Listening to the Literacy Needs of Adolescents

The article, The Literacy Needs of Adolescents in Their Own Words, features stories of seven students and their struggles with reading. It examines the reading intervention programs happening in schools and how they are meeting students' needs. I was amazed to read the results and also hear how knowledgable students and parents were about the issues.

The students surveyed varied from students with special needs or English language learners. All students were reading below grade level and struggled in the area of comprehension. Most students were good decoders, but struggled to understand what they were reading. When asked about reading strategies, most students didn't even know what strategies were. They needed help but weren't getting it.

A few shocks and surprises while reading this article. For starters, I was happy to see how many parents were involved and knew their child's specific reading needs. I was disappointed to see the interventions put in place at schools to not be meeting student needs. As a reading teacher, my job is to teach specific strategies to students based on their needs. Through assessment, a teacher should be able to see if it is a fluency, comprehension, or decoding skill that a student needs and then teach to those needs. Specifically in secondary schools, these adolescents need intervention programs that will directly enhance their literacy lives for all subjects. We need to be preparing our students for the workplace and a solid literacy foundation is essential. What good is an intervention program if it isn't intervening? What good is a teacher if they aren't working cooperatively with the student and the parents?

Pitcher, S.M., Martinez, G., Dicembre, E.A., Fewster, D., McCormick, M.K. (2010). The Literacy Needs of Adolescents in Their Own Words. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 53(8), 636-645.

Evolution of my Reading Life

In our last class, we discussed the different types of readers we may see in the classroom. I learned about a new type of reader - the "dormant" reader. Dormant readers are those do not read outside of school but do what is needed for their classes. They do not find reading very enjoyable and are not as engaged in reading as much as they could be.  After some reflection, I feel like this was me growing up and still is to some extent. 

Growing up, I was a good student and took my studies seriously. I enjoyed challenging classes and took many advanced English classes in middle and high school. The book lists for these classes were long and rigorous. I enjoyed the satisfaction of knowing that I had read so many classics and could add them to my reading repertoire. Looking back now, I don't think I truly enjoyed that and it definitely wasn't fostering a love of reading. I was and still am a good reader, but I had no drive to read for pleasure.

Fast forward to today and part of me still feels dormant. I am always involved in a professional book study with my school, always reading children's books ahead of time to prepare for read aloud instruction, and now I have textbooks to read for graduate school courses. Finding the time to read for pleasure has still been difficult for me. Luckily, in my literacy in secondary schools class, I have the opportunity to read a young adult novel for a book club. This has given me the opportunity to get back into reading for pleasure. I immediately was hooked from the first page of the novel, Wonder, and now I am very excited to carve out time to read.

I have also noticed that the environment which I read is crucial. I can't read in bed if I'm tired and I can't have a lot of background noise. Reading outside is ideal if it's a pretty day outside or reading next to a window where there is natural light. I had never really considered the parameters of where and how I read to matter up until recently. When the conditions are right and distractions are removed, I am a much more successful reader.

If my job as an educator is to foster a love of reading in my students, then I know it needs to start with good modeling from the teacher. I am making it a goal to improve and move past the dormancy. 

Reading & Writing Lives

I love teaching my students how to become successful readers and writers. I enjoy watching them foster a love of reading and finding books that hook them. It is my passion and ultimately why I chose my graduate school path in reading instruction.

I grew up as an early reader and enjoyed books. When I got to middle and high school though, this all seemed to change for me. I was given a list each year of classic novels to read, read them, took a test, and repeat. Although I love knowing that I've read so many famous classics and can check them off my "list", I don't feel like that enhanced my reading life. Now as an adult, I find I need to schedule time to read for pleasure. Up until recently, my reading life consisted of browsing daily news articles and reading children's books with my 2nd graders. By the time the end of the day came, I had no energy left for books for pleasure.

It is evident that I need to practice what I preach. I need to have a scheduled time for reading and writing in my day - beyond children's books. Randy Bomer, author of Building Adolescent Literacy in Today's English Classrooms, explains that you need to establish habits and conditions for forming a reading and writing life. Everything from your schedule, to the place, and even the light should play into your conditions for reading and writing.

Bomer states that "Educated people should know how to pursue their own intellectual projects. Educated people should have agendas that take them to texts. Educated people should have habits that allow them to have reading and writing lives." (Bomer 2011) If I want to create educated, lifelong readers and writers, I have to build these habits early and also build them within my own life.