Sarah+Primeau


 * Practicing Active Reading Strategies in First-Year Writing **

This lesson was designed to address the Critical Reading outcome for English 120/121:
 * **Critical Reading: ** Reading, incorporating, and citing sources using the conventions appropriate to a given genre
 * **Use of Evidence: ** Selecting and presenting evidence in writing that supports one’s own ideas as well as provides readers with necessary background information, examples, and details to appreciate those ideas
 * **Research: ** Adapting one’s own interests, ideas, and research strategies to the modes of inquiry used in college-level academic disciplines

Additional outcomes: Students will see that just as we write with different purposes, we also read with different purposes. Students will practice analyzing difficult passages, skimming sections of familiar information, and strategies for taking notes. Students will practice looking at different aspects of a text: reading for content, recognizing the format of a text, and understand how those aspects work together. Students will recognize reading strategies that are helpful for them and practice using those strategies in a variety of contexts. Students will understand how interacting with a text can improve understanding and increase engagement with a text.

This lesson could potentially help students meet one or more of these Learning Process Outcomes: (I say “potentially,” because in English 120/121, students reflect on their individual work and choose which assignments met LPOs.) Similarly, this lesson could encourage students to practice the Habits of Mind described in The Framework for Success in Postsecondary Writing.
 * **//Sense of Perspective //****: ** acknowledging and taking into account ideas and viewpoints of other people or texts that contrast/disagree with your own
 * **//Investment and Engagement //****: **<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> experiencing a sense of connection with your subject matter, drafts, and processes of composing beyond just doing what’s required
 * **//<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Competence and Confidence //****<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">: **<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> staying with and feeling capable of accomplishing difficult or challenging tasks/assignments
 * **//<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Reflection //****<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">: **<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> recognizing the choices available to you for completing tasks/assignments involving writing, reading, or research, as well as being able to explain your decision making


 * __<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Rough sketch of the lesson: __**

//<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Creating the homework assignment: //<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">For this activity, I chose a reading that was more challenging than our previous readings in the course. The article presented a series of complex arguments about the social purposes of genre. An article that presents a theory or critical analysis might work well, too. A longer article that is divided into subsections would work well. It would also be useful to write 1-2 questions for each subsection of the text. Questions should prompt critical thinking about the author’s position and/or ask students to apply the theory presented in the article to other situations.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Homework for Day 1: **<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Read a complex, theoretical academic article and respond to a list of questions. Hand out paper copies for homework or ask students to bring a paper copy to class.
 * __<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Day 1: __**<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Briefly discuss the homework questions but do not offer your own summary or overview of the article.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">As a class, review Active Reading Strategies from Diana Hacker. Read the annotated text example as a group and ask “what is the author doing here in each of these annotations?” Take notes next to each annotation.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">When most/all types of annotations have been labeled with a purpose, compile a list of “Active Reading Strategies created by our class.” Compare the list with Hacker’s Active Reading Strategies. Ask the class, did we get most of them? Add any that the class finds interesting/important. <span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Divide students into groups of 2-3 and ask them to apply this set of active reading strategies to one section of the article. (In a larger class, some groups may work on the same section.) Students should annotate the article just like in the example from Hacker.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Have students present their notes to the class by placing their annotated copies of the article on the digital projector. (In a larger class, you could ask for volunteers instead of hearing from all groups.) Groups should present their notes and also explain the main points of their section of text.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">As a full group, return to the homework questions. How have the reading strategies helped us understand this text?


 * <span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Homework for Day 2: **<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Try out our active reading strategies with an assignment //for another class.// Annotate the reading and bring it to class with you. Email the list of strategies to the class.


 * __<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Day 2 __**__<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">: __<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Freewrite about your use of Active Reading Strategies for homework. Which strategies did you find the most useful? Why do you think they worked? What didn’t work so well? What kinds of texts did everyone read? (novels, textbooks, academic articles.) Which strategies worked best for which kinds of texts? Students could write-pair-share before discussion. Ask pairs to compare and contrast their use of the strategies.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">(Some noticings from my students: finding main points or writing your own opinion didn’t work well for fiction but did work well for informational or critical texts. Highlighting new terms or important terms worked well for fiction and non-fiction. (For fiction, highlighting character’s names was helpful.) “Talking to the text” was helpful but time-consuming; students used that strategy when they were stuck or bored.

<span style="font-family: 'Cambria','serif'; font-size: 16px;">For future readings, continue using the Active Reading Strategies list that the class created.