Reading Assignment 4: Great Readers Read to Learn

This article is about how reading to learn involves a different purpose and a different type of text. It says that when we read to learn we often are reading informational text or nonfiction text. Students find reading stories easier than reading informational text, which I can agree with. If I had to pick, I would almost always choose a story over an informational text because I would assume the story would be easier to understand and more entertaining. The article, however, says that “students find reading stories easier simply because stories are more familiar to them.” I thought this was a great point because there weren’t as many nonfiction, informational texts readily available in the classroom or in our homes.

The article also talks about the importance of understanding the difference between nonfiction and fiction. One of the suggestions is to start with books that address the same subject, which I think is a great idea. The example is Tacky the Penguin and The Emperor’s Egg. Students that were read these two books were able to pick up that one was real and the other wasn’t and use details to support their reasoning.

The article also brings up another point as to why informational texts are harder to comprehend than stories. This is because often nonfiction books contain so much information that it can be challenging and overwhelming. This makes it “hard for our young readers to determine what is important because informational texts are packed with so many facts” (pg 79). I still find this to be a challenge. For example, if I am taking notes on a chapter in a history book, I end up taking way too many notes because everything always seems so important.

I also liked the example about Adam and his process of looking through the magazine for the article he wanted to read. It exemplifies how important text features can be in helping reader gain background knowledge. By looking at the images, the headings, the graphs, and other text features, he was able to make predictions about what the article was about without reading a sentence.