Deep Reading: Teaching Reading in the Writing Classroom

Arguing that college-level reading must be theorized as foundationally linked to any understanding of college-level writing, editors Patrick Sullivan, Howard Tinberg, and Sheridan Blau continue the conversation begun in (2006) and (2010). Measurements of reading abilities show a decline nationwide among most cohorts of students, so the need for writing teachers to thoughtfully address the subject of reading, especially in grades 6–14, has become increasingly urgent. Curriculum and state standards often reflect an impoverished and reductive understanding of reading that views readers as passive recipients of information, fueling the widespread use of standardized tests to measure proficiency in English literacy, and ignoring decades of reading scholarship that positions readers in more complex relationships with the texts they read. Contributors to this collection—high school teachers, college students who discuss the challenges they faced as readers and writers, and composition scholars—offer an antidote to this situation. These authors: