This website, a work in progress, is the result of a research study completed at the University of Connecticut through the support of Carnegie Corporation. The primary purpose for our work on this project is to improve the quality of subject-matter instruction in U.S. middle and high schools. While primary-grade teachers use a number of research-based instructional strategies to support emerging readers, those who teach adolescents know little about how to help the struggling readers in their classrooms (Biancaroso & Snow, 2004). The foundation of content area learning rests firmly on effective literacy strategy use. As a result, the project focus is preparing middle and high school teachers to effectively integrate literacy instruction- both traditional and new literacies-i.e., those higher-level literacy and learning skills required to read, comprehend, compose, and learn with traditional as well as online information resources in math, science, and other curricular areas. The two main ways through which we seek to support this charge are as follows:

1. improving the capacity of teachers to enact research-based pedagogy in foundational print literacy as well as the new literacies of the Internet and other information and communication technologies and;

2. building a cadre of adolescent literacy researchers who will study effective ways to develop competency in print literacy and the new literacies of the Internet and other information and communication technologies.

What You Will Find At This Site

This site will offer teacher educators, secondary teachers, and researchers materials and resources used in support of the goals sought above. Parents will find resources to help them understand the challenges their children face when learning new content.  Teacher educators and secondary teachers will find syllabi, project descriptions and references to studies that might support their instruction or further their own learning about literacy. Finally, researchers will find examples of our tools and findings. Please keep in mind that the content and purpose of this site is to document our journey. Thus, what is shared here is subject to ongoing refinements. The site and our materials are a work in progress.