INTRODUCTION
Every Teacher Is a Literacy Teacher
In this series of books, called Every Teacher Is a Literacy Teacher, we focus on how each subject area in the grades 6–12 experience has a need to approach literacy in varying and innovative ways. To address this need, we designed each book in the series to:
▶ Recognize the role every teacher must play in supporting the literacy development of students in all subject areas throughout their grades 6–12 schooling
▶ Provide commonly shared approaches to literacy that can help students develop stronger, more skillful habits of learning
▶ Demonstrate how teachers can and should adapt literacy skills to support specific subject areas
▶ Model how a commitment to a PLC culture can promote the innovative collaboration necessary to support the literacy growth and success of every student
▶ Focus on creating literacy-based strategies in ways that promote the development of students’ critical-thinking skills in each academic area
As an ELA teacher, you may immediately recognize how this approach differs from many traditional school practices and formats, where educators view literacy development as the job of ELA teachers, reading teachers, or teachers of English learners. It is an accepted practice that these teachers bear the responsibility of teaching skills like vocabulary development, comprehension skills, inferential skills, and writing skills. In stand-alone ways, it may feel that you shoulder the charge to single-handedly support the literacy growth of students. While these traditional education approaches may be effective to a degree, we recognize the need for our schools to support changes that make teaching literacy a responsibility for all teachers. In this book, which focuses on the ELA classroom, we propose that schools adopt the collective commitment that every teacher is a literacy teacher. This commitment means we must support collaboration between ELA teachers and experts in literacy using processes we detailed in this book’s preface (page xv).
As we begin to aggressively address literacy issues in our classrooms, PLCs need to recognize the value of supporting literacy skills within every classroom—and every content area. Science teachers need to be literacy teachers. Mathematics teachers need to be literacy teachers. Social studies teachers need to be literacy teachers. World language and fine arts teachers need to be literacy teachers. Every teacher needs to be a literacy teacher, because the work cannot rest solely on the shoulders of the ELA department. By making literacy a core commitment in the work of every academic discipline, schools can begin to develop students’ abilities to read and write with a variety of more focused literacy strategies that support the critical-thinking skills necessary for science, social studies, mathematics, language acquisition, and the fine arts as well as ELA studies.
In this book, we emphasize how building collaboration among ELA teachers and literacy experts will be one of our greatest catalysts for supporting student growth in every area of school curriculum, and we stress a strong commitment toward building instructional improvements that can support the growth of every learner. As we’ve seen in many PLC cultures, collaboration generally begins with teaming teachers within like disciplines. Science teachers team with other science teachers, social studies teachers team with other social studies teachers, and so on. When teams form according to discipline, they tend to focus only on their content and discipline-based skills. We intend for this book to encourage collaboration of a different sort—collaboration among literacy and ELA experts teaching middle school and high school. When discipline-based teachers and literacy experts team up, they can build stronger approaches to teaching and learning that connect literacy-based strategies with discipline-specific subject areas, even in the ELA classroom. Although ELA teachers are clear content experts in the study of literature and related subject matter, few ELA teacher-preparatory programs offer more than a class or two, if that, to prepare educators to teach and support the scaffolds of reading as a skill.
Because ELA teachers are already committed to literacy by the very nature of their work, we have organized this book around three different methodologies that support literacy education: (1) we focus on recognized literacy strategies that educators should promote across all content areas to ensure all students approach literacy-based tasks with confidence and skill; (2) we encourage the consistent and regular use of literacy strategies in the ELA classroom that support all students, whether struggling or proficient; and (3) we provide many different reminders that all students need strategies to support their personal growth. To support your work in enacting these methodologies, we also present questions we hope ELA teams will use as conversation starters; you can find these questions in the Collaborative Considerations for Teams box that concludes each chapter.
We recognize that many schools do not have dedicated literacy experts (specialists and coaches) available to collaborate with ELA teachers around the challenges of building stronger readers and writers. To that end, we encourage you to use this book as a thought partner with your team or as your own personal literacy expert that can help you generate changes to support student learning. Use it to guide your practice and reflection in a sequence that makes sense for you and your team and not necessarily as a one-time, cover-to-cover read.
With or without dedicated literacy specialists or coaches, we mean for this book to be a helpful companion as you deepen conversations and navigate choices that will positively affect student growth and development, and we structured the text to demonstrate how to not only develop collaborative practices but also support both individual readers and teams in becoming reflective practitioners. This book provides, describes, and gives examples of many literacy-based strategies that you can integrate into the ELA classroom. You can use many of the strategies immediately; others require more preparation. In either case, we urge you to get started. Integrating focused literacy strategies initiates and promotes significant gains in learning, deep comprehension, and the capacity to think critically.
In addition, each strategy in this book lists specific adaptations, accommodations, or modifications for students learning English, for students in special education, and for students showing high proficiency. As you review this content, it’s critical to remember that, while the first two of these groups often benefit from similar adaptations, language barriers for English learners (ELs) are not the same as the cognitive barriers many students in special education face. When applying adaptations for a strategy, be mindful of how you approach these differences and adjust your instruction accordingly.
There are many reasons why ELA teachers in grades 6–12 need to renew and strengthen their focus on core literacy skills. Reading, writing, and thinking require strong habits of mind. Regardless of the discipline, all reading and writing tasks demand the following.
▶ A close attention to detail
▶ An understanding of how details interconnect to build concepts
▶ The ability to interpret data
Literacy strategies create an infrastructure of supports that allow students to learn independently and confidently. ELA teachers who focus on building stronger literacy strategies in their classrooms provide the necessary skills that support students’ abilities to develop their own thoughts and opinions.
The Need for Literacy Instruction
Picture a reader who is just beginning to learn how to read. What behaviors do you see as this student engages with text? What is he or she learning to do first? How is he or she grappling with the challenge of learning how to read? Chances are, you visualize this reader at the beginning stages, working to crack the alphabetic code—breaking apart and sounding out words, one syllable at a time, and likely dealing with simple