Flight of the Bumblebee: A Middle School STEM Text Set to Support Development of Disciplinary Literacy Skills

Disciplinary literacy skills are essential for building knowledge in the fields of science and engineering. Teaching these literacy skills is a shared responsibility of middle school science and English language arts (ELA) teacher. But in many U.S. schools, there is often little instructional collaboration between these disciplines. In addition, about 65% of U.S. eighth-grade students are not proficient in reading (NCES 2019). Diverse learners such as English learners (ELs), and students with disabilities or from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds are especially at risk of not acquiring the literacy skills needed for science learning. This article describes new resources based on research and practice for teaching disciplinary literacy skills. Reports from teachers and assessments of their students provide evidence of enhanced instructional collaborations and improved learners' STEM literacy skills.