Now I Know Why I'm Worried

Throughout this period of thinking about the Middle States goals that we have established for SBP, I've been anxious about the process of introducing strategies that will improve the writing and critical reading skills of our students.  I had an idea about why I was worried, but I may have figured it out.  I read it in a report published by the Alliance for Excellent Education, called Literacy Instruction in the Content Areas: Getting to the Core of Middle and High School Improvement.

"At the secondary level, the responsibility for teaching reading and writing often seems to belong to no one in particular."

We may ask our teachers, not just those in the English Department, to take on responsibilities for teaching reading and writing.  This will increase the workload of all the teachers because "content area teachers have to contend with a number of pressures that make it difficult to emphasize the teaching of reading and writing even if they fully agree with the need to do so."

The report describes the many real challenges involved in incorporating literacy instruction in content areas, and points out that "the greatest challenge of all has to do with the scarcity of ongoing, high-quality professional development for teachers...relatively few of the nation's secondary school teachers have had meaningful opportunities to learn about reading and writing practices that go on in their own content areas."  It is with optimism that the authors report that when content area teachers "receive intensive and ongoing professional support, many content area teachers find a way to emphasize reading and writing in their classes...many teachers do in fact manage to integrate literacy instruction successfully into their content area courses."

Ongoing, high-quality professional development for teachers: this must be included in our agenda as we pursue our Middle States goals.

Work Cited:  Heller, R. and Greenleaf, C.L. (2007).  Literacy instruction in the content areas: Getting to the core of middle and high school improvement.  Washington, D.C.: Alliance for Excellent Education.    pdf version available here.