Escape Velocity: How Narrative Immersion Can Revolutionize Reading Education

James Flanagan

ISBN 10: 1736383000 / ISBN 13: 9781736383001

Published by Contrapposto Press 2021-06-30, 2021

About this Item

Seller Inventory # 6666-IUK-9781736383001

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Escape Velocity: How Narrative Immersion Can Revolutionize Reading Education
• Publisher: Contrapposto Press 2021-06-30
• Publication Date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1736383000
• ISBN 13: 9781736383001
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

There is a superior approach to reading instruction. All students, but particularly students from low-income households, need immediate access to well-written, high-interest books from diverse perspectives and authors. Students need a high-volume of daily prosodic modeling and reading practice, and they need agency in determining the course of their study. I call this systematic approach to meeting these needs in the classroom narrative immersion.


Narrative immersion creates the right atmosphere for students to have autotelic reading experiences every day, and counters the dark pull of social media with face-to-face social literacy. When we align reading instruction with students’ emotional and learning needs we not only have more engaged, motivated, and happier students; but additionally, we achieve highly significant growth in vocabulary and comprehension.


The combination of joy, intrinsic motivation, curiosity, and freedom needs to be a daily experience for all of our children, and when we strive for it with intense, deliberate practice, we can achieve stunning results. Narrative immersion is a classroom structure that any teacher or school is capable of implementing, and the classroom structure every child deserves.

About the Author

James Flanagan, MA Ed., teaches English and Language Arts in the School District of Philadelphia. He also conducts practitioner research focusing on engagement, high-volume reading, choice, and prosodic audiobook modeling. He has contributed to the Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, The Writing Teacher's Companion, and Literacy Today, and also copresented at the International Literacy Association's National Conference. James has been a reading teacher in Philadelphia since 2002.