By Miles Romney
Two local educators are being featured in a book designed to increase writing skills and help increase a child”s love of reading.
The editors of a book called “Teaching Ideas for 7-12 English Language Arts: What Really Works” liked the work of award-winning LuAnn Staheli, an English teacher at Payson Jr. High, and BYU”s Brett McInelly, an assistant professor of English at BYU, and decided to include them in the book.
The publisher”s intent is to promote new methods of teaching that were developed among educators. Staheli has been developing her teaching methods for over 25 years and said she has seen great success.
Her focus is getting children to want to read. Using techniques such as partner reading, books on tape and group discussions, she has been able to hook kids when they are young.
She believes readers focus on decoding the words when they are young, but as the child grows up, his or her comprehension of those words declines.
As reading comprehension becomes harder, children quit reading. It”s at this point Staheli focuses her efforts. All her techniques revolve around reading in groups or out loud.
“I don”t think that reading necessarily is an isolated activity, and so I use a lot partner reading,” Staheli said.
She claims this helps children become more excited about reading.
For those kids who really hate to read, she brings in the big guns — books on tape.
“If you take a student who is a complete non-reader and put them on books on tape, they will improve their reading skills just because they have new things given to them,” Staheli said. While Staheli”s efforts have centered on junior high students, McInelly”s techniques target college students and are taught in the college classroom. He said he was a bit surprised when the editors wanted to include his methods in a book focusing on high school age students.
“My teaching idea has more to do with teaching students about writing as persuasive writing,” McInelly said.
He teaches English at BYU, and does not work in secondary education. However, McInelly said the editors “Felt like the teaching idea was very relevant and applicable to high school teachers.”
His method revolves around Shakespeare, but not the way you would expect. McInelly sees Shakespeares” work as a great way to teach English rhetoric. Especially the play Henry the V.
In Shakespeare”s play Henry the V, King Henry gives many speeches that stir and inspire his soldiers to fight. This, claims Mcinelly, is great example of rhetoric. He usually picks two or three scenes to read, has the class analyze the rhetoric used in the scenes and then McInelly shows an adaptation of the play to help the kids visualize rhetoric.
“I want my students to be able to look at the strategies that Henry the V is using,” McInelly said. “And say you know what I can do that in my writing.”
