Writers carefully include critical information in the opening lines of their chapters, but students often gloss over these beginning sentences, missing information that could help them better comprehend the text. To address this concern, the authors created a strategy that prompts students to examine the opening lines of chapters, helping readers…

Hands-on explorations can be extended through interactions with informational texts, enhancing both science learning and literacy development. In this article, the author describes a primary-grade science activity that begins with students examining pine cones and sharing their experiences and observations with peers. The students then generate…

Discusses a need for "post picture books" (which do not contain an orderly progression of story elements) to be evaluated and understood using different criteria. Considers how literary theory provides a structure for ordering the chaos. Discusses how new metafictive books reflect new literary codes and a new dynamic reading process of…

Suggests that each type of literature presented to young readers serves two important functions: to develop a schema for that literary genre; and to encourage the application of thinking skills in a variety of literary engagements. Presents four related resources from the ERIC database. (MG)

Offers a procedure to help students develop effective strategies for using labeled diagrams in their research projects. (MG)

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)

Describes a model procedure for integrating direct instruction in story structure with reader response to literature in two settings: traditional storybook read-aloud sessions and nontraditional HyperCard computer sessions. (SR)

Noting that elementary-school students often fail to understand many of the ideas presented in school textbooks, this book presents the Questioning the Author (QtA) strategy, which is designed to establish student interactions with text and build greater understanding by teaching students to question the ideas presented in the text while they are…

Graphic organizers (also referred to as structured overviews, mapping, webbing, or pyramiding) are visual aids which depict the relationships among concepts in a text and which reflect the organization of the text. Five patterns of graphic organizers--cause/effect, comparison/contrast, time/order, simple listing, and problem solving--reflect the…

Compares and contrasts chapters from two children's science textbooks, one published in 1992 in a traditional format, and the other in 1995 using a new format. Finds them very different in terms of structure and organization. Shows that children respond to these texts very differently. Shares some ideas about teaching with such texts. (SR)

Explains the details of a method of teaching text structure that proved successful in improving both reading comprehension and summary writing of fifth graders. Reports that students quickly learned how to attend to and remember main ideas from problem-solution passages in their textbooks and how to write summaries. (MG)

Shows how to help students fill in textual "gaps" to interact more fully with contemporary texts, classics, and myths. Presents examples of this approach for studying (1) Shakespeare's "Hamlet" with Tom Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead"; and (2) George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion" with the…

While young children's problem-solving models are not as elaborate as those of older students, they share an important belief, namely, that writing and reading are fundamentally purposeful acts of communication. Focusing on the interpretation of process, in particular on writing and reading as forms of problem-solving that are shaped by…