An Update on Reading in the Content Areas: Social Constructionist Dimensions

Redefining Content Area Literacy

Our understanding of what it means to be literate in the new millennium has expanded dramatically in scope. We have moved well beyond the view that literacy is the ability to read and write. Yet, in the not too distant past, being literate in content fields meant being able to read and comprehend texts in history, science, mathematics, literature study, and other academic disciplines. Indeed, one could complete a school report with a few cursory text and encyclopedia sources carefully paraphrased (Elkins & Luke, 1999). In contrast, today the real problem in content area literacy is being able to discern whether the multitude of information we can download or locate in our libraries is worthwhile. Thus, how students manage multiple texts and a multitude of sign systems becomes the core issue.

Along with others in our field, I began thinking about this issue and ways to expand our view of content area literacy. I believe a more contemporary definition of content area literacy must account for the following dimensions:

Content area literacy is a cognitive and social practice involving the ability to read and write about multiple forms of print. These multiple forms of print include textbooks, novels, magazines, Internet material and other sociotechnical sign systems conveying information, emotional content, and ideas to be considered from a critical stance (Bean, 1999).

Literacy scholars in Australia have taken this a step further in the development of curriculum that embodies engagement with critical multiliteracies (Elkins & Luke, 1999). In an earlier Reading Online article, Luke and Freebody (1999) describe the four resources model of reading in use by Australian teachers and curriculum developers, which goes well beyond simple comprehension of text material. The four essential elements for a contemporary reader of content material described by Luke and Freebody include code breaker, meaning maker, text user, and, most important, text critic. This fourth element of text critic draws on work in critical literacy aimed at discerning the voices and agendas behind a text, asserting that “texts are not ideologically natural or neutral...they represent particular points of views while silencing others.” (For a carefully constructed comparison of the differences between critical reading and critical literacy, see Cervetti, Pardales, and Damico, 2001, online document).

If content area literacy is, indeed, a social practice, as many current scholars in this area maintain, then it is very much tied to larger societal needs and the world of work. “The capacity to handle, manipulate, control, and work with text and discourses -- in print, verbal, visual, and multimedia forms -- is increasingly replacing the capacity to work with our hands as our primary mode of production” (Elkins & Luke, 1999). Media texts (films, advertisements, Internet ads for dot.coms, and so on) influence students’ thinking about a host of issues and entice them to be consumers. Content teachers need to be able to guide students’ critical reading and critical literacy with respect to ways people are positioned, stereotyped, and manipulated in these new times (Luke, Luke, Alvermann, Hagood, & Lewis, 1999). Critical media literacy holds great potential for engaging students in a careful look behind texts to critique how teens and others are depicted in, for example, ads, popular television shows, young adult novels, contemporary music, and chat rooms (Stevens, 2001).

In essence, we have come a long way from the 1980s’ interest in validating text comprehension strategies that might help students’ successfully read and digest concepts in biology, math, English, or history. Much of this new research has its roots in a shift from cognitivist traditions in quantitative research to a substantial wave of interest in qualitative studies of classrooms rooted in the social constructionist traditions of cultural anthropology and sociology. There is now growing interest in social constructionist dimensions of classroom interaction, issues of student voice and agency, and hegemonic power structures influencing curriculum design and teaching (Au, 1998, online PDF document; Fairclough, 1989).

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Research on Beliefs and Practices

One of the early issues explored in a qualitative fashion was the broad question of how preservice and inservice teachers’ beliefs and practices influence students’ learning in content fields. Major themes emerging from this body of work suggest that

• Tension exists between stated beliefs and practices
• This tension typically emerges in field-based practica
• Traditional transmission teaching is often favored over content strategies advanced in university classes
• Cooperating teachers influence the model of teaching preservice teachers decide to adopt

(See my original chapter in the handbook [Bean, 2000] for detailed discussions of the following work in this area: Bean, 1997a; Dillon, O’Brien, Moje, & Stewart, 1994; Fox, 1994; Hinchman & Zalewski, 1996, online PDF document; Jetton & Alexander, 1997; Lloyd, 1996; Moje, 1996; Sturtevant, 1996, online PDF document; Wilson, Konopak, & Readence, 1993).

