Flogging Books, Killing Young Readers---A Voice for What We Know to be True

As I read Kelly Gallagher's book, READICIDE, especially chapter 3, "Avoiding the Tsunami" it became clear to me that here I had found a voice who spoke for all of us who remembered why we learned to love reading in the first place. Gallagher calls it the "reading flow." But with it comes a sense of timelessness born of focus and concentration, a letting go of our fitful surroundings, a giving of ourselves to the story and to the intentions of the author.

For some reason though, we have found it an imperative to study to death the molecular structure of the great themes and stories of the human condition. In doing so we have kept young readers prisoners in the analytical, conscious world. Gallagher instead says, as teachers, we should be the ushers who lead young readers to the reading flow and the love of reading. We should help grow their passion for recreational reading by allowing "high interest, recreational" reading to happen in school.

We should assist students expand their abilities to interpret even difficult books, as his friend Carol Jago recommends, by actively doing "everything we can to ease students into academic reading" (READICIDE, p.79). She says we should "give students a hands-on guided tour of the front half of the book" and that we should shift to "the budget tour mode" (READICIDE, p.79) in the back half of the book where we step out of the process and begin letting students find their own way.

I believe that before we can reach that point though, there must be quite a different pattern of teaching literacy and literature that has to precede this. That pattern, that expectation of how teachers and schools present reading must change at an early age for young readers. They first must have the expectation that schools are places where fun reading can happen. We must maintain this "m.o." most teachers create at the elementary level into middle school and beyond if we are to change this modality at the secondary level it seems. We're talking about a whole sea change of expectations about reading under the school roof.

The real coup de grace for me however was Gallagher's citation of Kenneth Burke's notion that "the real value in reading literature is that it provides our students with imaginative rehearsals for the real world." As a young reader, I remember putting down just-read books feeling as though I had gained some kind of valuable insight into my world, as though I had somehow lived through a profound event and time. Things looked different to me having "been through it." Outside real, first hand experiences, this to me is real learning. This is the high level stuff that becomes built into us having had these reading experiences.

I particularly like the idea of the "Topic Flood" as a means of validating a book. Gallagher's "One Pager" also looks like an effective way to galvanize the gains a student makes after having engaged in reading that captivates him or her and holding them accountable to their having had such a reading experience.

Today my carpentry II students began framing their floor framing mock-ups. They were mostly collaborating well with work getting done in sweltering, out-of-season heat. The interesting things in the air today though were the words I noticed flying around, words you would only hear during such a carpentry operation among a crew. As I've said before, this was their new vocabulary at work. Their hands held the materials which were articulating into a useful product. Words they did not know only a few weeks ago were flying around as if they were veterans.

The point here is everything became crystal clear to them, as one boy had said, because "now I can see and hold what the book and drawings actually meant to show, what a joist band is and what bridging is." As I said in my Inquiry Project statement recently that "based upon my own experience,...it is repetition embedded in a meaningful content that clinches the vocabulary knowledge" especially in learners more inclined to learn while working with their hands.

I believe I can use some of the Fisher and Frey strategies as frameworks to teach vocabulary to my students in reverse order. It seems this follows the pattern they mention as most effective even for ESL students or anyone learning a foreign language. That is, at first it is easiest to take on such a language orally, that the written language is better learned after the words are seen at work, in context, where needs of the moment become the incentive for learning the new vocabulary.

What I intend to try now with my students is have them record a new word or two each day as they build their floor systems as a way of teaching them to be more sensitive to unfamiliar words. I'm hoping this creates more of a desire in them to demand that they understand words in whatever context they find them.

I have already been requiring weekly reflective journals of my students many of which have them account for new techniques or processes they have learned on projects such as these. Having them record new words could be an effective lead-in to their journals. I still remember how I learned the language of carpentry and what drove me was the desire to be a contributor to the process. I could do this best if I could use the correct terms at the right time. The vocabulary and me were at work.

Bringing the Carpentry Color and Lifestyle to the Content area

As we have read Fisher and Frey's IMPROVING ADOLESCENT LITERACY, we realize so many of the strategies seem to find almost perfect fits with English/language arts and social studies. Our content area, carpentry/construction technology however, seems farther away from such effectiveness. But we also realize some of this appearance is merely my inexperience and limited view as to how to initiate and execute these strategies which are wholly new to us. Nonetheless we are compelled and inspired to some type of action.

Today we had an early dismissal, half-student day and a staff development this afternoon. Dan Gediman representing "This I Believe, Inc. and one of the editors for the THIS I BELIEVE book series of essays spoke to all the faculties and administrators for Dare County Schools. In our superintendent's introduction she emphasized the importance of teaching literacy especially in the area of non-fiction. She understands.

