“FALL” INTO THE
COMMON CORE!
ELA: Focus on Collaborative Conversations & Writing
FCUSD Instructional Focus Meeting
Sara Parenzin
September 20, 2012
Welcome!
Please sign in and start the
Name Tag Mixer
We will begin at 3:10PM!
“Fall” into the Common Core!
 September 20: ELA – Collaborative
Conversations & Writing
 January 24: Math – Math Practice 3 & Math
Discourse
 March 21: ELA & Math - Best CCSS Practices
“Fall” into the Common Core!
 Teacher as Learner
 Teacher as Professional
 Teacher as Practitioner
Session Outcomes
Today we will…
 Learn about Speaking & Listening and
Writing strands in California’s Common Core
State Standards
 Explore what collaborative conversations are
and why they are important to students’
success
 Explore the communicative purposes of
writing applications – to persuade, to explain,
and to convey experiences
 Consider implications for teaching
Teacher as Learner
 Why is collaborative discussion important in
the classroom?
 Review Structure of the CCSS
 Reading
 Writing
 Speaking & Listening
 Language
Teacher as Professional
 “Including but not limited to skills necessary for
formal presentations, the Speaking and Listening
standards require students to develop a range of
broadly useful oral communication and
interpersonal skills. Students must learn to work
together, express and listen carefully to ideas,
integrate information from oral, visual,
quantitative, and media sources, evaluate what
they hear, use media and visual displays
strategically to help achieve communicative
purposes, and adapt speech to context and task.”
Council of Chief State School Officials and
National Governor’s Association (2010)
Teacher as Practitioner
 Locate your handout of the CCSS for ELA and
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turn to the speaking and listening standards.
How many are there?
What are the subheadings within the strand?
Read the standards for your grade
level and the grades immediately
before and after
What do you notice about the standards?
 Share one thing that stands out to you with your
table group
 In grade _____ something different is…
 In grade _____ something the same is…
Teacher as Practitioner
 Trace the progression of Standard #1
 College and Career Readiness Anchor
Standard #1
 “Prepare for and participate effectively in a
range of conversations and collaborations
with diverse partners, building on others’
ideas and expressing their own clearly and
persuasively.”
Teacher as Practitioner
 Trace the progression of Standard #1 cont.
 Read Speaking and Listening Standard #1, K-12 to
explore the progression
 As you read through the standards, highlight or
underline the specific actions or tasks students are
expected to perform at each grade level
 Share your observations with your table partners
 Discuss parts of the standards that you are
currently including in your classroom and what
you will begin to incorporate into your
instructional practice as you transition to the
CCSS.
Teacher as Practitioner
 Connect to the Curriculum
 How do the CCSS correspond to what you
already have in your curriculum?
 Take a look at your TE and focus on the next 4-6
weeks of instruction
 Are opportunities provided frequently for students
to have collaborative conversations? Are they
explicitly stated?
 If not, use post-it notes to note opportunities for
students to engage in collaborative conversations
 Discuss what you need to do to ensure that you
are providing opportunities for students to
develop the skills necessary to engage in
collaborative discussions
Putting it into Practice
 Establish norms for classroom conversations
 Give students multiple opportunities for
discussions with their peers (whole class,
small group, or with partners)
 Explicitly teach discussion strategies and
provide sentence frames, stems to scaffold
discussion for ELLs or struggling learners
 This is not exclusive to ELA; encourage
collaborative conversations in H/SS, science,
and math, too!
Teacher as Learner/Professional
 Writing is …
 “The activity or skill of marking coherent words on
paper and composing text.”
 “Researchers, conscious of how social influences
shape the composing process, define writing as an
action shaped by its intended goal and by the
expectations of a reader.”
 “Moreover, writing is not merely a school-based
practice but a lifelong skill used to accomplish
specific goals and convey particular messages
within community and workplace settings.”
Teacher as Professional
 To Persuade: Convince an audience to take
action or change a viewpoint on a variety of
topics important to others (e.g., peers, school,
the nation)
 To Explain: Seek to present information and
ideas to others in a manner that aids
understanding of a topic
 To Convey Experience, Real or Imagined: Bring
real or imagined experience to life for readers
using descriptive details, voice, style, reflection
and evocation of emotional response
National Assessment Governing Board (2011)
adapted from Writing Framework for 2011 NAEP
Teacher as Practitioner
 Locate the writing standards in your CCSS
packet
 How many are there?
 What are the subheadings within the strand?
 Text Types and Purposes
 Production and Distribution of Writing
 Research to Build and Present Knowledge
 Range of Writing
Teacher as Practitioner
 Read the standards for your grade level and
the grades immediately before and after
 What do you notice about the standards?
 Share one thing that stands out to you with your
table group (e.g. new, different, or same)
 In grade _____ something new is…
 In grade _____ something different is…
 In grade _____ something the same is…
Teacher as Practitioner
 Trace the progression of a Writing Standard
 Read Writing Standard #1, #2, or #3, K-12 to
explore the progression
 As you read through the standards, highlight or
underline the specific actions or tasks students are
expected to perform at each grade level
 Share your observations with your table partners
 Discuss parts of the writing standards that you are
currently including in your classroom and what
you will begin to incorporate into your
instructional practice as you transition to the
CCSS
Teacher as Practitioner
 Connect to the Curriculum
 How do the CCSS correspond to what you
already have in your curriculum?
 Take a look at your TE and focus on the next 4-6
weeks of instruction
 Identify opportunities for opinion, informative
explanatory, and narrative writing.
 Use post-it notes to identify opportunities for
“quickwrites” on the writing applications that are
less evident in your upcoming lessons
 Discuss what you need to do to ensure that you
are addressing the CCSS in your writing
instruction
Putting it into Practice
 Establish a community of writers in your
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classroom, that includes you!
Give students multiple opportunities to write
with their peers (whole class, small group, or
with partners)
Explicitly teach writing genres/strategies and
provide scaffolding for ELLs or struggling
learners
This is not exclusive to ELA; think of
opportunities to write in H/SS, science, and
math, too!
Just write!
“Fall” into the Common Core!
 Exit Ticket
 I learned…
 I valued…
 I’d like more information about…
 Comments…
*no need to write your name, but if you could please
write your grade level on your exit ticket, that will help
us organize needs & concerns by grade level!
Thank you!