In essence, preservice teachers are likely to respond positively to strategies learned in their university classes, but they jettison most of these approaches in favor of more didactic modes of instruction once they are at the school site. Reasons for this include a desire for classroom control afforded by whole-group structures and the effects of an apprenticeship with an experienced teacher who often reinforces traditional instructional patterns (Bean, 2000).

Despite the prevalence of multiple literacies in students’ out-of-school lives, in many content areas, the single textbook reigns supreme. Witness any middle or secondary student lugging an overloaded backpack across a school parking lot and it is hard to deny this fact. In many ways, our curriculum is stuck in the 1980s’ world chronicled in Alvermann and Moore’s 1991 review. As we acknowledge the need to redefine content area literacy to include a broader array of print and other sign systems, this may help shift our emphasis toward curricular models that embrace content area reading strategies and small-group teamwork. At present, the combination of single texts and high-stakes testing mandated throughout the United States seems to run counter to a curricular model that might guide students toward cooperative, critical reading of multiple texts. The competitive “myth of the rugged individualist” (Britzman, 1991) still prevails in American classrooms.

Research exploring the beliefs and practices of inservice teachers reveals the following themes (Bean, 2000):

• Teacher-centered approaches to content area instruction predominate, making student-centered, small-group learning seem unusual
• Content teachers express a desire to develop students’ high-level interpretive thinking, but they use lower level questions and tasks in actual classroom practice
• Successful students become skilled at “doing school,” adjusting their styles to those of their various content teachers
• Content teachers are idiosyncratic in the ways they organize classrooms, use strategies, and deliver content, and this variability is related to pedagogical content knowledge
• Pacing and control issues are a concern for inservice content teachers, much as they are for their preservice counterparts

The disparity between oft-stated support for critical thinking and for content classrooms where students receive and transmit concepts has progressed little since Alvermann and Moore’s 1991 review. Issues of overcrowding in secondary schools, limited variety in texts, and limited computers are the reality for far too many teachers and students. As students see a growing distance between their out-of-school lives and the texts they must read in school, many either “do school” by adapting to dull routines, or they opt out.

At a time when the national policy emphasis in education in the United States is squarely on literacy development in young children, programs for adolescents are few and far between. This holds true in other countries. In a philosophical comparison of policy initiatives for early childhood and adolescence, Luke and Luke (2001), writing from the Australian perspective, argue that the intent of policy efforts in literacy has been to “refocus significant levels of investment away from the schooling of adolescents” (p. 18). Ironically, this ideological shift toward the neglect of adolescent literacy initiatives comes at a time when youth find themselves marginalized from print-based mainstream employment. Secure labor in unskilled physical work that pays a living wage is rapidly being displaced by transient, information-based white collar jobs and low-paying work in the service sectors (Luke & Luke, 2001). In addition, an easily accessible media culture celebrating consumer spending is the preferred mode of getting information for many youth, who no longer seek out print-based sources. But, ironically, we do little to foster critical media literacy with adolescents (Luke & Luke, 2001).

The growing distance from school-based literacy and out-of-school literacy experienced by many adolescents is further exacerbated by youth having few opportunities to see their lives represented in the narratives they encounter in content area classrooms (Bean, 2000). School becomes a period of life to endure, rather than a pathway to success. School literacy is seen as distinctly different from literacy in the nonprint media that may well represent the day-to-day crises and problems of families and teens. Young adult literature connected to content areas that truly allows for personal links between adolescents’ in- and out-of school lives and the dilemmas they face in these various contexts needs a larger presence than is currently the case (Bean, 2000). Most important, the increasingly strong array of multicultural young adult literature needs to become a more visible and integral part of the literary canon students read.

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Attitudes, Interests, and the Role of Literature

Trends charted in the U.S. National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) show a decline in recreational reading. For example, NAEP data reveal that in 1994, twelfth-grade students reported reading less for fun than had their counterparts in 1992 (White & Dewitz, 1994, online document). McKenna, Kear, and Ellsworth (1995) noted that by sixth grade, students were largely indifferent to reading. Ironically, this decline is occurring at a time when there is a growing body of powerful young adult literature available to illuminate social issues and concepts in various content areas (Readence, Bean, & Baldwin, 2001). Moreover, frequent recreational reading helps develop comprehension (McKenna, Kear, & Ellsworth, 1995), so that students who do not read frequently may experience difficulty in comprehension -- and, hence, begin to avoid challenging reading tasks.

