Text Citation or Link	Rationale for Choosing	Text Frame(s)	Strategies Used and Resource
Extended Thinking Example	How many gold atoms make gold metal?	Explains how the development of technology encourages new information that can be applied in real-world situations. This article examines changes in the electronic properties of nanometer-sized pieces of gold, which can be used in short-term storage of energy or even electric charge so this information is being used to develop bioimaging and sensing. This article discusses how technology proposes a new	Synthesizing Compare/contrast	Discussion Web (McLaughlin & Buehl)

            Discussion web is a great strategy for students use in their education when working with text information online. Discussions have the opportunity to reflect two sides to every question provided. The teacher can incorporate the strategy of discussion web in the classroom in order to allow students to exchange with one another, which allows the students to have an opportunity to refine their thinking, consider different ideas, and respond to ideas that can challenge their own. The advantages of using discussion web include that students are active participants and develop the skill of collaboration. Students also have a framework that allows them to evaluate both sides of an issue or question leading to opposing evidence and information before their viewpoints are asserted. Students learn to write arguments that support their positions. Classroom discussions are considered an important strategy to help students think.

            Discussion web meets the standards by providing students with the opportunity to read and reread an author’s message. This helps students decode the main ideas of the article by examining interrelationships of the details or ideas. Students can also develop an understanding of the author’s perspective and purpose. Students will integrate these ideas into a visual representation with supporting their arguments. Students will research to compare and contrast multiple texts. Discussion web allows the reading of complex literary and informational texts through collaborative conversations. By performing follow-up writing this allows students to practice using text-based evidence in order to support their arguments. Students will be able to develop their vocabulary by maintaining their attention to word relationships.

            There are many different ways to incorporate discussion web into the classroom to meet the communication needs of the students through reading, writing, speaking, and listening. The teacher can incorporate different questions into the discussion to active prior knowledge and how the new information changed their views. The teacher can assign the students to work in partners in order to develop different views towards the question(s). The teacher can encourage the students to work together to develop a consensus towards the question(s). The teacher can allow a person from each group to justify their conclusion. Each student can be encouraged to write his or her own personal view statements by reflecting on the discussion web.

This article was the perfect topic to incorporate my teammate, Karen, considering she is going into the mathematics content. The article seems to resemble a relationship between biology and chemistry, but it incorporates mathematics as well. We have had a lot of experience with discussion webs while taking online classes. After discussion the article and how we would approach the topic in our different content areas it provided insight on how this article blends with STEM content areas. It is always important to start with an understanding of the article and why it is important in the assigned tasks that the students will receive. After understanding the article’s main points I took the information and broke it up into questions. This allowed me to introduce the discussion web to the students at the right time so they could brainstorm prior information. The four questions are as followed:

1.     Why do you feel that the number of gold atoms behaved differently with understanding that the smaller cluster of 102 gold atoms behaved more like a giant molecule while the larger cluster with 144 gold atoms behaved more like a macroscopic chunk of metal?

2.     When the laser light was shining onto the solution samples it showed that energy dissipated from the clusters and went to the surrounding solvent so why did this happen? What biological process does this resemble?

3.     After reading this article, how did technology create an opportunity for advancement in understanding biology?

4.     Name future technological advances you believe will occur in biology.

I will have students paired with a teammate to have a discussion and develop different views to the questions. After they have had time to discussion the information the students will be placed in groups of four to develop a conclusion to the questions above. There are no right or wrong answers, but I want students to be able to think of different scenarios and reasoning. Students will write their own personal statement reflecting on the discussion and provide an opportunity to review how they applied their prior knowledge to the new information. The idea of this assignment is to encourage students to build on the article from one topic into a broader opportunity.

            I enjoy this literacy strategy because it allows students to become independent thinkers who can develop a hypothesis and support it by providing evidence. These students are developing multiple hypotheses to each question and finding the best solution through group collaboration and research. Students need to build their skills of defending their view through supporting evidence in order to help them find the best possible solution. This builds their decision-making and critical-thinking skills to become problem solvers. Teachers should encourage students to work in groups to expand their ideas and help guide each other, which helps build each other’s skills. Teachers can benefit from this strategy by having the ability to view group discussions and having the opportunity to see various viewpoints. This is a good way to assess students on their level of thinking. Students can benefit from this strategy by developing their ability to expand their information by supporting it with evidence, incorporating other ideas, and become more engaged in their own education.

Buehl, D., (2014) Classroom Strategies for Interactive Learning, 4^th ed. International Reading Association.

McLaughlin, M. (2015). Comprehending Content Area Text. In Content area reading: Teaching and learning for college and career readiness (2nd ed., pp. 57-62). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.

Suomen Akatemia (Academy of Finland). (2015, April 10). How many gold atoms make gold metal?. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 11, 2015 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150410083516.htm