This book examines nearly 30 years of research to identify how teachers can incorporate writing instruction that helps students master the course content and improve their overall achievement. Building on the recommendations of the National Commission on Writing, authors Vicki Urquhart and Monette McIver introduce four critical issues teachers should address when they include writing in their content courses: Creating a positive environment for the feedback and guidance students need at various stages, including prewriting, drafting, revising, and editing; Monitoring and assessing how much students are learning through their writing; Choosing computer programs that best enhance the writing process; Strengthening their knowledge of course content and their own writing skills.
Do you spend entirely too much time correcting your students' papers? Do your students' essays and term papers take side trips to nowhere? Is their writing riddled with mechanical errors? Do their lab reports and essays lack specificity and clarity? Writing in the Content Areas, Second Edition is for middle and high school content area teachers who assign essays, term papers, lab reports, and other writing tasks to students. This book provides strategies and tips to help teachers of social studies, science, art, etc. improve the quality of students' writing and apply national and state curriculum standards in your classroom. The strategies in this book can be integrated easily into every teacher's daily plans. They will help your students improve their abilities to - reflect before writing - organize and classify - provide detail without padding - use technical terminology correctly - avoid unnecessary words - spell correctly - take useful notes while they read and during your lectures. This book will help teachers - get what they want from a writing task - frame their assignments more precisely - correct student papers more quickly and efficiently The new second edition offers activities and strategies which involve technology (word processing, presentation programming, the Internet, and e-communications), differentiated instruction, and brain-based learning.
"We often hear middle and high school teachers are frustrated because their students can′t understand the textbooks or can′t write effectively about their particular content. This book will provide both the framework for solving this dilemma and the specific, practical classroom practices that teachers can use each day to help students become more competent readers and writers." -Douglas Johnson, Assistant Superintendent Kane County Regional Office of Education, IL "Every middle school and secondary teacher should have a copy of this book. It not only provides the theoretical basis for each strategy, but it also provides effective instructions for use of the strategies in the classroom." -Dorothy Giroux, Program Director, Initial Teacher Preparation Program School of Education, Loyola University Chicago Eager for proven methods to strengthen your students′ content literacy? Then this book is a must-have for your classroom! Using a step-by-step approach that makes the strategies easy to understand and implement, the authors provide updated research-based strategies that will help increase your students′ reading comprehension, strengthen their writing skills, and build vocabulary across content areas. Expanded coverage of content literacy, additional reading and writing strategies for exploring content, and suggestions for working with struggling readers are included in this revised edition. This rich resource also offers: Tips for using trade books in the classroom Graphic organizers to help students recognize text structures Assessment tools Technology activities in every chapter Real classroom examples of how the strategies have been implemented More ways to evaluate the "readability" of textbooks Over 40 ready-to-use reproducibles Whether you are getting ready to begin teaching or are a veteran teacher, this accessible, invaluable handbook will give you the tools you need to help your students become lifelong learners!
A great way to help students learn your content is to have them write about it. Writing is a way for students to review their own learning, organize their thinking and evaluate how well they understand what has been taught. Use the 81 tools in this binder to help students in every grade and subject become actively engaged in their own learning. The binder contains everything teachers need to begin using these strategies immediately. Each strategy includes complete how-to-use instructions, teacher materials for classroom use, classroom examples, and a template for student assignments.
Middle and high school writing is not pointless! From one of the most respected writing professors inAmerica, this book combines the insight — affective-- for writing with writing as a learning tool in all content areas. Prompted by the “near-total neglect of writing” in content areas outside English, Bill Strong explores and answers the question ‘why writing matters.’ At a time when more emphasis is being placed on middle and secondary students and when writing tests have been added to the new ACT and SAT assessments,Write for Insightis ideal for teachers seeking a flexible and inspiring way to increase students’ motivation and to enhance long-term learning. Arguing that writing is a powerful learning tool in all content areas, Strong utilizes note-taking, drawing, summarizing, brainstorming, and metaphor-building to help students collect notes, plan future action, frame questions, monitor their own learning, and engage in a rich array of imaginative and cognitive tasks. Written by a masterful teacher for teachers, the friendly, thought-provoking style is appropriate for teachers in diverse disciplines.
For students to become college-ready writers, they must be exposed to writing throughout the school day, not just in English class. This practical book shows teachers in all subject areas how to meet the Common Core State Standards and make writing come alive in the classroom. Award-winning educator Heather Wolpert-Gawron provides effective and exciting ideas for teaching argument writing, informational writing, project-based writing, and writing with technology. Each chapter is filled with strategies, prompts, and rubrics you can use immediately. Special Features: A variety of writing strategies that work in any subject area Tips for developing meaningful prompts Diagrams and templates that you can use with your students Rubrics for assessing writing, as well as ideas for having students create their own rubrics Samples of student work in different formats Ideas for teaching students to break the Google homepage habit and conduct effective research Cross-curricular writing assignments for science, history, ELA, electives, and PE Suggestions for teaching summary writing, an essential academic skill Ideas for staff professional development on Common Core writing
Based on interactive elements that apply to every reading situation, the authors explain instructional strategies that work best in the subject areas and how to optimize those classrooms for reading, writing, and discussion.
A National Book Award finalist by Newbery Medalist Kate DiCamillo. Walking through the misty Florida woods one morning, twelve-year-old Rob Horton is stunned to encounter a tiger—a real-life, very large tiger—pacing back and forth in a cage. What’s more, on the same extraordinary day, he meets Sistine Bailey, a girl who shows her feelings as readily as Rob hides his. As they learn to trust each other, and ultimately, to be friends, Rob and Sistine prove that some things—like memories, and heartache, and tigers—can’t be locked up forever. Featuring a new cover illustration by Stephen Walton.
Two seasoned veterans recount their 23-year collaboration to find ways to get students to improve their learning in their content area subjects. The two teachers, one an elementary-trained reading specialist and the other a secondary-trained science teacher, begin by telling of their mission to find what will work for them, rejecting and tiring of bandwagon movements and quick-fix promises, and finding the power of collaboration. In their subsequent chapters, they discuss practices and strategies for helping students read and become actively involved with books, lectures, and videos. Then they flesh out activities to help students write more effectively in the content areas. Every teaching strategy is one that they have used successfully with real students. And they have tracked improved grades and secured students' feedback about which strategies helped them the most.
Do you spend entirely too much time correcting your students' papers? Do your students' essays and term papers take side trips to nowhere? Is their writing riddled with mechanical errors? Do their lab reports and essays lack specificity and clarity? Writing in the Content Areas, Second Edition is for middle and high school content area teachers who assign essays, term papers, lab reports, and other writing tasks to students. This book provides strategies and tips to help teachers of social studies, science, art, etc. improve the quality of students' writing and apply national and state curriculum standards in your classroom. The strategies in this book can be integrated easily into every teacher's daily plans. They will help your students improve their abilities to - reflect before writing - organize and classify - provide detail without padding - use technical terminology correctly - avoid unnecessary words - spell correctly - take useful notes while they read and during your lectures. This book will help teachers - get what they want from a writing task - frame their assignments more precisely - correct student papers more quickly and efficiently The new second edition offers activities and strategies which involve technology (word processing, presentation programming, the Internet, and e-communications), differentiated instruction, and brain-based learning.
