bridging print literacies and digital literacies using strategy guides

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248 Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 55(3) November 2011 doi:10.1002/JAAL.00030 © 2011 International Reading Association (pp. 248–252) W ith the rise of the digital age, if there is one artifact of our classrooms that needs rethinking, it is the textbook. No longer can teachers rely on a single source of information to meet our curricular needs. With many states subscrib- ing to adoption models, the textbooks stay around too long and their content is frequently outdated. For this reason, strategy guides can be useful vehicles for bridging textbook content and the myriad of information available to us via digital sources. Strategy guides are not the study guides of yesterday—essentially a series of questions students had to answer while reading a textbook chapter. With the increasing need to develop strategic readers and writers, strategy guides (Wood, Lapp, Flood, & Taylor, 2008) use a modified Phased Transfer Model of Teaching and Learning to take students outside of a chapter and into multiple sources of information, touring virtual worlds, blogging about issues, and synthesizing information from websites, online encyclopedias, and so forth. In this column, I show how two strategy guides can be used in a classroom to guide students through the process of comprehending using analysis, synthesis and discussion of both printed and online text. The first strategy guide is the Reading Road Map (RRM). A typical RRM consists of missions (interspersed questions and activities), road signs (reading rate indicators), and location signs (related websites, text page or paragraph numbers, etc.). Teachers are encouraged to be creative in designing the guide activities, questions, and graphics to capture the attention of reluctant learners. A guide should be a blend of textbook content and related digital content. An excerpt from a guide on Afghanistan is shown in Figure 1 and a brief procedural description follows here. Begin by explaining the purpose and drawing parallels between the “text and online journey” and an actual trip to another location. As with any journey, it is less confusing to look ahead, plan the course, and know where you are going before you get there. So, have the students skim over the map so they can see where they are headed. Allow students to work in pairs to engage in the activities. With any trip, it is always more enjoyable to have a “traveling companion.” They can write their responses on a separate paper, preserving the guides for later use. Model one or two examples and assist students in locating and composing a response, often from more than one source. Bridging Print Literacies and Digital Literacies Using Strategy Guides Karen D. Wood Real-Time Teaching

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Page 1: Bridging Print Literacies and Digital Literacies Using Strategy Guides

248

Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 55(3)November 2011doi:10.1002/JAAL.00030© 2011 International Reading Association(pp. 248–252)

With the rise of the digital age, if there is one artifact of our classrooms that needs rethinking, it is the textbook. No longer can teachers rely on a single source of information to meet our curricular needs. With many states subscrib-ing to adoption models, the textbooks stay around too long and their content is frequently outdated.

For this reason, strategy guides can be useful vehicles for bridging textbook content and the myriad of information available to us via digital sources. Strategy guides are not the study guides of yesterday—essentially a series of questions students had to answer while reading a textbook chapter. With the increasing need to develop strategic readers and writers, strategy guides (Wood, Lapp, Flood, & Taylor, 2008) use a modified Phased Transfer Model of Teaching and Learning to take students outside of a chapter and into multiple sources of information, touring virtual worlds, blogging about issues, and synthesizing information from websites, online encyclopedias, and so forth.

In this column, I show how two strategy guides can be used in a classroom to guide students through the process of comprehending using analysis, synthesis and discussion of both printed and online text. The first strategy guide is the Reading Road Map (RRM). A typical RRM consists of missions (interspersed questions and activities), road signs (reading rate indicators), and location signs (related websites, text page or paragraph numbers, etc.). Teachers are encouraged to be creative in designing the guide activities, questions, and graphics to capture the attention of reluctant learners. A guide should be a blend of textbook content and related digital content. An excerpt from a guide on Afghanistan is shown in Figure 1 and a brief procedural description follows here.

■ Begin by explaining the purpose and drawing parallels between the “text and online journey” and an actual trip to another location. As with any journey, it is less confusing to look ahead, plan the course, and know where you are going before you get there. So, have the students skim over the map so they can see where they are headed.

■ Allow students to work in pairs to engage in the activities. With any trip, it is always more enjoyable to have a “traveling companion.” They can write their responses on a separate paper, preserving the guides for later use.

■ Model one or two examples and assist students in locating and composing a response, often from more than one source.

