Close Reading Close Up

Closing In On Close Reading

There is no passion more rewarding than reading itself. . .it remains the best way to dream and to feel the sheer carnal joy of being fully and openly alive.     
Pat Conroy in My Reading Life

 

Writing, combined with close reading, is among the most valuable, 

but least understood elements of schooling.  Mike Schmoker (2006)

 

 

Close reading is a goal, a disposition, a skill outlined in the Common Core State Standards as Reading Standard #1.  Of course, we have always wanted and worked to help our students be discerning, deep thinkers as they read a variety of texts.  With our responsive data-guided literacy instruction, our focus on Thinking Strategies to help students learn why and how to ignite and nurture understanding as readers and writers, and our caring efforts to create an edifying community of learning with our students, close reading is a constant focus in all our classrooms.

 

As close readers, over the course of their Kindergarten through 12th grade literacy learning journeys, our students are expected to know and do the following as detailed in the CCSS Reading Standard #1 for Literature and Informational Text:

 

Know (concepts identified by the nouns of this standard)

• evidence
• textual evidence
• details
• examples
• question
• inference

Do (skills identified by the verbs of this standard)

• CITE (textual evidence)
• ANALYZE (what the text says explicitly)
• ASK and ANSWER (questions)
• INFER/DRAW INFERENCES (drawn from the text)
• DETERMINE (where the text leaves things uncertain)

 

Again, these goals fire our work.  Key gifts we help all growing readers discover are the absolute rocket fuel of questions and inferences.  If a reader has no questions and generates no inferences, he/she is very likely to harvest nothing from his/her reading.  With the energy of questions and inferences, even developmentally young or struggling readers can and do work diligently to make sense of what they read.  And, by attending to the text to find answers to their own curiosities and predictions, growing readers naturally return to the text to cull evidence or name insights (especially when they live with someone like YOU who constantly shares your thinking work with them).    The goal of close reading has also become an instructional strategy which can make having a clear vision of close reading a bit fuzzy if not down right confusing.  There are excellent models of engaging students in intentional reading experiences to help them better see the thoughtful ways proficient readers interact with text as they read all with the goal of understanding.  But there are also some very bizarre methods of close reading being marketed all in the name of the Common core.  It's important to be highly discerning in embracing (and purchasing) close reading rituals and resources.    Thinking about what your students most need to learn as growing readers.  Offer them well-aligned apprenticeship in why and how you read text closely so that their close reading learning is not artificial to your goals for them.  The Common Core Reading Standard does not define close reading as reading short text exclusively nor does it say that students are expected to read every or even most texts multiple times.  And yet some close reading instructional strategies may give students these false understandings because they limit close reading to short bursts of text and repeated readings.  A few do not even encourage students' independent reading of text but rather rely solely on teachers read alouds.  As Vicki Vinton and Dorothy Barnhouse (2012) advocate in What Readers Really Do, we must engage students in literacy learning which puts them in the driver's seat.  By actively participating in their own reading, even when it is a struggle (or especially when it is a struggle), students better see, name, and own their thinking work.  Thus, it vital to craft our close reading instruction deftly.   In truth, when we encounter complex texts, we respond to the text with a variety of thinking maneuvers.  It is our habits of close reading that we want to demonstrate and practice with students.  When a text is demanding and I am finding it difficult to understand, I do reread the text.  But that is not all I do.  So, while I will model and collaboratively practice rereading with my students, over time, I will also share multiple ways of negotiating complex texts with my students.  This way, they can be truly strategic - Our students can better respond to the demands of a text if their thinking tool belt is richer and more diverse than just rereading.    Included below are a few ways thoughtful guidelines as you sculpt and chisel close reading practice for and with your students - with cautions to diversify your close reading apprenticeship with students throughout this year.  Toward that goal, in the upcoming days and weeks, I will profile numerous ways to strengthen your students' close reading habits and detail how to help students be skillful at text dependent questions without being text bound (i.e. only able to read this text vs. very able to read all texts of this genre).  So, please return to the Open Book soon!   Close reading has the following characteristics:       It works with a short passage.       The focus is intense.       It will extend from the passage itself to other parts of the text.       It should involve a great deal of exploratory discussion.        It involves rereading.    *From the excellent Note and Notice: Strategies for Close Reading by Kylene Beers and Robert Probst (2012)

