THE COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS: GETTING READY AND GETTING IT RIGHT

1
THE COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS GETTING READY
AND GETTING IT RIGHT

• Meredith and David Liben
• Student Achievement Partners
• dliben_at_studentsachieve.net
• mliben_at_studentsachieve.net
• www.achievethecore.org for resources

2
NEED TO MAKE THREE TIGHTLY INTERRELATED
INSTRUCTIONAL SHIFTSWashoe knows these as the 6
ELA Shifts

• Regular practice for all students with complex
  text and its academic vocabulary
• 2. Reading and writing (speaking and listening)
  grounded in evidence from text
• 3. Building knowledge through content-rich
  nonfiction and informational texts

3
Why the CCSS Emphasis on Complexity?

• Between the Lines ACT 2006 Study
• Complexity Gap between 12th grade and college and
  career demands
• 6th Grade McGuffey Reader circa 1961 was more
  difficult than average high school anthology is
  now
• Too many students never get to complex text

4
WHAT ARE THE FEATURES OF COMPLEX TEXT?

• Subtle and/or frequent transitions
• 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
• Longer paragraphs
• Any text structure which is not story-like or
  less story-like

5
FEATURES CANNOT BE BROKEN DOWN AND SEQUENCED

• Complex text can contain any possible combination
  of these features
• Cant possibly isolate these or control for these
  features in a scope and sequence or traditional
  skill based approach
• Where does that leave you?

• Subtle and/or frequent transitions
• 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
• Longer paragraphs
• Any text structure which is not story-like or
  less story-like

6
TEXT DEPENDENT QUESTIONS AND CLOSE ANALYTIC
READING (CAR)

• Every text is complex in its own way
• CAR requires making questions to unpack unique
  complexity of any text so students learn to read
  complex text independently and proficiently
• Standard 10
• Virtually every standard is activated during the
  course of every CAR
• Standards 2-9
• To do this questions have to be text dependent
  and focused on what makes the text complex
• Text dependent questions require text based
  answers otherwise known as evidence
• Standard One
• How is this emphasis shown in the reading
  standards?

7
Standard One
Standard Ten
Bands
11-CCR
9-10
6-8
4-5
2-3
K-1
Bands
11-CCR
9-10
6-8
4-5
2-3
K-1
Increased Ability to Use Text Evidence
Increasing Range and Complexity
Standards Two through Nine
8
EMMA LAZARUS POEM

• An example of close analytic reading at the 4th
  to 5th grade band

9
IS COMPLEXITY THE SAME AS DIFFICULTY?

• Subtle and/or frequent transitions
• 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
• Lack of words, sentences or paragraphs that
  review or pull things together for the student
• Longer paragraphs
• Vocabulary
• Any text structure which is not story-like or
  less story-like

• IN TERMS OF DIFFICULTY TWO OF THESE STAND
  OUTWHICH TWO DO YOU THINK THEY ARE?
• IMPLICATIONS

10
WHAT ELSE CAN BE DONE?of complex
text

• The once a month each subject equals 3 times a
  month transition plan This brings in
  informational text
• Alternatives to front loading
• Remediating ahead of the class not behind
• Going back into the text later
• Worthy portions
• Complex portions
• Rewriting the tasks and questions in the
  basals/anthologies
• Gradated text series on one topic
• First read in native language
• No Spitting

11
ELA TOTAL PROGRAM

• Securing the Core for All (handout)

12
CONCLUSION

• Reach out around the country, but with caution
• Start thinking about new materials, but with
  caution
• Modify or develop your own materials with
  confidence that you are addressing professional
  development and curriculum needs simultaneously,
  richly and cost effectively!

13
TEXT COMPLEXITY RESOURCES an incomplete set of
resources

• www.achievethecore.org (Student Achievement
  Partners resources)
• Publishers Criteria (for 3-12 and K-2)
• Close Analytic Reading Exemplars
• Qualitative scales for evaluating text
  complexity
• www.Textproject.org wonderful, free informational
  texts and information
• Open access portals for new text complexity
  quantitative measurement tools
• Words Worth Teaching Andrew Biemiller
• Educational Publishers Professional Development
  such as this conference
• Kansas, Vermont, Iowa, Florida State Ed Dept
  Common Core resources
• Alliance for Excellent Education website
  (publications tab)
• McKeown and Beck Rethinking Reading
  Comprehension Instruction Reading Research
  Quarterly 44(3) see notes below for full
  citation.