The following article has been excerpted from Language Arts for Gifted Students, one of six exciting books in the Gifted Child Today Reader Series. This series brings together the best articles published in Gifted Child Today, the nation's most popular gifted education journal. Each book in the series is filled with exciting and practical classroom ideas, useful summaries of research findings, and discussions of identification and classroom management, and informed opionion about educating gifted children.

Chapter 12

“The gift of reading, like all natural gifts, must be nourished or it will atrophy.”
—Katherine Paterson

If the “gift of reading” is to flourish for gifted and talented students, it must, as Katherine Paterson says, be “nourished.” And, while it is true that gifted and talented students usually have little trouble reading, especially in the areas that interest them, many of them need further guidance when it comes to developing strategies that lead to deeper levels of comprehension and enjoyment. If we are to offer such guidance and nourishment, we must give our students regular doses of metacognitive “vitamins” and rhetorical “minerals.” These vitamins and minerals are especially important in supporting the ways students learn to grapple with, and thus make sense of, informational texts.

Frequently, when students are assigned to read an informational text, especially one that is unrelated to their interests, they tend to skim it without deriving much enjoyment. When they skim, they are not exercising full, strategic control over their reading. As such, students often read an assigned informational text as if it is unrelated to their prior knowledge, to their previous experience, and to a variety of purposes that could inform their reading. Consequently, students may indeed ferret out a few nuggets of factual data as they read, but they may fail to put those data into a larger context that is both personally rewarding and academically important.

R.I.T.E. is an acronym for a reading process that occurs in four stages: Read, Interrogate, Tell, Explore. It enables students to use a multifaceted approach to develop the kinds of critical reading skills necessary for constructing meaning as they read an informational text. As such, R.I.T.E. enables students to see how an informational text allows meaning to be created in a multistaged, dialectical process. As students engage in the process of the R.I.T.E. activity, they use fluent and flexible thinking to make thoughtful predictions prior to reading the text and then employ close observation skills to search for specific information as they read. Furthermore, students use analytical skills to determine if the information in the text is relevant to their needs. Finally, they adopt synthetic skills to assimilate and accommodate information they found in the text into their internal rhetorical structures.

R.I.T.E. is also centered on the idea that reading must be fun and that pedagogical activities must contain, when possible, elements of play. Vygotsky (1978) reminds us that play is a key trait of successful education.

[P]lay gives a child a new form of desires. It teaches her to desire by relating her desires to a fictitious ‘I,’ to her role in the game and its rules. In this way a child’s greatest achievements are possible in play, achievements that tomorrow will become her basic level of real action and morality. (p. 100, emphasis in original)

R.I.T.E. initiates just such a sense of play into the process of reading an informational text because it makes new achievements and actions possible. By playing with the text, students also take cognitive and imaginative risks as they construct meaning. As such, the activity encourages students to imagine what an informational text is, how they might approach it, and how they might use it.

The following is an example of how R.I.T.E. can be used to enable upper-elementary and middle-school students to enlist critical thinking skills and to develop a desire to read an article about Mount Rushmore.

The first step involves an oral, prereading activity that orients students toward the Rushmore article (see Figure 12.1). The ensuing discussion enables students to articulate what they know and what they think they know about each item. Because “right answers” are not the focus, students will enjoy the freedom to offer divergent answers and to entertain new, and sometimes contradictory, ideas.

Moreover, the discussion, which may last 10–20 minutes, will stimulate students’ curiosity. Because no “right answers” to the questions are supplied by the teacher and because every answer students give (no matter how divergent) is acceptable, students find the necessary time to speculate, consider, and inquire. That is, they find themselves at the headwaters of a self-generated “need to know.” If students are to let their natural curiosity surface, then they need a stretch of time to think and discuss.

The next step involves narrowing the discussion to the topic of Mount Rushmore, which might involve the following discussion questions:

• Who do you think sculpted the faces onto Mount Rushmore?
• What techniques and tools do you think the sculptor used?
• When do you think the faces were sculpted?
• Where do you think Mount Rushmore is located?
• Why do you think the sculptor decided to create the monument?
• How long do you think it took to complete the monument?

As before, students should speculate about possible answers and, if need be, guess. Because this part of the prereading activity is based on open-ended questions, it is important to encourage students to use fluent thinking and offer as many answers as possible. Students should also be encouraged to use flexible thinking so that their answers range broadly and widely. When invited to use these two different thinking skills to speculate about questions prior to reading, students usually become energized, interested, and curious.

During the second discussion, the answers the students come up with should be written on the blackboard or on an overhead transparency. When finished, it is a good idea to pause and wait. This allows suspense to build. Feeling the tension, students often ask which of their answers are correct. This is the point to distribute copies of the article entitled “Mount Rushmore: Four Faces that Rock” (see Figure 12.2) and inform students that they might find the answers they are seeking in the article.

