QUESTION: How do you help your 7th/8th graders learn to bookmark/annotate as they read?

[Greg Williams]

I am currently working with a 7th/8th grade English teacher, and hopefully I can get her on this site soon to ask some more questions. In the meantime however, is there any way you have helped your students learn to read texts critically? To take notes, write in the margins, annotate as they read, and just all-around digest the text they are reading to a deeper level? We are open to any kind of idea at this point, and would love your feedback! 

Thanks!

[Danielle Levy]

I should probably add that each of the handouts I am attaching goes with a mini lesson. The kids tape the paper into their notebooks and, at the end of the year, have created their own reading and writing handbook.

[Danielle Levy]

Last one~!!

[Greg Williams]

Wow!! Thanks for all these resources Danielle! You have been a huge help, and I really appreciate you taking some time to pass these along. I look forward to reading these over in more detail.

Thank you!

[Anna J. Small Roseboro]

Greg, as the myriad ideas come in, urge your teacher to think about the students she teaches and the resources they have available to them.  Rather than insist that every student use the same strategies all the time, select a few and introduce them one at a time.  Introduce and model the annotation strategy, encourage the students to try them faithfully for, say, two weeks.  Then introduce another one, model and encourage them to try it.  Ask students to compare the effectiveness of strategy A to strategy B. Continue offering them options for the first semester.  Then, with a range of options in their “tool kits”, the second semester, encourage students to adapt the one(s) that prove most beneficial and personally satisfying to them.

For other ideas for use with students, I invite you to visit and refer my website TEACHING ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS.  You'll find many that I've designed and even more that I've borrowed and posted.

Enjoy!

[Greg Williams]

Thanks Anna, I appreciate your counsel and your offering these resources to me! I will encourage the teacher to consider this approach.