Adolescents are likely to be motivated to read when the nature of the material they read connects with their lives and when they have opportunities for discussion (Bean, 2000). The research in this area shows the following themes:

• Steady decline in positive attitude toward reading by the middle grades
• Strongest declines among less able readers

Curricular elements that seem to contribute to a decline in positive attitudes toward reading include dull textbooks, a view of reading as work, and tracking. On the other hand, time for book sharing and discussion, journal writing about books, book clubs, and field trips linked to book content have a positive influence on reading attitude. In general, content teachers exert a strong influence in shaping students’ attitudes toward reading but are often viewed as the sole interpretive authority, which limits students’ sense of voice and agency.

Research on the infusion of young adult literature in content area classrooms remains a relatively new but growing area. Studies show a growing interest in multicultural literature, reader response, and student voice and agency in discussion; exploration of interpretive issues related to social determinism, resistance, and assimilation without accommodation (Rogers, 1997); and an ongoing effort to critique the nature and accuracy of this literature in terms of whose work gets included or excluded.

It does appear that well-crafted young adult novels can help illuminate challenging concepts expressed in expository texts. (See the original handbook chapter [Bean, 2000] for a detailed discussion of various studies, including Bean, Valerio, Money-Senior, and White, 1999; Chevalier and Houser, 1997; and Godina, 1996). Much of this work involves students in reading and discussing young adult novels where the protagonist faces a series of obstacles, often due to racism or socioeconomic strife.

For example, in a high school social studies class, students might read and discuss Gary Soto’s young adult novel Buried Onions. This engaging story centers on Eddie, a young Hispanic character who confronts issues of ethnic identity and survival in a Fresno, California, barrio. At various points in the story Eddie must make a number of difficult ethical decisions.

Bean and Rigoni (2001, online document) conducted a multiple case study of responses to the novel among students and adults. High school social studies students read the novel and exchanged interpretive dialogue journals with a group of teachers in a university graduate-level class. Both the teachers and the high school students made personal connections with events in the novel, but this was especially true for the high school students. Events in the novel created a climate of interpretive disequilibrium that challenged dialogue journal partners to consider divergent and contradictory views. For some of the high school students, this was one of the few novels they read from front to back; they saw themselves represented in many of the issues Eddie faced as a young adult.

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Adolescent Literacy

In addition to outlining research related to teachers’ beliefs and practices, attitudes and interests, and the role of literature in content classrooms, the broad and relatively new area of adolescent literacy deserves some commentary before I summarize overall findings and implications for future research.

The International Reading Association has taken a strong leadership role in highlighting the literacy needs of adolescents. In 1999, its Commission on Adolescent Literacy, established 2 years earlier, prepared Adolescent Literacy: A Position Statement (Moore, Bean, Birdyshaw, & Rycik, 1999) to alert school districts and policy makers to key concerns related to adolescents’ literacy growth. The commission has also offered national forums and conducted policy initiatives, and it continues to develop new publications in this area. The most recent, What Adolescents Deserve (Rycik & Irvin, 2001), is an edited volume directed at programmatic and instructional approaches.

Content area literacy research now falls within the larger umbrella of adolescent literacy. For example, Adolescent Literacy: A Position Statement asserts that “adolescents deserve instruction that builds both the skill and desire to read increasingly complex materials.” This statement has its roots in scaffolding students’ reading of content area material.

In an effort to sort out the features of this expanded view of content and secondary reading proposed by the term “adolescent literacy,” Moje, Young, Readence, and Moore (2000) asked, “What does adolescent literacy signal that content reading and secondary reading do not?” (p. 401). They argued that older terms, such as “secondary reading,” conjure up images of outdated remedial reading labs, isolated from science, math, history, and other content area classrooms. Similarly, “content area reading” is aligned exclusively with school and subject-based literacy. “Adolescent literacy,” on the other hand, acknowledges the multiple literacies teens encounter, including the Internet, compact discs, music, television, magazines, other forms of print, and other sign systems and media.

