Mount Ida College

20 Mount Ida faculty gathered over lunch on October 1st to discuss the teaching/reinforcing of reading skills in their classes.  Faculty use a variety of teaching practices to help students acquire and hone their reading/critical thinking and writing skills.  Some examples that were cited included:

• Have students develop written responses to what they read to bring to class.  Faculty member checks that they do this, and periodically collects them to evaluate.

• One faculty member has students read together -- "communal reading" in class.  She then interjects statements and questions as they read.  By doing this, she is able to model the critical reading/thinking process. 

• Another faculty member in a technical course has students share reactions and questions about the material.

• One faculty devotes time in class to silent reading (on Tuesdays) and then on Thursdays, they read aloud the same passage.  Students are able to convert what they read on Tuesdays into "peer talk" on Thursdays to help them translate concrete skills into abstract skills.

• Several faculty give students guiding questions to help them focus their reading.  These questions are used by students to write an analysis and response as they read.  It encourages reading to be an active process.

• One strategy that is taught in the success workshops is for students to read 15 minutes, take a break, read again 15 minutes and so on.  Eventually they increase time on task.

• Many faculty use powerpoint handouts to focus students on what is important material.  However, this may cause some students to avoid reading the textbook and focus only on the powerpoints.  It is important to use powerpoints and other class materials to connect or anchor the text.

• One faculty requires students to bring their texts to class.  This achieves several purposes:  1) they know they have to buy the book and that it will be used, and 2) the faculty member can have students open to a page and refer to the text. 

• It is always important to stress to students that their ability to read and extract, synthesize, analyze and apply material from text is a skill that they will need beyond the class, beyond their Mount Ida education.  It will be necessary in the workplace and in their lives as consumers and citizens.