1. Welcome! In groups of 2-4, please choose from the front table any book that you might use for instruction in your classroom.

2. MTSU 3 rd Annual Reading Conference 9-12-15 READING ON THE EDGE: TOWARD INDEPENDENT READING OF COMPLEX TEXT

3. Pointed Reading Protocol WHY COMPLEX TEXT?

4. Hiebert, E. (2012). 7 actions that teachers can take right now: text complexity. Text Matters. Retrieved from http://textproject.org/library/text- matters/ http://textproject.org/library/text- matters/ 7 ACTIONS THAT TEACHERS CAN TAKE RIGHT NOW: TEXT COMPLEXITY

5. Action 7 IDENTIFY BENCHMARKS

6. “Teaching students to read grade-level and more complex texts requires first and foremost an understanding of what makes a text complex.” UNDERSTANDING THE FACTORS OF TEXT COMPLEXITY

7. THINKING THROUGH A RICH TEXT

8.  With a small group, work with a text that you would consider using at a particular grade level.  Using the appropriate form from the Achieve the Core Text Complexity Collection, record the Lexile measure from the front of the book.  Using Figure 2 from CCSS Appendix A, analyze the text for the qualitative features of text complexity, and make notes.  Use the questions at the bottom of the page to discuss reader and task considerations for this text. http://achievethecore.org/page/642/text-complexity-collection EXPLORING THE FACTORS OF TEXT COMPLEXITY

9. Action 1 FOCUS ON KNOWLEDGE

10. “The biggest reason why reading is so important is that texts are the place where human beings record their knowledge.” Content Area Knowledge Knowledge within Literature “The first action that teachers can take to support students with complex text is to bring to the foreground the themes of literature, even in the primary grades.” Hiebert (2012) FOCUS ON KNOWLEDGE

11. LITERATURE IN THE CONTEMPORARY CURRICULUM

12. EACH OF THE 6 SIGNPOSTS IDENTIFIED BY BEERS AND PROBST…  Had some characteristic that made it noticeable, that caused it to stand out from the surrounding text.  Showed up across the majority of books.  Offered something to readers who noticed and then reflected on it that helped them better understand their own responses, their own reading experience, and their own interpretation of the text.

13. THE SIGNPOSTS AND COMPREHENSION STRATEGIES “The more students noticed these signposts, the more they were using the comprehension processes: visualizing, predicting, summarizing, clarifying, questioning, inferring, and making connections.” (Beers & Probst, p. 69)

14. GENERALIZABLE LANGUAGE I’ll stop here because I can imagine how hard it is for Luke to decide if he wants to risk going over to the other house. He knows he might get himself and his family in a lot of trouble if he does this, yet he has realized he can’t stay in his house forever. I can almost feel his nervousness. When we can make connections like this, we better understand the characters. I’ll stop here because I’ve noticed an important contradiction. When authors show us a character acting in a way that contrasts with or contradicts what he has been doing, I know I need to pause and ask myself, “Why is the character acting this way?” Luke has been too afraid to leave his house and now he’s contemplating breaking all the rules and going to another house. In this scene, Luke knows he might get himself and his family in a lot of trouble if he does this, yet he has realized that he can’t stay in his house forever. I think he’s acting this way because….”

15. SIGNPOST #1: CONTRASTS AND CONTRADICTIONS  A sharp contrast between what we would expect and what we observe the character doing.  Behavior that contradicts previous behavior or well-established patterns.  A character behaves or thinks in a way we don’t expect, or an element of a setting is something we would not expect. CC

16. Anchor Question: Why would the character act or feel this way? This question encourages thinking about and discussing: Character Motivation Situation SIGNPOST #1: CONTRASTS AND CONTRADICTIONS

17. SIGNPOST #2: AHA! MOMENT  A character’s realization of something that shifts his actions or understanding of himself, others, or the world around him.  “Suddenly I understood…”  “It came to me in a flash…”  “Now I knew…” Aha!

18. An Aha Moment reveals change. This question focuses on that change – for the character or the setting. SIGNPOST #2 AHA MOMENT Anchor Question: How might this change things?

19. SIGNPOST #3 TOUGH QUESTIONS  Questions a character raises that reveal his or her inner struggles.  Phrases expressing serious doubt or confusion…  “What could I possibly do to…?”  “How could I ever understand why she…?” TQ

20. The answers will help in the understanding of internal conflict, theme, and character development. Anchor Question: What does this question make me wonder about? SIGNPOST #3 TOUGH QUESTIONS

21. SIGNPOST #4: WORDS OF THE WISER  The advice or insight a wiser character, who is usually older, offers about life to the main character.  The main character and another are usually off by themselves, in a quiet, serious moment. WW

22. Words of the wiser suggests the theme. Students begin to think about the theme in the context of the character’s life, and then may start to think of it in the context of their own life. Anchor Question: What’s the life question and how might it affect the character? SIGNPOST #4: WORDS OF THE WISER

23. SIGNPOST #5: AGAIN AND AGAIN  Events, images, or particular words that recur over a portion of the novel.  A word is repeated, sometimes used in an odd way, over and over in the story.  An image reappears several times during the course of the book. AA

24. Recurring images, events, or words offer insight into character motivation or theme. Anchor Question: Why might the author bring this up again and again? SIGNPOST #5: AGAIN AND AGAIN

25. SIGNPOST #6: MEMORY MOMENTS  An recollection by a character that interrupts the forward progress of the story.  Often takes several paragraphs to recount before we are returned to events of the present moment. MM

26. SIGNPOST #6: MEMORY MOMENT Anchor Question: Why might this memory be important? Answering this question can offer insight into character motivation and theme. It asks students to consider the relationship between the memory and the character or plot.

