The Adolescent Literacy Conundrum Improving Student Reading Achievement Jo Hartmann, TIE

Who knows what a conundrum is?

What is literacy? A literate student is one who has the ability to read, write, speak, listen and think effectively

Why is it MY job? Being literate enables students to: Learn Communicate clearly about what we know and what we want to know Become informed Inform others Make informed decisions

Thomas Jefferson … a literate populace is essential to preserving a functioning democracy…

Adolph Hitler Knowledge is ruin to my young men

Problems we encounter Much reading instruction based on fictional text Magnitude of the language Large amount of discipline-specific vocabulary required Multiple meanings

Good news/Bad news We know what works because of extensive research Guess what! We don’t use it

Where does the research come from? Reading experts, of course, but also cognitive psychology, English Language Arts instruction and assessment, linguistics, motivation theory, English as a Second Language, education, and discourse analysis. And there’s a TON of it!

What are the important factors to attend to? adolescents’ social and motivational issues; Explicit teaching and use of good cognitive strategies applicable to any discipline, and Integration of literacy instruction with content area learning, in ways that support teaching and learning in that discipline.

We’ll look at some reading strategies that aid comprehension We’ll look at some vocabulary issues and some strategies