Nonfiction Text Analysis

For my literacy lesson, I selected the article Why Do Animals Play? By Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld. The article focuses on animals and is an informational text exemplar aligned with NYS Grade 3 Common Core ELA test. I chose this article to help students recognize and comprehend informational text independently and proficiently. According to Fountas & Pinnell (2001), high-quality informational texts are key to students’ development of an important concept called “content literacy”, which involves the strategies required to read, comprehend, and write informational texts in a variety of subjects. Therefore, by participating in this literacy lesson, students will be able to enhance their comprehension skills by critically analyzing the story focusing on the text features.

Sometimes it gets to the point that people get too attached to books, a bibliophile per se. Those who are not too fond of books, might find one novel that they grow to love. Literature tends to spark emotions in someone which makes them keep reading. This is something that this class does as well. Talking about a book with peers, gets you excited to keep on reading.

The English department does a wonderful job of finding texts that keep the students interested in what they read, but challenges them with new vocabulary and terms they would not normally use. These topics are also at different lengths that target specific skills that all students need and at different levels so that students with different developmental levels can improve. The English department also works with our school’s library to find some of the newest books that the students will enjoy and do their best to bring those books in. The school’s librarian and one of our freshman English teachers have started a “Book Club” on campus so that students could read some of the newest books and be able to talk about them in an educational setting. Many students are a part of this new club and some of them have stated that this club has really helped them improve their overall reading and summarization skills.

Nonfiction has been highly disregarded as irrelevant, compared to fiction, until this new common core came into play. Before this standard was established when preparing for the future, fiction based works put many college students at a disadvantage when most colleges and universities only use nonfiction in class. According to the article, “The Nonfiction Revolution” by Connie Matthiessen, the author states that, “Some 20 percent of students who go to four year colleges and 40 percent who go to community college have to take remedial courses.” Matthiessen is saying in this section is that major chunks of students have to learn the

About how nonfiction literature doesn’t just need to be informational text. It can be in the form of newspaper articles, brochures and even websites. He urges teachers to not only read informational text as nonfiction literature but to also read materials that

Reading has the power to broaden my perspective, expand my mind, and take me on an adventure far away from reality. Unsurprisingly, I am very enthusiastic about reading and it has earned its title as my favorite pastime. Admittedly, before this class, I usually chose to read my favorite genre, fictional novels, and would only read nonfiction books on occasion. This was due to my illusory belief that only a work of fiction would have the power to whisk me off into another world and evoke powerful emotions. However, after the first three lessons, I was challenged to read literature from all kinds of different genres, including speeches. I was astounded by how much I enjoyed all of the different works of literature. They were able to take me on an adventure, regardless of the genre.

The Texas Treasure Literature Curriculum is published by Glencoe McGraw-Hill, and based on the information provided from their website and textbooks, I discovered the authorship team includes senior program consultants, program consultants, special consultants, Glencoe’s National Reading and Language Arts Advisory Council, and a Texas Advisory Board. Most of these members hold Ph.D.’s in fields such as Reading, Literacy, as well as Curriculum and Instruction. The two senior program consultants, Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph. D., and Douglas Fisher, Ph. D., are both published authors, and many of the other consultants are as well. One of the special consultant’s is Dinah Zike a classroom teacher and consultant, who created the graphic organizer, Foldables®. The Texas Advisory Board consists of Texas teachers from high schools and middle schools through the state. Collectively, their classroom-tested and validated instructional practices form the basis of the program. Based on synopses of the consultants, I concluded that engaging today’s adolescent learners into reading and writing is the goal of this curriculum. One of the senior program consultants, Jeffery Wilhelm states, “People read for enjoyment, to help themselves think, to solve problems, and to get work done. Their reading is often organized around “inquiry” questions. These questions help them explore how what they learn can help make a

I will use the Literature circle to enhance the student’s ability to collaborate on a higher level so that they can move toward independent readers, molding them to integrate in a powerful classroom activity that will activate their critical thinking skills. I will do a book study and have students to meet and discuss the importance of rotating their roles giving everyone an opportunity to share the responsibility. I will teach how to highlight in different colors distinguishing each student reading.

ETo most people, the thought of reading a non fiction piece sounds very boring; but in order to get through years of school with textbooks, you have got to know how to comfortably read them. To start out with, set yourself apart from all distractions and have a single goal in mind: I will finish the reading assignment. Now let's get to the basic fundamentals of reading a non - fiction book.

