English Language Arts and Content Literacy: The

English Language Arts and
Content Literacy:
The Key Shifts
College and Career Ready Standards
Implementation Team
Quarterly – Session 1
Today’s Outcomes
The participants will :
• Become familiar with three key shifts in the
English Language Arts Standards.
• Discuss opportunities and challenges the shifts
present for implementation of the standards.
Professional Development Plan
Phase 1 (PD Topics)
 Components of the Course of Study
 Strands (Comparison, New Emphases)
 Vertical Alignment
 Content Movement
 Literacy Standards, Grades 6-12
 Implications for Special Education
Phase 2
 Analyzing the Standards
 Sample Units of Study
 Sample Lessons/Curriculum Development
 Differentiated Instruction for RtI
 Assessment
 Resources
Phase 3
 Continuous Support, based on LEA needs and requests
Prepared Graduate Defined
Knowledge and Skills
Possesses the knowledge and
skills needed to enroll and
succeed in credit-bearing, firstyear courses at a two or four year
college, trade school, technical
school, without the need for
remediation.
Ability to Apply Learning
Possesses the ability to apply core
academic skills to real-world
situations through collaboration
with peers in problem solving,
precision, and punctuality in
delivery of a product, and has a
desire to be a life-long learner.
The Background of the Common Core
According to ACT, Inc.
The Background of the Common Core
Three Key Shifts in ELA/Literacy
1. Building knowledge through content-rich
nonfiction and informational texts.
2. Reading, writing and speaking grounded in
evidence from text, both literary and
informational
3. Regular practice with complex text and its
academic language
Shift #1: Building Knowledge
Through Content-Rich Nonfiction
and Informational Texts
Shift #1: Content-Rich Nonfiction
Grades
Literary
Informational
K-5
50%
50%
6-8
45%
55%
9-12
30%
70%
•
Students learning to read should exercise their ability to
comprehend complex text through read-aloud texts.
•
In grades 2+, students begin reading more complex texts,
consolidating the foundational skills with reading
comprehension.
•
Reading aloud texts that are well-above grade level
should be done throughout K-5 and beyond.
Building Knowledge Through ContentRich Nonfiction: Why?
•
Nonfiction makes up the vast majority of required
reading in college/workplace.
•
Informational text is harder for students to comprehend
than narrative text.
•
Students are required to read very little informational
text in elementary and middle school.
•
Supports students learning how to read different types
of informational text.
Content Shift #1
Sequencing Texts to Build Knowledge
•
•
Not random reading
Literacy in social studies/history, science,
technical subjects, and the arts is embedded
Resources
Page 33 in the CCSS for ELA/Literacy – The Human Body
Processing Key Shift #1
• Extensive research establishes the need for college- and
career-ready students to be proficient in reading BOTH
complex literary text and informational text
independently in a variety of content areas.
• Students must establish a base of knowledge across a
wide range of subject matter by engaging with works of
quality and substance.
• Literacy is a shared responsibility.
Shift #2: Reading, Writing and
Speaking Grounded in Evidence
From Text, Both Literary and
Informational
Reading, Writing and Speaking
Grounded in Evidence from Text: Why?
•
•
Most college and workplace writing requires evidence.
•
Evidence is a major emphasis of the ELA Anchor Standards:
Reading Standard 1, Writing Standard 9, Speaking and Listening
standards 2, 3 and 4, all focus on the gathering, evaluating and
presenting of evidence from text.
•
Being able to locate and deploy evidence are hallmarks of strong
readers and writers.
Ability to cite evidence differentiates strong from weak student
performance on NAEP
Content Shift #2
Text-Dependent Questions
Not Text-Dependent
•In “Casey at the Bat,” Casey strikes
out. Describe a time when you failed
at something.
•In “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,”
Dr. King discusses nonviolent protest.
Discuss, in writing, a time when you
wanted to fight against something
that you felt was unfair.
•In “The Gettysburg Address”
Lincoln says the nation is dedicated
to the proposition that all men are
created equal. Why is equality an
important value to promote?
Text-Dependent
What makes Casey’s experiences at
bat humorous?