Phases of a Close Reading Lesson                                                                              Timothy Shanahan (2013), International Reading Association Prereading Set the context for the text without revealing too much information and thus denying students the opportunity to think deeply for themselves. Keep it short and to the point.  First Reading ~ What does the text say?        Guide students to consider the most important elements of the text, and clarify confusion.         Ask students to summarize the information or retell the story, including the key ideas and details. Second Reading ~ How does the text work?        Lead the students in considering the author’s craft and the text’s structure as tools for conveying ideas.        Develop an awareness of the choices an author and illustrator make to convey ideas.        Focus on why and how the author told the story or shared the information. Third Reading ~ What does the text mean?        Consider what the text means to a reader and how it connects to other texts and the reader’s life.  vs. Suggested Close Reading Steps – Five Readings Paraphrase the sentences. State, elaborate, exemplify the author’s claim/thesis. Identify the author’s purpose, including the most important problem(s), issues, concerns, implications, and/or point of view. Evaluate or assess the text based on clarity, accuracy, relevance, precision, logic, significance, and fairness. Role playing – author and questioner. *From The Thinker’s Guide to How to Read a Paragraph: The Art of Close Reading by Richard Paul and Linda Elder (2008).  Their theory is that if you can read a paragraph critically, you can read a chapter and then a book in the same way. For a wealth of ideas in supporting your students as readers, writers, and thinkers, I highly recommend Gretchen Owocki's (2012; 2013) lighthouse books:     And Sunday Cummins' (2012) compelling and practical book...

Too often, and for very understandable reasons, we want things to be black and white.  The thinking word of understanding readers is not tidy.  Understanding cannot be easily named with one or two descriptors.  It's messy work and we will do better by our students if we do not narrow the definition of close reading too simplistically.  More on all of this soon!  Until then, happy reading, joyful teaching!

Building Literacy Bridges as We Close The School Year

The end of the school year is always a bit painful...A bittersweet mix of joy, dread or denial, celebration, anxiety or excitement...We have grown so close to our students...We know each other well...Our workshops are running smoothly and productively (Well, most days, right?).  We have become a true community of learners ready to share, support, and strengthen our thinking with one another.  But then there is the good-bye, the letting go, the right of passage for our students to journey to their next grade level.  And we have to do this when everything in our classrooms is in such a lovely place of independence, investment, and flow...and just when everyone is so on fire as thinkers, readers, writers, learners, and collaborators!

Of course, working our way out of job is the goal of our work.  We want our students to grow and progress.  From our thoughtful efforts, this is possible.  But, like having to brave through the empty nest when our own children grow up and leave our homes, we can celebrate everyone's growth by engaging in just a few more lessons with our students as we let go and they move on.  For me, I focus a lot of my end of the year work on helping my students build literacy bridges. 

 

Building literacy bridges is all about giving kids the tools and the heart to continue their daily rituals of reading, writing, and thinking. 

•    
   
  Help all your students know and name favorite authors.  Encourage the kids to read widely from their favorite authors over the Summer.  This may include doing a bit of research together to develop a list of "must reads."  And talk with your students about continuing to view the authors they read as key mentors in growing their lenses as writers.
 
• Immerse your students in books in a series, especially with a goal of having a good number of the texts "still to go" so that the kids will pursue the rest of the series over the summer break.
• A key exit ticket for my students was giving each of them a brand new journal.  Sometimes I was able to scrap together some funding to purchase these from the dollar store.  Other times, I made them myself with a book binding machine.  I like to offer students a variety of styles, sizes, and colors or covers so that each child can chose one for himself/herself.  These journals may be extensions of our Writer's Notebook rituals or become something new and different - a science journal, a travel log, a diary, a place to collect favorite thoughts, ideas, or quotes, an album for beloved treasures and captions.  I offered my own students a great deal of choice in why and how they would use these parting gifts.  But I was open and passionate in sharing a key message about their journals - the importance of writing, writing, writing everyday. A new pen or special pencil is a lovely companion present, too, if possible. 
• Make sure every student has a library card.  If they don't, work with your public library and students' parents so that by the last day of school every growing reader is a card carrying library patron. 
 
