Every time there is a blog assignment dealing with Content Area Literacy, I always try to figure out a way to approach my classroom differently. Since I only teach reading, Literacy is the content area in my classroom. I know that all teachers might say this, but I think I have the hardest task--only because comprehension is so contextual. Reading comprehension is the foundation to success in all subject areas. The discussion in this chapter about how contextually dependent comprehension is made me reevaluate how things are going in my classroom. How do I scaffold my students’ acts of making meaning? How do I mold their thought processes? Can I actually do a mass overhaul that requires completely reprogramming them? This seems like a daunting, maybe impossible, task. I do think that I am slowly learning how to help my students though. I just wish time could slow down at this point.
When reading Chapter 3, I immediately thought about Question and Answer Relationship (QAR). I think it is essential when a reader has a learning experience with a text. We spent a couple weeks on QAR in my class, but I think only a small number of my students understood the purpose of it. They did understand that the “Right There” questions are lower level, and are the ones they usually have no problems with. The “Think and Search,” “Author and You,” and “On Your Own” questions are the ones that we are still having big issues with. We did guided practices where I showed them how to identify these questions. Then, we went through question packets where they identified what type of question it was before they answered it. The main issue with QAR is the importance of prior knowledge. Most of my students have minimal prior knowledge. It’s so hard for them to make connections to the text because they don’t pick up on idiomatic language, cultural references, and functions of words. So, we aren’t really at the point where we can even say that we’re “Making Meaning” through the text. The author states on page 45 that, “Youth who can comprehend complex prose are better students in all the subject areas as compared with their peers who struggle to understand what they read.”
I completely agree, and that statement makes perfect sense. Nevertheless, that is what’s holding my students back. This also has direct implications on the state test. 7th Grade Language Arts is a state-tested subject. This means that my students will be exposed so Expository and Prose texts. They will do fine with expository texts, because they are straightforward and don’t require much inference. The prose narratives are the speed bumps. Students have to be “active” readers to be able to follow those texts. I’ve read some of the texts on the state practice exams—they are terse. I’ve been trying very hard to model active reading for my students, but I don’t think I’ve been very effective with it. We also read texts, then go back and talk through them, but that hasn’t been very effective either. Since I’m not modeling this well enough, I don’t know if my kids will be ready for the novels I want to teach next semester.
I know that Chapter 3 discussed a lot more information, but the QAR really stuck out because it is something that I’ve taught and implemented in my classroom. Hopefully, we’ll find a way to expand their knowledge so that prose texts don’t seem so foreign and overwhelming. This is my task. This is my duty.
