Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter One: English Language Arts, Educational Reform, and the Common Core State Standards Movement
- Cycles of Change
- The Common Core State Standards: Promise and Controversy
- Holding on To Literature in the English Curriculum
Chapter Two: Cultivating Literacy Learning through Close Reading
- The Importance of Integrating Reading and Writing
- Close Reading Strategies for Literary and Informational Text
- Close Reading: What it Is and Why It's Important
- Close Reading Controversy
- What is Complex Text
- Suggested Close Reading Strategies
- Strategy One: Four Basic Questions
- Strategy Two: Think-Aloud
- Strategy Three: Vocabulary: Structural Analysis and Context Clues
- Strategy Four: Reading Like a Writer
- Strategy Five: Text Marking
- Strategy Six: Charting the Text
- Strategy Seven: Interactive Shared Reading
- Strategy Eight: Monitoring Comprehension
- Strategy Nine: Multiple Readings
- Strategy Ten: Using Evidence from Text
- Strategy Eleven: Student-Determined Text-Dependent Questions
- Strategy Twelve: Teaching Text Structure
- Strategy Thirteen: Color Coding of Text
- Strategy Fourteen: Commentary
- Strategy Fifteen: Analyzing a Source
- Strategy Sixteen: Paraphrasing
- Strategy Seventeen: KNOWS
- Strategy Eighteen: Apps for Promoting Reading Skill
- Strategy Nineteen: The One Pager
Chapter Three: Textual Evidence and Elaboration
- Textual Evidence: What it is and Why it's Important
- Simple Ways to Teach Textual Evidence
- Sample Strategies
- Color Coding Strategy
- Poetry Explication: Supporting Your Reading by Citing Textual Evidence
- Using Transitions
- A Time to Dig Deeper: Answering Text-Based Question
Chapter Four: Performance Tasks for Specific Literary Texts
- What are Performance Tasks?
- Performance Tasks for Specific Texts
- Huckleberry Finn and 19th Century Literature Performance Task
- Cyrano De Bergerac Performance Task
- The Great Gatsby Performance Task
- Our Town Performance Task
- Of Mice and Men Performance Task
- The Crucible Performance Task
- Ricochet River Performance Task
- The Bean Trees
- House on Mango Street Performance Task
- Poetry Performance Tasks
- Part One: Literary Analysis of Theme
- Part Two: Layered Curriculum
Afterword: Letting Our Garden Grow
