Session 3: CKLA Overview and Design
Principles of the Listening and Learning Strand
Goals and Outcomes
Overarching Objectives of the August 2014 Network Team Institute







Participants will be able to explain the significance of starting instruction with the most frequent or least ambiguous sounds.
Participants will be able to identify ways the Listening and Learning strand supports children’s comprehension and
background knowledge.
Participants will be able to identify evidence of quality practice within the implementation of the Listening and Learning strand.
Participants will be able to identify the instructional and support materials (e.g., cards, posters) required for Skills strand
implementation.
Participants will be able to identify evidence of quality practice within the implementation of the Skills Strand.
Participants will be able to articulate the assessment procedures and the purpose of tools they will encounter in the first 60
days of instruction.
Participants will identify the factors involved when considering flexible grouping options.
High-Level Purpose of this Session

This session is designed to give participants a deeper understanding of the guiding instructional design principles around
which the Listening and Learning domains were created. The three key Listening and Learning strand principles include: 1.
The connection between oral and written language parallel reading and writing development and is supported in CKLA
through read alouds. 2. CKLA systematically builds background knowledge essential to strong comprehension. 3.
Vocabulary learning is most efficient when it is content-based, contextualized, and constant.
Related Learning Experiences
This two day training is designed as a curricular kick-off to support instructional leadership teams and teachers who plan on
implementing Core Knowledge Language Arts (CKLA) in the coming school year. While this training module is a new launch,
individuals who have participated in previous CKLA sessions can use this as an opportunity to reground in the content. This
module will not extend beyond the content of previous trainings.
During the first day of training, participants will develop a deep understanding of the guiding instructional design principles
around which the two strands of CKLA (Listening & Learning and Skills) were created. “Lessons learned” from the field will
also be shared, and participants will have an opportunity to reflect as a team on the instructional implications. Participants will
also have an opportunity to review materials of the Listening & Learning strand and see implementation in action. The
second day will orient participants to the Skills strand of the CKLA. Participants will have an opportunity to use materials,
curricular lesson types, and support tools critical to high-quality implementation (including tools for assessment, placement,
grouping, and monitoring of students). Finally, participants will be provided resources to facilitate home-to-school connections
about CKLA. This includes a turnkey presentation for a back-to-school night, answers to key frequently asked questions, and
a highlight of embedded curricular materials to support connections between the home and classroom.
Session Outcomes
What do we want participants to be able to do as a result of
this session?
In this session participants will be able to:
 Describe how the domain structure of the Listening
and Learning strand supports children’s
comprehension and background knowledge.
 Identify at least two ways the Listening and Learning
materials support vocabulary learning.
How will we know that they are able to do this?
Participants will demonstrate their understandings
through activities, discussions, and questioning.
Session Overview
Section
Time
Overview
Section 1: The
Design Principles of
the Listening and
Learning strand
25 min.
Participants will examine the
design principles of the
Listening and Learning Strand.
These include: 1. CKLA uses
read-alouds to support oral
language skills that underlie
and parallel reading and writing
skills. 2. CKLA Systematically
Builds Knowledge. 3. CKLA
stays on topic to foster the
most efficient word learning.
Prepared Resources

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rinciplesLL_BestyRossPassage

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rinciplesLL_WordWeb

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rinciplesLL_Reflection

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rincipleLL_Royal Family

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rincipleLL_CCSSp33

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rincipleLL_Sequence

August2014_Session3_DesignP
rincipleLL_WordWebSample
Facilitator’s
Preparation

Session Roadmap
Section 1: The Design Principles of the Listening and Learning
Time: 25 minutes
Strand
Time
min.
Slide #/Pic of Slide
Slide 3
Script/Activity directions
Key Points:
This section is designed to give participants
a deeper understanding of the guiding
instructional design principles around which
the Listening and Learning domains and
lessons were created. The three key
principles include:
1. Background knowledge is essential to
strong comprehension.
2. Vocabulary learning is most efficient
when it is content-based,
contextualized, and constant.
3. The connection between oral and
written language development must
be supported.
Grouping
WG
Slide 4
Slide 5
Slide 6
WG
Slide 7
Key Points:
WG
 Researchers who study the development
of language in young children point out
that oral language development precedes
and is the foundation for written language
development.
 Receptive language precedes expressive
language, so children typically understand
before they speak, speak before they
read, and read before they express
themselves in writing.
 Children’s oral language competence is
strongly predictive of their facility in
learning to read and write. A child’s
listening and speaking vocabulary, and
even mastery of syntax, set boundaries