• Send kids home with any extra or "about to be thrown out" school supplies so that they have resources to continue their own writing, reading, and research.  If your students are young, wit these resources, it can be edifying to nudge kids to play school and create their own literacy workshops at home.  If your students are older, encourage them to develop their own book clubs and writing collaboratives just as they have done with you this year.  *My husband Dave and I have belonged to book club of cherished friends for over 25 years...Here is one of gatherings from last year when we read a book Dave authored - The Cloud of Fire. 
• As antique as it may sound, engage your students in letter writing as you close the school year.  Create or provide note cards and stationery for your students to take home.  If fiscal resources make this impossible, ask (or beg) for your PTA group's help or a local business to provide your students with notes, envelopes, and stamps so that students can experience the delight of receiving and sending mail. Enlist your students' parents and grandparents in this effort so that the kids gain receptive and answering letter writing partners. I often send my graduating and my new incoming students at least one postcard over the summer to connect with them and to extend and kick off a study of this increasingly rare but oh-so-beloved genre. 
• Encourage your students to create a family blog or travel blog with their parents or caregivers. As you know well, students urgently need to keep writing over school breaks. Tap into the ways students engage in text as writers, readers, thinkers, artists, innovators, emerging scientists, social activists, etc. outside of school and legitimize these energizing literacy bridge vehicles.  Some from my own students and family have included blogging; song writing; earning Scout badges; fixing cars with an Uncle; scrap booking; pet care business ventures; summer camp experiences; captioning family photo albums; and creating a detective club to find lost pets. 
 
• Send every student home with peer-authored text.  I made multiple copies of some of the books my kids authored each year.  I kept one copy for my classroom and distributed the rest of the copies to my students so that they would have a summer reading library.  Our student authors always give us permission to make copies of their work :) and, even with the cost of duplication, this is often the most affordable and delightful way of making sure every student will have "good fit" and very inviting texts to read during their break. I often set out these texts on one of the last days of school so that they kids can shop for books - and gain author autographs, too!
• Teach your students how to play word games.  If possible, create games with your students and send them home with your kids on the last days of school.   My grown-up son Tim and I still play word games and he names these experiences as a chief reason was his was a early spelling bee champ of our school district :) and his love of writing - A skill he uses in his news reporting every day.) Word games like Scrabble, Upwords, Hangman (which we turned into "Build a Bird House" for a more non-violent version), and Scattegories help kids fall in love with words.  And having fun should always be a big goal for summer literacy bridges just as joy fuels our literacy workshops during the school year. 

For all of you who have guided students to live literate lives, to voice their thinking boldly, to become bigger not only in brain but hope, too...

I wish you a joyful Summer season full of all you love...

 

 

[I sincerely apologize for the long delay in completing my series focused on Synthesis.  The last few moths have been full of crushing challenges within our extended family but we are finding our way through these painful days to stronger places within ourselves.  Additionally, my treasured laptop crashed and, even with terrific cloud storage tools, retrieving files and reorganizing my writing are taking many hours - Time I just have not had with the fullness of end of the school year responsibilities.  Thank you so much for your kind patience and caring support and for not giving up on me!]

Synthesizing Synthesis Studies ~ Part II

 Synthesis is like a quilt...Just as quilters take pieces of cloth and sew them together to innovate a piece of art, readers weave together the words of the page to create their own whole...to construct their own version of the text.  Thinkers have to integrate bits and chunks of information to innovate a new and personal understanding of what they are learning. 

 

Apprenticing students in synthesis studies expands their

capacities to hold onto their thoughts and process their thoughts into new vistas of understanding.

 

For many students, synthesis and summary feels like this. 

Helping students identify important ideas is a huge first step in supporting their capacities to summarize and integrate what they learn.  If students cannot evaluate a text (written, heard, or viewed) to discern the most important ideas, their summary work is unfocused, rambles on, or very thin.  Often, when presented with a lot of new information, young (developmentally) students cannot see the forest for the trees.  They will, for example, highlight an entire text yellow (even words such as of and the!).  Thus, I study why and how to determine importance with students over a long period of time before I engage them in a deep and specific study of synthesis.  Becoming a thoughtful judge of importance sets students up for greater success and efficacy as we move into investigating synthesis. 


An effective and confidence building instructional strategy is one I first learn from Denise Nessel as we worked together for The National Urban Alliance.  Denise's Key Word Notes process engages students in taking on the habits of proficient readers (but it can easily be adapted for viewing and/or listening).  Because this process nudges students to identify important ideas during their reading (or hearing/viewing), they are much more likely to determining importance.  Too often, students try to identify important ideas after they have read an entire text.  This will be too late and make the task too demanding as there will be far too many ideas for them to filter if their work is left for after reading. 

As always (with my Gradual Release of Responsibility  pedagogy), I model Key Word Notes with students first and engage them in at least a few rounds of collaborative practice before turning this process over to the kids to use in pairs or independently. 

