Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Content Literacy: The Key Shifts

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Common Core State Standards for English Language
Arts and Content Literacy The Key Shifts

• Professional Development Module 1

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The Background of the Common Core

• Initiated by the National Governors Association
  (NGA) and Council of Chief State School Officers
  (CCSSO) with the following design principles
• Result in College and Career Readiness
• Based on solid research and practice evidence
• Fewer, higher and clearer

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The CCSS Requires Three Shifts in ELA/Literacy

1. Building knowledge through content-rich
   nonfiction
2. Reading, writing and speaking grounded in
   evidence from text, both literary and
   informational
3. Regular practice with complex text and its
   academic language

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Shift 1 Building knowledge through content-rich
nonfiction
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Content Shift 1

• Content-Rich Nonfiction
• 50/50 balance K-5
• 70/30 in grades 9-12
• 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.

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Building Knowledge Through Content-Rich
Nonfiction Why?

• Students are required to read very little
  informational text in elementary and middle
  school.
• Non-fiction makes up the vast majority of
  required reading in college/workplace.
• Informational text is harder for students to
  comprehend than narrative text.
• Supports students learning how to read different
  types of informational text.

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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

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Shift 2Reading, writing and speaking grounded
in evidence from text, both literary and
informational
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Reading, Writing and Speaking Grounded in
Evidence from Text Why?

• Most college and workplace writing requires
  evidence.
• Ability to cite evidence differentiates strong
  from weak student performance on NAEP
• Evidence is a major emphasis of the ELA
  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

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Content Shift 2
Text-Dependent Questions
Not Text-Dependent
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?

• What makes Caseys experiences at bat humorous?
• What can you infer from Kings letter about the
  letter that he received?
• The Gettysburg Address mentions the year 1776.
  According to Lincolns speech, why is this year
  significant to the events described in the speech?

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Sample Informational Text Assessment Question
Pre-Common Core Standards

• High school students read an excerpt of James D.
  Watsons 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.

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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. Students
  could develop a method that would fit in the time
  of Tom Sawyer and a method that would incorporate
  items and words from current time. Boys played
  with dead cats and frogs, during Toms time. Are
  there cultural ideas or artifacts from the
  current time that could be used in the charm?

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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 Toms
  hesitations have on Ben?

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Shift threeRegular practice with complex text
and its academic language
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Regular Practice With Complex text and Its
Academic Language Why?

• Gap between complexity of college and high school
  texts is huge.
• What students can read, in terms of complexity is
  greatest predictor of success in college (ACT
  study).
• Too many students are reading at too low a
  level.(lt50 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.

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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 less narrative and/or
  mixes structures

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Scaffolding Complex Text

• The standards require that students read
  appropriately complex text at each grade level
  independently (Standard 10).
• However there are many ways to scaffold student
  learning as they meet the standard
• Multiple readings
• Read Aloud
• Chunking text (a little at a time)
• Provide support while reading, rather than before.

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Close Analytic Reading

• Requires prompting students with questions to
  unpack unique complexity of any text so students
  learn to read complex text independently and
  proficiently.
• Not teacher "think aloud.
• Virtually every standard is activated during the
  course of every close analytic reading exemplar
  through the use of text dependent questions.
• Text dependent questions require text-based
  answers evidence.

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www.achievethecore.org
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Structure of the Standards

• Four Strands Reading, Writing, Speaking and
  Listening, Language
• Each strand has Science/technology and social
  studies standards for literacy
• Text complexity standards are listed by grade
  bands K-1, 2-3, 4-5, 6-8, 9-10, 11-12, CCR
  College and Career Ready)

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Identify the Standard
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Identify the Standard