Essential Questions. Why does the complexity of text used in

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Increasing Text Complexity

• Through Reading, Writing, and Fluency Development

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Essential Questions

• Why does the complexity of text used in
  instruction matter?
• How can thinking through the complexity of text
  we use help us prepare students?
• How can we support students when they encounter
  complex text?
• How can we provide additional support for
  students to become independent in comprehending
  complex grade level text?

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Reading is....

• Reading is an active and complex process that
  involves
• Understanding written text
• Developing and interpreting meaning and
• Using meaning as appropriate to type of text,
  purpose, and situation (NAEP Framework, 2008)
• Reading is the single most important educational
  skill students will learn. As students move up in
  grade levels text demand significantly increases.

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not all reading is created equal

• Many students are engaged in shallow reading,
  skimming text for answers, focusing only on
  details and failing to make inferences in order
  to integrate different parts of the text. Years
  of reading in this superficial way will cause a
  students reading ability to deteriorate.
• For many students the decline of text demands in
  the courses that they take has both an immediate
  and long term impact on student achievement.

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NAEP Results - 2011

• At grade 4, the percentages of students
  performing at or above Basic, at or above
  Proficient, or at Advanced did not change
  significantly from 2009 to 2011 but were higher
  in 2011 than in 1992 .
• At grade 8, the percentage of students performing
  at or above the Proficient level in 2011 was
  higher than in 2009 and 1992 (figure C). The
  percentage of students at Advanced in 2011 (3.4)
  was higher than in 2009 (2.8). The percentage of
  students at or above Basic did not change
  significantly from 2009 to 2011 but was higher in
  2011 than in 1992.
• For Florida Scores were not significantly
  different from 2009 for either 4th or 8th grades.

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Reading Between the Lines ACT Findings

• Question type and level (main idea, word
  meanings, details) is NOT the chief
  differentiator between students scoring above and
  below the benchmark.
• The degree of text complexity in the passages
  acted as the sorters within ACT. The findings
  held true for both males and females, all racial
  groups, and was steady regardless of family
  income level.
• What students could read, in terms of its
  complexity--rather than what they could do with
  what they readis greatest predictor of success.

ACT, 2006
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RESULTs

• A huge gap exists between reading demands at the
  end of high school and college, equal to 350L
  (Lexile) or the Lexile difference between 4th
  grade and 8th grade NAEP texts!
• 20 of college freshman require remedial reading
  courses (NCES, 2004b).
• Only 30 of students enrolled in any remedial
  reading course went on to receive a degree or
  certificate (NCES, 2004).
• Over 75 of surveyed students who dropped out
  indicated that difficulty with reading was a
  major contributing factor (Lyon, 2002).

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The Crisis of Complexity

• The complexity of texts which students are
  expected to handle during K-12 has eroded
• Complexity of high school textbooks has declined
  in all subject areas over several decades.
• Average length of sentences in K-8 textbooks has
  declined from 20 to 14 words.
• Vocabulary demands have declined (e.g., 8th grade
  textbooks demands are equivalent to former 5th
  grade texts 12th grade anthologies are
  equivalent to former 7th grade).

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The Crisis of Complexity, Continued

• Complexity of college and careers texts have
  remained steady or increased
• Lexile scores of college textbooks have not
  decreased in any block of time since 1962 and in
  fact have increased (Stenner, Koons, and Swartz
  in press).
• Vocabulary difficulty of newspapers has remained
  stable (Hayes, Wolfer, Wolfe, 1996).
• Word difficulty of scientific journals and
  magazines 19301990 has increased since 1930
  (Milewski, Johnson, Glazer Kubota, 2005)

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Turn and talk

• What is the impact of this research on our work
  today?

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Text Complexity

• Included within the Standards is an enhanced
  focus on text complexity. Specifically, within
  reading standard 10
• Anchor Standard
• R.CCR.10 Read and comprehend complex literary and
  informational texts independently and
  proficiently.
• Example Grade-level Standard (6th grade)
• RI.6.10 By the end of the year, read and
  comprehend literary nonfiction in the grades 6-8
  text complexity band proficiently, with
  scaffolding as needed at the high end of the
  range.

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Just as it is impossible to build muscles
without weight resistance, its impossible to
build robust reading skills without reading
challenging text. The Challenge of Challenging
Text Shanahan, Fisher, Frey
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Looking at text through new lenses

• Chocolate Fever Tangerine
• Lexile 680 Lexile 680
• What factors might be used then to differentiate
  these texts?

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Thinking about text complexity.

• Chocolate Fever Tangerine
• Listen as I read an excerpt of each, think about
• What about this text is supportive for the
• reader? What about this text is challenging for
• the reader?

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Determining Text Complexity

• Gone are the days when text was judged as
• difficult solely on the basis of sentence
  length and
• syllable count. We know that many factors
  affect text complexity. With this increased
  understanding, teachers do not have to rely on
  intuition to figure out what their students can
  handle. Instead, teachers can select texts
  worthy of instruction and align their
  instructional efforts to ensure that all their
  students read complex, interesting, and important
  texts.
• 
  Shanahan, Fisher, and Frey, 2012

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What Factors Make Text Complex?

• Vocabulary
• Domain-Specific and Academic Terms
• Sentence Structure
• Simple v. Complex Short v. Long Density
  Embedding Language Punctuation
• Coherence
• Connections
• Organization
• Straightforward v. Varied
• Background Information
• Developmental, Experiential, and Cognitive

Shanahan, Fisher, Frey, 2012
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Vocabulary
Powerful Predictors of Complexity
Syntax
Liben, D. and Liben, M., 2012.
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Stretch Break
Take 2-3 minutes to stretch and say hello to your
table mates.
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Text Complexity

• Text complexity is defined by

Qualitative measures levels of meaning,
structure, language conventionality and clarity,
and knowledge demands often best measured by an
attentive human reader
Quantitative measures readability and other
scores of text complexity often best measured by
computer software.
Reader and Task considerations background
knowledge of reader, motivation, interests, and
complexity generated by tasks assigned often best
made by educators employing their professional
judgment.
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Determining Complexity - Digging Deeper

• Using available resources to determine the text
• complexity of materials

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Determining Text Complexity

• A Four Step Process

• Determine the quantitative measures of the text.

Quantitative
Qualitative

• Analyze the qualitative measures of the text.

Reader and Task

• Reflect upon the reader and task considerations.

• Recommend placement in the appropriate text
  complexity band.

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Step 1 Quantitative Measures
The Quantitative Measures Ranges for Text
Complexity This document outlines the suggested
ranges for each of the text complexity bands
using

• Lexile Text Measures

---or---

• ATOS Book Levels (Accelerated Reader)

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Step 2 Qualitative Measures

• Measures such as
• Text structure and organization
• Language Demands and Conventions
• Knowledge Demands
• Levels of Meaning/Purpose
• Content analysis
• Visual supports

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Step 2 Qualitative Measures cont

• A tool to qualitatively measure texts
• Qualitative Features of Text Complexity

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Step 2 Qualitative Measures

• A companion tool to this is
• Qualitative Dimensions of Text Complexity Chart
• The rubric for literary text and the rubric for
  informational text allow educators to evaluate
  the important elements of text that are often
  missed by computer software that tends to focus
  on more easily measured factors.

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Step 3 Reader and Task

• Considerations such as
• Motivation
• Knowledge and experience
• Purpose for reading
• Proficiency of language
• Complexity of task assigned regarding text
• Complexity of questions asked regarding text

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Step 4 Recommend placement in the appropriate
text complexity band
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TEXT COMPLEXITY AND THE GROWTH OF COMPREHENSION

• Whatever they are reading, students must also
  show a steadily growing ability to discern more
  from and make fuller use of text, including
  making an increasing number of connections among
  ideas and between texts, considering a wider
  range of textual evidence, and becoming more
  sensitive to inconsistencies, ambiguities, and
  poor reasoning in texts. (CCSS Page 8)

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Instructing with Complex Text
Knowledge of text complexity can help teachers
design three important components of literacy
instruction building skills, establishing
purpose, and fostering motivation.
Building Fluency
Reading
Writing
Vocabulary Syntax
Multiple Interactions Motivation / Purpose
Text Dependent Questions Other Responsive Writing
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Teacher Role in Fostering Independent Reading
with Grade Level Text
As independent reading ability increases..teacher
scaffolding decreases.
Scaffolding
Independence
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Scaffolding for Independence
Scaffolds enable all students to experience the
complexity of the text, rather than avoid it. 

• Scaffolding should support students in
  negotiating the text, but not exempt them from
  doing the hard work of grappling with text.
• Many students will need careful
  instructionincluding effective scaffoldingto
  enable them to read at the appropriate level of
  text complexity.
• Scaffolding is support and is not an alternate,
  simpler source of information that diminishes the
  need for students to read the text itself
  carefully.

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Instructing with Complex Text Through Close
Reading
Over time, as students read with purpose, they
develop background knowledge and a deeper
understanding of the organizational structures
authors use to convey information. This
understanding gives students access to
increasingly complex texts.
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Instructing with Complex TextClose Reading
HOW ?
Opportunity for Struggle

• Not the entire text
• Doesnt have to be the beginning
• Opportunity to discuss a question following the
  reading (Read, Think, Discuss)

Student has task

• Teacher models then students re-read
• Building Background Knowledge
• Analyze the text
• Promote Interaction

Responsive Writing
Seek evidence within text

• Text dependent questions

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Unlocking Text Through Close Reading
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Break 10 minutes
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Observing Close Reading
Coleman Expert Think Aloud on Close Reading
Close Reading in Action with Students
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Instructing with Complex TextPlanning for Close
Reading

• Reflective questions
• What supports do my students need before they
  begin reading a passage?
• What strategies will assist them to read the text
  with purpose and clarity?
• How can I encourage re-reading to facilitate
  deeper meaning?
• What kinds of collaborative activities will help
  deepen their understandings?
• How can I help students who need more
  scaffolding?
• Without my assistance what will students take
  away from this reading?

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Lets Practice

• Words We Live By Your Annotated Guide to the
  Constitution. From The Preamble We the
  People

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The Text Monk, Linda R. Words We Live By Your
Annotated Guide to the Constitution

• The first three words of the Constitution are the
  most important. They clearly state that the
  peoplenot the king, not the legislature, not the
  courtsare the true rulers in American
  government. This principle is known as popular
  sovereignty. But who are We the People? This
  question troubled the nation for centuries. As
  Lucy
• Stone, one of Americas first advocates for
  womens rights, asked in 1853, We the People?
  Which We the People? The women were not
  included. Neither were white males who did not
  own property, American Indians, or African
  Americansslave or free. Justice Thurgood
  Marshall, the first African American on the
  Supreme Court, described the limitation
• for a sense of the evolving nature of the
  constitution, we need look no
• further than the first three words of the
  documents preamble we the
• people. when the founding fathers used this
  phrase in 1787, they did not
• have in mind the majority of Americas citizens .
  . . the men who gathered
• in Philadelphia in 1787 could not... have
  imagined, nor would they have
• accepted, that the document they were drafting
  would one day be
• construed by a Supreme Court to which had been
  appointed a woman
• and the descendant of an African slave.
• Through the Amendment process, more and more
  Americans were eventually included in the
  Constitutions definition of We the People.
  After the Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment
  ended slavery, the Fourteenth Amendment gave
  African Americans citizenship, and the Fifteenth
  Amendment gave black men the vote. In 1920, the
  Nineteenth Amendment gave women the right to vote
  nationwide, and in 1971, the Twenty-sixth
  Amendment extended suffrage to eighteen-year-olds.
  

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Writing in Response to Reading

• Implications
• Common Core puts greater emphasis on the use of
  evidence in writing
• Writing will need to be more closely integrated
  with reading comprehension instruction
• The amount of writing about what students read
  will need to increase
• Greater emphasis on synthesis of information and
  critical essays than in the past

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Instructing with Complex TextResponsive Writing

Direct Note Taking
Student Generated Questions
Writing
Reflective Analysis
Text Dependent Questions
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Instructing with Complex TextResponsive Writing
Text Dependent Questions

• The Common Core State Standards for reading
  strongly focus on students gathering evidence,
  knowledge, and insight from what they read.
  Indeed, eighty to ninety percent of the Reading
  Standards in each grade require text dependent
  analysis accordingly, aligned curriculum
  materials should have a similar percentage of
  text dependent questions.

How can we ASK text dependent questions if we
dont know how to WRITE them?
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Turn and Talk

• What has been most helpful for you so far?
• What additional questions do you still have?
• At your table, write your questions on sticky
  notes. (Facilitators will collect)

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How to Craft Text Dependent Questions

• A text dependent question specifically asks a
  question that can only be answered by referring
  explicitly back to the text being read.
• It does not rely on any particular background
  information extraneous to the text nor depend on
  students having other experiences or knowledge.
• A Guide to Creating Text Dependent Questions,
  JRF

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Closed Sorting ActivityText Dependent Question
Cards

• Use the selection from the Words We Live By
• Sort question cards into two piles TEXT
  DEPENDENT and NON-TEXT DEPENDENT QUESTIONS.
• Share out

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Text Dependent Text Dependent Text
Dependent
NON-Text Dependent
Text Dependent Text Dependent
NON-Text Dependent NON-Text Dependent
NON-Text Dependent
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CRAFTING TEXT DEPENDENT QUESTIONS
YOUR TURN !

