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When students write about what they have read, comprehension and retention are enhanced (Graham & Hebert, 2011). A student’s literacy development is dependent on this interconnection. “Writing can facilitate students’ comprehension of text through the following: fostering explicitness, promoting integration of information, creating a personal involvement with text, encouraging thinking about ideas, and facilitating new understandings” (ILA, 2020, p. 3). Bottom line, when reading and writing instruction and opportunities receive equal emphasis, students become more literate (Graham, Liu, Aitken, et al., 2018). Furthermore, Daniel Willingham (2017b), cognitive psychologist and University of Virginia professor, brings the whole literacy triangle together by saying that students remember what they think about. When students read, discuss, and then write about what they have learned or read, memory improves. “Writing is an extension of speech. Speech allows the transmission of thought” (Willingham, 2017b, p. 15).

What Is the Literacy Triangle?

As we have worked with teachers all over the world, many using a wide range of reading programs and literacy-based instruction, we began to see a disconnect from school to school, and teacher to teacher. We heard teachers say things like, “I’m not the reading teacher” or “I only teach writing,” and students say things like, “We don’t do reading in this class,” and the much more frequent, “I don’t have time to fit it all in!” It became clear to us that many teachers and students have differing mindsets concerning literacy. The literacy triangle, therefore, is an interactive framework, driven by teacher and student mindsets, which promotes literacy every single day in every content area. The literacy triangle’s three main elements—(1) reading, (2) discussing, and (3) writing—are never treated as separate entities during literacy-building time, and they work for all subjects—even mathematics. The literacy triangle’s three elements are represented in figure I.1.

Before Readingx Pre-Expose and Prime the Brain Activate Prior Knowledge Set a Purpose for Reading Read

xDuring Reading Make the Thinking Job Visible Self-Monitor and Clarify for Understanding Discuss to Strengthen Comprehension

Write

Literacy Mindsets

Discuss

Synthesize Reading and Discussions Into Writing xAfter Readingx Teach Skill Minilessons That Get Maximum Results Go Deeper With Teacher-Led and Student-Led Discussions

Figure I.1: The literacy triangle—The big picture.

Visit go.SolutionTree.com/literacy for a free reproducible version of this figure.