Reading for Intermediate and Advanced Learners, Fall, 2011

I was intrigued by the Point of View Strategy, presented in Diane Lapp’s column for the International Reading Association. This strategy can be easily used in Reading/Language Arts classes, but it can also be effective in other content areas as well. With this strategy the students delve deeply into texts – both fictional and nonfictional – to the point that they can portray or assume a new perspective. Lapp said that the student should “acquire deep insights allowing them to view life as ‘the very hungry caterpillar,’ ‘the rainbow fish,’ or even America’s first president. However, in order to accurately portray such a character, the students have to think about how that character would feel, what events would look like to that character, what that character would think.