The research question examined for this capstone was “How does the integration of science and/or social studies standards with language arts standards impact the reading comprehension of upper elementary students? Topics explored in the literature review were different models of integration, such as CORI - Concept of Oriented Reading Instruction; Science IDEAs - In-Depth Expanded Application of Science; Dr. Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences; and project-based learning. Additional literature was examined on how background knowledge and vocabulary impact reading comprehension. A teacher professional development workshop was developed as the project to educate teachers about the benefits of integrated instruction. The workshop also included examination of reasons adults read and how teachers currently teach reading in the upper elementary classroom. Combined elements of the Science IDEAs and project-based integration models of teaching provided the structure to a redesigned upper elementary school day along with components in a lesson plan template. The second half of the teacher professional development workshop was a modeled integrated science and language arts lesson plan, where teachers became the students. Research on background knowledge and vocabulary were interspersed throughout the modeled lesson plan. The goal of this project was to persuade upper elementary teachers to use integrated curriculum of content and language arts standards as much as they can to increase opportunities for students to acquire new background knowledge and vocabulary knowledge which has demonstrated to have a positive impact on reading comprehension