 

Key Word Notes is a note taking strategy to help students identify important ideas as they read text/view/observe/listen) and summarize what they read/view/observe/hear).  This strategy works across grade levels and content areas but is especially helpful in supporting grades 3–12 students. (It can also be utilized with K–2 students as a guided practice strategy with the teacher acting as a scribe for the group.  Additionally, younger students can be encouraged to record a key picture from what they hear or view.  These pictures can then support them in creating a summary with you/with you as a scribe in capturing their summary/ies.)  Teachers can gradually increase the segments students read and the numbers of words to select at each reading. (Note: The smaller the number of segments and words, the easier it will be for students to summarize the text.) To differentiate instruction, have students read different texts about the same subject/topic, matched to their reading levels.  Again, after a period of modeling and collaborative use, it is helpful to have students use the strategy independently when they are studying or doing research. 

Directions:

1. Students work in pairs.  Each student gets a Key Word Notes form.
2. Everyone reads designated piece of text individually and silently.
3. With the prompt “Which word/s will help you remember this information?” each student selects 1–2 words as memory aides, and writes them in box 1.  (As students become more skilled at Key Word note taking, you can direct students to harvest 3–4 words or, possibly, a key phase.  Again, caution students not to record too many key words in each box.  Modeling of how to determine “most important ideas” is crucial for all students.)
4. Partners tell each other what words they selected and why.
5. Students repeat steps 2–4, completing all segments using boxes 2, 3, and 4 (and 5 and 6 if you are segmenting a text into six sections/chunks). 
6. With books closed, each student uses his/her Key Words to write a summary in the "My Summary Sqaure" box (at the bottom of the page.  I can encourage students to or differentiate instruction by asking the kids to create a One Word Summary, One Sentence Summary, or a longer summary. (*By asking students to create their summaries without looking at the text or referring back to it, we are encourage students to paraphrase, a critical skill of summarizing. Of course, at other times you will want your students to utilize texts in crafting their summaries.)

   1.  Important Word	2.  Important Word
   3.  Important Word	4.  Important Word
   5.  Important Word	6.  Important Word

My Summary Square:

 

 

 

 

Take Note is a wonderful variation of Key Word notes.  Depending on the text/content information and your students' strengths, needs, and questions, you can easily adapt either process to inspire and support your own students.

Take Note!

Box 1   After reading the first two para-graphs, select three words that will help you remember what you read.

Box 2   After reading the last paragraph, select three words that will help you remember what you read.

Box 3:  Write a summary here using your key words above. Do not refer to the text.

 

 

And Exit Slips are another way to encourage students to note important ideas and summarize them.

 

Exit Slips Kittye Copeland, Jerry Harste, and Carolyn Burke

When readers/writers are encouraged to reflect on their learning, they come to understand and value the content and process in new and deeper ways.  Exit Slips are a simple way to help students reflect on what they have learned and to identify areas that need further exploration.  Exit Slips work well after any learning experience, or at the end of the school day, as a way of prompting students to review what they have accomplished.

Procedure

If this is the first formal use of a reflective strategy, talk about the importance of thinking about what is learned (content) and how people go about learning things (process).  Teachers should demonstrate by highlighting their own decision-making within a simple context; for example, writing a letter, deviating from a recipe, deciding what to wear, thinking about how to approach a friend about a problem, discovering what route to take to an unfamiliar destination, and so on.  Students may need to talk through some of their processes before using this strategy.

1. Following the initial demonstrations and at the end of a school day, or any important learning activity, distribute one 3 x 5 card to each student.
2. Ask students to write one thing they learned during the day, or from a particular activity, on one side of the card.  On the other side students are to write one question they still have.  Present this part of the strategy in an open ended manner so students are free to consider content or process issues in their responses.
3. Collect the cards for review.
4. Select several questions to use in a whole group setting the following morning or during the class meeting.  Questions can be answered directly by the teacher, orally or by writing on the card, or students can be invited to respond.  Selected questions can be put aside for future study or be used to inform the teacher about topics from Mini-lessons.

VARIATIONS

1.     Exit Slips can be used throughout the reading of a text, much like a written Say Something.  The first part of the strategy, then serves as a reflection of what has been learned; the second part, a reader-generated question.

2.     RAPID REFLECTION is a verbal form of Exit Slips.  Throughout the school day at the end of important discussions, demonstrations, mini-lessons, or any learning engagement students can be asked to reflect on the experience quickly and at random, call out a response.  Responses can be focused by asking open-ended questions before Rapid Reflection begins:

§  What was surprising for you?

§  What were you thinking about the most?

§  What was one question that you have?

§  What is one idea you are excited about?