Educational Leadership

learning and construct questions about the key concepts, events, and people in the text (Klingner, Vaughn, & Schumm, 1998).

Teachers introduce the model
during whole-group instruction,
explaining and modeling each strategy.
Students take turns applying the four
Students organize their notes and use
Cornell notes or graphic organizers to
compare differing points of view (De
La Paz, 2005).

Purpose at the Core The genre-with-purpose approach goes beyond genre study, or learning genre fea-

Instead of asking, “Did you use the index?”
ask, “How did you find the information
you were looking for in this book?”

strategies as a class and then in small, teacher-facilitated groups in front of the class. Finally, students work in small, student-led groups. They take turns being the expert for each strategy, helping team members apply the strategy, while the teacher circulates to support each group as needed.

Persuasive reading. Susan De La Paz (2005) had middle school students prepare to write arguments by having them read, discuss, and take notes on readings portraying different points of view on historic events. Students who learned to read for point of view wrote longer and more convincing arguments than those in a control group who didn’t have this preparation.

Students deepen their understanding
of point of view by learning how to
n Identify each author or speaker and
describe his or her argument. Students
define the speaker’s purpose, consider
his or her reasons, and look for evi-
dence of bias.
n Compare details and look for
conflicting views. Students look for
inconsistencies within a work, consider
differences in how different authors
describe people and events, consider
what’s missing in each argument, and
make inferences across sources.
n Make careful notes on each source.

tures for their own sake. Instead, it embeds genre instruction in a rich bed of purpose-driven activity that—in our experience—students and teachers alike find more engaging and instructive. We encourage you to put genre with purpose at the core of your curriculum. EL

1Kathryn Roberts developed the cur-
riculum for the summer school program.

References

Baumann, J. F., & Bergeron, B. S. (1993). Story map instruction using children’s literature: Effects on first graders’ comprehension of central narrative elements. Journal of Reading Behavior, 25( 4), 407–437.

De La Paz, S. (2005). Effects of historical reasoning instruction and writing strategy mastery in culturally and academically diverse middle school classrooms. Journal of Educational Psychology, 97( 2), 139–156.

Duke, N. K., Caughlan, S., Juzwik, M. M., & Martin, N. M. (2011). Reading and writing genre with purpose in K– 8 classrooms. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Duke, N. K., Purcell-Gates, V., Hall, L. A., & Tower, C. (2006/2007). Authentic literacy activities for developing comprehension and writing. The Reading Teacher, 60( 4), 344–355.

Duke, N. K., & Roberts, K. M. (2010). The genre-specific nature of reading comprehension. In D. Wyse, R. Andrews, & J. Hoffman (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of English, language and literacy teaching (pp. 74–86). London: Routledge.

Gersten, R., Fuchs, L. S., Williams, J. P., & Baker, S. (2001). Teaching reading comprehension strategies to students with learning disabilities: A review of research. Review of Educational Research, 71( 2), 279–320.

Klingner, J. K., Vaughn, S., Arguelles, M. E., Hughes, M. T., & Leftwich, S. A. (2004). Collaborative strategic reading: “ Real-world” lessons from classroom teachers. Remedial and Special Education, 25( 5), 291–302.

Klingner, J. K., Vaughn, S., Dimino, J., Schumm, J. S., & Bryant, D. (2001). From clunk to click: Collaborative strategic reading. Longmont, CO: Sopris West.

Klingner, J. K., Vaughn, S., & Schumm, J. S. (1998). Collaborative strategic reading during social studies in heterogeneous fourth-grade classrooms. The Elementary School Journal, 99( 1), 3–22.

Miller, C. (1984). Genre as social action. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 70( 2), 151–167.

Purcell-Gates, V., Duke, N. K., & Martineau, J. A. (2007). Learning to read and write genre-specific text: Roles of authentic experience and explicit teaching. Reading Research Quarterly, 42( 1), 8–45.

Schleppegrell, M. J. (2004). The language of school: A functional linguistics perspective. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Williams, J., Brown, L. G., Silverstein, A. K., & deCani, J. S. (1994). An instructional program in comprehension of narrative themes for adolescents with learning disabilities. Learning Disabilities Quarterly, 17( 3), 205–221.

Williams, J. P., Hall, K. M., Lauer, K. D., & Lord, K. M. (2001). Helping elementary school children understand story themes. The Exceptional Child, 33( 6), 75–77.

Nell K. Duke ( nkduke@msu.edu) is professor of teacher education and educational psychology and codirector of the Literacy Achievement Research Center; Samantha Caughlan (caughlan@msu .edu) is assistant professor of English education; and Mary M. Juzwik ( mmjuzwik@msu.edu) is associate professor of language and literacy at Michigan State University, East Lansing. Nicole M. Martin (nicolemartin@uncg .edu) is assistant professor in reading education at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.