I have a class subscription to Time For Kids. The subscription I have is for the grades 4-6 version, so the reading level is a little bit difficult for most fourth graders. We work through the feature articles as a class when I think there’s something there worth paying attention to. TFK had a global warming story recently. With all of the media attention being given to Arctic warming I thought it might be good for Alaska students to know a little bit about the greenhouse effect, so we read through the feature article as a class.

Most teachers do a lot of schema development when they work this way with kids, supplying loads of background information. Frequently what happens is that the article content gets lost under all of the more interesting information that the teacher supplies anecdotally. So when the kids respond to the article we often hear our own echoes coming from the kids rather than any thoughtful processing of the actual text. I hear it. I think we all do.

When we finished reading the global warming story, I asked an open ended question about the article. “What is the feature story mostly about? (Use 2 or more sentences).” I figured it would be a slam dunk after we read it together and discussed it. Here is a sample of the responses (with made-up student names):

  • It’s about global warming. It’s also about pollution. -Ben
  • The feature story is mostly about climate scientists wondering if we are having a manmade global warming. TFK is telling us that there are things to help us prevent global warming. -Rebecca
  • Some sintes beleve that thir is going to be a global warming. The reson sints thnk that thir is going to be global warming is because we lose mor ice. -Joel
  • It is mostly about gloBel warming. gloBel waming is aBout the sun geting to close thats what I think.-Barbara

Clearly, there were a range of understandings. What’s interesting to me about this is that I would never have expected anyone in the room to have suggested that the sun gets too close. This is an example of how a naive misconception retains more meaning than the actual experience. And that is precisely why reading is impossible to assess with standardized multiple choice test instruments. Background knowledge is key to any interpretive act. Reading is an interpretive act. Words are merely vehicles and have no inherent meaning.