Readicide and Close Reading

I vaguely remember my 9th grade Literature teacher talking about the art of close reading and its necessity in our honors course. Since we'd be moving onto AP English eventually, she wanted to set us on a path of metacognition in reading so that we would fully develop as mature readers. Gallagher explains close reading in more detail, and I certainly gained some insights on how to facilitate and encourage this type of analytical thinking in my future classroom.

I like the way Gallagher's writing on close reading mirrored Dr. Webb's demonstration of close reading a few weeks ago in class. As teachers, we can model our own thought processes at the front of the classroom which encourages our high-achieving and struggling students and helps them feel more comfortable with their own thoughts about the material. Figure 4.2 on page 102 is a great example of well thought-out close reading and the metacognition of our students' thoughts.

Like all of Gallagher's strategies, I do think that this activity would take some getting used to by struggling students, especially those prone to classroom management disturbances and interruptions. However, once students begin to expect a routine and structure in the classroom, and the same literacy activities are repeated (but with different excerpts and books), the students will gain confidence in their abilities to work with the activities. The more confidence they have, the better they will perform academically, and when they perform better in one class, they will want to do better in their others classes.

I think any teacher implementing these strategies has to have confidence in and care of his or her students as well as a plethora of patience. However, after using his "Article of the Week" activity as one of my literacy engagements, I know that the students I worked with responded well, and I hope to use some of his other strategies in my future classroom.