Answer: CCLS expects and demands that all students have a chance to productively struggle with complex texts. Students need opportunities to strengthen their reading abilities but to also experience satisfaction and pleasure of easy fluent reading. Close reading is 80% of the ELA CCLS. WHOA!
Question: What are the opportunities during the course of the instructional day? How can we maximize these opportunities?
Answer: Close reading of text involves investigation of a short piece of text with multiple readings and deconstructing of text. Students analyze through discussion and reading and will appreciate things such as vocabulary, form, tone, imagery,word choice, authors message, etc.
Here's the dealio. We want students to grapple with advance concepts and participate in collaborative discussions. This is what will make them better thinkers. I've seen this first hand in Reader's Workshop. I had 3 kids last year who were just stuck on a level B. Every time I tested them they just weren't meeting the mastery. So, I experimented by just pushing them up a level. They saw the other students around them moving up and I know they desired the same. As soon as I pushed them up I noticed their decoding skills improve along with their fluency. Two out of my three strugglers ended up moving to a D by June. They still weren't on grade level but progress is progress. Let's face it.
This brings me to my next question...
Question: How do we determine complexity of a text?
Answer: There are three major components that go into selecting a complex text for your kiddies.
- Qualitative Measures - Aspect of text complexity, word/paragraph/sentence length, number of pages
- Qualitative Measures - Aspect of complexity, layout, meaning, structure, clarity, purpose
- Reader/Task Consideration - How much prior knowledge do your students bring to the table?
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