledge. Good readers may even argue with the author when they are reading. Like when reading a newspaper, you can argue about the "facts" while you read. Reading is problem solving. The reader works to make sense of the text, to analyze what they are reading, to try and make sense of it, not just the knowledge on the page, but from the ideas evoked from words.
As teachers, we have four key dimensions of classroom life that are needed to support reading development.
1-Social dimensions. A safe environment built inside the classroom, where students can be open to what they read, and difficulties about reading. Student can also be thought to acknowledge resources brought by other members. At first I thought, maybe some kind of book club, but that has a problem. That would be removing this environment from the classroom. This needs to exist inside a regular classroom.
2- Personal dimensions. Helping students create identities about themselves as readers, as well as helping them come up with goals for reading improvement.
3- Cognitive dimension. Help your students create a mental process, which includes their own problem solving strategies. This will help them throughout life, as problem solving skills can be used in every subject.
4- Knowledge-building dimension. Grow the kind knowledge that that readers bring to a text, and make sure it grows though further interactions with texts.
Hi Patryk,
ReplyDeleteI like the way you've laid out the four key dimensions of classroom life and how they apply to reading. I'm most interested in the social dimension, particularly in the anxiety that many students have about admitting difficulties while reading. I think that a big part of the reason why many adolescents list math and science classes as their least favorite is because of the perceived notion that there are clearly right and wrong answers, as opposed to subjects with more open-ended, subjective content. That's why I think it's extra important in math and science classes to create a classroom culture where it's totally okay and expected to be confused and make mistakes. I'd be interested in hearing from math and science teachers about good subject-specific ways to create that culture -- if anyone has any input, let me know!
i agree with your classroom idea with mistakes being ok. I think many students hold back from answering out of fear of being wrong. Mistakes are good, it's how we learn, and they need to know that.
DeleteHello Patryk,
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you on how some reading/English teachers "teach to the test" rather than teaching reading on a more critical level so that they can learn to be critical readers, which is a very important skill to have in today's world. Going along with that, I would say the last dimension of classroom that focuses on more long-term results is knowledge. With students asking questions on where they are confused in a text, is them interacting with a text. As Shoenbach, Greenleaf, and Murphy (2012) mentioned, reading has a problem solving aspect and not all of it is automatic (129).
The way I see it is that an engaged reader is a reader who is trying his or her best to understand the reading. For example, say the teacher asks something similar to "What was confusing about the reading?" If a student is able to clearly explain to the teacher what was confusing to him or her, the student is able to effectively communicate his or her thoughts on the text, which is a great start to reading comprehension and analysis.
Yes, teaching to test is a issue in the classroom right now, and not just in english. In other subjects, teachers just teach what is the bare minimum, instead of challenging the kids.
DeleteThe issue of teaching to the test goes further than the teacher. Sometimes there is pressure by administration or the actual test has time constraints and isn't really designed to get students to engage. This is usually standardized tests. However, teachers that go with the model you presented, then they can also create "tests" to see their students understanding and comprehension. -Kiley
DeleteHey Patryk,
ReplyDeleteI think your experience with middle school reading is unfortunately reflective of many of our experiences with how reading was taught as well. A lot of times, teachers do not encourage students to comprehend the text. Instead, they use it as preparation for standardized tests, which is good, but not much emphasis is placed on the texts themselves. If we are taught to read to know the content of the reading so we can regurgitate it on a test, sure, we might get good grades, but the fact that many of us forget about the reading after taking the test is a testament to how this way of teaching reading is ineffective in actually comprehending the texts. This unfortunate method of teaching encourages students to pseudoread, which is something that Buehl, Lee and Spratley talk about in their research articles. We really need to avoid encouraging this behavior to our students as teachers and instead, as you've mentioned, integrate the four key dimensions of classroom life that support reading development: the social, personal, cognitive, and knowledge-building dimensions.
Yes it is sad that many of us go through the same in middle school english, but it is also a benefit. Now, the future wave of teachers will know better than our teachers, proving that education is moving us forward.
DeleteHi Patryk, I agree that reading is more than just skill. This remind me that I could give the right answer via reading strategies but, actually, I didn’t understand the whole text in English reading test. This kind of reading, I think, is invalid. And many English learning problems described by the author of The Reading Apprenticeship Framework indeed happen to me. For example, “when readers are unfamiliar with particular language structures and features of a text, their language-processing ability breaks down.” (Schoenbach, Greenleaf, & Murphy, 2012, p19) But to be honest, the strategies the author mentioned in Chapter 2 are not specific enough to me, I mean, are there any more practical teaching methods? If anyone have more specific strategy about teaching English reading, let me know! Thank you!
