Exploring the COREA Overview of the

Common Core Standards for ELA and Literacy

Why Common Core State Standards? What is the research behind it?

http://www.corestandards.org/about-the-standards

What does this mean for Georgia? https://www.georgiastandards.org/Common-

Core/Pages/default.aspx

Essential Questions

• Enable colleges and universities to better prepare for incoming students.

• Standards designed to

meet the needs for

college and career

readiness.

• Common K-12 standards for pre-service teacher training in over 47 states.

Consistency

CCGPS GEORGIA TIMELINE

June 2, 2010 - CCSS Released July 8, 2010 - Adopted by SBOE 2010-2011 - Communication and Administrator Training (Crosswalks GPS/CCSS) 2011-2012 - Teacher Training 2012-2013 - Classroom Implementation (Transition Year)2014-2015 - Projected Date for Common Assessment

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards

CCR anchor the CCGPS in basic terms and define general, cross-disciplinary literacy expectations that must be met by the time a student leaves high school to enter college and workforce training programs ready to succeed. There are a total of 32 (10 reading, 10 writing, 6 language, & 6 in speaking and listening

English Language Arts and Literacy Standards “Roadmap”

READING WRITINGSPEAKING & LISTENING LANGUAGE

10 Anchor Standardsfor College and Career Readiness

10 Anchor Standards

for College and Career Readiness

6 Anchor Standards

for CCR

6 Anchor Standards

for CCR

ELA Standards K-

12

ELA Standards K-

12

ELA Standards K-

12

Literacy

Standards 6-

12

ELA Standards K-

12

Literacy

Standards 6-

12

Literary Text

Hist. / S.S.

Sci. /

Tech Subj.

Inform Text

1K

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9-1011-12

9-1011-12

6-8

9-10

11-12

6-8

11-12

1K

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9-10

9-1011-12

6-8

1K

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9-1011-12

1K

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9-1011-12

K

1

2

3

4

5

9-1011-12

6

7

8

Found-

ational

Skills

1

2

3

4

5

K → → → → → → → → → → →→ → → → → → → → → → →

→ → → → → → → → → → →

→ → → → → → → → → → →

→ → → → → → → → → → →→ → → → → → → → → → →

→ → → → → →

→ → → → → →

→ → → → → →

→ → → → → →

→ → → → → →

→ → → → → →

Why Text Complexity Matters

How do you know if a student is college-or career-ready? According to ACT’s Reading Between the Lines, “what appears to differentiate those who are more likely to be ready from those who are less likely is their proficiency in understanding complex texts.”

Over the last 50 years, the complexity of college and workplace reading has increased, while text complexity in K-12 have remained stagnant.

ROAD BLOCKS TO ROBUST LEARNING

K–12 Schooling: Declining complexity of texts and a lack of reading of complex texts independently

Not enough informational reading—too much note taking without students having to read

Too much copying vocabulary and just “looking” up words versus understanding and using academic language

Limited reading and writing connection activities

The Staircase of Text Complexity

In many respects, text complexity is the hallmark of the CCSS as it reveals the depth of educators’ commitment to providing American students every opportunity to be prepared to meet future global challenges. The combination of the increased text complexity and the depth of cognitive demand within the task, such as incorporating discipline-specific questions, generates higher levels of rigor.

Students read a true balance of informational and literary texts.

Elementary school classrooms are, therefore, places where students access the world – science, social studies, the arts and literature – through text. At least 50% of what students read is informational.

This shift will build a common knowledge base to prepare students for academic work in middle and high school.

Shift One: Balancing Info/Literacy

Content area teachers outside of the ELA classroom emphasize literacy experiences in their planning and instruction.

Students learn through domain specific texts in science and social studies classrooms – rather than referring to the text, they are expected to learn from what they read.

Note there is a shared responsibility for literacy-it’s not just the ELA teachers!

Shift 2: 6-12 Discipline Knowledge

In order to prepare students for the complexity of college and career ready texts, each grade level requires a “step” of growth on the “staircase”.

Students read the central, grade appropriate text around which instruction is centered.

Teachers are patient, create more time and space in the curriculum for this close and careful reading, and provide appropriate and necessary scaffolding and supports so that it is possible for students reading below grade level.

Shift 3: Staircase of Complexity

Students have rich and rigorous conversations which are dependent on a common text. Teachers insist that classroom experiences stay deeply connected to the text on the page and that students develop habits for making evidentiary arguments both in conversation, as well as in writing to assess comprehension of a text.

