438* Fall 2019

EDUC 438*--Teaching Reading and Writing in the Content Field: Course explores issues of literacy development (reading, writing, listening, speaking, visualizing, thinking) across core content areas of secondary school curricula.

Literacy in its many forms, matters. We are teachers who write and writers who teach. As educators, it is our professional responsibility to ensure that students engage in all forms of literacy in our classes using strategies that open up and deepen understanding of the content. Most middle and high schools don’t have reading courses because the assumption is that by 6th grade, students know how to read. Unfortunately, that is not the case. As knowledge domains become increasingly sophisticated and discipline specific, so too, do the literacy practices that are needed to comprehend these discipline-specific texts.

Framing Questions for the Course

The course seeks to address the questions below:

· What is schema?

· What is the relationship between literacy and your discipline?

· What conditions promote literacy development?

· What is the difference between learning to read and reading to learn? How are both important?

· What are the most important things students need to learn to become more literate in our disciplines?

· How do new technologies influence reading and writing in our subject area classrooms?

· What is the distinction between content area literacy and discipline literacy?

· How do we perceive ourselves as Teachers who write and writers who teach?