Barbara A. Marinak, PhDMount St. Mary’s University

barbara.marinak@gmail.com

Read for Real

High Impact Teaching Using Informational

Text

Pedagogical Shift

•IDEA 2004 and the CCSS are suggesting a major shift in how we approach reading instruction for all students.

Closer Look at CCSS

•Expectations of CCSS

•Impact on core reading instruction

•Impact on intervention

Purpose

• State-led effort coordinated by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO).

• Developed in collaboration with teachers, school administrators, and experts, to provide a clear and consistent framework to prepare our children for college and the workforce.

Purpose

• Are aligned with college and work expectations

• Are clear, understandable and consistent

• Include rigorous content and application of knowledge through high-order skills

• Are evidence-based

English Language Arts

• Establish a “staircase” of increasing complexity in what students must be able to read and comprehend in order to be prepared for the demands of college and career.

English Language Arts

• Reading: Literature and Informational Text

• Writing

• Speaking and Listening

• Language

• Media and Technology

• Range, Quality and Complexity

• Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects

English Language Arts

• By reading a diverse array of classic and contemporary literature as well as challenging informational texts in a range of subjects, students are expected to build knowledge, gain insights, explore possibilities, and broaden their perspective.

Informational Text

• Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.

• Describe the overall structure (e.g., chronology, comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in a text or part of a text.

Informational Text

• Compare and contrast a firsthand and secondhand account of the same event or topic; describe the differences in focus and the information provided.

• Interpret information presented visually, orally, or quantitatively (e.g., in charts, graphs, diagrams, time lines, animations, or interactive elements on Web pages) and explain how the information contributes to an understanding of the text in which it appears.

Informational Text

• Analyze how two or more texts address similar themes or topics in order to build knowledge or to compare the approaches the authors take.

Informational Text

• Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize the text.

Impact on Core and Intervention

• Read deeply and widely from a truly balanced collection

• Read regularly within in and between text

• Regular written responding within and between text

Fiction Heavy…Why?

•Perception of difficulty

•Perception of interests

•Perception of turf

Result?

Informational Text Imperative

• Significantly increase the amount of informational text students access

• Increase the diversity of informational text

• Select mentor texts that allow multiple core standards to be taught

• Teach informational text using high impact methods

High Impact Methods

•Explicit

•Evidence-based

•Portable

•Promote transference

So now what?

Critical Considerations

• Read within and between text

• Vocabulary

• Compare and Contrast

• Summarization

Photo Documentaries:

Within Text

Photo Documentaries:

Within and Between Text

Between Text and Website

Pay Attention to Words!

• Frontload vocabulary

• Assess vocabulary knowledge

Antarctic

Text Impression

Antarctic

African

Text Impression

Antarctic

African

one

Text Impression

Antarctic

African

one

rookery

Text Impression

Antarctic

African

one

rookery

herd

Text Impression

• Group on land is a waddle or colony

• Nesting group is a rookery

• A group of babies is a crèche

• A group in the water is a raft

Antarctic

African

one

rookery

herd

kindergarten

Text Impression

Let’s try a Text Impression!

• Structural Grammars

Teach Features of Text!

Characters: The living beings in stories, plays, and poems that speak, think, and carry out the action. A character can be a person, animal or a personified object

Setting: When and where the story occurs. 

Problem: The conflict or goal around which the story is organized. 

Events: One or more attempts by the main character(s) to achieve the goal or solve the problem. 

Resolution: The outcome of the attempts to achieve the goal or solve the problem.

Theme: The main idea or moral of the story.

 

Elements of Fiction

• Studies also indicate that children become aware of and are comfortable with narrative story structure (characters, setting, problem, events, solution) at an early age. In other words, due to narrative reading practice and instruction in story grammar, fiction text becomes “predictable” (Williams, 2005).

Research Findings

• It is just as important that informational reading practice be increased and that students become aware of and comfortable with the “predictable” elements and text structures that occur across informational text (Marinak & Gambrell, 2007).

Just as there is a narrative story grammar, there is also an “informational grammar” (Marinak & Gambrell, 2007).

Informational Grammar

Five Text Elements of Informational

Grammar• Author’s Purpose

• Major Ideas

• Supporting Details

• Aids

• Important Vocabulary

(Marinak, Moore, & Henk, 1998)

• Hall, Sabey, and McClellan (2005) and

Williams (2005) found that text structure

instruction promotes informational text

comprehension.

• Text structure awareness has also been

linked to accurate recall and retelling

(Richgels, McGee, Lomax & Sheard,1987).

Teach the Text Structures

Big Five Text Structures

• Enumeration

• Time Order

• Compare & Contrast*

• Problem/Solution

• Cause & Effect

(Hall, Sabey & McClellan, 2005; Neufeld, 2005; Richgels, McGee, Lomax & Sheard,1987; Williams, 2005)

• Text Map

Compare and Contrast

Knowledge of ContentGraphic Organizers

• A small cadre of graphic organizers and/or text maps should be used carefully

• Should be discipline-specific

• Should always be purposeful…discussion, writing, etc.

Compare/Contrast

Giraffe Emperor Penguin

Supporting Details Attributes Supporting Details

Africa Live Antarctica

One Number of Babies One

Live Type of Birth Egg

Kindergarten Protection of Young Kindergarten

We can compare and contrast giraffes and Emperor penguins. Giraffes live in Africa but Emperor penguins live in Antarctica. Giraffes have live births. Emperor penguins lay eggs. Both giraffes and Emperor penguins have one baby at a time. Giraffes and Emperor penguins are similar in how they protect their young. These two animals place their babies in kindergartens.

Compare/Contrast Summary

Compare/Contrast

Giraffe Emperor Penguin

Supporting Details Attributes Supporting Details

Africa

Number of Babies

Kindergarten

AttributesAnaconda Reticulated

PythonAfrican Python

Indian Python Boa Constrictor

Where do they live?

How do they have babies?

What do they look like?

How do they catch their prey?

Summarization

• Summarization is the process of restating the essence of text or an experience in as few words as possible or in a new, yet efficient, manner.

• In order to summarize, the student must be able to process the ideas of the passage and consider how they are related to one another.

Summarization

• Authors structure text in a variety of ways based on content and topic.

• Many studies indicate that teaching students to identify text structure and clarifying important information leads to more effective summarization.

I-Search

Response Heuristic

The Response Heuristic asks students to react to the following three-part format:

1.Text perceptions

2. Reactions to the text

3. Associations with the text

Marian Anderson

Response Heuristic

• Text Perception: is a summary statement about important information from the text.

On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939 Marian Anderson sang to a

crowd of 75,000 people on the steps of the Lincoln

Memorial. She sang at the Lincoln Memorial because the

DAR had a "whites only” rule at Constitution Hall.

• Reactions to Text: are evaluative statements that ask students to express their opinion about the text.

I was outraged when I read this book. I had no idea

that the Daughters of the American Revolution

prohibited this great singer from performing at

Constitution Hall.

 

• Associations with the text: are higher level evaluations that require students to associate information with their own prior knowledge or associate current reading with past readings.

It is now clear why Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his

“I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln

Memorial. Amazing that Dr. King’s speech didn't happen

until August 28,1963!

On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939 Marian Anderson sang to a crowd of 75,000 people on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. She sang at the Lincoln Memorial because the DAR had a “whites only” rule at Constitution Hall. I was outraged when I read this book. I had no idea that that the Daughters of the American Revolution prohibited this great singer from performing at Constitution Hall. It is now clear why Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Amazing that Dr. King’s speech didn't happen until August 28, 1963!

Good teaching is forever being on the cutting edge of a child’s competence.

Jerome Bruner