Most literate people within their lifetime, will read nonfiction and fictional documents regardless the language of text or the reader's education level. Of course, if a person is new to the English language their priority will be on how to read nonfiction documents. In order to understand the world around them, they have to be able to read signs, labels, schedules etc. It may seem that students in ELA class should read more nonfiction, because it will help them in their daily lives rather than reading a book about Dorothy traveling to see the Wizard of Oz. However, if students read more nonfiction in ELA their brains will not grow as strong to go on to read challenging books or passages, such as the ones shown on the MCAS. This can become an issue because their brains will be

She is an avid reader and enjoys young adult literature – especially romance novels. While she reads a lot, she does struggle with comprehending nonfiction and often has questions about vocabulary. She is quick to look up the definition of words and enjoys using annotating as a skill to help her recall key facts. However, her MAP score in reading is 71% for her grade level or above average. Her ACT reading score indicates that she is slightly below college readiness standards. To help increase her confidence and raise her ACT reading score, I have encouraged her to annotate written texts and have created an annotating bookmark that gives her tips on what to annotate while she reads. To understand Student A as a reader, I have included a reader’s response to Gretchen Rubin’s TED Talk “The Five Half-Truths about Happiness,” a talk that addresses topics such as love and family. These topics are of high-interest to Student A. Also, I assigned Student A with an independent book assignment, which allowed her to choose a nonfiction book that interested her and related to her idea of the American Dream. The student received guidance from the Library Media Specialist and me in selecting a book that would both interest her and satisfy the requirement that the book relates to her definition of the American Dream. For this assignment, Student A read The Opposite of Spoiled by Ron Lieber, a book about how to raise a family, which related to Student A’s definition of the American

I think this question is easiest to answer by stating what type of creative non-fiction I am not drawn to: “Kissing”, “The Glass Essay,” and “Dream Children” are excellent examples of what I personally do not enjoy reading. The “Glass Essay” and “Kissing” are too much work for me. My husband complains that I am a scanner and he is correct. This is due largely in part to my business training and years of practice in the field. Thus, my initial reaction is to scan the pages and when it is out of order in my scanning brain, I immediately tune out. A format such as “Dream Children” may get my attention but as I read, the endless thought feels tiring. Over the years I tried to convince

As Wells (1990) comments, Literature based instruction is not assigning the class to read a number pages, but to set the stage for students to engage in authenticallky that individuals writing and reading naturally do. (Perles, 2017) goes on to say that literacy should be part of real reading,writing and thinking activities. Research shows that students become better readers, writers and thinkers when literature-based instruction is used in the classroom.Literature-based instruction is the natural activity of allowing the students to do what they normally do when reading. As an example, when we enjoy a good book, it is natural to make comments about the book to others; however, when we discuss a good book, it is unnatural to answer ten or fifteen questions about the book. In fact,for literature-based instruction to be effective, the teacher must plan and support

Topping also points out in his article how it seems that children do somewhat like nonfiction, but they are not choosing to read as nonfiction books as fiction books. He then speculates that the answer lies in the preferences of the teachers. An earlier study has shown that girls have a preference works of fiction. This fact pared with the fact that the majority of our teachers are women leads Topping to the conclusion that by accident teachers have slowly moved away from nonfiction. Coleman and Job has also marked the lack of nonfiction in the classroom. In fact, Coleman and Job claim that out of what children read ninety percent is fiction. This figure may seem too large to be true, but in the library of my school there are nineteen different sections of the stacks that are available to be checked out. Only one section of those nineteen consists of nonfiction literature. This is a real life example of how our schools are placing more and more fiction into the hands of children.

The strangeness of creative nonfiction, as far as I can see, comes from the flexibility of the genre—there is almost a chaos to it, because, we are after all trying to wrangle a true story by telling it in the best way one can. The range of literary tools creative nonfiction writers can pull from can be intimidating and at times one might forget the diversity of said tools at their disposal. For me, the nature of creative nonfiction is far more complicated than I still have yet to grasp in full. I do often forget all of the literary tools that are waiting to be used. The is much room for complication within the genre, at every turn. Paisley Redkal says something early on in the video about a specific piece of creative nonfiction and as she