Improving Content Area Literacy

The American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE) Report “Preparing STEM Teachers: The Key to Global Competitiveness” was released as part of a Congressional Briefing last week. The document highlights more than 50 programs at institutions across the country dedicated to increasing the number of effective K–12 science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educators. Why does this matter to those of us who teach English language arts and composition? NCTE’s “Teaching Composition: A Position Statement” provides the answer:

In the classroom where writing is especially valued, students should be guided through the writing process; encouraged to write for themselves and for other students, as well as for the teacher; and urged to make use of writing as a mode of learning, as well as a means of reporting on what has been learned. The classroom where writing is especially valued should be a place where students will develop the full range of their composing powers. This classroom can also be the scene for learning in many academic areas, not only English . . . . Teachers in all academic areas who have not been trained to teach writing may need help in transforming their classrooms into scenes for writing. The writing teacher should provide leadership in explaining the importance of this transformation and in supplying resources to help bring it about. [emphasis mine] (“The Scenes of Writing”)

We call this kind of interaction by many names, including reading and writing across the content areas, interdisciplinary learning, integrated curriculum, writing across the curriculum, and writing across the disciplines. What all of these undertakings have in common is their focus on collaboration among teachers who teach different subjects or who have different academic expertise. Here are some additional resources to help you get started on collaborations that can increase student success in every classroom:

• NCTE Position Statement on Interdisciplinary Learning, Pre-K to Grade 4
  
  
• Learning through Language: A Call for Action in All Disciplines from NCTE
  
  
• Statement on Multimodal Literacies from NCTE
  
  
• An Introduction to Writing Across the Curriculum from The WAC Clearinghouse
  
  
• Writing Across the Curriculum and Writing in the Disciplines from the Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL)
  
  
• Reading and Writing from Literacy Matters
  
  
• Reading in the Content Areas from Literacy & Learning
  
  
• Interdisciplinary Learning in Your Classroom from Concepts in the Classroom
  
  

Evidence of Literacy in Every Classroom

Dickie Selfe comments that participants at last week’s 21st Century Literacies Impact Conference discussed “the need for . . . groups to literally ‘see’ what it looks like to integrate these [literacy] skills into our curricula.” Demonstrating what literacy and literacy learning looks like is perhaps the most important challenge teachers face. The 21st century classroom is a changing space. Our job is to find ways to show the rich, dynamic learning that takes place there.

Projects like the cross-curriculum activity described in “The Mouse That Roared: Teaching Vocabulary with Source-Based Lessons” from English Journal document what a classroom engaged in literacy instruction looks like. When you look at the deltoid poster students composed, you can see the student thinking and the connections among content areas—art, science, and language arts. Perhaps we cannot photograph, videotape, or record all the literacy learning that takes place in the classroom, but there are still ways to document good teaching and 21st century literacy. We just need to spend time thinking about how students work and identifying the artifacts that will show every stakeholder what literacy looks like.