Common Core Standards: Close Reading

Man oh man do I wish I could be as excited as so many of my colleagues seem to be about close reading, the practice of examining short, complex texts until your brain hemorrhages. (No, wait. That's beyond the standard. I think...)

Unfortunately, I'm having a hard time feeling the passion for close reading because I can't figure out how it's anything new. Most strange too because people are certainly acting like it's new. (Not that my inability to figure out something that everyone else seems to innately get is anything new either.)

Yet, last I checked, taking a written passage then pulling at it like your making taffy has been every teacher's modus operandi since the Greeks sat in a circle to chew the literary fat.. Hmmm.. maybe that's what all the hullabaloo is about -teachers grasping that they have free license to do what they like doing best (not so much the fat chewing.).

Anyway, I'm doing what I always do begining from a point of non-sense in the hope that it leads to some form of clarity for anyone reading. Here's the skinny. I was asked to present my understanding of close reading as is connects to the Common Core State Standards. I did what we all do. Went pale, tried to get out of it, accepted my fate, told myself it's nothing we're not doing already (not true in too many ways to list), and scoured the top 10 listed links to all of my Google searches. (I may have gone to page two, links 11-20 a few times even. Shows resolve.) Then, lacking any creating, which you already concluded from my Internet only research, I slapped together a PowerPoint.  Hey! If I have to suffer making this, then we will all suffer together watching it.

Below are the slides for that presentation. You'll be missing out on all my blank stares, errs and umms because there is no audio for it. Be very thankful for that.

Common Core Standards: Close Reading from RLagana

Common Core State Standards -Writing

select below for argument
http://bleckblog.org/comp/node/266

This blog title is a bit misleading. When I'd originally been asked to put something together on the Common Core writing standards, I presumed I'd be focused on three areas: narrative, informational, and argumentative.

However, as you'll see, the embedded slide show  focuses mainly on one of the three Common Core writing approaches -argumentative writing; and it is no accident that it happened that way.

The Common Core asks for three areas of writing to be nurtured and developed with students: narrative, informational, and argument writing. The narrative form, which comes under a large umbrella of styles from poetry to narrative non-fiction, is highly familiar to teachers and students alike, precisely why little attention is given to it. The same thinking applies to informational writing, because high-stakes testing has dominated the educational landscape for many years, everyone knows expository writing well.

So, if you haven't guessed by now, that leaves one approach to writing on the outside looking in -argumentative writing. The Common Core wants students and teachers alike to revert to the earlier practice of reading passages with a keen eye, one that spots and collects text evidence then uses logic to draw conclusions or form hard-to-refute claims.

Writing for argument is not about screaming louder than the other guy, as many political debates seem to do, nor is it about writing in the persuasive style, where loaded words and a complete disregard for the other side of the issue is the normal method of expression.

Writing as argument is more gentlemanly -and, if possible, almost entirely sterile. Below is one of the purest forms of written argument and logic.

All humans are mortal.
Aristotle is human.
Therefore, Aristotle is mortal.

Good luck arguing against that conclusion!

Of course, not many arguments are so easy to lay out. Evidence can be interpreted incorrectly and reasonable claims made on each side of an argument, but the model serves to remind educators and students alike as to the type of thinking required when writing to argue. If a pure, logical argument cannot be made, then one steps over a bit and adopts as much reason as possible.

At least, this is my ham-fisted understanding of what to emphasize for the Common Core writing standards.

Common Core State Standards -Writing from RLagana