This article reports the findings of a study that examined how middle school struggling readers transact with the reading task demands of his or her respective classroom. The study also examined how each student's teacher transact with the student's reading challenges. The author used a descriptive, case study approach. Findings showed that the…

In her well known keynote address at the Responsibilities for Literacies Conference, Mary Louise Pratt defined "contact zones" as "social spaces where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power." Pratt's view of a contact zone hints at the fact, but does not make explicit, that…

The article talks about how--and whether--"English" can justify itself as an academic discipline, and about the pressures on it to do so. In the search for justification, is it the creative writer or the critic who provides the crucial element of value? Particular reference is made to the tradition of English at Cambridge, where the…

Background: Children with fluent and accurate word reading in the presence of poor text comprehension are impaired on a wide range of reading-related tasks. Aims: This study investigated the consistency of skill impairment in a sample of poor comprehenders to identify any fundamental skill weakness that (i) might be associated with poor text…

Historically, and continuing to the present, children in the primary grades receive the lion's share of attention and resources in learning to read. This makes sense: Young, early readers have a head start in achieving well not only in literacy skills, but in school in general. However, as inner-city, middle-grade teachers will readily attest,…

Some educators (Ravitch, 1990) have suggested that students use multiple source documents to study history. Such documents could be primary sources, such as Congressional bills or eyewitness accounts, or secondary sources, such as later commentaries. This study examined the processes used when 19 tenth-grade high school students were presented…

Offering practical, classroom-based strategies teachers can use to promote literacy development, this book presents many examples of children engaging in discussion activities about narrative and informational text that emphasize collaborating, constructing meaning, and using these different types of texts to arrive at new understandings. Chapters…

What is pleasing about hypertext is what has always been pleasing about genre fiction: the creative process of reading. Genre novels are written to a formula--and often called formula fiction. Critics say they are written to make money and to make money only. According to C. S. Lewis, they "rot the mind." If looked at from the standpoint…

This paper focuses on methods to improve the reading abilities of college students. A list of five elements college instructors (who are not reading specialists) should establish in a content reading agenda is offered; (1) an instructional basis for the reading process which will work for them; (2) content literacy environments; (3) insights into…

Any model of reading must take into account the role of the language system in reading. Readers' subjectivities and the reading position taken up in a text can be explicated by demonstrating how texts function in context and how readers function in social situations to construct possible meanings. Components of this model include text and context…

This book offers teachers a convenient means of broadening their understanding of reader response theory and criticism and applying this theory to the teaching of literature in high school and college classrooms. The book is designed to arouse individual teachers' interest in reader response theory and encourage them to apply it to their teaching.…

Activities related to women's issues are many and varied at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, but it is doubtful how much of this sensitivity trickles down into actual literature courses. Efforts at moving students away from passive reading and into a more critical stance that would promote active engagement with texts must be encouraged…

This paper examines the dual coding hypothesis, a model of the coding of visual and textual information, from the perspective of a mass media professional, such as a teacher, interested in accurately presenting both visual and textual material to a mass audience (i.e., students). It offers an extension to the theory, based upon the various skill…

Reciprocal teaching is an instructional procedure designed to teach heterogeneous groups of learners, including the educationally disadvantaged, how to approach text in a thoughtful manner. In reciprocal teaching, teachers and students take turns leading discussions about shared text to achieve joint understanding through the application of the…

This study examined the efficacy of Judith Langer's PreReading Plan (PReP) with Hispanic and other high school students. Specifically, the study investigated (1) the effect the PReP has on learning when used with predominantly Anglo and Hispanic high school students in conjunction with a social studies textbook reading assignment; (2) whether…