I found the article "Making a case and place for effective content area literacy instruction in the elementary grades" to be very interesting. According to the author there has been a push for encouraging the importance of content are a literacy instruction. The need for this stems from the emphasis of standardized testing, and society's stronger reliance on technology. I never considered technology having an impact on literacy instruction. However, it makes perfect sense that students are exposed to more expository texts as a result of researching information on the internet. I know if I don't know the answer to something, I look it up on my iPhone. I'm sure other students do the same thing. Expository have become a convenient and vital essential in today's society. Thus, students should be frequently exposed to this type of text, starting at an early age.
What stood out the most to me in the article was the three points the author made when arguing importance of expository text in the class room.The first of these points is Early Exposure. This means that students have practice dealing with this type of text at an early age. This lays the foundation in understanding informative text. The nest point is that informational text motivate students to read. It provides them with a new form of literature, and provides knowledge seekers an outlet to learn new and exciting information. I completely agree with this point. When I was in elementary school, I begged my parents to buy me a subscription to Zoobooks. Zoobooks was a monthly non-fiction magazine. Each issue was dedicated to a different animal, and everything you could possibly want to know about that animal. I was so excited each month when the magazine came in. I would read it cover to cover!The final point the author made was "informational text increase new knowledge domains." Students may read a expository text about science, and become immersed in the science domain. They learn how to think like a scientist through the text written by a scientist. This situation is the same for mathematics and history.
This article has really opened my eyes to just how important expository text are. I will definitively include them in my future classroom lessons. The only question or concern I have, is how can I incorporate them in a way that is fun and motivating for those students who are not interested in reading? I know most students love to read anything about animals, but what about the other subjects that are not so interesting? Other than that I found the article to be very enlightening.
Excellent post, Logan. My nephew, who's five now, was all into Ranger Rick and National Geographic for Kids, both of which are pretty amazing magazines for kids. In fact, you just gave me an idea for my next Monday class, if I can get a hold on a bunch of nature magazines for 4th graders, my Haiku-ing lesson might just come together with some public speaking skills to boot. You raise a good question about subjects that aren't as interesting as, say, Leopards.
ReplyDelete