What can you infer from King’s letter
about the letter that he received?
“The Gettysburg Address” mentions
the year 1776. According to Lincoln’s
speech, why is this year significant to
the events described in the speech?
Sample Informational Text Assessment
Question: Pre-Common Core Standards
High school students read an excerpt of James D.
Watson’s The Double Helix and respond to the
following:
James Watson used time away from his laboratory and
a set of models similar to preschool toys to help him
solve the puzzle of DNA. In an essay discuss how play
and relaxation help promote clear thinking and
problem solving.
Sample Literary Question: Pre-Common
Core Standards
From The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Have the students identify the different methods
of removing warts that Tom and Huckleberry
talk about. Discuss the charms that they say
and the items (i.e. dead cats) they use. Ask
students to devise their own charm to remove
warts.
Sample Text Dependent Question:
Common Core Standards
From The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Why does Tom hesitate to allow Ben to paint the
fence? How does Twain construct his sentences
to reflect that hesitation? What effect do Tom’s
hesitations have on Ben?
Processing Key Shift #2
• Students must demonstrate the interrelated literacy
activities of reading/listening, gathering evidence about
what is read/heard, and analyzing and presenting that
evidence.
• Students learn how to participate effectively in real,
substantive discussions around text-related topics and
issues to provide them with opportunities to build
confidence and extend knowledge regarding a text by
connecting their ideas with those of others through
reporting their findings.
Shift #3: Regular Practice with
Complex Text and Its Academic
Language
Regular Practice With Complex text
and Its Academic Language: Why?
•
•
Gap between complexity of college and high school texts is huge.
•
Too many students are reading at too low a level.
(<50% of graduates can read sufficiently complex texts).
•
Standards include a staircase of increasing text complexity from
elementary through high school.
•
Standards also focus on building general academic
vocabulary so critical to comprehension.
What students can read, in terms of complexity is the greatest
predictor of success in college (ACT study).
Measuring Text Complexity
•
•
•
•
Levels of meaning
Structure
Language conventionality
and clarity
Knowledge demands
•
•
Qualitative
Readability measures
Other scores of complexity
Quantitative
Reader and Text
•
•
Reader variables such as motivation, knowledge, and experience
Task variables such as purpose and the complexity generated by the task
assigned and the questions posed
What are the Features of Complex
Text?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Subtle and/or frequent transitions
•
•
Longer paragraphs
Multiple and/or subtle themes and purposes
Density of information
Unfamiliar settings, topics or events
Lack of repetition, overlap or similarity in words and sentences
Complex sentences
Uncommon vocabulary
Lack of words, sentences or paragraphs that review or pull things
together for the student
Any text structure which is less narrative and/or mixes structures
Activity: Exploring Text Complexity
From Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
There was nothing so VERY remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it
so VERY out of the way to hear Rabbit say to itself, “Oh dear! Oh
dear! I shall be late!” (when she thought it over afterwards, it
occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the
time it all seemed quite natural): but when the Rabbit actually
TOOK A WATCH OUT OF ITS WAISTCOAT-POCKET, and looked
at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed
across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a
waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with
curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in
time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.
Processing Key Shift #3
• In order to prepare students for the complexity of
college- and career-ready texts, each grade level requires
a “step” of growth on the “staircase”.
• Students read the central, grade appropriate text around
which instruction is centered. Teachers create
opportunities for close and careful reading, and provide
appropriate and necessary scaffolding and supports so
that it is possible for students reading below grade level.
• Students constantly build the vocabulary they need to
access grade-level complex texts.
Video
ELA & Literacy: 6 Shifts Condensed into 3 Shifts
1.
50:50 info text to lit (K-5)
2.
70:30 info text to lit (6-12)
3.
Appropriately complex text
4.
5.
6.
Text-dependent questions
Writing to inform/argue
based on evidence
Academic vocabulary vs.
domain-specific vocabulary
1.
2.
3.
Building knowledge
through content-rich
nonfiction and
informational texts.
Reading and writing
grounded in evidence
from text.
Regular practice with
complex text and its
academic vocabulary.

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