We are only beginning to conduct research that looks closely at daily out-of-school reading events. Moje, Young, Readence, and Moore (2000) recommend that we “listen to and watch young people in a variety of spaces and contexts, looking for what they can do and for ways to bring that proficiency into the classroom. Often, kids who appear to struggle in the classroom are completely different people outside of the classroom” (p. 405). For example, adolescents may have out-of-school funds of knowledge in car repair, surfing, computers, music, and so on that can be tapped as a bridge to school-based literacy. Moje et al. also recommended that we explore critical literacy practices in our teaching to help adolescents move toward a questioning stance through which they can determine who is benefiting from or being marginalized by historical accounts, advertisements, magazine articles, or other forms of text.

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Conclusions and Future Directions

The related research and practice domains of content area reading, secondary reading, and adolescent literacy continue to shift in shape and scope of interest. Major changes since the 1980s include a shift away from decontextualized, quasi-experimental studies related to strategy validation and a clear movement toward qualitative descriptions of classroom contexts and patterns of group interaction (Bean, 2000). Nevertheless, studies in the area of teacher beliefs and practices show a preponderance of didactic, teacher-centered approaches in content classrooms and the continuing dominance of the single textbook.

Where should we center our research and practice efforts in the future? I believe that recent work in adolescent literacy and critical literacy offers some exciting new directions. For example, Moje, Young, Readence, and Moore (2000) considered the question, “What constitutes best practices in adolescent literacy?” (p. 403). Consistent with the current emphasis on qualitative, localized studies of content area classrooms, these authors argue that our many content area reading strategies need to be tailored according to how they best fit within specific, local learning contexts. “To our way of thinking, any unqualified claim that an educational practice is effective is quite a bit like claiming that watering plants is effective: It depends” (p. 403). Personal dimensions of literacy and its relationship to students’ effort and attention are seen as a crucial element of consideration for best practice. To this end, Moje et al. ask, “Do classrooms display any passion for reading, writing, experiencing, and learning?” (p. 405). I would argue that classrooms where powerful young adult literature combined with students’ voices represented in discussion of this literature to illuminate content area concepts are likely to meet this criterion.

Getting to know students in content classrooms in terms of their day-to-day interests and incorporating these interests in curriculum development is another important recommendation for practice made by Moje and her coauthors. In my work, for example, I have been incorporating music as a concept learning vehicle in science and other content areas for some time now (Bean, 1997b, online document; Readence, Bean, & Baldwin, 2001). Using blues and rap, students create stimulating, engaging songs that encompass key concepts about cells, sharks, bats, and a host of other topics. Others use drama to frame literary discussions (Vogt, 2000) or multimedia to explore characterization in a novel (Smagorinsky & O’Donnell-Allen, 1998). These artful forms of reader response to texts, novels, media, music, and Internet material bridge adolescents’ experiences with the texts of their lives and provide a basis for comprehending more traditional texts. Multiple texts and multiple forms of representation are the wave of the future and invite participation from both accomplished and struggling readers.

The next 10 years should witness increasing interest in applying and investigating the role of critical literacy in our content classrooms (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000; Moje et al., 2000). Critical literacy practices engage readers in questioning the ideologies underpinning multiple forms of print. In essence, students are looking behind the text to question whose agenda is being served by its message. How are various people positioned by the text? Are people portrayed in stereotypical ways? Are there people who are not represented in texts? Questions of this nature should become part of our classroom vocabulary; we should be moving beyond low-level literal questions.

Critical media literacy is a logical extension of critical literacy (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000). Critical media literacy encourages careful reflection about mass media and popular culture messages from radio, television, video, movies, compact discs, the Internet, gang script, and evolving youth cultures. A number of perspectives inform critical media literacy including feminism, masculine theory, media studies, and cultural studies (Alvermann & Hagood). For example, teen romance novels and their television counterparts position teenage males and females in a way that reinforces stereotypical social roles. Images conjured up by Barbie and Ken dolls live on in many of these media representations and, while teens may appear to accept these characterizations unquestioningly, there is some evidence to indicate that they are well aware of the complexity and differences in fictional and real worlds (Stevens, 2001).

