Content literacy

Literacy
content

The Role of Content Literacy

in an Effective RTI Program
William G. Brozo

esponse to Intervention (RTI) has become a

potent influence on the design and delivery
of literacy programs in elementary schools
throughout the United States. Premised on a tiered
approach, its advocates characterize RTI (Gersten et
al., 2008) as a comprehensive strategy that includes
universal screening, high-quality instruction for all
students, and needed interventions for struggling
students to prevent additional learning difficulties. I
have purposely highlighted the phrase high-quality
instruction for all to draw attention to the idea that
RTI, though emerging out of the Individuals With
Disabilities Education Act of 2004 (IDEA), is being
offered to schools as a system of instruction and
remediation for every student (Applebaum, 2009;
Commission on RTI, 2010).
How can legislation for the learning disabled
spawn a system of instruction and intervention for
struggling and nonstruggling students alike? The answer lies in the language of IDEA requiring schools
to institute preventive measures that attempt to reduce the number of students who experience initial
failure. Within RTI, the frontline of prevention is Tier
1, or the general education classroom, where every
student regardless of ability is to receive high-quality
instruction. Thus, the preventive possibilities of RTI
are only as good as the Tier 1 supports classroom
teachers provide students.
The general education classroom is also where
students receive their first exposure to and ongoing experiences with disciplinary content (Brozo, in
press). It stands to reason, therefore, that classroom
teachers are more likely to meet the learning needs of
every student if they are knowledgeable of and skillful
in content literacy practices (Alvermann, Swafford, &
Montero, 2004; Duke & Bennett-Armistead, 2003).

The Emerging Importance

of Content Literacy in Tier 1

The Reading Teacher, 64(2), pp. 147150

DOI:10.1598/RT.64.2.11

2010 International Reading Association

ISSN:0034-0561 print / 1936-2714 online

Our elementary school classrooms are more diverse

now than at any time in the history of U.S. schooling.
With this diversity come numerous challenges, not
least of which is ensuring all children develop literacy and learning skills to acquire information and concepts in the content areas (Brozo & Puckett, 2009).
In the hands of skillful classroom teachers, content literacy strategies can be mediated in ways that
differentiate instruction to meet the reading, writing, and learning needs of students with diverse
abilities and backgrounds (Edyburn, 2003; Fisher &
Frey, 2001; Tomlinson, 2005). This is an indispensable skill for a classroom teacher working in an RTI
program because of the expectation that responsive
instruction at Tier 1 will diminish the need for Tier 2
and 3 supports for most students (Brozo, 2010).
An interesting new influence on content literacy comes from the Common Core State Standards
Initiative (CCSSI; www.corestandards.org). Questions
about the extent to which these standards will be
adopted notwithstanding, it appears inevitable that
in the coming years they will impact how reading is
taught in the elementary grades and beyond. Whats
revolutionary about these new standards is that they
situate literacy and language development squarely
within the content areas. Citing the failure of traditional reading schemes to leaven achievement of children and youth in the United Statesas evidenced
by flat trend lines on the National Assessment of
Educational Progress and a slipping in rank on international assessmentscommon core proponents
assert that prevailing literacy curriculum needs to
shift from a focus on developing reading skills and

147

building fluency with simple narratives toward reading and writing to gain knowledge and express new
understandings with informational text.
Even the title of the common core English language
arts standards for grades 612 makes clear this significant shift in emphasis: Common Core State Standards
for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social
Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects (CCSSI,
2010). This new focus for literacy in the service of content learning is defended on the grounds that building
a foundation of knowledge in these fields [will give
students] the background to be better readers in all
content areas (CCSSI, 2010, p. 10).
At least four decades of research in reading comprehension support the primacy of relevant prior
knowledge (Pearson, Kamil, Afflerbach, & Moje, in
press). As the so-called fourth-grade slump (Brozo,
2005) demonstrates, children who acquire good reading skills may not be able to transfer those abilities to
comprehending content text if they lack relevant prior
knowledge for that content. In other words, reading is
domain specific (Chiesi, Spilich, & Voss, 1979; Duke &
Pearson, 2002; Kintsch & Kintsch, 2005).
The force of domain-specific knowledge on comprehension cannot be dismissed. This phenomenon
became vivid for me once again when I was jarred
from sleep by my alarm clock early one morning at the
recent IRA convention in Chicago, USA. While I slowly sat up in bed, the local newscaster calmly uttered
these words: Live hogs found July unchanged. What
an odd expression, I thought, as I wrote the words out
on the small hotel notepad. A few days later in a graduate practicum I was directing, I presented this sentence
to one of our third-grade tutees. He was able to read it
flawlessly and fluently but had no idea what it meant.
Indeed, when I shared the sentence with my graduate
tutors, only one, who had grown up on a farm with livestock, got the gist. The point is that to comprehend this
expression, reading skill alone is not enough; one must
also possess the needed background knowledge, in
this case, of trading in commodities. As I was to discover, Chicago is the home of the Mercantile Exchange,
where trades in live hog futures take place daily.
My episode in domain-specific reading comprehension reminds us that knowledge about life and
all manner of things (even trading in commodities)
is necessary to have successful meaning-making experiences with texts that inform. This knowledge can
be gained by exploring content topics through reading. Teachers skillful in content literacy practices can

