Historically science teachers have been some of the worst offenders in regard to refusing to teach reading skills in the science classroom. In fact, Leigh Hall in the article Teachers and content area reading: Attitudes, beliefs and change noted a study by David Donahue in 2000 in which science teachers were questioned about their views respecting literacy. The results were appalling; “approximately half of the pre-service science teachers believed that science class was a place where students did not have to focus on reading and writing” (Hall, 2005). This is a terrifying statistic and it is in direct conflict with what science is fundamentally.

Science relies on the ability to not only read, but comprehend scientific literature, and then continue in higher order thinking to generate interpretations concerning the meaning of the text in relation to the reader, as well as the scientific community. Through the integration of reading, in concert with the readers own knowledge base, something new, over and above the text and the reader’s knowledge, is created—an interpretation of the text. Interpretations transcend what is in the text, what was the author’s intent, and what was in the reader’s mind before reading it (Norris and Phillips, 2003). And as a discipline science has relied on this concept of reviewing, re-defining, and ultimately rewriting to postulate all of the theorems which define our universe today. By not teaching literacy skills in the science classroom we are in essence denying children opportunities to learn science from the first person perspective– as novice scientists who actively participate in critically considering the world around them.

Because science is such a dynamic content area, it only makes sense that literacy has many different faces. Literacy in science includes the fundamental definition, the skills of reading and writing about science, and the more derived STEM centered definition where literacy is the knowledge and understanding of scientific concepts and processes required for personal decision making, participation in civic and cultural affairs, and economic productivity.

But it is critical to remember, we cannot have either definition without the other. Without the ability to read and comprehend material, students cannot be expected to continue on to propose adequate solutions to scientific problems or generate educated guesses (aka hypotheses) about what is occurring during an experiment. Science teachers rely heavily on the oral and/or visual tradition to teach most conceptual scientific processes, but this ignores the opportunity to learn science through reading– something many mistaken teachers believe cannot happen. Zollman (2012) notes Piaget’s ideas in STEM literacy for Learning  that “cognitive understanding occurs when the child decodes, conceptualizes and then applies the content– then reflects.”  This quote is a powerful idea about where reading belongs in the science classroom: right at the foundation! This also forms the basis for a type of pedagogy close to the heart of many science teachers: Problem Based Learning.

It is not strange that many science teachers neglect developing student reading skills in their classroom, many are not prepared to do so.  And historically we have placed a handicap on these teachers offering them few opportunities to see how perfecting these skills assists student learning. Unlike Elementary Education teachers, middle and secondary level teachers are not instructed on how to teach reading skills to students in an effective manner. Although an in-service teacher may be able to identify teaching reading skills will no doubt take their classroom’s performance to the next level, they are hesitant to integrate reading skills into their classroom environment and lesson planning through force of habit, lack of professional development, or reliance on a reading specialist (Hall, 2005).

However, through taking a course in content literacy, I have come to understand the importance of teaching literacy skills to assist and functionally teach science. Not only can the content area of science work to increase the reading ability of all students by challenging them to rise to higher levels of critical thinking, it can also connect the cross content skills reinforced through the act of analyzing and making meaning of complex and confusing material. Science texts  often require high level reading skills in order to get through the vocabulary which convolute the work to the actual meaning and future implications. Even collegiate and post-collegiate level students have difficulty with science texts. But something else makes these high level skills difficult to learn and implement, they are rarely taught by a professional at the middle and secondary school level. I believe through implementing teaching techniques including active note-taking, structured summarizing, writing with purposes (persuasion, description, explanation, etc.) and other cross content methods which are usually only utilized in English course work, I can improve the reading skills as well as content knowledge of my future students.

Another valuable point in the discourse of scientific literacy, is the concept that the abstract language can be daunting for most students. Not in terms of lexical density, or use of technical terms, but in sheer disconnection from the everyday life of the student.  Teachers need to make reading relevant to the student because most students will not continue on into scientific professions after school.  Students are often left wondering, “why does this matter?” or “what does this have to do with me?”  By forming authentic connections to the material, teachers can increase the investment the students have for science to promote life long learning and fostering critical reading. As Norris and Phillips (2005) note, newspapers, science magazines, news magazines, and the internet are primary sources of technical and scientific information for the general public.  And, according to the National Science Board in the United States, “Americans utilize numerous sources and institutions for scientific and technical information, but television and newspapers remain primary sources.”

Through teaching content which is in line with standards as well as relevant to my students, I hope to use various methods to increase their literacy in both definitions (fundamental, and derived STEM) which ultimately encompasses increased comprehension, critical thinking, and the generation of new interpretations in science.

References

Hall L.A. (2005). Teachers and content area reading: Attitudes, beliefs and change. Teaching and Teacher Education, 21(4): 403-414.

Norris, S. P. and Phillips, L. M. (2003), How literacy in its fundamental sense is central to scientific literacy. Science Education, 87: 224–240.

Shanahan, T., & Shanahan, C. (2008). Teaching disciplinary literacy to adolescents: Rethinking content-area literacy. Harvard Educational Review, 78(1): 40-59.

Zollman, A. (2012), Learning for STEM Literacy: STEM Literacy for Learning. School Science and Mathematics, 112: 12–19.

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