Unraveling the Common Core
State Standards and
Frameworks
District Learning Day
Location goes here
Session time goes here
August 5, 2015
Do Now
• Do now activity goes here
Norms
• Be present and engaged.
• Be respectful of differences in perspective
while challenging each other productively and
respectively.
• Monitor “air time.”
• Make the most of the time we have.
• Stay focused on students.
Objectives
Know
The CCR expectations for student learning across grade levels
How to support student reading readiness through appropriate
grade-level instruction and curricular documents
Understand
The knowledge, skills, and habits students need to be successful
with grade level tasks
Do
Utilize specific instructional strategies that will enhance
students’ instructional practices
Utilize District curriculum guides, pacing charts, and textbook
resources to plan instruction effectively
Context for presentation – Include the
WHY and WHAT.
• Highlight any article, book, relevant research, or data
to support your presentation
What do the instructional shifts really mean?
PEDAGOGICAL SHIFTS FOR INSTRUCTION
Instructional 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
Sequencing Texts to Build Knowledge
• Texts are not randomly chosen.
• Students build knowledge about the world through TEXT
rather than through the teacher or through activities.
• Texts, within and across grade levels, need to be selected
around topics or themes that systematically develop the
knowledge base of students.
Through Content-Rich Nonfiction: Why?
• Students are required to read very little informational
text.
• Non-fiction makes up the vast majority of required 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.
Summary
There should be a balance of literary and informational
texts used in your classroom.
Shift 1
Building
knowledge
through
content-rich
nonfiction
Knowledge in the Disciplines
• English/Reading – syntax (the way in which linguistic
elements (as words) are put together to form constituents
(as phrases or clauses); mechanics (the application of
standard rules of grammar, spelling, punctuation); and literal
(explicit) and figurative (implicit) meaning
• Social Studies – the interaction between ideas, individuals
and events using sources (primary and secondary); bias and
credibility
• Science – interpreting; analyzing; synthesizing;
questioning/forming hypotheses (etic and emic)
• Technical Subjects – accuracy; authority and corroboration;
and literal (explicit) meaning
Summary
• The standards address knowledge in all of the disciplines.
Shift 1
Building
knowledge
through
contentrich
nonfiction
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 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.
Text-Dependent Questions and Text-Based Responses
• The standards call for students to ask questions that require
students to return to the text for the answer.
• Students should engage in rich and rigorous evidencebased conversations about the text.
• Students are required to produce original text characterized
by an emphasis on the use of evidence from sources to
inform or make an argument.
Shift 2
Reading, writing
and speaking
grounded in
evidence from
text, both
literary and
informational
Content Shift #2
Text-Dependent Questions
Not 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?
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Text-Dependent
What makes Casey’s experiences at bat
humorous?
What can you infer from King’s letter
about the letter that he received?
•
“The Gettysburg Address” mentions the
year 1776. According to Lincoln’s
speech, why is this year significant to
the events described in the speech?
•
Think Pair Share
• Insert Activity for participants to practice
creating a text dependent question.
Why?
•
Gap between complexity of college and high school
texts is huge.
•
What students can read, in terms of complexity is the
greatest predictor of success in college (ACT study).
•
Too many students are reading at too low a level.
(<50% 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.
Shift 3
Regular
practice
with
complex
text and its
academic
language
What are the Features of Complex Text?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Subtle and/or frequent transitions
•
•
Longer paragraphs
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
Any text structure which is less narrative and/or mixes structures
14
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.
15
Considerations for ELL/SPED
• Instruction must include both “macro-scaffolding,” in which teachers
attend to the integration of language and content within and across
lessons and units, as well as “microscaffolding” during the “moment-tomoment work of teaching.”1
• In order to develop the ability to read complex texts and engage in
academic conversations, ELs and SPED population need access to such
texts and conversations, along with support in engaging with them.
• With support, ELs can build such repertoires and engage productively in
the kinds of language and literacy practices called for by the Standards for
both ELA and other disciplines
1
Bunch, George C., Amanda Kibler, and Susan Pimentel. "Realizing Opportunities for English Learners in the Common Core English
Language Arts and Disciplinary Literacy Standards." Understanding Language, Stanford University. Web.
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“.
•
Text dependent questions require text-based answers –
evidence.
Virtually every standard is activated during the course of
every close analytic reading exemplar through the use of
text dependent questions.
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What’s Common about the Common Core State Standards?
COMMONALITIES IN THE STANDARDS
Activity
• Participants will compare and contrast the
standards and find the commonalities.
What do the standards really mean?
INTERPRETING THE STANDARDS
Activity
• Participants will examine and analyze the
reading informational standards to determine
the meaning of each standard.
• This activity will assist teachers in knowing
which direction to lead students as they teach
and demonstrate each standard.
How are the standards and the curriculum documents
connected?
THE CONNECTION: STANDARDS AND
CURRICULUM
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•
•
•
•
Airtight Activity:
MODELING
Have the facilitator MODEL the skill.
Align the activity to the objective
Check for participants’
understanding
Give explicit instructions to your
activity
Have participants give feedback
•
•
•
•
Reflection:
MODELING
What resonated with you?
What is similar to your current
practice?
What is different than your current
practice?
What are you going to change as a
result?
Title of section 2 goes here, for
example, “Application to your
Classroom”
First section of presentation header goes here in
the form of a question, for example, “How do we
measure successful co-teaching in the inclusion
setting?”
Airtight Activity: Application
(ie – apply to upcoming lesson)
• Align the activity to the objective
• Check for participants’
understanding
• Give explicit instructions to your
activity
• Have participants give feedback
Reflection:
Application
• What was easiest for you?
• What was most difficult?
• What else do you need to learn/do
prior to applying to your classroom?
Closing
Revisit Objectives
Place session objectives here in KUDOS format
What will participants:
• Know
• Understand
• And Be Able to Do as a result of this
presentation?
Next steps and activities for follow up
Describe the next steps and activities for follow up
Reflection:
One minute paper on post-it
• Jot down your “Take-Aways”
• Consider what you need to know and be able to
do to successfully implement what you have
learned in this session.
– What is still unclear?
– What professional development or additional
resources do you need?
District Contacts
• Place district contacts and website
information here