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The Reading Teacher Vol. 64, No. 2 October 2010

increase students reading capacity, vocabulary, and

knowledge with texts focused on real content.

Ensuring Content Literacy

for All
Even as RTI and the common core standards exert
increasing pressure on classroom teachers to meet
the reading and learning needs of all students in all
subject areas, it is important to consider structural
and curricular reforms necessary to ensure effective
content literacy instruction occurs for whole classes in
Tier 1 (Brozo, in press). Following are three guidelines:
1. Instill the awareness that content learning and
content literacy learning are inseparable.
2. Premise the language arts curriculum on reading to learn.
3. I ncrease print encounters and experiences
with informational text.

Instill the Awareness That Content

Learning and Content Literacy
Learning Are Inseparable
Advocates of content area reading have been saying
as much for nearly a hundred years (Mraz, Rickelman,
& Vacca, 2009). Teachers who recognize how thinking, reading, and communicating are inseparable
from the content of the disciplines can craft instructional practices that braid language development
with knowledge building in science, history, math,
and all the other subjects (Brozo & Puckett, 2009). It
is essential, in other words, for a fifth grader who is
knowledgeable in science to also possess the literacy
and communication skills that enable him or her to
acquire additional science information and concepts
through reading and to write and talk in ways that
demonstrate to others his or her science knowledge.

Premise the Language Arts

Curriculum on Reading to Learn
Notions that there is a dichotomy between learning
to read and reading to learn must surely be put to
rest. Whether about the structure of language or the
structure of a molecule, about what motivates a main
character or what motivates a political leader, about

places in the heart or places in Africa where French

is spoken, all reading is learning. Children should be
brought to see this as the purpose of reading right
from the start.
As a result of this transformation, the development
of skills as the focus of reading instruction will be replaced by gaining knowledge and building cognition
through reading. Approaching the language arts in
this way may hold a key to engaging curiosity as well
as expanding ideas and content knowledge (Brozo
& Simpson, 2007). If properly selected, and with appropriate instructional support, informational text
can ignite students innate curiosities about the world
around them and build vital reading and thinking
skills (Duke & Pearson, 2002). The common core proponents argue that proficiency in reading and writing can only be achieved through a curriculum that is
coherently structured to develop rich content knowledge within and across grades (CCSSI, 2010, p. 10).

Increase Print Encounters and

Experiences With Informational Text
It is more important than ever for children to know
how to read for and critically evaluate information
from both traditional and online sources (Caswell &
Duke, 1998; Leu, Kinzer, Coiro, & Cammack, 2004), because as they progress through the grades and enter
adulthood, most of what they will encounter will be
informational in nature. Furthermore, because reading problems that may develop in the primary and elementary grades tend to become generalized over time,
adversely affecting cognitive development and overall
performance in all subjects (Stanovich, 1986), its critical that young children receive instruction that builds
knowledge and literacy skills not just during language
arts period but throughout the school day. Therefore,
early in their schooling experiences children should
receive exposure to a variety of informational texts
(Benson, 2003; Kamil & Lane, 1997).
Yet, many teachers in the early grades may not be
giving informational text the kind of attention it deserves. Indeed, the common core advocates reassert
what Duke (2000) found a decade ago: Primary-level
teachers in the United States continue to privilege
simple stories as the source material for reading instruction. This occurs even though some children,
especially young boys (Zambo & Brozo, 2009), may
actually prefer informational texts to narrative stories

(Caswell & Duke, 1998). For these children, informational texts may be an entryway to literacy learning,
and limiting childrens contact with informational
text may leave them ill-prepared for the demands
of standardized tests and subject area textbooks
(Brozo, 2005; Brozo & Calo, 2006), as well as those
placed on them as citizens in an information age.
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The department editor welcomes reader comments. William G. Brozo teaches at George Mason
University, Fairfax, Virginia, USA; e-mail wbrozo@gmu.edu.

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