Examples of Close Reading of Complex Texts to Meet the ELA Common Core Standards - Middle School

[Marcy Prager]

Can we start posting lessons that exemplify the "close reading" of complex texts that need to occur when the Common Core Standards go into effect?  I'm particularly interested in 7th grade.  This is the wave of the future ladies and gentlemen.  It would help if we all get a head start.

[Anna J. Small Roseboro]

Thanks for getting the discussion going, Marcy.

Probably one of the challenges in the coming years will be to define what is meant by close reading and what can be expected of students at different grade levels.  We know, in general, this kind of reading means to pay close attention to author's choice of words, sentence structure, selection of images, organization, etc. to help students become both critical readers and effective writers.  We're going to have to teach students the language of literature in order to have conversations that work.

An issue will be deciding who gets to choose passages for close reading and how we teachers can resist the temptation to tell the students rather than letting them decide meaning based on skills we teach them.  How willing will we be to accept diverse readings of the same passage?  How can we teach our students to have confidence in their own responses and observations about a closely read passage?

I hope this is the direction we'll be going. I'll climb down now...:-)

 

I invite you to take a look at some of the lessons in my book TEACHING MIDDLE SCHOOL LANGUAGE ARTS: Incorporating Twenty-First Ce... and also on my website TEACHING LANGUAGE ARTS at the Teacher Resources tab.  You'll find some lessons requiring close reading using art and patterning passage students have analyzed for content and structure.

[Marcy Prager]

Thank you, Anna!  I just ordered your book.  I am a retired elementary teacher as of June after 33 years of teaching.  I almost took a full-time job writing curriculum for middle school e-learning, and declined because I have never taught middle school and did not feel comfortable teaching literacy with "close reading" for that age group, though I feel very comfortable teaching grades 1-4, even grade 5.  Middle school is another whole animal.  I will certainly read your book to see how the younger grades and middle school literacy line up.  Thank you again!

[Anna J. Small Roseboro]

You're welcomed.  Feel free to stay in touch here on POP or directly.  I've done some work with on-line mentoring through the Bay Area Teachers Center (UCSF) and have played around with writing curriculum for on-line learning. I'd be glad to bounce around ideas with you.  [e-mail]