Bridging Print Literacies and

Digital Literacies Using Strategy

GuidesKaren D. Wood

Real-Time Teaching

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Page 2: Bridging Print Literacies and Digital Literacies Using Strategy Guides

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Figure 1 Reading Road Map: Afghanistan

Directions : Welcome to South Asia. The first country you will visit is

Afghanistan, then on to Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Location Speed Mission

Connecting to Your World

Pg. 385 Skim

Share your thinking about what you already know about Afghanistan and then skim over this opening

Afghanistan

Detour to the World Wide Web

History and Government

Pg. 385

Slow Down

Read and discuss with your partner why Afghanistan is a strategic location and so important to other countries through the years.

Website: www.nationalgeographic.com Look at the links on the toolbar with your partner and jot down some facts about the following (remember to use the key at the bottom of each map): Ethnic Groups Drought and Vegetation What does this information tell you about Afghanistan?

Pg. 386

With your partner, draw a chart that illustrates the control of Afghanistan from the 1800s to the present.

Fork in the Road

Stop & Write

You choose an online source to determine the role of the Taliban today. (Be sure to use the website verification form we discussed in class) Are they still a threat? Why and how are they able to survive?

Land Use in South Asia

Economics and Culture

Map on

Look at the key to the left and study the map on this page. Develop a circle graph that depicts how the land is used in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, & India

What is subsistence farming? Explain why most Afghans live by this method?

Turn Here

Pg. 387 Slow

Down

Note. From “Promoting literacy through visual aids: Teaching students to read maps, charts and graphs,” by P. Pilonieta, K.D. Wood, and D.B. Taylor, 2010, in B. Moss and D. Lapp (Eds.), Teaching New Literacies in Grades 4–6. Copyright 2010 by Guilford. Reprinted with permission.

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what they already know. This is the time when the teacher can model how to start thinking about the topic of study.

■ Record—In this phase, students jot down important concepts they see or hear using abbreviated notes, drawings, or what best represents what they heard.

■ Elaborate—In this phase, the predetermined group members “put their heads together” to recall details; f lesh out their abbreviated notes; contribute what they heard or saw; and combine, elaborate on, and extend their individual responses. The responses in the “group” column are noticeably more detailed than the “individual” column because students are using their collective recall to reconstruct the material.

■ Synthesize—After the groups have met to discuss their responses, students go back to the whole class format to provide a broader view, synthesize the main concepts, and make some generalizations. This can be accomplished via

■ Allow the class to work on more activities in pairs with you guiding, circulating, and providing assistance as needed.

■ Ask for a class-wide discussion of responses at strategic points along the way.

What happens when a teacher wants to show a DVD or videotape (yes, they still exist), or maybe visit a virtual world on the Internet? Too often the viewing of material is not treated like an actual lesson, with pre-, during, and poststages. Using a accompanying strategy guide avoids the experience of putting in the DVD or movie only to have students pass notes to friends, or put their heads on their desks and drift off to sleep as soon as the lights go out. Today, however, we see the value of visualization as a learning tool with the proliferation of books devoted to the topic (see Flood, Brice, & Lapp, 2008, for additional information). In addition, state curricula across the country include visual literacy as part of the standard course of study.

A second strategy guide, the Collaborative Listening Viewing Guide (CLVG) works well with material that is viewed or heard: a science experiment, an outside speaker, a virtual tour to a foreign country, an online interview with an author, a field trip, a virtual field trip. The list is endless especially in today’s digital world. In this example, a DVD entitled Lost Treasures of Afghanistan was selected from National Geographic website (www.nationalgeographic.com) to complement the study of South Asia in a social studies classroom. As with any effective lesson, students should be provided an instructional framework for the material that is viewed or heard. The form provided in Figure 2 illustrates the five phases or components of this framework: previewing/reviewing; recording, elaborating, synthesizing and extending the content. The CLVG calls for whole class, small group, paired, and individualized learning, documented as the best combination for effective learning.

■ Preview/Review—Here the teacher leads the class in a discussion of the topic, focusing on building background knowledge, preteaching significant terms, and concepts, connecting to

Figure 2 Excerpt From a Collaborative Listing-Viewing Guide for Social Studies

Video Title: Lost Treasures of Afghanistan

Name: Kate

Class: Third Period Social Studies

Group Members: Juan, Rachel, Angel

Preview/Review

Wars in early 90s National Museum in Kabul attacked by rockets; Taliban ordered non-

Islamic statues destroyed—two thirdsrds of the hundred thousand items were

destroyed. Taliban didn’t know many objects were hidden away. Afghanistan has the

best art objects known to man.

Record (Individually) Record (Group Input)

Safe-cracked a vault Treasures were in vault in a palace

Gold pieces saved; Silk Road 20,000 Bactrian gold pieces from Silk Road culture

(China, India, Greece, Rome, Egypt)

Coins from fifth century Ivory statues, water goddesses, Buddhist sculptures

Teams worked to help out Experts from U.S., Afghan, National

Geographic got funds and worked to find and

restore items

Synthesis (Whole class)

What led to the problem? How was it solved? Outcome?

Civil war; Taliban regime Stashed away the objects Art objects safe and hidden,international tour

Extend/Apply/Research (In Pairs)

With your partner, select a topic to research using online resources: the Taliban today;

status of the art collection; history of specific art objects; other ideas?

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navigate the Internet. One option is to do what we

have done in these examples, carefully screening the

media forms and websites in advance and including

them as part of the instructional lesson. However,

if students are asked to do their own research, you

will want to consult one or more of the various re-

sources available for helping students evaluate web-

site quality. See Literacy Strategies Across the Subject

Areas (Wood & Taylor, 2006) as well as the Baildon

and Baildon (2008) article in The Reading Teacher for

a few examples.

References

Baildon, R., & Baildon, M. (2008). Guiding independence:

Developing a research tool to support student decision

making in selecting online information sources. The Reading

Teacher, 61(8), 636–647. doi:10.1598/RT.61.8.5.

Fisher, D., Frey, N., & Lapp, D. (2008). In a reading state of mind.

Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Flood, J., Heath, S.B., & Lapp, D. (Eds.). (2008). Handbook of

research on teaching literacy through the communicative and visual

arts, volume II. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Wood, K.D., Lapp, D., Flood, J., & Taylor, D.B. (2008). Guiding

readers through text: Strategy guides in “New Times.” Newark,

DE: International Reading Association.

Wood, K., & Taylor, B. (2006). Literacy strategies across the subject

areas (2nd ed.). New York: Allyn & Bacon.

a graphic organizer or chart such as the one excerpted in Figure 2, or group and whole class writing activities, brainstorming, or any other activity that fits the content.

■ Extend—This optional phase allows students to work in pairs to extend, apply, and research the content more extensively.

The next logical question is how do all of these forms of information fit together in a classroom? Let’s take a look at a representative weekly schedule in Figure 3. I do not advocate showing a DVD or any other form of media in one setting. Instead I advocate “chunking,” or dividing the content to make it more manageable. Chunking text in all its forms (digital and traditional) has proven to be more beneficial to student learning because there is less of a cognitive strain to process and assimilate shorter amounts of material (Fisher, Frey, & Lapp, 2008). In this way, the students and the teacher engage daily in discussions synthesizing the content from varied sources. Anyone who has taught at the middle or high school level knows that students of the “sound bite” generation are accustomed to information that is presented in smaller amounts and in a variety of media formats.

A final note on using online resources: It is imperative as educators that we help students learn how to judge the validity of online material as they

Figure 3 Sample Weekly Schedule Using Two Strategy GuidesMonday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday

Introduce the

topic, elicit

background

knowledge;

Introduce and

model sample

questions on

Reading Road

Map

Introduce

Collaborative

Listening-

Viewing Guide

(CLVG), engage

in preview phase

of DVD;

Reading Road

Map

(RRM)—

Allow students to

work in pairs

then discuss

content as a

class

RRM—Students

work in pairs to

continue answering

questions/activities;

Student-led

discussions;

Continue with DVD/

CLVG and group

discussions

RRM—Students

work in pairs to

continue answering

questions/activities;

student-led

discussions;

Continue with

conclusion of

DVD/CLVG and

group discussions

RRM—Teacher

and students

discuss and review

content from the

text/online

sources;

CLVG: Teacher

and students

engage in

synthesis of the

DVD and begin the

extend phase

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Wood is a professor in the Department of Reading and Elementary Education at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA; e-mail [email protected].

The department editors welcome reader comments. Douglas Fisher teaches at San Diego State University, California, USA; e-mail [email protected]. Diane Lapp teaches at San Diego State University; e-mail [email protected].

Supporting InformationAdditional supporting information may be found in the online version of this article:PodcastPlease note: Wiley-Blackwell are not responsible for the content or functionality of any supporting materials supplied by the authors. Any queries (other than missing material) should be directed to the corresponding author for the article.

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