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Close Reading for the Social Studies Classroom, 6-12Primary SourceSusan Zeiger, PhD

+Think-Pair-Share

Think of a challenging text you read with students this year. Why did you choose it? What did you want students to understand after they read it? What instructional strategies did you use? When you anticipated /encountered difficulties, how did you

help students through them?

Share your story with your partner. Listen to his/hers.

+WORKSHOP AGENDA

Close Reading & Text Dependent Questions (TDQs): definitions and concepts

Activity 1: Close Reading of an Exemplary Text

Activity 2: Use of Supporting Texts & Integration of Multiple Texts/ Text Types

BREAK

Activity 3: Reading for a Purpose: Designing Your Own TDQs

Activity 4: A Reading Strategy for Students: Talk-Alouds for Visual Texts

Evaluation & Closing

+Close Reading

Critical examination of text with repeated readings

Intended for students “to assimilate new textual information with their existing background knowledge and prior experiences to expand their schema” (Fisher & Frey, 2012, p. 179)

Support students as independent readers

Fisher, D. & Frey, N. (2012). Close reading in elementary schools. The Reading Teacher, 66(3), 179-188.

+Close Reading: Key Features(Fisher & Frey, 2012)

Complex Texts

Short Passages

Limited and Strategic Frontloading

Repeated Readings

Text-Dependent Questions

Annotation

Fisher, D. & Frey, N. (2012). Close reading in elementary schools. The Reading Teacher, 66(3), 179-188.

+Selecting Sources

Not all texts require close reading

Excerpts that support overall understanding, key ideas, key terms (short but complex)

Knowledge of the text is key!

Text Complexity

+Adapting Sources for Accessibility Focusing

Ellipses 200 – 300 words

Simplification Conventional syntax, spelling, punctuation

Presentation 16 pt font White space

Other supports/scaffolding (visual clues; vocabulary)

Wineburg, S., & Martin, D. (2009). “Tampering with history: Adapting Primary Sources for Struggling Readers.” Social Education, 73(5), 212 – 216.

+Text-Dependent Questions

Questions that require answers from the text

Not just recall questions

Use text evidence to make inferences beyond what is written in text

Progression from explicit text to implicit meanings from the text(s)

Can also include prompts for discussion and writing

Questions that help students understand the key historical significance and understandings of the text

+Example: Emancipation Proclamation (1863)– 150 years!

“I do order & declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States…are, and henceforward shall be free.”

“Upon this act,…I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind & the gracious favor of Almighty God.”

+Non-example/Example of Text-Dependent Questions

How did African Americans in 1863 feel about the issuing of the Proclamation?

How did Lincoln feel the American public would react to the issuing of the Proclamation?

NOT Text-Dependent Text-Dependent

+Text-Dependent Questions

Key Ideas and Details

general understandings, key details, who, what, where, when, why, how, themes, central ideas

Craft and Structure

vocabulary, text structures, syntax, meanings, language, organization

Integration of Knowledge and Ideas

Inferences, arguments, opinions, intertextual connections

+Activity #1Close Reading of an Exemplary Text using Multiple Readings & Text Dependent Questions

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What do you want students to consider and know from a reading of this document?

What Common Core skills do you want them to develop by working on this document?

A United Nations Report: “The Impact of Armed Conflict on Children” (1996)

+Procedure for the Activity

1)Read the text independently & annotate with these in mind:

What ideas, details & features are most important?

What might be difficult for your students?

What vocabulary stands out, and why?

What important understandings could this text help students develop?

2)Discuss with your partner:

For your class, what student understanding would you regard as the most important “take-away” from this text?

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Student understanding: How does the United Nations do its work? What tools & strategies are available to international NGOs?

CCSS Reading Standards 1(read closely; cite evidence) and 10 (read independently)

Close Reading a UN Report:What are our learning goals? (ex.)

+TDQ: Key Ideas and Details Who was the author/creator of this source?

Where did the author get his/her information?

What phrase/sentence indicates the author’s main purpose in writing this document?

Who is the intended audience for this document? What tells you this answer?

What is recommended for teachers to teach the children who are survivors of war?

+TDQ: Craft and Structure

Using clues in the text, what do you guess to be the meaning of the phrase “international community”?

What words give away the author’s feelings about children in war zones? Point to your evidence.

What are the text features that you notice most about this document?

How are the four sections of the report related, and how is each part different?

What is the specific purpose of part III? Of part IV? Why do the sections appear in this order?

How does the author hope the reader will react to this report? Point to your evidence.

+TDQ: Integration of Knowledge and Ideas Is the style and language of the text a good match for its

main purpose? State why or why not. Use evidence from the text to support your answer. (Writing prompt)

Based on your reading of the text, do you think the United Nations is a powerful organization or an organization with limited power? Use evidence to support your view. (Writing prompt/discussion question)

Summarize what you have learned, from direct information and inference, about how the United Nations protects vulnerable or endangered people. What are the tools or techniques that the United Nations can use to give protection? Give evidence from the text.

+Activity #2Using Supporting Texts; Integrating Information from Multiple Texts

+Adding different text genres: Personal testimony and photographs

Beyond the Fire: Teen Experiences in War http://archive.itvs.org/beyondthefire/master.html

Children in War Zones: 14 Photos of Innocents Lost http://www.takepart.com/photos/children-war-zones/

+Activity #3Writing Your Own Text Dependent Questions with a Learning Goal in Mind

+Your Turn

1. Read the text.

2. Identify the key understanding you want students to take away.

3. Underline key passages that address the key understanding.

4. Circle key vocabulary or text structures.

5. Think about what CCSS reading standard(s) you want to address.

6. Create a text dependent question for each category that will help students address what you’ve identified as significant.

1. Key Ideas and Details2. Craft and Structure3. Integration of Knowledge and Ideas

7. Reorder questions for best flow (if necessary).

8. Shareout

+Activity # 4 Talk-Aloud Sentence Starters: A Reading Strategy for Students

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+Resources

+More on the Common Core

Common Core State Standards Initiative http://www.corestandards.org/

Partnership for 21st Century Skills Common Core Toolkit http://www.p21.org/tools-and-resources/publications/p21-common-core-toolkit

Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers http://www.parcconline.org/ and Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium http://www.k12.wa.us/smarter/

Measuring Text Complexity (Kansas DOE) http://www.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=4605

+Resources for Informational Texts

Nonfiction Resource Guide (Primary Source) http://resources.primarysource.org/nonfiction and other regional guides: http://www.primarysource.org/resourceguides

Primary Source World http://www.primarysource.org/primarysourceworld

World Digital Library http://www.wdl.org/en/

Online Newspapers http://www.onlinenewspapers.com/