Reader-Based and Teacher-Centered Instructional Tasks: Writing and Learning about a Short Story in Middle-Track Classrooms

This study describes how and what 2 classes of middle-track 10th-graders wrote and learned when their teacher employed reader-based and teacher-centered instructional tasks for discussing and writing about a short story. The students wrote an analytic essay in response to the story and completed 3 posttests of story understanding. Retrospective interviews of 4 case-study students were analyzed to examine the students' thinking and reasoning, and...