Prepared for Step 1 of R.I.T.E. (Read), students are ready to become self-directed, critical readers. One problem that students frequently experience when reading assigned informational texts is that they become overwhelmed with data. Because they have no clear, self-generated purpose for reading, they often fail to distinguish between what is important in the text and what is not.

The two prereading discussions help students decide what they should notice as they read. Specifically, the answers students give to the discussion questions and, most notably, the answers that pertained to Mount Rushmore become guides for students as they read. When they speculate and guess about information that may be contained in a text they are going to read, they naturally want to find a way to verify their own ideas. In this way, they develop a “need to know,” and their reading is then driven by two specific, well-defined, self-generated purposes: (a) compare data in the text with their speculations and (b) find out if they were correct.

As the students begin reading the article, the teacher should ask them after a minute or two to stop. At this point, the following announcement should be delivered: “Many of the facts in the article are incorrect!” Ask the students to resume reading and identify any facts that appear to be incorrect.

The interrogation stage of R.I.T.E. is crucial, for it allows students to query the article dynamically. Robert and Michelle Root-Bernstein (1999) remind us that “all knowledge begins in observation” (p. 31). As students read the article, they are not simply locating facts, but also weighing the veracity of each fact they locate. As such, they are entering into a new reading game and are necessarily changing the speed and depth of their reading. Additionally, they are using the skill of close observation in their encounter with new stimuli to both increase and challenge their knowledge base. Langer (1997) wrote, “we can present novel stimuli to our students. We can introduce material through games, because in games players vary their responses to . . . look more closely at all aspects of the situation” (p. 42). Because R.I.T.E. may be a novel game as Langer describes, students will need to shift their cognitive footing. They can’t proceed in their reading as they had done before because the linguistic playing field and rules have changed and there are new problems to solve. De Bono (1990) reminds us that “in problem solving one always assumes certain boundaries” (p. 93). The same is true with reading: It is hemmed by boundaries that are based on the nature of the text and on the reader’s skills and expectations. If we are to initiate changes in the way a reader reads, we must change either the text or the reader’s expectations—or, if possible, both. When students read the Rushmore article, they will need to shift their expectations, because the text is not the kind they have usually encountered before. Consequently, they need to slow down in order to question and evaluate each piece of data they encounter.

Evaluation in this case takes the form of further questions. For instance, students might ask:

• Is this fact true?
• What evidence in the article would lead me to believe the fact is either true or false?
• Is there any way, within the limits of the article, to test the truthfulness of the fact?
• What do I know about Mount Rushmore or about the fact itself that would lead me to think it is true or false?

These kinds of questions are the general criteria upon which students should base their critical thinking. By using the questions as tools, students are free to think about, discuss (in small groups), and weigh each fact.

Lively group discussions often ensue at this stage of R.I.T.E as students try to differentiate between fact and fiction. After all, “Noticing new things about any body of information is involving. When students draw distinctions, the distinctions are necessarily relevant to them. Distinctions reveal that the material is situated in a context and imply that other contexts may be considered” (Langer, 1997, p. 75). As they read, students draw distinctions between what seems to be true and what seems to be in error—the more distinctions they draw, the more involved they become.

For instance, students might discuss the following point: “The faces originally intended to be carved into the mountain were not those of the presidents, but rather three American heroes: John Colter, Kit Carson, and Buffalo ‘Bill’ Cody.” Some students may be adamant that the entire statement is incorrect. They may give such reasons as

• Who ever heard of those guys, especially John Colter?
• If somebody was going make an American monument about famous people, it would have to be about the Presidents, not about people no one has ever heard of.

Other students may counter with:

• Maybe the monument was just some guy’s idea and he liked those “heroes.”
• Maybe he was eccentric and didn’t plan on the monument becoming as famous as it has become.
• Maybe he didn’t like politics and didn’t want to carve the Presidents.

Students tend to take positions that are supported not so much by prior knowledge, but by inferences, associations, and assumptions. One reason why the article is effective is because most students have little or no prior knowledge about Mount Rushmore. Moreover, because the article is “inverted” (full of errors, not truths), students will be able think about information in new ways. “It may be that by inverting . . . we free ourselves from preconceived categories and open ourselves to the available information” (Langer, 1997, p. 133). Freed from preconceived notions about how this informational text functions and what its purposes are, students must think critically and carefully as they evaluate each fact. The goal is not for students to arrive at what they know, but at what they think they know. Moreover, it was also important for students to give voice to how they arrived at what they think they know. As R. Hunt (1993) mentioned, “for language to be meaningful it must be the vehicle for social transaction” (p. 114). As students talk about why they think certain facts are true or false, they situate themselves in metacognitive reflection, a key element to critical thought and to the construction of socially configured meaning.

