Disciplinary Literacy Archives

Disciplinary Literacy

As students advance through middle and high school grades, the required level of literacy skills increases significantly to meet the growing demands of reading and writing in different content areas. Students need to be able to understand the language used in school texts that becomes increasingly complex and specialized. This post focuses on what is frequently described as disciplinary literacy – what it is, how it is different from basic reading skills and content literacy (i.e., general reading skills and strategies), and the role that content area teachers can play in helping students develop the literacy skills needed to support content learning.

Joan Sedita | November 12, 2024 | 0 Comments

Motivating & Engaging Adolescents to Read

A significant number of the teacher trainings that Keys to Literacy delivers at schools and districts are focused on teaching reading comprehension, vocabulary, and writing to students in grades 5-12. A common question teachers ask us is, "How can I motivate students to read and stay engaged while they are reading?" This is not surprising given that there is strong evidence that students' motivation and interest in reading school-related texts declines after they move from elementary to middle school, and this is particularly true for students who have difficulty learning to read (Torgesen et al., 2007; Kamil et al., 2008). This post provides information about this topic and suggests instructional practices associated with improved motivation.

Joan Sedita | October 4, 2023 | 1 Comment

New Book: The Writing Rope

I am pleased to announce that Brookes Publishing in August published my new book titled The Writing Rope: A Framework for Explicit Writing Instruction in All Subjects. I am also delighted that my friend and colleague, Jan Hasbrouck, wrote the foreword. The book can be ordered at the Brookes website. I wrote about The Writing Rope framework in a 2019 article, and again in a Literacy Lines January 2020 blog post.

Joan Sedita | August 26, 2022 | 4 Comments

Reading Intervention for Older Struggling Students

In the last few months I have seen a growing interest in adolescent literacy. This includes content literacy instruction for all students that is integrated across subject areas, as well as intervention instruction for older students who struggle with reading and writing. Between 2005 and 2015, a number of adolescent literacy research reports were published based on meta-analyses of research on effective practices for teaching reading and writing to older students, and the website AdLit.org was also launched (see the reference list).

Joan Sedita | April 8, 2021 | 6 Comments

What is adolescent literacy?

Ever since the report of the National Reading Panel in 2000, significant emphasis has been placed on research-based practices for teaching reading in the elementary grades. Early literacy achievement, however, is not necessarily a guarantee that literacy skills will continue to grow as students move beyond grade 3. Scores at the secondary level, where there has been relatively little investment by school districts or states, have remained flat. A growing body of research has developed about what students beyond grade 3 need in order to keep growing their reading and writing skills, why some struggle, and what effective instruction looks like, beginning with two seminal research reports: Reading Next (2004) and Writing Next (2007).

Joan Sedita | January 13, 2021 | 0 Comments

Previewing Vocabulary Before Reading

Existing background knowledge is a critical component for comprehension, and word meanings are part of larger knowledge structures about a topic. Knowing the vocabulary words associated with a given topic enables students to connect their background knowledge to what they are reading. What if students aren't unfamiliar with some of the vocabulary in the text? Many studies have shown that previewing unfamiliar words before students read improves comprehension.

Joan Sedita | December 5, 2019 | 3 Comments

How to Jigsaw a Literacy Lesson in P.E. by Peg Grafwallner

This guest post was written by Peg Grafwallner and first published in her blog 2018. It caught my eye because it is an excellent example of how literacy instructional strategies can be embedded in any subject area. She made main idea and summary instruction a part of her lesson, which are two big skills in our Key Comprehension Routine.

Joan Sedita | February 25, 2019 | 0 Comments

Background Knowledge and Reading Comprehension

A recent article “Why American Students Haven’t Gotten Better at Reading in 20 Years” in The Atlantic addressed the critical role that background knowledge plays in the ability to comprehend. The article subtitle was “Schools usually focus on teaching comprehension skills instead of general knowledge – even though education researchers know better.”

Joan Sedita | May 22, 2018 | 6 Comments

Digital Note Taking

Beth Holland’s recent blog piece Digital Note Taking Strategies that Deepen Student Thinking, written for Mind/Shift, includes some helpful suggestions for how technology can support student note taking. I wrote a post in October, 2016 that referred to earlier pieces written by Holland on a similar topic, Note Taking Technology. Her current suggestions are so good that I had to revisit this topic again.

