Promising approaches to transforming English language arts classrooms into dialogic, democratic, and critical spaces for literature discussions involve the selection of compelling young adult literature (YAL) and the use of student-centered discussion strategies (e.g., literature circles). Scholars have demonstrated, however, the shortcomings of…

This paper examines whether model annotations can foster disciplinary literacy in higher education. Using history as a test case, 102 education undergraduates participated in a training and transfer task in which they read two-period documents, and responded to recall and comprehension questions, and to a short essay question requiring historical…

Academic reading is different from other forms of reading because it is complex and discipline-specific. It involves a measured, challenging, and multifaceted process in which students are dynamically engaged with a range of reading strategies. Academic reading improvement is possible, provided students work on it and there are no short cuts or…

This study used think-aloud methodology to explore undergraduates' spontaneous attention to and use of source information while reading six documents that presented conflicting views on a controversial social scientific issue in a Google-like environment. Results showed that students explicitly and implicitly paid attention to sources of documents…

In a sample of 135 Norwegian education undergraduates, we examined the effects of topic-specific epistemic beliefs concerning the simplicity and source of knowledge on deep-level understanding of multiple expository texts about the same topic--climate change. The results showed that students holding sophisticated simplicity beliefs, viewing…

This study examined the influence of critical reading orientation on use of external strategies such as note-taking and underlining while reading an expository text. In two experiments, undergraduate students were asked either to review an article on a linguistic policy (critical reading) or to summarise it (less-critical reading). Experiment 1…