Once students draw distinctions between what they think is true and false in the article, they are ready to share their findings. Their findings, though, should be confined only to what they think is incorrect in the article. In this way, they need to proceed through the article line by line to identify what they thought were errors. As they do, the teacher’s job is to cross out any fact students thought were fiction (the article should be placed on a transparency). It is a good idea to tell them that, as you cross out facts, you will not state whether the facts are true or false (see Figure 12.3). Tell them, also, that you will cross out anything they tell you to (one exception is not to cross out entire paragraphs).

The tell stage is important because it gives every student a chance to express a thought and take a risk. Because students aren’t sure if their ideas are correct, they have to take risks when they suggest items to cross out. The risks, however, became part of the “reading game” of the activity. And, because students experience the activity as a game, they will be willing to take part in it. The activity-as-a-game also encourages students to relax, let down their guards, and discover more fluid ways of thinking and participating. Not only are students sharing their well-wrought speculations, but they are also creating a classroom dynamic based on cooperation, participation, and curiosity. When these three elements combine, learning soars.

After the students finish suggesting items to cross out, they are ready to measure their accuracy. In fact, at this point in the activity, students are usually hungry for the right answers. Such a need, based on cognitive and emotional involvement, is crucial if students are going to engage actively with the correct Rushmore article. Such a need also signals the difference between passive and active reading. When such a need is in place, students will then have a clear, self-generated purpose for reading: to find out what the correct information is, to see how closely their speculations match the correct data, and to be surprised.

As soon as they get the article (see Figure 12.4), they begin reading—usually without encouragement. The whole point of the R.I.T.E. activity is to motivate students to want to read the accurate version of the Rushmore article. As they read the article, they naturally engage in comparative thinking. They compare the items they had wanted to be deleted from the first article with their counterparts in the second article. By comparing data, students are also performing a critical reading task. They will use the fewest possible clues in the text to create meaning. As the students read the accurate article, they read selectively, carefully, critically, and energetically.

After reading and discussing both articles, the teacher should then invite students to use both Mount Rushmore articles as models for their own research and writing. Students should select one item from the list (see Figure 12.1), research it, and then write both an error-ridden and an accurate article. The purpose is to have students share their erroneous articles with the class, who then tries to ascertain which statements in the article are incorrect. The students who wrote the articles then share the correct versions. Based on the R.I.T.E. activity, students become teacher-experts on a particular topic.

Moreover, by writing and sharing their own articles based on the R.I.T.E. activity, students will find an important way to enhance their literacy development by making the reading-writing connection. Such a connection results in productive thinking, which is grounded in the dynamics of synthesis; “productive thought occurs when internal imagination and external experience coincide” (Root-Bernstein & Root-Bernstein, 1999, p. 24). As students construct their various articles, they blend their external experiences (accurate information) and internal imagination (fictive data) in ways that are unique, individual, and delightful.

After students research their topics by investigating at least two different informational texts, they create articles packed with misleading information. In order to create their articles, however, they have to understand the purposes of their writing, which is to inform and to mislead. They also have to confront concerns of content by changing correct information to incorrect and by adding sentences and paragraphs that contain false information. They also need to be concerned with the elements of style, because the article they construct must have a journalistic, objective tone. Furthermore, they will need to be cognizant of matters of organization and structure as they arrange information (which should be grouped under subtopics, such as location, purposes, designer, cost, visitors, etc.) into logically organized paragraphs.

Students have created wonderful articles with titles such as “The St. Louis Arch: The Design That Inspired a Hamburger Chain”; “Big Ben: The Clock That Time Forgot”; “The Leaning Tower of Pisa: The Building’s Right, The World’s Wrong”; and “The Great Wall of China: Stacks of Dinner Plates That Saved a Nation.”

Students will certainly enjoy the R.I.T.E. activity. But, more importantly, they will learn to negotiate the reading and writing of informational texts—two yoked skills that nourish the gift of literacy.

de Bono, E. (1990). Lateral thinking. New York: Harper & Row.

Hunt, R. (1993). Texts, tabloids, and utterances: Writing and reading for meaning in and out of the classroom. In S. B. Straw & D. Bogdan (Eds.), Constructive reading (pp. 113–129). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Langer, E. (1997). The power of mindful learning. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

Panati, C. (1987). Extraordinary origins of everyday things. New York: Harper & Row.

Root-Bernstein, R., & Root-Bernstein, M. (1999). Sparks of genius. New York: Houghton Mifflin.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.