Book Clubs and Content-Area Reading

Chapter 9 dealt primarily with content area book clubs, a way of making reading accessible in disciplines other than English. As an future English teacher, I don't feel I can really comment on this fully, because I don't know the demands of a History or Biology or Geometry class. (This is not to say that a book club is not useable or useful for an English classroom, it's just that there is usually a good deal of reading in an English classroom already.)

What I do know is that reading is an important tool for students to have. Reading books on a subject that might otherwise be inaccessible, dry, or too difficult for a student may very well help them to master a concept or appreciate a topic in a way they might not have previously. I think that friendlier, more accessible language is key to this being a success in the classroom; if the book is inaccessible to students (much like those bad textbooks), and if reading them is too difficult, then nothing has really been accomplished. Struggling with a text is important, but it's a fine line between struggling and giving up entirely. You have to gauge your students ability and work ethic when it comes to difficulty in texts.

I also want to push the importance of writing in the classroom, and not just the English classroom. Writing is an extremely important tool for students; anyone, really. Reading is important, but it is too often a passive activity. I think this can and needs to be rethought, but I also think that writing is a key component to student engagement. It needs to be the English teacher's role to show students how to write, but that's not the only place that writing should be happening. And while in my experience there was a great deal of writing going on in my History classes as well, it was heavily prompted, specific-knowledge-driven writing. What I mean by this is that there was little to no student choice in writing, and the only knowledge needed to succeed in these essays was to know a small, specific set of recently-learned information.

This makes writing a passive activity as well. Information passes from the text to the essay, with no student mediating the transaction.  This makes writing a chore rather than a tool, and I have to stress its importance as a tool. Writing allows you to take your thoughts and ideas and make them readable for everyone else around you.

This may well have only been my experience, but regardless I ask that we use reading and writing in every classroom. And again, I do not know the specific needs and demands and handicaps of every classroom, both in a general content-area way and a specific individual-classroom way. I don't even know the specific needs and demands of an English classroom, really. Or any classroom.

Let me just say, then: Reading and writing cannot be a chore for students. They cannot be passive information-gathering techniques or passive information-regurgitation techniques.

(And lastly: I know it's become pretty cliché to use the word "regurgitate" when talking about students mindlessly retrieving information, but it's just such a visceral word, right? It's too good not to use.)

RAFTing vs. the Dark Side

RAFTing vs. the Dark Side

While the Darth Vader bit was a tad on the nose, it presents a very real image of high school and middle school classrooms. These are places where writing assignments are used as punishment, where lengthy reports come without any instruction, collaboration, or point other than the hope that a student might find it interesting. Which they don't.

I think some of the best questions teachers can ask themselves is: Would I enjoy doing this? Would I be interested in this? Would this make me think differently?

If the answer is no, then it's probably not a terribly useful assignment. Teachers tend to assign things because they think it is necessary, and I think a lot of teachers don't bother to think about what it is they're even assessing when they give out assignments. If you're not sure what an assignment helps you to assess, don't give it. Wait, think about what it is you want to assess, and come up with a better assignment. If you're not sure what an assignment is going to do to help you or the students, don't give it.

Of course, it's easy enough for me to say all of these things from my internet pedestal. Here's what I can say: I think that RAFTing, combined with backward design, is a very strong method to keep ourselves in check. It's very easy to slip into a pattern of giving easy, pointless, or vague assignments, and all of these things demotivate students. I have to imagine they demotivate teachers, too. And why bother being inefficient if you don't have to be?

Right now, I don't know what it's going to be like as a teacher. I know it will be hard. I know that I will be critical. And I know that the RAFT design will be useful to me. I hope teachers everywhere at least try and use this method.