At a basic level, Alvermann et al. suggest having students write for peer audiences about their preferred music, films, and other media. By engaging in writing based on popular culture artifacts, students may become more aware of dual dimensions in the media: a representation of their lives, but also a limiting of the complexity and scope of those lives for dramatic effect.

Our school discourse has evolved into a unique, separate, and at times alienating collection of discipline-based texts and tests. Schools have a predictable, visible, institutional culture that defines this space. Work and pleasure are clearly delineated by the function of various physical areas within a school. These divisions maximize control and the maintenance of dominant mainstream values: “Intellectual endeavors are privileged over pleasure and fun, high culture trumps low/popular culture, and rational thought reigns over emotive thought” (Alvermann et al., p. 200).

In essence, Descartes’ mind-body duality exists in the curriculum and physical design of schools. There is little room for popular culture artifacts and multiple forms of text representation when this view is taken at face value. The sharply demarcated distance between students’ multiple literacies outside of school and sanctioned, text-based, canonical literacy inside the school walls creates an artificial education where students “do school” to succeed. Or, in a worst-case scenario, they drop out and take jobs in the low-paying service sector. Alvermann et al. assert that, to counter this duality, “all texts -- popular culture and canonical, media and print, audio and visual and the like -- should be valued and included in critical media literacy instruction” (p. 201).

Two sources that offer help in how to infuse critical media literacy in content classrooms are

• Alvermann, D.E., Moon, J.S., & Hagood, M.C. (1999). Popular culture in the classroom: Teaching and researching critical media literacy. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
• Stevens, L.P. (2001). South Park and society: Instructional and curricular implications of popular culture in the classroom. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 44, 548-555.

In my closing statements from the original Handbook of Reading Research review of content area reading research, I quoted from Will Kyselka’s (1987) work on Polynesian wayfinding, a form of navigation tied to careful observations of natural phenomena:

How different the ways of navigation. Instrument navigation is discontinuous, and we don’t know where we are until we have a fix. The wayfinder on the canoe so close to us stays continuously oriented: external verification is neither a possibility nor is it wanted. (p. 641)

As reading researchers, we are now staying close to the natural contexts of participants’ experiences in content classrooms, representing a powerful move forward from our strategy validation research of the 1980s. The more recent studies of adolescents’ multiple literacies, and the significant role of popular culture in their identity development, suggests that we need to think about curriculum more broadly. We need to engage students in reading and reflecting on the multiple forms of print and other sign systems that constitute their world.