Slide 8
as to what they can read and understand
no matter how well they can decode.
It is helpful to understand that the brain is
hard wired for oral language development
– it happens naturally so long as a child is
exposed to/hears language being spoken:
it is a natural learning process that takes
place implicitly, as long as the necessary
exposure and modeling occurs.
The brain is not hard wired for reading
and writing – it has to be explicitly taught
– it comes after oral language and builds
upon the oral language foundation.
Key Points:
WG
 Meta-analysis by Thomas Sticht shows
that listening comprehension outpaces
reading comprehension on most
measures until the middle school years
(Grade 6, 7, 8).
 The takeaway message is clear and
obvious: we must devote at least as much
time during the language arts block to
reading aloud to young children as we
currently devote to providing children with
the skills they will need to decode and
encode language.
Slide 9
Key Point:
Written language uses richer vocabulary
than conversational language
WG
Slide 10
Key Points:
 The Standards, (Appendix A,) also
highlight the growing complexity of texts
students must read to be ready for the
demands of college and careers.
 The standards build a staircase of text
complexity so that all students are ready
for the demands of college and career
level reading no later than the end of high
school.
 To build knowledge and language
demands, students are provided with
systematic instruction in the Common
Core Reading Standards: Foundational
Skills. This is provided in the Skills
Strand of CKLA.
WG

Slide 11
Skills readers focus on explicitly taught
phonics, increasing in complexity by
involving the letter-sound
correspondences that have been
explicitly taught. By the end of second
grade, students begin to read rich, grade
appropriate, content-based informational
texts on their own.
Key Points:
 In the Listening and Learning strand, the
read alouds build on prior learning, ever
increasing the ability to comprehend
texts.
 Because listening comprehension
outpaces reading comprehension, the
L&L strand allows us to expose students
to more complex texts.
 By staying on topic ( for 2-3 weeks), the
domains provide repeated exposure to
both academic and domain specific
vocabulary
 Collaborative conversations include
intentional opportunities for students to
constantly build the vocabulary they need
to access grade level complex texts.
 By focusing strategically on
comprehension of pivotal and commonly
found words (predict, describe, compare,
and dictate) and also on domain-specific
vocabulary (such as root, stem, and
petal) teachers constantly build students
ability to access more complex texts and
Slide 12
Slide 13
read aloud across the content areas.
Activity:
Read passage on Betsy Ross and answer
questions.
Key Points:
• Simple texts, like those on reading tests
are filled with gaps—presumed domain
knowledge—just like the gaps in the
Betsy Ross passages.
• The author assumes the reader knows
something.
I
WG
Slide 14
Key Points:
Knowledge helps resolve ambiguity—as in
the case of multi-meaning words.
WG
Slide 15
Key Points:
Even simple or common words can be
ambiguous in a text.
WG
Slide 16
Key Points:
• The Listening and Learning Strand is
comprised of content-rich, knowledge
building read-alouds.
• This content knowledge will help
students “fill in gaps” and “resolve
ambiguity.”
Slide 17
Key Points:
 CKLA teaches respect for diverse
peoples and cultures.
 In addition to teaching key skills,
CKLA’s primary goals are to start
students on the path toward acquiring
(1) the knowledge that speakers and
writers assume literate adults have
and (2) the depth and breadth of
knowledge needed to fully grasp the
importance of diversity to human
history and current affairs.
WG
Slide 18
Slide 19
Key Points:
• The CCLS call for systematic building of
knowledge within and across grades.
• In this section, we will investigate what it
means to build knowledge systematically
and the concept of domain immersion.
WG
Slide 20
Key Point:
WG
Knowing things allows us to expend the
smallest amount of cognitive capacity on
processing lower-order aspects of a problem
so that more cognitive capacity is available
for higher levels
Slide 21
Key Points:
• The example in the CCLS demonstrates
what it means to build knowledge
systematically across grades.
• Being systematic and, more importantly,
coherent within a grade provides support
for student learning that doesn’t rely on
past experiences.
WG
Slide 22
Key Points:
WG




