Supporting secondary students is an area of focus for schools across the country. In December, researcher Timothy Shanahan spoke to SRCL states about promoting secondary and disciplinary literacy.

His research describes 8 strategies that increase the literacy skills of secondary students. These strategies include providing 1) vocabulary instruction, 2) comprehension strategies, 3) knowledge building through reading, 4) oral reading fluency practice, 5) time to write about text, 6) appropriate remedial instruction, 7) disciplinary literacy, and 8) complex text. Additional information on these strategies can be found in Promoting Secondary Literacy and https://shanahanonliteracy.com/.

Dr. Shanahan took a deeper dive into Disciplinary Literacy by describing how we read and write in science, history, math, and ELA. Disciplinary literacy focuses on the specific aspects of literacy within each discipline. This is a different idea than content-area literacy which focuses on using similar ELA strategies across subject areas. Take a look at the Teaching Disciplinary Literacy presentation for more information. This chart entitled, What are Literacies within the Disciplines? The book Disciplinary Literacy: A Shift that Makes Sense by Eleah Lent provides an overview of how one reads, writes, and thinks in each discipline. Doug Buehl’s Classroom Strategies for Interactive Learning, 4th Edition includes a variety of teaching strategies, text frames, and focusing questions for each discipline.

For additional resources on supporting adolescent literacy see the following practice guides from What Works Clearinghouse and the Secondary Literacy section on the OSRCL HUB.

Teaching Secondary Students to Write (Nov. 2016)

[Webinar}

Improving Adolescent Literacy: Effective Classroom and Intervention Practices (Aug. 2008)

Our next Zoom meeting will be February 11, 2020 at 10:00 am. Our topic will be Secondary and Disciplinary Literacy. We hope you are able to join us.

Register for the February Zoom meeting at this link.

https://zoom.us/meeting/register/uJ0pc-2hqDgvJ3REJYTUildS526HwcZHmg

Upcoming OSRCL Zoom Meeting Dates and Topics

• February 11, 2020 Secondary Literacy

• March 10, 2020 - TBA

• April 14, 2020 - FY21 Goals and Local Literacy Plans

Notes and resources from past calls:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10l3WMDvv91rf3hAQnOqv5FT_7ncvsPG2xPzEmsXZ4xk/edit?usp=sharing

As part of our federal grant requirements we must collect professional development information from our districts. Please keep the following guidelines in mind when planning for professional learning and the OSRCL pd survey:

• Is the professional learning 3 hours or longer? Do the OSRCL PD survey.

• Is the professional learning less than 3 hours? The OSRCL PD survey is optional.

Please keep in mind that you will receive a pd survey feedback report after participants have taken the survey. PD feedback reports are made when there are more than 5 participants. If you don’t have a pd feedback report for professional learning that has already taken place, please let Michelle Seybolt know.