RM Winter 2017 FINAL

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Reading Matters
Teaching Matters
Reading Matters | Volume 17 • Winter 2017 | | |53|
and written text using the text, Save Our Earth (Stewart, 2005) [CCSS:
RI.4.7, RI.4.8]. Nicole introduced the reading strategy by displaying
a phone message which had been half-eaten by her dog on a
document camera, explaining how she had tried to read it, and
asking students to try to help her read it. Then Nicole explained
that the half-eaten phone message and words in persuasive text
both tell only half of the message. Nicole said, “Writers put the
rest of the ‘message’ in the graphics. We need to ‘read’ the graphics
and think about what else they can tell us about why writers
believe what they believe.” Nicole set the lesson purpose and
explained the writer is going to share why he believes in recycling.
Nicole read aloud the first page and modeled her thinking
about the meaning of the first graphic and its connection to the
words on the page, by saying, “I see two girls in the graphic. That’s
a pump, and it looks like when they push on the handle, water
comes out into the bucket. The written text just talked about
how people need water. I think the graphic is showing us that
some people get their water for drinking, cooking, and washing
straight from the ground. It’s easy for water from the ground to
get polluted.” As the read aloud continued, students shared their
thinking about the graphics. Nicole supported students’ attempts
to integrate graphics and ideas in written text with questions such
as, “The author already said something about this earlier. What was
it?”, “How is that similar to what the author just said? Different?”,
and “How does this idea connect to what we have already read?”
Once the chapter was finished, Nicole and the students
compiled a list of the writer’s reasons for believing in the
importance of recycling on the whiteboard. Then Nicole
passed out photocopied pages of other persuasive texts.
Pairs of students collaborated to read graphics, articulate
writers’ reasons for supporting recycling, and add them
to the class list. Nicole ended the lesson by reviewing the
additional reasons, reminding students of the focal strategy,
and inviting them to “read” the graphics and think about what
else can be learned about the writer’s reasoning when doing
research for their “Let’s Use Renewable Energy!” project.
Lessons such as these may support elementary students’
understanding of the role of graphics in persuasive text and ability
to integrate graphics with ideas from the written text. The lessons
may lead to students’ increased comprehension of persuasive text.
Conclusion
Teaching students to focus appropriately on graphics in
persuasive text holds potential for addressing the surprising
gap that Michael and his peers revealed to us when we asked
them to read and recall persuasive text (Martin & Myers, 2016).
Addressing students’ uneven attention to graphics in persuasive
text may strengthen public education, enabling K-5 teachers
to increase students’ comprehension by helping them to recall
more ideas from the written text and graphics in persuasive
text and use these ideas to make informed decisions in and
out of school. We must all work together to close the gap in
elementary students’ comprehension of persuasive text.
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