Hmmm... While I agree that it is possible to not be able to name the text structure and yet still understand the article... I am thinking there is power in being able to identify a text structure when you are struggling to understand a piece of text. If you know how it is organized, you might make better sense of i t!
We are in the middle of a content literacy initiative in our district---three years of inservice total---, K-12. I am proud our district is working on this in a long-term, connected fashion. Last year we did quite a bit with text structure. At that time, I felt that it was less important for students to be able to look at a piece of text and identify its structure, than for them to realize that nonfiction text was organized differently and required different strategies in order to understand it. I had worked with kids and had them notice how particular texts were organized, but they named the organizational structure, not me. Now I am rethinking that...and I am not sure what to do about teaching text structures. After reading To Understand and listening to Ellin, I realize there is power in giving the kids a consistent language to use to discuss their reading. This is why I am struggling with this main idea issue. My kids named the text structures themselves last year...they noticed that a text had the most important info first OR that the text was organized by date, but I never taught them that a particular text structure was chronological or main idea or whatever. Now I know the language we use is important when working with students. Ellin even recommended teaching the names for the three deep and surface structure systems to kids in order to help them talk about their reading. Would I have done better to have named these structures for kids? I am still working this out in my head... SO...here is where I am now. If I am teaching kids text structures, do I teach main idea as a text structure,name it for them, knowing full well that many of the things kids read in schools is organized this way....and that they may have a better understanding of what they read on tests and in books/texts written for little children? I also know full well that reading is an interactive process between reader and text and I worry that by teaching the text structure of main idea I may be misleading kids into thinking there really is a single correct main idea rather than several important ideas that depend upon our purpose for reading? I guess I need to trust that my students will get this if I explain it clearly ---they always surprise me with what they can understand... I am getting completely muddled now! Yikes! Jennifer In a message dated 7/30/2008 9:38:22 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I remember that article, Jennifer, but I don't recall exactly how it was written either. Is that a clue to us that it is irrelevant? I don't feel like I have to know that text structure to have understood that article. Of course reading it ftom different points of view was terribly vavluable. Purpose. It has to go back to purpose. Why do we ask what the main idea is? Why can't we ask what you learned, or what that article said to you? Is main idea essential? Nancy **************Get fantasy football with free live scoring. Sign up for FanHouse Fantasy Football today. (http://www.fanhouse.com/fantasyaffair?ncid=aolspr00050000000020) _______________________________________________ Understand mailing list [email protected] http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/listinfo/understand_literacyworkshop.org
