Adolescent Literacy: Pennsylvania

Analysis of Pennsylvania's policies

Informational Texts: Pennsylvania's preparation standards and tests for all middle and secondary school teachers do not address the instructional shifts associated with college- and career-readiness standards toward building content knowledge and vocabulary through careful reading of informational and literary texts.

Literacy Skills: Regarding literacy in other content areas, Pennsylvania's 4-8 Program Guidelines articulate that "courses and related candidate experiences must describe clearly how the content knowledge and skills development described [within] is embedded in the proposed program." Outlined within this required skill set is "literacy in the content areas," which requires that "to ensure that middle level teachers have the knowledge and skills to promote this development, the program must include courses with explicit links between literacy and each of the main content areas."

The state also outlines "literacy in the middle level content areas: mathematics, science and social studies." Science content "must focus on the integration of learning science with reading and writing, use of texts, and graphical representations." Social studies content "must address the five Carnegie elements, the role of technology in teaching and learning for literacy in the social sciences, and what the International Reading Association calls 'an integrated system of reading, discussion, and writing about literary and informational text.'"

The state's teaching candidate secondary competencies are too broad to be considered addressing the incorporation of literacy into other content areas. For example, secondary candidates must be able to "Create lessons that demonstrate an understanding of literacy both broadly and in discipline contexts" and "create lessons that support literacy across the curriculum."

Citation

Praxis Test Requirement www.ets.org Grade 4-8 Program Guidelines http://www.education.pa.gov/Documents/Teachers-Administrators/Certification%20Preparation%20Programs/Specific%20Program%20Guidelines/4_8ProgramGuidelines.pdf Secondary Guidelines http://www.education.pa.gov/Documents/Teachers-Administrators/Certification%20Preparation%20Programs/Framework%20Guidelines%20and%20Rubrics/Secondary%20Grades%207-12%20Program%20Framework%20Guidelines.pdf

Recommendations for Pennsylvania

Ensure that middle and secondary school teachers are prepared to meet the instructional requirements of college- and career-readiness standards for students.

Incorporate informational text of increasing complexity into classroom instruction.
Pennsylvania should specifically address the instructional shifts toward building content knowledge and vocabulary through increasingly complex informational texts and careful reading of informational and literary texts associated with the state's college- and career-readiness standards for students. The state may consider addressing these shifts either through testing frameworks in tests taken by all middle or secondary teachers regardless of subject area (such as a teaching methods tests), or through teacher preparation standards.

Incorporate literacy skills as an integral part of every subject.
Pennsylvania should ensure that teacher preparation standards include literacy skills and using text to build content knowledge in history/social studies, science, technical subjects and the arts to ensure that secondary school students are capable of accessing varied information about the world around them.

State response to our analysis

Pennsylvania indicated that the grades 4-8 and Secondary Program Guidelines include literacy across all subject areas. Competencies in both Framework Guidelines includes reading of both fiction and non-fiction texts.

Updated: December 2017