Since pairing the classics with young adult literature can increase reading comprehension and spark interest amongst our students, this essay explores a unit plan for connecting Will Hobbs's "Downriver" (1991) with William Golding's "Lord of the Flies" (1954). Both works espouse significant and timely themes: the importance of…

After briefly reviewing how reading is conceptualised in the "Progress in International Reading Literacy Study" and the English National Curriculum, this article examines two unofficial reading activities in a class of 10-11-year-olds' to see how far these activities match up with the official definitions of reading, or whether they…

When response activities and comprehension strategies are combined, classroom instruction can enhance student engagement and understanding of a text, enrich student response, and improve students' awareness of their own strategic reading. This article presents some activities, adapted from the new IRA book "Children's Literature in the Reading…

Provides examples of using the Directed Reading Activity as a framework for teaching students to comprehend literary text at varying levels of response. (HOD)

Three significant changes have impacted the teaching of social studies to young adolescents in the past decade: (1) development of the curriculum standards for social studies by the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS); (2) growth in the number of middle schools, which are premised on the integration of content; and (3) expansive use of…

Describes a teaching method that uses Molly Bloom's soliloquy from James Joyce's "Ulysses" to teach punctuation to freshman writing students. Argues that the assignment helps students discover their power as orderers. (EL)

Shares how the author designed reading activities to increase students' understanding of nonfiction by adhering to three principles: purpose, classification, and collaboration. Recounts how students responded to the reading materials and each other as they developed an understanding of the information available to them. (MG)

The strategies in this book, geared for students from grades 4-8, are designed to bring literature to life for students, and to encourage students to become lifelong readers. The first section of the book presents four "'Into' Activities" that are designed to get students excited and curious about what they are about to read and to build students'…

This book gives English teachers more than 75 reproducible literature selections with ready-to-use lessons based on a variety of multicultural fiction and non-fiction by authors of African, Asian, Latino, Native American, and European descent. The book is designed to expand the choice of multicultural literature beyond that found in the department…