Critical Reading for Content Areas Teach your students how to learn your content

Why teach reading strategies? Research has shown that students can make significant improvement in reading comprehension when they are given instruction in strategies.

Where do I begin? Understanding Metacognition Metacognition Definition:  awareness and understanding one's thinking and cognitive processes; thinking about thinking Students must be taught and reminded to think about and monitor their thinking and learning processes.

What next? BE THE BRIDGE!

Another old theory? Schema Theory is a theory of learning. Schema are organized, structured, clustered and abstract bodies of information that are generally conceptualized as networks of information in which the relationships among facts and actions are specified.

Why is schema important? The theory hypothesizes that the schema a person uses during learning will determine how the learner interprets the task to be learned, how the learner understands the information, and what knowledge the learner acquires.

Why is schema important? Schema theory describes the process by which readers combine their own background knowledge with the information in a text to comprehend that text. All readers carry different schemata (background information) and these are also often culture-specific.

What does this mean for me? Schema-theoretic research highlights reader problems related to absent or alternate (often culture-specific) schemata, as well as non-activation of schemata, and even overuse of background knowledge.

What’s the “global” implication? All human beings possess categorical rules or scripts that they use to interpret the world. New information is processed according to how it fits into these rules, called schema. These schema can be used not only to interpret but also to predict situations occurring in our environment.

What’s the “global” implication? Think, for example, of a situation where you were able to finish another person’s thoughts, or when someone asked you to pass that "thingamabob." Schema theorists suggest that you used your schema to predict what your conversation partner was going to say and to correctly interpret "thingamabob" as the hammer needed to nail something into the wall.

I got it. Now what? Several instructional strategies logically follow from schema theory. The most important implication of schema theory is the role of prior knowledge in processing. In order for learners to be able to effectively process information, their existing schemas related to the new content need to be activated.

A Simple Example… Suppose you overheard the following conversation between roommates: Did you order it? Yeah, it will be here in about 45 minutes. Oh... Well, I've got to leave before then. But save me a couple of slices, okay?

You’re Probably Correct! Do you know what the roommates are talking about? Chances are, you're pretty sure they are discussing a pizza they have ordered. But how can you know this? You've never heard this exact conversation, so you're not recalling it from memory. And none of the defining qualities of pizza are represented here, except that it is usually served in slices, which is also true of many other things.

Another One… The girl sat looking at her piggy bank. "Old friend," she thought, "this hurts me." A tear rolled down her cheek. She hesitated, then picked up her tap shoe by the toe and raised her arm. Crash! Pieces of Piggo--that was its name--rained in all directions. She closed her eyes for a moment to block out the sight. Then she began to do what she had to do.

Showing our age?? If you have a well-developed schema for "piggy banks", this story should be readily comprehensible. You would understand that traditional piggy banks were usually made of some fragile, brittle material, that they contained a slot for inserting and saving coins, and that the money could only be removed by breaking them. On the other hand, if you have no schema for piggy bank, the story probably makes little sense.

More Depth to Schema Theory D. Rumelhart & D. Norman (1978) proposed that there are three modes of learning: accretion, structuring and tuning. Accretion is the addition of new knowledge to existing memory. Accretion is the most common form of learning. Structuring involves the formation of new conceptual structures or schema. Structuring occurs much less frequently and requires considerable effort Tuning is the adjustment of knowledge to a specific task usually through practice. Tuning is the slowest form of learning and accounts for expert performance.

An Example of the Three Modes On learning Morse code: Initial learning of the code is the process of accretion. Learning to recognize sequences or full words represents restructuring. The gradual increase in translation or transmission speed indicates the process of tuning.

So what’s my role? Since prior knowledge is essential for the comprehension of new information, teachers either need to help students build the prerequisite knowledge, or remind them of what they already know before introducing new material.

Assess & Activate Schema Teach text structure Preview reading Teach word analysis Focus on roots and affixes specific to your content Pull out and teach important/difficult vocabulary Use analogies and comparisons Ask for text-based predictions

Vocabulary and Content Optic information and ALIKE BUT DIFFERENT

BEFORE: Anticipation Guide Part of the allure of manga is the right to left orientation. Kids and female consumers have been drawn in by manga more so than other similar formats. Manga sales have remained predominately static over the last 4 years. Manga is derived from anime.

What the heck is MANGA?

DURING: REAP Manga Mania R = read on your own E = encode the text by putting the gist in your own words A = annotate by writing down the main idea and the author’s message P = ponder what you read by thinking and talking with others in order to make connections, develop questions about the topic, and/or connect new information to prior knowledge

AFTER: Anticipation Guide Part of the allure of manga is the right to left orientation. Kids and female consumers have been drawn in by manga more so than other similar formats. Manga sales have remained predominately static over the last 4 years. Manga is derived from anime.

AFTER: Exit Slips Respond to one of the following: One new thing I learned today. What questions do I still have? Within the first few weeks of school, I will try ___ with my students.