Journaling is an act of agentive note-taking or reflection designed to keep an external thoughts of feelings, insights in more.

The modality of a journal can range from text, to blogs, drawings, and video. The chosen mode often reflects the agency of the author and the discipline of the subject.

Disciplinary literacy refers to instruction that is discipline-specific in nature and attends to the unique ways that experts in each respective field approach and interact with text (Shanahan & Shanahan,2008). A physicists notes will not look like a notebook when critiquing a graphic novel.

Journaling within a subject allows readers and writers to essentially become members of the disciplinary community. They take on the role of disciplinary experts within the pages of the journal and interact with the text in such (Brozoet al., 2013) ways as those who work in the discipline.

The Common Core State Standards, Next Generartion Science Standards, and the 3C Framework for Social studies all call for teachers to support reading and writing with complex texts. Utlizing journals in the discipline (Graham, Kerkhoff, Spires, 2017) either in hybridity with literacy teachers or within the classroom provide the first step.

We must realize note-taking as a monolithic content area skill does not always reflect unique ways of producing external reflections in each discipline. Overall educators must provide (Duffy, 2002; Duke & Pearson, 2002; Fisher & Frey, 2008; Marin & Halpern, 2011) the metacognitive reflection, explicit modeling, and scaffolded approaches. Journaling provides an aevenue while creating assessment artifacts.

In the classroom journaling first revolves around a sense of agency and ownership. We want students to “BE” an historian or a “Newspaper Editor.” This can often include personifying a journal by decorating or picking one to two heroes in the that discipline.

In terms of the Common Core State Standards we are often teaching to the integration of knowledge and ideas, but you embed mini-lessons on author's craft and text structure.

Journaling also provides an opportunity for a more responsive classroom. First you can reclaim the instructional minutes of transitioning into or out of classroom if students walk into a daily prompt

In language arts the discipline focuses on the skills of a literary critic, close reading, and the production of creative texts across a variety of genres and modalities (Warren, 2011; Graham, Kerkhoff, Spires, 2017).

In Language arts you end up with two journals, or bifurcate them from the “free-write” or “writing journal” and the journal for textual analysis and critique where you explore the common threads of human condition that exists in all words and texts.

The writing journal helps us to understand what a child knows, how they know it, and why they value it. Students can respond to daily writing prompts and then pick pieces to develop during writing instruction

Literary Analysis Journal

In terms of literary journals you can break these up by units or novels.

• Vocabulary Section- Students can highlight words that interest them but as a teacher be intentional in the vocabulary words you develop connected to reading novels.
• Plot diagram w/ chapter summaries. Take two pages and have students draw the plot diagram map. They can add key events to the timeline as the story progresses. To eleveate the lesson you can leave the story blank and have students map the shape of the story.
• Predictions Have students write predictions and have them back them up with evidence from the text.
• Character Bios Make player cards or bios for main characters. In younger grades they have graphic organizers shaped like bodies to trace character development.
• Favorite Quotes What moved students in the book. Remember we often pair novels with informational texts or use current events. Quotes about the book do not have to come from the book.
• Connections/Reflections What does the reader bring to the book from their own story. They can write about these connections.