Joan Sedita | September 18, 2017 | 0 Comments

Literacy in Every Classroom

The focus of the February 2017 issue of Educational Leadership is “Literacy in Every Classroom”. The journal has several excellent articles aligned to our work at Keys to Literacy. Only members of ASCD can access the full edition, but there are a few articles that are available free to the public. I have listed them below and added notes connecting the instructional practices suggested by the authors with our Keys to Literacy teacher training routines.

Joan Sedita | March 20, 2017 | 1 Comment

Teaching Secondary Students to Write Effectively

The last decade has seen a renewed focus on improving the content writing skills of middle and high school students. A new Educator’s Practice Guide was just published in November, 2016 by the IES (Institute of Education Sciences) titled Teaching Secondary Students to Write Effectively. This report presents writing instruction recommendations aligned with several earlier research reports including Writing Next (2007) and Writing to Read (2010). The authors of the report (Steve Graham and colleagues) organized their recommendations into three sections. Similar to reading instruction where the focus after grade 4 shifts from learning to read to reading to learn, the focus for writing instruction also shifts from learning to write to writing to learn. As students move through grades 6 to 12, the need grows to learn to write specifically for different content areas (i.e., disciplinary writing). This opening paragraph from the introduction of the new report sums up the important role of writing.

Joan Sedita | February 7, 2017 | 1 Comment

Teaching Reading for Understanding

In the November/December 2016 issue of Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, Goldman, Snow and Vaughn present the results of a three-year adolescent literacy project that focused on three projects that examined content literacy instructional approaches. While each project had its own model of building comprehension, all were successful in improving student outcomes. Three common practices to support content literacy instructional practices are: engaged reading, small and whole group work, and knowledge building. The findings of the study support a continuing body of research that supports the teaching, modeling, and practice of content literacy instructional strategies that are embedded in the disciplinary classroom using subject-area text. This is foundational underpinning of all Keys to Literacy professional development!

Joan Sedita | January 17, 2017 | 0 Comments

Free Online Course: Content Literacy Instruction

I recently learned of a free online professional development course available called “Reading and Writing in the Disciplines”. It was produced by WGBH Educational Foundation and made available by the Annenberg Foundation. It can be accessed for free at the website Annenberg Learner: Teacher Resources for Professional Development Across the Curriculum....

Joan Sedita | November 1, 2016 | 0 Comments

Content Literacy Skills: Building a Stronger Plate

I recently read an article in the Washington Post about one school district’s plan to make an overhaul of literacy instruction a priority, especially in its high schools. The Prince George’s County School District in MD set a goal of ensuring that by 2020, 90 percent of its students graduating from high school will be prepared for college and the work force. The district decided to fully embrace the Common Core focus that instruction in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language be a shared responsibility among all content teachers within a school – literacy instruction is being filtered into every subject classroom, including math, science, and health class....

Joan Sedita | June 21, 2016 | 2 Comments

Why We Need Writing Instruction in Science

I work with a lot of science teachers while visiting schools to deliver literacy professional development. The Common Core literacy standards call for teachers of all subjects to provide reading and writing instruction. Understandably, many science teachers tell me they don’t understand why literacy instruction is something they should be doing, especially given classroom time demands placed on them to cover a lot of science content. My response: look at the science standards!....

Joan Sedita | May 10, 2016 | 1 Comment

Academic Vocabulary

The ACHIEVE THE CORE website is an excellent resource for everything related to literacy instruction. I recently became aware of a free, online tool at their website called the Academic Word Finder.

When teachers enter sample text into the tool, it finds the high-value, academic vocabulary words in that text. The Common Core emphasizes the need for students to learn academic vocabulary in order to access the content of subject-area texts, as noted in the anchor Language Standard #6 for grades K-12...

Joan Sedita | March 8, 2016 | 0 Comments

Text Driven Comprehension and Close Reading Instruction

Basic comprehension strategy instruction, close reading instruction, and text-driven instruction are closely related. Comprehension strategy instruction provides the foundational, basic comprehension skills that students need to get “under their belt” in order to apply the more complex, critical thinking skills required to closely read challenging text. Basic comprehension strategy instruction should be text-driven -- i.e., taught and practiced using content-related text. Teachers will not be effective if strategies (such as main idea and summarizing skills) are taught and practiced in isolation. Likewise, close reading skills need to be text-driven – i.e., using challenging content-related text....

Joan Sedita | January 26, 2016 | 1 Comment

Common Core, College Readiness, and Disadvantaged Students

A recent article in U.S. News and World Report about preparedness of college-bound students from disadvantaged backgrounds is the catalyst for this blog entry. It was written by Tiffany Miller, a first-generation college student. Miller refers to a report recently released by ACT and the Council for Opportunity in Education: The Condition of College and Career Readiness 2014: First-Generation Students.

Miller reminds us of the major challenges that first-generation and low-income students face when they enter college...

Joan Sedita | October 13, 2015 | 1 Comment

Why Students Need to Read Challenging Text

Why do literacy standards focus so much on making sure students learn to read complex text? Common Core Appendix A: Research Supporting Key Elements of the Standards (2010, p. 2-4) provides some insight, summarized below.

The demands and complexity of reading in a college setting, in workforce training programs, and in civic life in general have either remained the same or increased over the last fifty years. However, K-12 texts have actually declined in difficulty and sophistication and become less demanding....

Joan Sedita | July 28, 2015 | 0 Comments

Challenge Students With Challenging Text?

The title of a recent piece in The Hechinger Report caught my attention: ”Should we tailor difficulty of a school text to child’s comfort level or make them sweat?”

The author of the piece, Annie Murphy Paul, notes that the practice of leveling students’ reading material so that teachers can adjust the difficulty of text to suit the ability and skills of the reader is very popular and has been around for over sixty years....

Joan Sedita | June 16, 2015 | 2 Comments

Informational Text at the Expense of Literature?

Will the Common Core emphasis on having students read greater amounts of informational text result in students reading less quality literature?

I am often asked this question as I deliver literacy professional development at schools across the country, especially from English and ELA teachers who are understandably concerned that they may not have the time to expose their students to classic literature. I recently ran across two articles that address this issue...

Joan Sedita | May 12, 2015 | 1 Comment

What is Disciplinary Literacy?

The value of embedding literacy instruction in content teaching has been known for decades. Back in 1979 while studying for my Masters degree, one of my courses was titled Reading in the Content Areas. Since then, I have come across literally hundreds of books and courses with the same title. There has long been a consensus based on decades of research that content teachers can play an important role in teaching students literacy skills (Snow, 2002; Meltzer et al, 2003; Biancarosa & Snow, 2004). This is a major tenet of the Common Core State Standards, as evidenced in the title of the literacy standards: Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects and highlighted in the introduction to the standards:......

Joan Sedita | April 21, 2015 | 3 Comments

What Makes a Text “Complex”?

Many educators I meet while I am delivering literacy professional development ask this question:

“What makes a piece of text complex, and how can I determine if the text I use is complex?”

The Common Core literacy standards place significant emphasis on the need to teach students how to read challenging, complex text, as noted on pages 2-3 of Common Core Appendix A (Research Supporting Key Elements of the Standards).

This focus is driven by research showing that as demands that college and careers place on readers have either held steady or increased over the last fifty years, the complexity of K-12 reading texts have unfortunately trended downward in difficulty. The result is that there are too many students entering college or the work force without the ability to read and understand the text they will encounter...

Joan Sedita | April 7, 2015 | 0 Comments

Too Many College Freshman Need Remedial Courses

A few months ago I read an article quoting Bob Wise, president of Alliance for Excellent Education, about the very large number of college freshman who need remedial work, and how this often delays graduation and increases costs of higher education.

The article summarized findings from a study by the U.S. Department of Education based on 2012 statistics. Here are some troubling findings:

One in four college freshman nationwide takes at least one noncredit remedial class
Costly reading and writing remedial courses delay college graduation and increase by half the likelihood that students will not complete studies
The nationwide costs of remedial courses was $3.6 in tuition alone in 2007-08
Freshman at the 14 state-owned universities took 4,584 remedial courses in the 2012-13 school year that cost about $1000 a course....

Joan Sedita | February 17, 2015 | 1 Comment

Content Literacy Instruction for K-8 ELLs

Are you teaching and supporting English language learners (ELLs) as they acquire academic vocabulary, learn from increasingly complex informational texts, and tackle analytical writing?

If so, you will want to review the Institute of Education Science’s practice guide, Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners in Elementary and Middle School (Baker et al, 2014).

The guide is IES’s first upgrade for ELLs since 2007 and it is aligned to the Common Core literacy standards. It expands the scope to middle school and shifts the focus away from “beginning reading” and early reading intervention to academic language and academic vocabulary......

Joan Sedita | November 25, 2014 | 0 Comments