ABSTRACT
Overview is chapter presents how to teach reading and literature in light of the unique demands of tests. Tests require an approach to reading passages that is dierent from the types of reading most of us do in our homes for enjoyment, as well as from the types of academic reading usually required by schools. Certainly reading passages on tests are very dierent from the types of reading most Language Arts teachers want to encourage in their students. e answer is not to create a curriculum centered on reading for tests, because the more time a teacher spends on a test preparation curriculum, the less eective her teaching becomes. Rather, enhancing authentic practices in reading and literature makes students comfortable not only with the two basic types of reading (fact-based and aesthetic), but also with the specic ways students must read the specic
types of passages on tests (poetry, excerpts, and journalistic essays). is chapter also provides a larger framework for understanding the reading curriculum in which tests are situated, including whole language, phonics, and balanced literacy. is chapter also examines how “plot” and “theme” became a normative, if only moderately eective, approach to literature.