ReplyDeleteSadly, reading strategies for giving the right answer is really prominent in todays schools. Students learn how to the give the answer the test wants, but they do not know what the test is even asking. Truly a problem that needs fixing in todays schools.
DeleteHey Patryk,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your sharing. I do agree reading is really significant in the students' learning ability. Reading is a kind of skill that can not only exist during the students' period but can be lasted for our whole life. I agree with the idea that young children should read usually say that it "transports the child to another world" or something like that. When reading children always think them as the real thing that had happened just like bring them to another world, their emotion will be changed as the action changed. Besides, as educators, these four key dimensions of classroom life is also important and should be used in the classroom teaching. Building a safe environment in a class can not only open what they read but can open their mind, the can share what they have read then they can get many kinds of ideas at the same time. Helping students create identities about themselves as readers and helping them come up with goals for reading improvement will let them become a real reader, they will learned why they are reading, what kind of books should they read. This will also help them through their whole life.
A safe classroom is important for these very reasons, one, it will allow them to share about their readings to the class, and two, for the reasons you said, it will push them to read more.
DeleteI think the social dimension of reading is very important. So many students feel anxious about reading in front of the class and this in turn makes students dislike reading. I think this is especially important for English language learners. Students who do not speak English as their first language have an increased anxiety in these situations. The last things students want to feel is different and students who do not speak English as their first language likely feel very different when reading during class, especially if they make a reading mistake. I also agree that it is important to create a personal identity as a reader. Students who have negative experiences reading, whether it's a book for English class or a Chemistry lab report, create a reading identity that correlates with the idea that they are not good in that area. It is important for us as teachers to not only build up their positive reading identities but to counteract their previously negative reading identities.
ReplyDeletePatryk,
ReplyDeleteIt is true that reading involves complex processes. I had never thought about what reading entitles until I stated learning English, at age fifteen. It was then that I became aware of my metacognition. I started to question of everyone was "talking to the text" as I was. And I had never questioned anyone about it. It is now that I am reading these texts that I have a deeper understanding about the process of reading.
Based on these reading, I think is important that we allow our students to become aware of this and let them understand that they are reading to understand and that not everyone gets it right the first time.
Hi Patryk,
ReplyDeleteI had a similar reading experience with you in adolescence that reading was just reading, to be exactly, it was reading without independent thinking. I think that might be due to the typical style of teaching reading in many schools. When I was in middle school, teachers always just asked students to read texts aloud first and then pointed out some key points directly, but not left us enough time to silently think independently and raise our own questions. What we answered about the texts were all teachers’ questions, which caused that we had never realized that we need to read with our own questions. As a result of this no-enlightenment teaching approach, students become lazy while reading. In other words, they do not think while reading, let alone questioning the “facts” in articles or even problem solving. And I think in addition to the four key dimensions of classroom life teachers should provide that the author mentioned in Chapter 2, the specific teaching approaches or strategies teachers use, like Metacognition Conversation that “serves to demystify the reading process for the students” (89) mentioned in Chapter 4, are more important.
I have heard about the "think aloud" process before where teachers describe how they personally think about/through a text. However, I agree that it then gives the one narrative and doesn't allow students to think for themselves. That is why it is imperative for teachers to overly prepare. To know how far to go in the meta cognition conversation. - Kiley
DeleteHi Patryk! Thanks for sharing. I still remember the words mentioned in the Buehl’s article a few weeks ago that reading is about “the mind of the reader and the mind of the author”. In chapter4, the author listed four dimensions of reading, which enabled me to have a deeper understanding of reading. However, when it comes to education, especially the typical education in China, teachers tend to focus only on student’s abilities to do exercises and writing in order to get good grades, rather than emphasizing the importance of reading. In fact, reading ability is quite crucial. It is a complex process, which can help readers combine the existed knowledge with the new knowledge, and it is also a key approach to obtain solutions to problems. “Read for tests” makes students regard academic reading as merely completing assignments, rather than mentally engaged in reading to understand. I think that's what we should change.
ReplyDelete