Education Week - November 14, 2012 - Special Report - S18

Literacy Instruction Expected To Cross the Curriculum
Teachers of science, social studies, and other subjects to engage students in reading, writing

he 4th graders in Mason A. Kuhn’s classroom recently wrapped up an unusual assignment: Write a science-themed book and make the target audience not their teacher but 2nd graders at Shell Rock Elementary in northeastern Iowa. One student wrote and illustrated a cartoon about a feline named Space Kat trying to figure out how to power up her rocket ship to get back home. Along the way, the story explored concepts such as gravity and friction. At Lewis County High School in Vanceburg, Ky., science teacher Sara M. Poeppelman asks her chemistry students to closely read and analyze an essay Albert Einstein penned in 1946 for a popular science magazine. The two science-related assignments dovetail with the call in the Common Core State Standards to teach literacy across the curriculum. The English/language arts standards adopted by all but four states specifically highlight the teaching of reading, writing, and other literacy objectives in science, history/social studies, and technical subjects. Around the nation, education leaders are grappling with how best to help teachers and schools reflect this cross-disciplinary dimension. If not exactly a new idea, educators and experts say the standards offer a clear articulation of the notion—including detailed learning objectives— and may well spark an expanded and more deliberate emphasis in schools. In fact, the standards say students should read equal amounts of fiction and nonfiction “informational texts” in elementary school, and by high school, the balance should tip to 70 percent nonfiction. (See related story, Page S15.) In a sign that word is getting out, more than two-thirds of some 400 science teachers who replied to a recent online survey from the National Science Teachers Association said they’re being asked by administrators to spend class time on the common core’s objectives for reading in science. Mr. Kuhn sees a natural nexus. “So much of science is reading and writing and communicating about what you discover,” he said. Kathleen A. Hogan, a social studies coordinator for the Lexington-Richland district, near Columbia, S.C., said she welcomes the attention in

the common core to her discipline. “We’ve been doing this all along if we were doing good social studies teaching,” she said. Last month, the South Carolina education department hosted a best-practices seminar on teaching literacy across the curriculum under the common core. Lewis E. Huffman, an education associate for social studies at the state agency, said one challenge is helping to clarify “what’s going to be expected and required” of social studies and ela teachers, noting that he sees some misunderstanding among those who teach both subjects. “If we can get more of that cross-fertilization between English/language arts and social studies teachers, this is going to be beneficial to both disciplines,” he said. But he admits it won’t be easy, noting that, oftentimes, teachers in those disciplines don’t collaborate. “It’s going to require some sitting down and working together,” he said.

Hundreds of Examples
The common standards for English/language arts espouse a vision of literacy instruction that involves virtually all teachers. “The standards insist that instruction in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language be a shared responsibility within the school,” the document says. In grades K-5, the literacy objectives across disciplines are embedded with the rest of the ela expectations. But for grades 6-12, there’s a special seven-page section, “Standards for Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects.” (See chart, Page S20.) For example, it calls for students to compare and contrast treatment of a topic in several primary and secondary sources, and determine the meaning of symbols, key terms, and phrases as used in a scientific or technical context. The standards document has an appendix with nearly 150 examples of informational texts, or “text exemplars,” that might be used, organized by subject and grade level, such as Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address,” Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense,” and an article, “Amusement Park Physics,” from Scientific American. There’s even an excerpt of federal guidelines for home insulation with a table of information. Several educators praised the appendix as a

valuable resource to help teachers get started. Ms. Hogan from the Lexington-Richland district said that at a recent meeting of school department chairs in the social studies, “I pulled out all the exemplars that match the social studies standards.” She wanted those attending to “have a whole list of the kinds of informational texts, the kinds of primary sources that the common core is expecting kids to have an opportunity to ... do a close read on,” she said. Under revisions to South Carolina’s social studies standards finalized last year, Mr. Huffman said, one addition was a suggested set of social studies literacy skills, some of which were derived from the common core. At the same time, a set of common science standards being developed by 26 states—in collaboration with educators and experts—are expected to reflect an emphasis on literacy goals. A framework for the standards, crafted by a National Research Council panel, spotlights the issue and explicitly references the common core. “Reading, interpreting, and producing text are fundamental practices of science in particular,” the nrc says, “and they constitute at least half of engineers’ and scientists’ total working time.” Science reading is often challenging for several reasons, the nrc says, including the use of unfamiliar “jargon,” complex sentence structure, and different modes of representation, such as diagrams, charts, and symbols. From reading to writing, the nrc says, “every science or engineering lesson is in part a language lesson.”

E=MC²
Several science education experts say they’ve encountered resistance from some secondary science teachers to the notion that it’s also their job to teach reading and writing. But Ms. Poeppelman, the Kentucky science teacher, said it’s nothing new to her. Literacy, she explained, has long been viewed as a schoolwide affair for her school and district. “Even before the common-core standards, we had that mindset in our building,” she said. “But now with the common-core standards,” she added, teachers are taking it “up a notch.” One big change, she said, is that students are expected to tackle a higher level of text complexity than before. “You’re basically bumping up things by two years in a lot of cases,” she said.

By Erik W. Robelen

S18 |

READING IN THE COMMON-CORE ERA www.edweek.org/go/common-reading EDUCATION WEEK • November 14, 2012

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Education Week - November 14, 2012 - Special Report

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