We experimented with two of our classes today by doing read alouds to our students with a THIS I BELIEVE essay. It was an essay by ground-breaking, professional skateboarder Tony Hawk. We feel it's supremely important to bond with our students over things they love and which we may have some personal experience. Hawk's essay, entitled "Do What You Love," seemed to get this done and more. Students asked meaningful questions and brought up their own anecdotes about skateboarding. Soon we were talking about making skateboards. Imagine that---carpentry students initiating dialog about making something useful.

Phase two will bring the color and culture of the carpentry/building world beginning with Tracy Kidder's book, HOUSE, published in the 1980's. In it, Kidder recounts his experience framing a house in New England with his framing crew. This is close-in stuff, and rarely written. Yes, it does contain technical language, the language of carpentry and structure. However it conveys the color of the carpenter's lifestyle, what they are concerned about technically while on the job, and what concerns and entertains them in their lifestyles.

We see this book as a means of teaching literacy, where some of the strategies recommended by Fisher and Frey may be easier for us to use as they will more closely resemble the forms in the book. Plus they will reinforce the vocabulary of carpentry and have students see how one crew views a collaborative effort.

We will begin inviting local carpenters---framers, trim carpenters, cabinetmakers, and remodelers---into the class as guest speakers as well to address specific building issues and to just tell stories of building homes on the Outer Banks. We believe coloring the grey textbook pages with human voices will only help the learning. We'll keep you posted. Thanks for reading. We would love to hear from you.

The Reckoning---Determining What Works

I teach high school students carpentry. But I also teach them better communication skills, using both the spoken and written word. One supremely critical lesson I learned as a young carpenter's helper was that the most important tool I would need in carpentry I already possessed.

Carl Prescott, the 6'5", 280 pound giant of a framer who wore a long pigtail down his back,was also a mechanical engineer. He taught me so much about structure and the forces on them. He taught me to recognize the step-by-step process that would deliver us to the vision of the finished house. These words however, are written on the white board day-one in my classroom where they remain all year along with "Have a great work ethic" and "straight, level, square and plumb." Carl revealed to me what he called, "rock of the eye" as my most important tool. He was speaking of my own two eyes---my ability to be critical of my own work. If you constantly checked your work as it came together, if you probed and looked back at it as it took form, you could shape it into the finest of finished product, he explained.

I believe this applies to my young students learning to refine their writing skills and presentation skills in my classroom too. It is also essential I believe, to look closely at what is happening in your classroom as instruction happens too, no matter what it's form. I desire that my teaching literacy be embedded and mostly invisible to my students. I want them to recognize it as a tool they use daily to make them better craftsmen and that only. They want to build real things. They will accept the tools that get them there, but they don't want to revel in the fact that one of the most useful tools might be a book which one must read.

What has helped me more than any single thing in learning what teaches literacy to my students in my discipline is using my own "rock of the eye." This has me remain watchful for what bridges to this audience who love to tell you how much they hate to read and write, but will burn up a cell phone reading and writing texts all day, or stay attached to their circle of friends till late at night on Facebook. I believe we must make it alright, to at least meet them some of the time on the ground where they love to play, and for me, that means having them submit a reflective journal in "text" language once in a while.

The premise of Kelly Gallagher's book, READICIDE, that schools are killing the joy of reading for students, has heightened my awareness for how I teach literacy in a carpentry/construction class. To some degree though, I think he pushes a one dimensional thesis. He acknowledges it. But it is important to remember the other stakeholders in suffocating the love of reading, most notably in textbooks and what Fisher and Frey call trade books. And then there is or isn't parental support. I know, "but this is public school, and this is our context."

The most important metric I know for when it's right in my classroom though, when my students are getting it, is the frequency and quality of their feedback, their inquiries, their dialogue between each other over the topic of the moment. This is the good stuff. This is the classroom telling me what's going on is worthy and they recognize its benefits to them. Remember these are students who abhor sitting in a class and "doing bookwork." They want to "go over there (the shop)."Are we going over there today, Mr. Saunders?"

Fisher and Frey, in their book, IMPROVING ADOLESCENT LITERACY, talk about teaching vocabulary in context. They say in teaching vocabulary in mathematics that "teachers find success in timing the instruction of technical vocabulary using the sequence of "introduce, define, discuss, and apply." I believe that, with my students, it is often even more effective to have them apply first if possible, using the vocabulary required over the work and in context, then re-visit the definition, discuss, and apply again. This way they get to see the vocabulary at work. That's the payoff. It then becomes an imperative for them to learn it. It has purpose.

This brings us to Fisher and Frey's discussion of Vocabulary in Electives (p.71). The bell rang for me when I read their "it is repetition embedded in a meaningful context that supports vocabulary acquisition." Some of what I teach my students takes a carpenter's helper 2-4 years to master. Repetition is the vehicle that carries them there. I have one year with my students at each level, Carpentry I and Carpentry II. In that time, I tell them, they won't become carpenters, but combined with the power of our classroom, they will far exceed the knowledge of a newbie helper. They must be told this repeatedly as well.