By: Laura Scott
Incorporating reading and writing with content area teaching is effective and fun! It provides students with practice in utilizing reading to acquire new information. It also teaches students how to convey their understanding of what they read through speaking and writing.
This blog shares ways to incorporate topic book sets to support content learning alongside literacy throughout the school year.
Create a Topic Book Set Display in Your Classroom
When you set up your classroom, include an area to display topic books:
- Select a space that captures students' attention, such as a display shelf or a special tub or basket.
- The display can be a part of your classroom library or kept separate. You can keep all the topic book sets in your classroom library, moving books to the designated display area when learning about that topic.
- Be sure to mark your topic books in a way that helps students know to return them to the correct place.
Build Enthusiasm for Each New Topic
When a new topic is presented and a fresh set of books displayed, take a moment to view them. Allow students time to browse, skim, and discuss the books in the topic set. You can begin to incorporate graphic organizers to help students express what they know and want to learn about the new topic. Click here to download a KWL chart, concept map, and more.
Help Students Learn How to Read & Record New Information
Graphic organizers are effective scaffolds; however, students need to be taught how to use them. Beginning readers need to see and practice the process of reading, thinking about what they read, processing the information, and recording it. They also need to understand how graphic organizers help them arrange the information they are learning.
Creating a class graphic organizer and posting it on the wall near your topic book display is a great way to help beginning readers become familiar with this process. Add to your class graphic organizer throughout the unit, modeling continuously how to learn from reading and record the information you learn.
When students are ready, they can read and add to the class graphic organizer in pairs or independently. Eventually, they will be able to use their own graphic organizers. Throughout the school year, as students gain confidence with graphic organizers, be sure to carve out time for them to share what they have learned.
Read-Alouds
Having books readily available that are related to what you are teaching in class makes it easy to incorporate a read-aloud any time of day! Do you have an extra five minutes before lunch? Snag a book from the topic book display. Surprise students by setting aside a few of your favorite topic books to read aloud. When you read the story, ask students to guess why you chose this particular book. See if they can link it to what you are learning in class. Place the book in the topic book display after the read-aloud. It will be one of the first books students want to look at during independent reading time!
Independent Reading
Allow students to place books from the topic book display in their book tubs to explore during independent reading time. If students learn a new fact or find an interesting vocabulary word, ask them to write it down in a notebook, on a sticky note, or use a graphic organizer (click here to download). If you are using sticky notes, place a piece of chart paper on the wall and ask students to add their sticky notes to the chart paper. Schedule in time to discuss what students have learned, either in a whole group or with partners. This holds students accountable for learning new information and generates enthusiasm and ownership about expanding their knowledge.
Learning Projects
Use projects to explore topic-related questions or dive deeper into certain aspects of the topic you are learning. Students can share their learning through presentations, writing, or art projects.
Here's one idea for a learning project that incorporates reading, writing, and subject area learning:
- At the start of your unit, brainstorm inquiry questions about the topic.
- Place students in pairs or small groups and assign them an inquiry question.
- Students can use what they've learned in class along with topic books to research the answer.
- Ask each group to share their answer to the inquiry question in the form of a text feature (chart, diagram, image with a caption, vocabulary word with a definition).
- Finally, play a game. Ask students different inquiry questions, and they can answer them by referring to one another's text features for help.
Celebrate What You Learned
When it's time to swap out your topic book set for a new one, talk about what you learned! Discuss how the books helped students explore more about the topic. Review new facts and vocabulary they learned. Talk about why the books were grouped together and their genres. Students can practice expressing their opinions with reasons about which books were their favorites.
List the topic sets you use throughout the school year and ask your class to vote on their favorite. For the last month of school, set out a favorite topic set each week. Students will enjoy re-reading the stories they loved!
Blending literacy into science, social studies, and even math can seem intimidating. Incorporating topic book sets as part of everyday routines is a great way to bring literacy practice into all areas of learning.
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Hameray's Content Area Collections are sure to enhance classroom content learning while supporting essential literacy skills. Choose from larger collections like science and social studies, or find specific sets to target learning about themes like friendship, seasons & weather, community, and more!
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Laura Scott taught English Language Learners of all ages for twelve years and spent three years as a bilingual coordinator and co-teacher in dual-language K-1 classrooms. She is part of the Hameray team. Laura values giving a voice to all students by supporting teachers as they bravely try new approaches to learning in their classrooms.
