Describes a unit on the literature of the Vietnam War (part of a college course called "Twentieth Century War Literature") which uses the arts to enhance student learning. Discusses activities and assignments in which students create visual representations, conduct research, and prepare oral reports on the Vietnam War literature they…

Focuses on two primary meanings of the term interaction in the second-language (L2) context: face-to-face interaction in which two or more people create meaning, and the creative interaction between the reader and the text. Argues that many claims related to the value of L2 spoken interaction can apply equally well to L2 reading. (94 references)…

Follows the development, from fifth grade through eighth grade, of a student poet, who can teach educators what it means to "feel expressed." Offers new ways to think about who children are, what they need to say, and what they need to be taught. Discusses the possibilities of poetry for gaining access to children's deepest capacities for…

Reviews research on metacomprehension, indicating that awareness and control of cognitive activity are key characteristics of successful independent readers. Presents findings from a study of 25 university students taught to use a text-marking system. Reports that the system led to more sophisticated levels of metacognitive awareness. Sample text…

Charts the process by which, over some 10 years, one reader came to read a particular text "with full understanding." Indicates how crucial in that process were the complex, interacting influences of other, simpler literary texts, of the reader's own life experience, and (paradoxically) of "family" experience not consciously…

Discusses the Facts and Feelings Response Diary strategy for assisting middle school students in inclusive settings to connect both efferently and aesthetically with informational text. Notes that this activity stimulates students to focus their attention on important facts and details and to use their prior experiences, feelings, interests,…

A study compared the behaviors of 17 children with reading difficulties and their teachers during one-on-one learning sessions and 17 excellent readers with their teachers in similar sessions. Results indicated the children with reading difficulties physically possessed their reading materials less, participated in little interaction, and handled…

Outlines Literacy Junction, an interactive website for middle school students and their teachers. Explains that while Literacy Junction is grounded in transactional theory, its conceptual base extends into a blend of actual and virtual transactions between readers and texts that expands the traditional boundaries of literacy and learning.…

Suggests that, in the author's experience teaching fiction to high school students, the key to their understanding a work lies in their ability to make connections with the characters. Notes the importance of using many activities to enable all of the students to understand character. Describes three such activities, incorporating brainstorming,…

Examines the performance and construction of subjectivities of four early adolescent, sixth-grade girls as they read and discussed a novel about two adolescent Mexican children seeking a new life in America. Suggests they engaged in ongoing construction of their subjectivities as they interacted with the text and each other. Notes the girls…

Describes ways in which a small group of preschool children in an urban Head Start Program responded to typical information books during read-aloud sessions. Notes results of a group pretend reading of books children had just heard. Concludes even young children are attuned to characteristics of texts. (PM)

Discusses reading as a receptive skill in relation to current foreign language learning and teaching theory. Three types of reference in texts are defined (reference to the outside world, textual reference, and situational reference), and selected examples of these types in adapted texts are reported and analyzed. (26 references) (GLR)

Uses a survey to determine how adult, adolescent, and elementary age students remember what they read. Finds that, for all three groups studied, adjunct (during reading) strategies were reported as being used more often than pre- and posttype strategies. Finds that adolescent readers believed teachers taught them to remember, but adults believe…

Calls for a curriculum which uses the plays of Shakespeare to teach human values. Suggests that attention to certain moments within Shakespeare's plays may enhance or refine the understanding of moral qualities. Acknowledges that some critics would deny that those values are universal or eternal. (SG)

Discusses a variety of software programs which will assist middle school through college teachers in teaching text structure to their students. Notes that these programs represent a departure from traditional programing style--they allow the person who uses information technology to combine the roles of producer and consumer. (RS)