Each Listening and Learning domain
outlines the prior knowledge students will
have regarding the topic.
The Listening and Learning domains are
intentionally sequenced to build prior
knowledge. If implemented using the
recommended sequence, students will
have been exposed to the content listed
here as prior knowledge.
The domains build upon one another
within and across the grades.
Can you see any connections within the
grade? Across the grades
Slide 23
Slide 24
WG
Key Points:
WG
•
•
Vocabulary learning takes place
primarily through implicit exposure
rather than explicit instruction.
This example serves as an expedited
model of how word learning occurs.
Slide 25
Key Points:
• Repetition is key to vocabulary learning
• Learning words in context makes word
learning more efficient.
• Staying on topic, as the Listening and
Learning strand does, facilitates word
learning.
WG
Slide 26
Key Points:
WG
•
•
Words about a topic are connected in a
network.
Connections among words are
facilitated by materials, like the Listening
and Learning strand that are written
explicitly to tell a story for the purpose of
knowledge and vocabulary building.
Slide 27
Key Points:
We are going to look at how words connect
within the Kings and Queens Kindergarten
Anthology.
Slide 28
Key Points:
S
In this activity we will investigate the text of a
read-aloud to see how the language and
vocabulary are connected.
Slide 29
Key Points:
 What we are doing here is visually
showing how networks or webs of words
begin building. Obviously we are not
showing every word we can.
 Nor are we showing how the words that
are ‘activated’ in your brain when you
hear a story or paragraph like that we just
heard also link to other words in your
brain.
 But we want to give you a flavor of how
connections among words are facilitated
by materials that are written explicitly to
tell a story for the purpose of knowledge
and vocabulary building.
 The network of words grow fast and are
intensely interconnected.
Slide 30
Read passage.
Slide 31
Key Points:
 The way that the paragraph is written, it
explicitly helps many of these links form.
 Little is left up to inference for children.
 Rather the story, while interesting, is also
very clearly designed to start building
connections of the idea of king to broader
concepts of power, money, and royalty.
Slide 32
Read passage.
Slide 33
Key Point:
 The growth is pretty amazing. In one
story, these words and links were
created.
 The value of non-fiction read alouds is
this very explicit knowledge and
vocabulary building that we see
visualized here.
 The value of non-fiction is these sorts of
webs are impressive within a single story.
Slide 34
Key Points:
•
Slide 35
The exponential vocabulary support that
can be had from non fiction is through a
series of stories on a similar topic and
related topics in other Domains
Activity:
 Please work as a table, using the
instructions provided on this slide.
 Be prepared to share some of your
table’s ideas with the larger group.
WG
Slide 36
Key Points:
 Think about how those word webs are
created for each read aloud, on a daily
basis for 12 plus read alouds per domain
and how that builds a foundation of word
knowledge systematically that students
have access to when listening to read
alouds in domains in later grades.
 Staying on topic within a domain helps to
build the depth, context and
comprehension students need to support
reading writing, listening and speaking
WG
Slide 37
Key Points:
• Equity is an additional value to staying on
topic.
• Jumping from topic to topic privileges
those kids who already know something
about the topic.
WG
Slide 38
Key Point:
WG
Participants reflect on the value of building
knowledge systematically.
Turnkey Materials Provided

August2014_Session3_DesignPrinciplesLL_PPT