Book and Blog Post 6

Another blog! Yeah! Today we will examine a concept known as the Reader-Response Writing Chart (Carey-Web, 2001). This concept is designed to ask students what both they and the author of the text bring to the passage while in a social studies class. When writing expository social studies pieces, students need to try to remain neutral and focus on the facts, data and research. (Clark) 

To elaborate, students will need to establish a clear point of view when writing in social studies and this strategy will allow students to become more aware of any bias that they may have and what writing are acceptable to use them bias’. This would be an example of a chart used to distribute to your students:

The Author	The Student
Mountain Men traveled all over the Northwest part of the United States long before the settlers arrived. The settlement in Oregon did not begin until 1834. The Oregon trail led the way to the Northwest and the wagons began to come.	I think the Men were settlers. They should have given credit for being the first settlers in the area. They may not have built the homes but the lived there first. They knew the area better than anyone.

For the teacher: The left side is where the students would write the author’s point of view of the topic along with any examples of bias or prejudice that the student feels the author may have in the piece. If you are working with older students a good practice would be to ask the students to gather proof of the bias or prejudice from the text and write it in the right column. Along with the chart, you can ask guided questions including:

1.       What do you know about the subject?

2.       What are your feelings about this topic?

3.       Have your read anything about this topic before?

4.       What do you think about this topic?

5.       Do you think the author has preconceptions (an idea or opinion formed in advance) about this topic?

These questions will help the students determine the value of the author’s opinion on the topic and allow the students to eliminate their biases that they may have. The final part to this method would be to ask the students to record whether or not their views have changed after reading the piece and if so, have them document the change.