• SELECT A TEXT FROM THE EXEMPLAR SET AND WORK IN
  TEAMS TO CREATE TEXT DEPENDENT QUESTIONS TO
  ACCOMPANY THAT TEXT

Tuskegee Airmen
Depression in Teens could be diagnosed with blood
test
Because of Winn Dixie
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Instructing with Complex TextBuilding Fluency

• True fluency is not merely lining up one sentence
  after another and reading them aloud quickly
  it's also maintaining understanding across a
  text.
• Shanahan, T, Fisher, D., and Frey, N., 2012

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Instructing with Complex TextBuilding Fluency
Vocabulary
Building Fluency
Syntax
Oral Reading
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Instructing with Complex TextRole of Vocabulary
in Fluency Building
Building Fluency
Vocabulary
What role does it play in fluency building?
Why should we consider vocabulary when
instructing with complex texts?
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Instructing with Complex TextRole of Syntax in
Fluency Building
Building Fluency
Syntax
Pronoun references
Punctuation and Clauses
Sentence Structure
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Syntax Detective Activity
http//www.flhsmv.gov/handbooks/EnglishDriverHandb
ook.pdf
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• No Two Texts Are Alike
• Considering Vocabulary and Syntax
• Which Text Is More Complex?

https//www.lexile.com/analyzer/
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Text Dependent Questions That Support Fluency
Development

• Using the same text exemplar which was used to
  write text dependent questions earlier, circle
  sample text dependent questions that support
  students to notice vocabulary or syntax.
• Discuss with a partner the things you notice
  about these questions and how you think they
  would support fluency development.

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Instructing with Complex TextBuilding Fluency
through Oral Reading
Building Fluency
Oral Reading

• Re-reading is an important tool for enhancing
  comprehension.
• Meaningful repetition cements learning.
• Learning is enhanced through group interaction.
• Performance motivates students.
• Comprehension is RECIPROCAL to oral
  interpretation.
• Meaningful use of rhythm aids memory of key
  concepts.

Repeated Reading
Radio Reading
Echo Reading
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Instructing with Complex TextBuilding Fluency
Increase Your Pedagogy
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Reflection
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References

• ACT . (2006) . Reading between the lines What
  the ACT reveals about college readiness in
  reading. American College Testing. Available
  on-line http//www.act.org/research/policymakers/
  pdf/reading_report.pdf
• Common Core State Standards .(2010). Common core
  state standards for English language arts and
  literacy in history/social sciences, science, and
  technical subjects Appendix A Research
  supporting key elements of the standards and
  glossary of key terms. Retrieved January 10,
  2012, from www.corestandards.org/assets/Appendix_
  A.pdf
• Fisher, D ., Frey, N. (2012, January). Text
  complexity and close reading. Engaging the
  adolescent learner.
• Graham, S., Hebert, M. ( 2010). Writing to Read,
  Evidence of how writing can improve reading.
  Carnegie Corporation of New York.
• Hayes, D.P., Wolfer, L.T., Wolfe, M.F. (1996).
  Sourcebook simplification and its relation to the
  decline in SAT Verbal scores. Educational
  Leadership, volume 69, 58-62.

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References cont

• Liben, D. Aspects of text complexity project why
  complex text matters.
• Liben, D. and Liben, M. (March 7, 2012). Text
  complexity research project and educational
  implications, draft.
• Livingston, A., and Wirt, J. (2004). The
  Condition of Education 2004 in Brief (NCES
  2004076). U.S. Department of Education, National
  Center for Education Statistics. Washington, DC
  U.S. Government Printing Office.
• Lyon, G. R. (2002). Testimonies to Congress
  19972002. Covington, LA Center for Development
  Learning.
• Milewski, G.B., Johnsen, D., Glazer, N., Kubota,
  M. (2005). A Survey to Evaluate the Alignment of
  the New SAT Writing and Critical Reading Sections
  to Curricula and Instructional Practices. College
  Board.
• National Assessment Governing Board. (2008).
  Reading framework for the 2009 National
  Assessment of Educational Progress . National
  Assessment of Educational Progress. Washington,
  DC. US Department of Education.

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References cont

• National Center for Education Statistics (2011).
  The Nations Report Card Reading 2011. (NCES
  2012457). Institute of Education Sciences, U.S.
  Department of Education, Washington, D.C.
• Opitz M. Rasinski T.(1998) Good-Bye Round
  Robin 25 effective oral reading strategies.
  Portsmouth, NH Heinemann. 
• Rasinski, T. Ph.D.. Making Oral Reading an
  Authentic and Effective Part of Your Intermediate
  Grade Curriculum Making Oral Reading an
  Authentic and Effective Part of Your Middle and
  Secondary Grade Curriculum.
• Shanahan, T, Fisher, D., and Frey, N. (2012,
  March). The challenge of challenging text.
• Stenner, A.J., Koons, H., and Swartz, C.W (in
  press) Text complexity and developing expertise
  in Reading. Chapel Hill, NC MetaMetrics, Inc.
• Varlas, L. (April, 2012). Its complicated,
  Common Core State Standards focus on text
  complexity. Educational Update, volume 54,
  number 4.