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References

Alvermann, D.E., & Hagood, M.C. (2000). Critical media literacy: Research, theory, and practice in “new times.” Journal of Educational Research, 93, 193-205.
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Alvermann, D.E., & Moore, D.W. (1991). Secondary school reading. In R. Barr, M.L. Kamil, P.B. Mosenthal, & P.D. Pearson (Eds.), Handbook of reading research: Volume II (pp. 951-983). White Plains, NY: Longman.
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Au, K.H. (1998). Social constructivism and the school literacy learning of students of diverse backgrounds. Journal of Literacy Research, 30, 297-319. Available (PDF document): nrc.oakland.edu/jlr/archive/v30/article_30_2_7.pdf
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Bean, T.W. (1997a). Preservice teachers’ selection and use of content area literacy strategies. Journal of Educational Research, 90, 154-163.
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Bean, T.W. (1997b, May). ReWrite: A music strategy for exploring content area concepts. Reading Online, 1(1). Available: www.readingonline.org/articles/art_index.asp?HREF=/articles/bats/index.html
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Bean, T.W. (1999). Redefining content area literacy: A research review. Paper presented at the 44th annual convention of the International Reading Association, San Diego, CA.
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Bean, T.W. (2000). Reading in the content areas: Social constructivist dimensions. In M.L. Kamil, P.B. Mosenthal, P.D. Pearson, & R. Barr (Eds.), Handbook of reading research: Volume III (pp. 629-644). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
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Bean, T.W., & Rigoni, N. (2001). Exploring the intergenerational dialogue journal discussion of a multicultural young adult novel. Reading Research Quarterly, 36(3), 232-249. Available: www.catchword.com/ira/00340553/v36n3/contp1-1.htm
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Bean, T.W., Valerio, P.C., Money-Senior, H., & White, F. (1999). Secondary English students’ engagement in reading and writing about a multicultural young adult novel. Journal of Educational Research, 93, 32-37.
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Britzman, D.P. (1991). Practice makes practice: A critical study of learning to teach. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
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Cervetti, G., Pardales, M.J., & Damico, J.S. (2001, April). A tale of differences: Comparing the traditions, perspectives, and educational goals of critical reading and critical literacy. Reading Online, 4(9). Available: www.readingonline.org/articles/art_index.asp?HREF=/articles/cervetti/index.html
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Chevalier, M., & Houser, N.D. (1997). Preservice teachers’ multicultural self-development through adolescent fiction. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 40, 426-436.
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Dillon, D.R., O’Brien, D.G., Moje, E.B., & Stewart, R.A. (1994). Literacy learning in secondary school science classrooms: A cross-case analysis of three qualitative studies. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 31, 345-362.
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Elkins, J., & Luke, A. (1999). Redefining adolescent literacies. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 42, 212-215.
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Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. White Plains, NY: Longman.
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Fox, D.L. (1994). What is literature? Two preservice teachers’ conceptions of literature and of the teaching of literature. In C.K. Kinzer & D.J. Leu, Jr. (Eds.), Multidimensional aspects of literacy: Research, theory, and practice (43rd yearbook of the National Reading Conference, pp. 394-405). Chicago, IL: National Reading Conference.
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Godina, H. (1996). The canonical debate -- Implementing multicultural literature and perspectives. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 39, 544-549.
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Hinchman, K.A., & Moje, E.B. (1998). Locating the social and political in secondary school literacy. Reading Research Quarterly, 33, 117-128.
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Hinchman, K.A., & Zalewski, P. (1996). Reading for success in a tenth-grade global studies class: A qualitative study. Journal of Literacy Research, 28, 91-106. Available (PDF document): nrc.oakland.edu/jlr/archive/v28/article_28_1_6.pdf
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Hruby, G.G. (2001). Sociological, postmodern, and new realism perspectives in social constructionism: Implications for literacy research. Reading Research Quarterly, 36, 48-62. Available: www.catchword.com/ira/00340553/v36n1/contp1-1.htm
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Jetton, T.L., & Alexander, P.A. (1997). Instructional importance: What teachers value and what students learn. Reading Research Quarterly, 32, 290-308.
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Kamil, M.L., Mosenthal, P.B., Pearson, P.D., & Barr, R. (Eds.). (2000). Handbook of reading research: Volume III. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
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Kyselka, W. (1987). An ocean in mind. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press.
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Lloyd, C. (1996). Scientific literacy in two high school biology classrooms: Considering literacy as social process. Journal of Classroom Interaction, 31, 25-30.
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Luke, A., & Freebody, P. (1999, August). Further notes on the four resources model. Reading Online. Available: www.readingonline.org/past/past_index.asp?HREF=/research/lukefreebody.html
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Luke, A., & Luke, C. (2001). Adolescence lost/childhood regained: On early intervention and the emergence of the techno-subject. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 1, 1-24.
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Luke, A., Luke, C., Alvermann, D., Hagood, M., & Lewis, C. (1999). New times, new identities, new (multi) literacies. Paper presented at the 44th annual convention of the International Reading Association, San Diego, CA.
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McKenna, M.C., Kear, D.J., & Ellsworth, R.A. (1995). Children’s attitudes toward reading: A national survey. Reading Research Quarterly, 30, 934-956.
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Moje, E.B. (1996). “I teach students, not subjects”: Teacher-student relationships as contexts for secondary literacy. Reading Research Quarterly, 31, 172-195.
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Moje, E.B., Young, J.P., Readence, J.E., & Moore, D.W. (2000). Teenagers in new times: A new literacy studies perspective. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 43, 400-411.
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Moore, D.W., Bean, T.W., Birdyshaw, D., & Rycik, J.A. (1999). Adolescent literacy: A position statement. Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Available (PDF document): www.reading.org/pdf/1036.pdf
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Readence, J.E., Bean, T.W., & Baldwin, R.S. (2001). Content area literacy: An integrated approach (7th ed.). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.
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Rogers, T. (1997). No imagined peaceful place: A story of community texts, and cultural conversations in one urban high school English classroom. In T. Rogers & A.O. Soter (Eds.), Reading across cultures: Teaching literature in a diverse society (pp. 95-115). New York: Routledge.
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Rycik, J.A., & Irvin, J. (Eds.). (2001). What adolescents deserve: A commitment to students’ literacy learning. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
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Smagorinsky, P., & O’Donnell-Allen, C. (1998). Reading as mediated and mediating action: Composing meaning for literature through multimedia interpretive texts. Reading Research Quarterly, 33, 198-227.
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Stevens, L.P. (2001). South Park and society: Instructional and curricular implications of popular culture in the classroom. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 44, 548-555.
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Sturtevant, E.G. (1996). Lifetime influences on the literacy-related instructional beliefs of two experienced high school history teachers: Two comparative case studies. Journal of Literacy Research, 28, 227-258. Available (PDF document): nrc.oakland.edu/jlr/archive/v28/article_28_2_2.pdf
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Vogt, M. (2000). Active learning: Dramatic play in the content areas. In M. McLaughlin & M. Vogt (Eds.), Creativity and innovation in content area teaching (pp. 73-90). Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon.
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White, S., & Dewitz, P. (1994). Reading proficiency and home support for literacy (National Assessment of Educational Progress NAEP facts series, 2, pp. 1-6). Washington, DC: National Center for Educational Statistics. Available: nces.edu.gov/pubs/96814.html
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Wilson, E.K., Konopak, B.C., & Readence, J.E. (1993). A case study of a preservice social studies teachers’ beliefs and practices about content-area reading. In D.J. Leu, Jr. & C.K. Kinzer (Eds.), Examining central issues in literacy research, theory, and practice: Forty-second yearbook of the National Reading Conference (pp. 335-343). Chicago, IL: National Reading Conference
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Glossary

