Disciplinary Literacies and Learning to Read for Understanding: A Conceptual Framework for Disciplinary Literacy

Abstract

This article presents a framework and methodology for designing learning goals targeted at what students need to know and be able to do in order to attain high levels of literacy and achievement in three disciplinary areas—literature, science, and history. For each discipline, a team of researchers, teachers, and specialists in that discipline engaged in conceptual meta-analysis of theory and research on the reading, reasoning, and inquiry practices exhibited by disciplinary experts as contrasted with novices. Each team identified discipline-specific clusters of types of knowledge. Across teams, the clusters for each discipline were grouped into 5 higher order categories of core constructs: (a) epistemology; (b) inquiry practices/strategies of reasoning; (c) overarching concepts, themes, and frameworks; (d) forms of information representation/types of texts; and (e) discourse and language structures. The substance of the clusters gave rise to discipline-specific goals and tasks involved in reading across multiple texts, as well as reading, reasoning, and argumentation practices tailored to discipline-specific criteria for evidence-based knowledge claims. The framework of constructs and processes provides a valuable tool for researchers and classroom teachers' (re)conceptualizations of literacy and argumentation learning goals in their specific disciplines.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The named authors participated in the writing of this article; however, the conceptual framework that is described evolved from its initial formulation over multiple years of Project READI activities and involved well over two dozen additional members of Project READI who we list here in alphabetical order: Michael Bolz, Stephen Briner, Candice Burkett, Jessica Chambers, Irisa Charney-Sirott, Rick Coppola, Angela Fortune, Thomas Griffin, Gina Hale, Allison Hall, Johanna Heppler, Jodi Hoard, Katie James, Mon-Lin Ko, Kimberly Lawless, Sarah Levine, Cindy Litman, Joe Magliano, Michael Manderino, Stacy Marple, Kathryn McCarthy, Courtney Milligan, James Pellegrino, Jacquelynn Popp, Diane Puklin, Josh Radinsky, Ursula Sexton, Tanya Solomon, Teresa Sosa, Jennifer Wiley, and Mariya Yukhymenko.

Additional information

Funding

Project READI is a multidisciplinary, multi-institution collaboration supported by the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, through Grant R305F100007 to University of Illinois at Chicago. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not represent views of the Institute or the U.S. Department of Education.