27. USING PICTURE BOOKS TO INTRODUCE THE SIGNPOSTS Aha Moment Contrasts and Contradictions, Again and Again, Words of the Wiser Tough Questions, Words of the Wiser Again and Again, Word of the Wiser Tough Questions, Again and Again, Words of the Wiser

28. THE SIX SIGNPOSTS 1.Contrasts and Contradictions 2.Aha Moments 3.Tough Questions 4.Words of the Wiser 5.Again and Again 6.Memory Moments “We think that these signposts show up in novels because they show up in the world. Fiction does imitate life, and as a result we shouldn’t be surprised to find that the patterns that help us understand the world around us also help us understand the world of the book in front of us.” (Beers & Probst, p. 74)

29. Action 2 CREATE CONNECTIONS

30. HOW CAN TEACHERS HELP STUDENTS CREATE CONNECTIONS? “For knowledge to be useful, new ideas and information need to be connected to existing knowledge.” (Hiebert, 2012)

31. Action 3 ACTIVATE STUDENTS’ PASSION

32. “Students need the chance to delve into topics. They also need some choice in what they read. The choices, researchers have shown, do not have to be great. Even getting to choose between two books can go a long way in increasing students’ engagement in reading.” (Hiebert, 2012) READING WIDELY AND DEEPLY 520L 270L “We must organize our readings in every subject so each text bootstraps the language and knowledge needed for the next. Gradually, students will be ready for texts of greater complexity. (Adams, 2009) 820L 1100L 1050L

33. Action 4 DEVELOP VOCABULARY

34.  In any natural language sample, 90% of the words come from a small percentage of the words in English. These (approximately 5,000 words) occur over and over.  The other 10% of words are unique. These come from a group of at least 300,000 words.  The stronger a student’s vocabulary, the more complex the text that can be read. The more complex text that is encountered, the stronger the vocabulary. (Matthew Effects) THE CHALLENGE OF VOCABULARY INSTRUCTION Recommended: Advancing Our Students’ Language and Literacy: The Challenge of Complex Texts by Marilyn Jager Adams http://achievethecore.org/page/642/text- complexity-collection

35. Tier 1 Words: Basic words, well known, used often; e.g. house, milk Tier 2 Words: High-frequency words used by mature language users in a wide range of contexts; e.g. jealous, huge Tier 3 Words: Low-frequency words, often limited to specific content areas; e.g. amphibian, reptile Tier 2 Words are: Useful - can be used in many different contexts Understandable – children have some idea or concept to connect to the new word Interesting Selecting Words to Teach (Beck, McKeown, & Kucan)

36. In early times, no one knew how volcanoes formed or why they spouted red-hot molten rock. In modern times, scientists began to study volcanoes. They still don’t know all the answers, but they know much about how a volcano works. Our planet made up of many layers of rock. The top layers of solid rock are called the crust. Deep beneath the crust is the mantle, where it is so hot that some rock melts. The melted, or molten, rock is called magma. Volcanoes are formed when magma pushes its way up through the crack in Earth’s crust. This is called a volcanic eruption. When magma pours forth on the surface, it is called lava. Simon, Seymour. Volcanoes. New York: HarperCollins, 2006. CCSS Text Exemplar, Grades 4-5 Text Complexity Band Tier 2 and Tier 3 Vocabulary

37. 1.The teacher provides a description, explanation, or example of the new term. 2.Students restate the explanation of the new term in their own words. 3.Students create a nonlinguistic representation of the term. 4.Students periodically do activities that help them add to their knowledge of vocabulary terms. 5.Periodically students are asked to discuss the terms with one another. 6.Periodically students are involved in games that allow them to play with the terms. Direct Vocabulary Instruction Six Steps to Effective Vocabulary Instruction (Marzano, 2004)

38. http://textproject.org/ Teach and practice using networks of words.

39.  Morphemic Analysis: A strategy in which the meanings of words can be determined or inferred by examining their meaningful parts (i.e., prefixes, suffixes, roots, etc.)  Contextual Analysis: A strategy readers use to infer or predict a word from the context in which it appears. http://reading.uoregon.edu/big_ideas/voc/voc_what.php Strategic Approaches to Vocabulary Learning

40. Action 5 INCREASE THE VOLUME

41. GRADUAL RELEASE OF RESPONSIBILITY

42. INDEPENDENT READING

43. Action 6 BUILD UP STAMINA

44. “…I taught some students who seemed to have no instructional level. They either could do something on their own – or they were frustrated and resistant; they crossed right over to the frustrational level.” (Newkirk, p. 126) ACADEMIC EMOTIONS

47.  Talk about mindset with students  Celebrate difficulty  Utilize think-alouds to model “productive inner dialogue” http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/nov13/ vol71/num03/What-Students-Can-Do-When-the-Reading-Gets-Rough.aspx Fisher, D. & Frey, N. (2015). Teacher modeling using complex informational texts, The Reading Teacher, 69(1), 63-69.  Use metaphors  Introduce other tools and strategies that students can return to when they’re on their own with complex text (systems for annotating texts, pneumonics, step-by-step strategies for word-solving) STRATEGIES FOR PROMOTING A GROWTH MINDSET

48. THIEVES STRATEGY FOR PREVIEWING TEXT  T = Title  H = headings  I = introduction  E = Every 1 st Sentence  V = Visuals and vocabulary  E = End of article  S = summarize thinking

49. “Perhaps one of the mistakes in the past efforts to improve reading achievement has been the removal of struggle. As a profession, we may have made reading tasks too easy. We do not suggest that we should plan students’ failure but rather that students should be provided with opportunities to struggle and to learn about themselves as readers when they struggle, persevere, and eventually succeed.” Text Complexity: Raising Rigor in Reading, p. 11 Kathryn. pattullo @mnps. org KATIE PATTULLO