Shift 4: Text Based Answers

Writing needs to emphasize use of evidence to inform or make an argument rather than the personal narrative and other forms of de-contextualized prompts.

While the narrative still has an important role, students develop skills through written arguments that respond to the ideas, events, facts, and arguments presented in the texts they read.

Shift 5: Writing from Sources

Students constantly build the vocabulary they need to access grade level complex texts. By focusing strategically on comprehension of pivotal and commonly found words (such as “discourse,” “generation,” “theory,” and “principled”) and less on esoteric literary terms (such as “onomatopoeia” or “homonym”), teachers constantly build students’ ability to access more complex texts across the content areas.

 

Shift 6: Academic Vocabulary

Webb’s Depth of

Knowledge

No Child Left Behind requires

assessments to “measure the

depth and breadth of the state

academic content standards

for a given grade level” ( US

Department of Education,

2003, p.12)

DOK- What it is and what it is not? A common language for

discussing knowledge complexity

A tool for alignment A way to “tune” common

assessments A conversation starter

about content A part of reflective

teaching Most state/national tests

will have DOKs 1 & 2 with few DOK 3; however, the PARCC test in 2014-2015 will have DOK 4.

A state mandate A silver bullet Based on verbs A taxonomy A wheel DOK is not an exact

science. DOK is not about

difficulty but more about the cognitive demand needed to meet the standard.

DOK LEVEL REVIEW

LEVEL ONE - RECALLRecall of a fact, information, or procedure

LEVEL TWO – SKILL/CONCEPTUse information or conceptual knowledge

LEVEL THREE – STRATEGIC THINKINGReasoning, developing a plan, more complex and abstract, students must justify responses

LEVEL FOUR – EXTENDED THINKINGRequires an investigation, collection of data and analysis of results; often occurs over an extended period of time

The Depth of Knowledge is NOT determined by

the verb, but the context in which the verb is used and the

depth of thinking required.

A Model by Willard R. Daggett, Ed.D.

Studies have shown that students understand and retain knowledge best when they have applied it in a practical, relevant setting.

A teacher who relies on lecturing does not provide students with optimal learning opportunities. Instead, students go to school to watch the teacher work.

All educators can use Daggett’s Rigor/Relevance Framework to set their own standards of excellence as well as to plan the objectives they wish to achieve.

This versatile Framework applies to standards, curriculum, instruction, and assessment.

Source: http://www.leadered.com/pdf/academicexcellence.pdf

How does this apply to Curriculum?

CStudent

Think

DStudent Think &

Work

ATeacher

Work

BStudent

Work

Think about

ContentDOK 2/3/4

Base Knowledg

eDOK 1

Create New

Concept with

KnowledgeDOK 4

Apply Knowledg

eDOK 2/3

Although the standards are divided into strands for clarity, the processes of communication are closely connected.

Reading comprehension and student writing always require direct textual evidence for claims, inferences, and analyses. Research and media skills are blended into the standards as a whole.

What is integrated learning?

Cited from www.gadoe.org

http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/103011/chapters/What-Is-Integrated-Curriculum%C2%A2.aspx

To be ready for college, workforce training, and life in a technological society, students need the ability to gather, comprehend, evaluate, synthesize, and report on information and ideas, to conduct original research in order to answer questions or to solve problems.

The need to conduct research and to produce and consume text and media is embedded into every aspect of today’s curriculum. Similarly, research and media skills and understandings are embedded throughout the standards rather than treated in a separate section.

http://www.literacydesigncollaborative.org/

Welcome to LDC!Partners use the LDC framework as a common chassis to create LDC tasks, modules, and courses designed to teach students to meet the new Common Core Literacy Standards (CCSS) while also learning to meet content demands at high levels of performance.

The Literacy Design Collaborative is a project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

“Teaching practice is intricate, requiring a complex combination of knowledge, skill, timing, and relational work.”Deborah Ball

Conclusions…

Common Core emphasizes a 21st century classroom that transcends the idea of teaching standards in isolation and embraces a holistic approach where reading, writing, listening, speaking, and language are woven together to engage students with meaningful and relevant lessons.

http://www.parcconline.org/about-parcc

PARCC is a 24-state consortium working together to develop next-generation K-12 assessments in English and math.

PARCC benefitsStudents who will know if they are on track to graduate ready for college and careersTeachers with regular results available to guide learning and instructionParents with clear and timely informationabout the progress of their childrenStates with valid results that are comparable across the member statesThe nation as it is based on college-and career-ready, internationally benchmarked CCSS.

QUESTIONS?