Reading and Analyzing Nonfiction

Many years ago, when I was teaching at Fairview, I was part of a group of teachers that read the book, Reality Checks- Teaching Reading Comprehension with Nonfiction K-5 by Tony Stead.  One of the strategies that he talks about in this book is the R.A.N.(Reading and Analyzing Non-Fiction) strategy.  It is a modification of the KWL chart. I really like this strategy for helping students, when they have misinformation or misconceptions about a topic.  I recently used it to help students when working on informational report writing and doing their research and have seen it being used in a Kindergarten classroom for science instruction. You can use it on chart paper for whole class discussions or as a graphic organizer for independent of small group instruction.  It is a very versatile strategy that helps kids find evidence to confirm their thinking and allows them to clarify misconceptions in content.

.