Expository Non-fiction

      Maybe it is because of my background as a math and science teacher that I am so passionate about teaching my students how to read different types of non-fiction.  When I worked as a middle school science teacher the common complaint amongst the members of the department was that the kids just "didn't get it".  Many times the blame game was played. Responsibility for their lack of knowledge was placed on elementary teachers, language arts teachers,  or students' lack of effort or caring. I remember as a first year teacher asking for suggestions on how to help my kids to be able to read the text.   I was often told it was not "our problem" because we were not reading teachers and "they should know this by now".   There was part of me that knew better. even though I found myself teaching middle school, my teacher preparation was in elementary education.  My internships taught me that the majority of the day was focused on reading/language arts and math.  In my experience science and social studies were not strongly emphasized.  Occasionally students would do a thematic unit relating to a science or social studies topic, but it was not taught everyday. Many of the schools I was at didn't even use a science or social studies textbook. Most of the reading done in the classroom focused on narrative text.
After struggling to get my students to understand a middle school science textbook, I realized it was my in fact my problem.  As middle school teachers we were operating under the assumption that the students had prior exposure to reading content area textbooks.  In many instances, the students had little or no experience with reading that kind of text.   I have been working for the past several weeks with my classes on learning non-fiction text features, questioning nonfiction text, and stopping to ask questions as they are reading nonfiction text.   It has made me even more aware of how much kids enjoy reading non-fiction texts and how important it is to include in my classroom library.  

My students have been working on creating a text feature sharing board.   Each student chose an expository  non-fiction book to create their sharing boards.  I found the idea for non-fiction sharing boards on Laura Candler's website  http://www.lauracandler.com/.   I modified it to fit the text features we have been working on.   You could honestly spend hours on this site looking for lesson ideas and graphic organizers.  Love this SITE!!!