Education Commons^™

What Are The Disciplinary Literacy Complex Texts And Comprehension Habits Of Mind In Elementary (K-6)?, Stephanie Buelow, Charlotte Frambaugh-Kritzer

Literacy Practice and Research

This article spotlights complex texts and the comprehension habits of mind that elementary students may encounter across the disciplines of visual arts, performing arts, science, social studies, and mathematics.

Supporting Informational Text Comprehension: One Educator’S Scaffolding During Instruction In Kindergarten, Nicole M. Martin

Reading Horizons: A Journal of Literacy and Language Arts

Educators’ support when using informational text in kindergarten is foundational to children’s comprehension and future learning. Prior research has not offered clear insight into their help when children experience difficulties during informational text comprehension instruction. The current study examined one kindergarten educator’s support. Mrs. Swanson’s teaching was observed two to three times per week for 15 weeks, and lesson artifacts were collected. Discourse analytic coding procedures, constant comparison, and thematic analysis revealed that the educator consistently provided verbal scaffolding but inconsistently supported the individual children who were experiencing comprehension difficulty. An expanded focus on educators’ scaffolding at children’s points of …

A Structured Literacy Approach To Support Striving Readers In Secondary Grades: Meaningful Transactions Through Morphological Awareness And Fluency Building, Samantha Bart-Addison, Robert A. Griffin

Georgia Journal of Literacy

A high school English teacher and a university literacy professor provide secondary teachers with structured literacy strategies to support striving readers in the middle and high school grades. The authors present strategies that can be utilized with diverse texts across learning contexts. As a structured literacy approach, morphological awareness and prosodic fluency are emphasized to foster deeper, more meaningful transactions between students and texts. An example of a full structured literacy lesson is also provided that includes multiple strategies and is based on a gradual release model with guided and independent reading cycles. Applicable strategies for delivery of these skills …

Teaching Students To Comprehend Cause And Effect Text Structure, Jennifer A. Knight, Angela R. Child

Michigan Reading Journal

Teaching students text structure in expository text is important for comprehension. Text structure is complex and varies depending on the author’s focus. Cause and effect is one of the more difficult text structures for students to read and understand. This article demonstrates how to explain and teach cause and effect text structure for deep analysis and summarization of expository text.

Cultivating The Strategy Of Summarizing Sequential Expository Text: Scaffolds And Supports For The Intermediate Grades, Jennifer M. Green, Jennifer Holman

Literacy Practice and Research

Fourth-grade students in the United States have notoriously experienced a fourth-grade slump in reading. This persistent trend has led researchers, school leaders, and teachers to seek ways to improve comprehension of expository text. Summarizing is a complex strategy that requires students to analyze, condense, and express information in their own words. This action research project explored the impact of three techniques (cloze summaries, graphic organizers, and paraphrasing) on students’ ability to summarize sequential text in writing. Explicit instruction led to marked growth in students’ ability to write summaries of expository text.

Educator Researched Methods And Interventions That Increase Below Level Readers’ Fluency And Comprehension, Shawnee Knott, Shannon Tovey

Georgia Journal of Literacy

A student walks into a classroom multiple grades below grade level and already on day one that student is behind and will most likely be behind their entire school year. Many teachers are faced with this scenario year after year. Students entering their classrooms unprepared for the on-level content they need to be on. Reading below grade level is just the beginning of the learning gap that exists in today’s classrooms. Teachers work hard to close that gap, but by upper elementary is it too late? What can teachers do to help these students grow and become successful learners?

This …

Fives: An Integrated Strategy For Comprehension And Vocabulary Learning, Mary Shea, Nancy Roberts

Journal of Inquiry and Action in Education

This article describes a strategy that emphasizes the integration of all language and literacy skills for learning across content areas as well as the importance CCSS place on learners’ ability to ask questions about information, phenomena, or ideas encountered (Ciardiello, 2012/2013). FIVES is a strategy that meaningfully integrates research-based methodologies associated with reading, writing, speaking, listening, viewing, and visually representing for differentiated disciplinary literacy instruction related to authentic texts and issues. The strategy described can be universally applied across disciplines to develop high levels of competence with literacy processes and content.

Using Poetry To Improve Fluency And Comprehension In Third-Grade Students, Karen E. Newsome

Georgia Educational Researcher

This study examined the effects of repeated choral reading of poetry on fluency and comprehension of third-grade students (N = 76) in the southeastern United States. Student attitudes toward poetry were also measured. Students served in regular, remedial, and special education were taught reading using the school’s basal series for four weeks. Choral repeated reading of poetry was then added to the curriculum. The DIBELS ORF test, STAR reading assessment, and an attitude survey were used to assess student performance. Statistically significant gains were made during the poetry intervention in fluency (M = 18.78, p < .01) and comprehension (M = 0.33, p < .05). Slight improvements in students’ attitudes toward poetry were also observed.