Incorporating New Literacies Through the Use of Nonfiction Texts to Help Support Student Engagement and Literacy Progress in Reading Comprehension

This project introduces and teaches the benefits of incorporating new literacies into the classroom in order to promote student engagement and build upon literacy skills when reading nonfiction texts. It teaches a group of elementary school teachers on how to incorporate new literacies as well as what new literacies to teach and introduce to their classes through the use of technology. Teachers receive hands out experience as well as time to plan out lessons that incorporate the new literacy so that they will use it with their students and collect data on student engagement and progress. New literacies are the core to this project and they help support and enhance the learning expectations of the 21st century common core standards. Teachers will be able to gain new ways to teach nonfiction literacy to all students which include struggling readers as well as English Language Learners. Through a series of six half day professional development sessions, teachers will learn new teaching strategies, utilize them within their classrooms, and discuss their overall experiences with the new literacies. Teachers will also receive a hands on experience for each of the new literacies taught in order to fully understand the new teaching strategies. This project is designed to take place over the course of six months in order for teachers to truly understand the use of each new literacy.