Analytical reading and writing are embedded in a disciplinary approach to history instruction and present opportunities to extend students' literacy practices. U.S. educators and researchers have come to rely on the Document-Based Question (DBQ) to assess and develop students' historical knowledge and argument writing. However, this task has been…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) emphasize disciplinary literacy by making literacy instruction every teacher's responsibility (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief State School Officers, 2010). The CCSS require content area teachers to adapt curriculum and pedagogy to support disciplinary literacy…

This study explored the extent to which an 18-day history and writing curriculum intervention, taught over the course of one year, helped culturally and academically diverse adolescents achieve important disciplinary literacy learning in history. Teachers used a cognitive apprenticeship form of instruction for the integration of historical reading…

In recent years, educators in the USA have emphasized disciplinary literacy as an essential path forward in cultivating adolescents' understanding of subject matter in tandem with literacy practices. Yet, this agenda poses challenges to teachers who have been tasked with its implementation. Here, we examine two expert US history teachers' efforts…

One path to improving adolescents' literacy skills is to integrate reading and writing into the content areas in which such work occurs. Although argumentative writing has been found to help students understand historical content and transform information, scholars do not know the influence of specific task structures on students' writing or…

As the call for adolescent literacy grows louder, attention must be paid to the particular demands of each discipline if educators are to help students develop advanced literacy skills. The hallmarks of advanced literacy are specific to different fields of study. This article proposes a descriptive framework for adolescents' historical writing.…