Close Reading in the Early Grades Participant Workbook Core Knowledge Foundation 801 East High Street Charlottesville, VA 22902 434.977.7550 © 2015 Core Knowledge Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0 Creative Commons Licensing You are free: •to Share — to copy, distribute and transmit the work •to Remix — to adapt the work • Under the following conditions: •Attribution — You must attribute the work in the following manner: • This work is based on an original work of the Core Knowledge® Foundation made available through licensing under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. This does not in any way imply that the Core Knowledge Foundation endorses this work. •Noncommercial — You may not use this work for commercial purposes. •Share Alike — If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under the same or similar license to this one. • With the understanding that: •For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. The best way to do this is with a link to this web page: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ © 2015 Core Knowledge Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ Close Read Planning Process Adapted for elementary educators from http://www.achievethecore.org/ela-literacy-common-core/text- dependent-questions/ Step 1: Identify Key Ideas Read the entire text to identify and record the key understanding and ideas. Step 2: Identify Knowledge Demands Re-read entire text to identify and highlight/annotate the knowledge demands of the text. Look for elements of the text that represent life experiences, cultural knowledge, and content knowledge that may be similar to or different from students’. Step 3: Identify Language Demands Re-read the text and identify and highlight/annotate the language demands of the text. Look for elements of language in the text that illustrate levels of meaning, conventionality or clarity, or purposeful structure. In particular, look for vocabulary, text structures, and literary devices that support understanding of the key ideas, meaning, and purpose of the text. Step 4: Select Passage Use annotations to select the excerpt that would serve as an appropriate passage for a close reading. Use the volume and frequency of your annotations to scaffold fewer or more elements of complexity to meet your students’ needs. Step 5: Craft Culminating Activity Craft an idea for a culminating activity/assessment, based on the reading that will allow students to demonstrate understanding of key ideas presented in the text. Step 6: Craft Text-dependent Questions Create text-dependent questions to guide discussion, focusing on the language and knowledge demands of the text. Begin with questions that foster confidence and proceed to questions that coherently build understanding. Step 7: Ensure Alignment Identify and record the standards addressed via the text-dependent questions. Revisit culminating activity/assessment to ensure that the activity allows students to demonstrate key objectives of the close reading and mastery of the stated standards. 1 © 2015 Core Knowledge Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0 Close Reading Planning Tool (4.) Passage: Note page(s) # from selection of text (1.) Core Understandings and Key Ideas from Text: Identify the key insights and/or understandings students need to extract from the text (5.) Culminating Assessment: Develop an assessment focused on key ideas or understandings that reflect (a) mastery of one or more of the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (CCSS ELA), (b) involves writing (or speaking—primary grades), and (c) is structured to be completed by students independently. (7.) Standards: Identify and record the CCSS ELA addressed via the text-dependent questions. (2.) Knowledge (3.) Vocabulary (3.) Structure (3.) Literary Devices (6.) Text Dependent Questions Look for elements of Look for targeted Look for complex Look for elements of • Ask literal, inferential, and evaluative text-based questions: the text that contain vocabulary, including: sentences and the text containing : o Literal questions assess students’ recall of key details from the assumptions regarding read aloud; these questions require students to paraphrase • general academic syntactic structure, • literary devices students’ depth of and/or refer back to the portion of the read-aloud which the (Tier 2) and domain- including: knowledge. This o imagery specific answer to the question is provided. These questions specific (Tier 3) • pronoun referents includes: o metaphors generally address CCSS (RL._.1) and (RI._.1) vocabulary • temporal and/or • students’ similes Inferential questions ask students to infer information from the • multiple meaning causal relationship o o cultural/literary text and think critically; these questions require students to words – definition or and meaning of o personification knowledge paraphrase and/or refer back to the different portions of the synonym in this text specific conjunctions o onomatopoeia • read-aloud that provide information leading to and supporting the extent of their context; discussion • words that signal • voice or narrator of the inference they are making. These questions generally address life experiences of possible meanings transitions breaking a particular text CCSS (RL._.2–RL._.5), and (RI._.2–RI._.4; RI._.6). • students’ content/ • meaning of complex sentences excerpt Evaluative questions ask students to build upon what they have discipline-specific figurative or with clauses into o learned from the text using analytical and application skills; these knowledge idiomatic speech separate parts questions require students to paraphrase and/or refer back to the • specific word choice portion(s) of the read-aloud that substantiate the argument they and nuances of are making or the opinion they are offering. Evaluative questions meaning might ask students to describe how reasons or facts support specific points in a read-aloud, which addresses CCSS (RI._.8). Evaluative questions might also ask students to compare and contrast information presented within a read-aloud or between two or more read-alouds, addressing CCSSS (RL._.9) and (RI._.9). • Begin with a “winnable” question that will help orient students to the text. • Sequence the questions to build a gradual understanding of the key details of the text. Sections of the text that might pose difficulty due to dense information and/or that require making inferences and/or connections to previously read texts or knowledge should not be the initial questions asked. #’s 1-7 reference the Close Reading Planning Process—an adaptation of A Guide to Creating Text Dependent Questions for Close Analytic Reading (www.achievethecore.org) 2 © 2015 Core Knowledge Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0 Common Core State StandardS for engliSh language artS & literaCy in hiStory/SoCial StudieS, SCienCe, and teChniCal SubjeCtS Figure 2: Qualitative Dimensions of Text Complexity Levels of Meaning (literary texts) or Purpose (informational texts) • Single level of meaning Multiple levels of meaning • Explicitly stated purpose Implicit purpose, may be hidden or obscure Structure • Simple Complex • Explicit Implicit • Conventional Unconventional (chiefly literary texts) • Events related in chronological order Events related out of chronological order (chiefly literary texts) • Traits of a common genre or subgenre Traits specific to a particular discipline (chiefly informational texts) • Simple graphics Sophisticated graphics • Graphics unnecessary or merely supplementary to understanding the text Graphics essential to understanding the text and may provide information not otherwise conveyed in the text Language Conventionality and Clarity • Literal Figurative or ironic • Clear Ambiguous or purposefully misleading • Contemporary, familiar Archaic or otherwise unfamiliar • Conversational General academic and domain-specific Knowledge Demands: Life Experiences (literary texts) • Simple theme Complex or sophisticated themes • Single themes Multiple themes • Common, everyday experiences or clearly fantastical situations Experiences distinctly different from one’s own • Single perspective Multiple perspectives • Perspective(s) like one’s own Perspective(s) unlike or in opposition to one’s own Knowledge Demands: Cultural/Literary Knowledge (chiefly literary texts) • Everyday knowledge and familiarity with genre conventions required Cultural and literary knowledge useful • Low intertextuality (few if any references/allusions to other texts) High intertextuality (many references/allusions to other texts) Knowledge Demands: Content/Discipline Knowledge (chiefly informational texts) • Everyday knowledge and familiarity with genre conventions required Extensive, perhaps specialized discipline-specific content knowledge required • Low intertextuality (few if any references to/citations of other texts) High intertextuality (many references to/citations of other texts) Adapted