What do you see when you look at this image?
Just as different people will see different things in this picture, we all have a different lens through which we look at the world, a different perspective. The prescription through which we each view our present and future experiences and encounters is formed by our past experiences and encounters. As we seen in the image above, we can all be looking at the same thing but seeing something very different!
Lets examine discipline! What lens do most people view this topic through? What are your experiences with discipline? I would think that most people who hear the word view it as something negative: maybe a trip to the principal's office, a time-out, a fine, a loss of a privilege, or, as I remember when I'd fight with my sister as a little girl, sitting on separate couches and not being aloud to talk until we could say something nice!! Why is that the common association with this topic? I believe it is because we learn by experience. However, when we reach a certain level, if we look at things through a different lens, 'discipline' actually turns into an opportunity to explore and grow!
One of the definitions listed in the dictionary for 'discipline' is "a branch of knowledge, typically one studied in higher education." When discipline is viewed through this lens, it opens up a whole new world! As I venture into graduate school, I find my vision focused on this version of discipline, and it is a welcome change!! In the world of education, I believe the more we focus on disciplinary literacy, specifically on giving our students the right perspective or lens for each discipline, the more engaged they will be, and the less we will have to live in the world of the negative discipline!!
As we begin to explore disciplinary literacy, I am starting to see the importance of this focus as an educator and its critical role in accomplishing what we all strive for - to help our students reach their full potential and really be engaged in meaningful learning!!
"I just don't know how primary teachers teach students to read. They go from not reading, to reading, its amazing." As a middle school teacher, that is a thought that has gone through my mind so very often! When I get students, they generally have at least the very basic skills. So this week, as I was exploring materials, it struck me how as students get older, we do tend to just assume they already know how to read, we don't often look at the bigger picture - that just as we all have a different lens we view each situation from, students come into each discipline with their own views and to expect them to get the most out of the content, we cannot assume that the literacy lens with which they are looking is the right prescription. We need to address the fact that there are many factors that contribute to adjusting each persons view to see most clearly with-in each discipline!
A professor I once had said "elementary teachers get into teaching because they love the students and secondary teachers get into teaching because they love the topic." I think most teachers are in in because they love the students, but I do see how passionate about a specific topic that secondary teachers can be. I wonder if it could be a temptation to get so caught up on the content that we lose the student along the way because we fail to prepare them to be literate in the topic. The past few years, I have been working on getting my students to view each topic as an expert. So in math, I try to address them as mathematicians, in Science, as scientists, in history, as historians. However, I'm starting to realize that while I speak to them as such, I don't always set them up to successfully learn. This goes back to disciplinary literacy and the need to prepare students to receive the content. One common thing I found this week in the exploration into disciplinary literacy is the need for the teacher to take into account the many factors that contribute to how students view the content they are about to read and to set them up for success in this.
Yes, students generally know how to read by the time they get to middle school, but we need to continue to build on that foundation by teaching them the skills they need to read the content. As Buehl says, "Few teachers have been asked to teach the reading skills students need in each subject"(21).
While "A number of teachers feel that the strategies place an unfair burden of teaching reading
on them when they should be teaching content" (Moje, 98), I'd argue what is the point in teaching content if students are simply going to be caught up in the 'pedagody of telling' which is simply knowledge being transferred from the head of the teacher into the student (Moje, 98). We need to help our students to be literate in the disciplines by modeling - showing them how to think as historians, scientists, etc!
Kucer mentions that proficient readers are readers that are flexible and guided by a purpose (37). He also points out that people's prior experiences create a powerful influence on how a reader gets what they are reading (41). If readers don't have experience that has given them knowledge of a content, they will lack the knowledge to make sense of what they are reading (43). This makes a lot of sense. Once students reach the different disciplines, they are usually coming in with their foundational reading skills. They don't usually have the experiences needed to put the contents in perspective or to understand the purpose in what they are reading. That is when we, as educators need to start looking at how we can help model and teach disciplinary literacy!!
Each student comes into class with their own perspective and lens. I believe as a teacher, if I can start looking through the lens of teaching disciplinary literacy, my students will truly start gaining the skills to think with the lens of a historian, scientist, etc!
Question: Under a time crunch, how do you balance teaching disciplinary literacy and taking the time to make sure students are ready to learn in the different content areas with getting all the content you are required to get in?
