Resource for Educators: Subjects Matter: Every Teacher's Guide to Content-Area Reading

Subjects Matter: Every Teacher’s Guide to Content-Area Reading
By: Harvey Daniels and Steven Zemelman
Daniels, H., & Zemelman, S. (2004). Subjects Matter: Every Teacher's Guide to Content-Area Reading. Chicago: Heinemann.

This phenomenal resource should be in every teachers classroom, whether they are a reading teacher or not. Subjects Matter takes the time to break down a variety of reading strategies and activities for all teachers, no matter what subject is being taught. Many teachers often forget that their subjects involve reading, just as much as Language Arts! Daniels and Zemelman (2004) invite professionals to examine concepts such as “How Smart Readers Think,” “Why Textbooks Are Not Enough,” “Tools for Thinking: Reading Strategies Across the Curriculum,” and many more thought-provoking topics.

One specific topic Daniels and Zemelman touch upon is vocabulary development. They offer teachers a few simple, yet interesting techniques to promote vocabulary development within the classroom. The first activity requires students to work in groups to dissect three to six vocabulary words they are currently studying. The groups are asked to fill out at graphic organizer that lists the “target word,” “where the topic is found,” “parts of the word that is recognized,” “examples”, “what the word means,” “why it is important,” “where the word is used,” and “how it connects to other words.” By completing these organizers, students should be able to discover more about each of the words than they had known previously (Daniels et. al., 2004).

Another intriguing activity for students to complete is a “Vocabulary Tree.” In this inquiry, the students are to draw a tree with the word resting in it’s trunk. As the students learn more about the word at hand, they can draw branches to help make connections. For example, if the word is “polynomial,” the student’s roots may say “Poly=many” and “Nomial=number.” Some of the branches may include examples of “monomial,” “binomial,” and “trinomial” (Daniels et. al., 2004). Using the tree image can help students see how vocabulary truly is interconnected, just like the branches on a tree.

Using Daniels and Zemelman’s book in your classroom could open up a myriad of reading and vocabulary experiences for the students. When students are able to make personal connections, while seeing how words in general relate, they will better be able to add important words to their lexicon.