For some reason, Language Arts people have difficulty seeing that scientists read and write in the normal course of their work, and that young students love reading and writing about matters that we call "science." So, while there is a natural melding of multiple language skills in doing real science, that rarely translates to the classroom. In our project, the introduction of Whole School Reform meant that each school was required to choose from among 6 or 7 models of WSR (all bought from private education groups who seem to have made big profits). Some of the models are very rigid and provide scripts for teaching reading all morning. Some of the readings may (or may not) be on science topics, and they may (or may not) be integrated with the science curriculum. There are lots of people working at cross-purposes! One or two of the models require that the school develop a theme for teaching and some of our participating schools chose a science theme, such as "biodiversity" or "aerospace." These few schools could easily integrate the science into many areas of curriculum, but the others had much more difficulty. No one in any of these WSR districts has actually tackled the problem of requiring the WSR consultants to integrate the WSR planning with the district's adopted curriculum!!! (Makes me nuts!) So far it is hard to say if any of these WSR models is actually improving reading skills.

--Jackie Willis