Adolescent literacy: Considers the broad spectrum of multiple literacies in teens’ lives, in and out of school (e.g. popular culture, hobbies, music, computers, the Internet, and other print and nonprint forms of communication).
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Content area literacy: A cognitive and social practice involving the ability to read and write about multiple forms of print, including textbooks, novels, magazines, Internet material, and other sociotechnical sign systems conveying information, emotional content, and ideas to be considered from a critical stance.
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Critical literacy: Engaging readers in questioning the ideologies underpinning multiple forms of print; looking behind the text to see whose agenda is being served by its message.
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Critical media literacy: Engaging readers in a careful examination of mass media and popular culture messages from radio, television, video, movies, compact discs, the Internet, gang script, and other evolving youth cultures; reflecting on whose agenda is being served through popular culture media.
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Sociocultural dimensions of literacy: Exploring the complex, hegemonic contexts of schools and classrooms and their interaction with readers’ ethnic, gender-based, and cultural beliefs and practices.
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Social constructionist dimensions: Knowledge construction between participants in social relationships and communities of practice (e.g., classrooms). Hruby (2001, online document) differentiated social constructivism, with its roots in Soviet activity theory and knowledge formation “inside the head,” from social constructionism, which “deals with knowledge formation outside the head between participants in social relationships” (p. 51). Knowledge construction in communities is at the core of this definition and represents a departure from the cognitive tradition. In a social constructionist view, classrooms are complex, hegemonic contexts where participants negotiate multiple forms of print with varying degrees of success (Hinchman & Moje, 1998).
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About the Author

Thomas Bean is a professor in literacy and reading and coordinator of doctoral studies in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, University of Nevada, Las Vegas , USA (e-mail Beant1@nevada.edu). He recently served as a visiting scholar at the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, and is engaged in crosscultural research in young adult literature in Australian and American contexts. He has published widely in the areas of content and adolescent literacy and has been honored with a Distinguished Research Award for his studies of reader responses to multicultural young adult literature in content area classrooms. Back to top

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Citation: Bean, T.W.. (2001, December/January). An update on reading in the content areas: Social constructionist dimensions. Reading Online, 5(5). Available: http://www.readingonline.org/articles/art_index.asp?HREF=handbook/bean/index.html

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Posted December 2001
© 2001 International Reading Association, Inc.   ISSN 1096-1232