English Learners & Text Complexity 1. What and why of Complex - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

English Learners & Text Complexity

• 1. What and why of Complex Text
• 2. Role of core vocabulary in complex texts
• 3. Features of core vocabulary that make it complex for

English Learners

• 4. Making English reading more challenging for ELs
• 5. Texts that grow ELs’ capacity as readers

1977—Chall proposes: Dumbing down of texts

1996: Analysis of Declining Text Difficulty

• 80
• 70
• 60
• 50
• 40
• 30
• 20
• 10

Primer 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th

LEX Mean

1919-1945 1946-1962 1963-1991

2006: Reading Between the Lines

Only 51 percent of 2005 ACT- tested high school graduates are ready for college-level reading— and, what’s worse, more students are on track to being ready for college-level reading in eighth and tenth grade than are actually ready by the time they reach twelfth grade.

COLLEGE READINESS

Reading Between the Lines

What the ACT Reveals About College Readiness in Reading

2010: Discrepancy in High School & College Texts

Stenner, A. J., Koons, H., & Swartz, C. W . (2010). Text complexity and developing expertise in reading. Chapel Hill, NC: MetaMetrics, Inc.

Core and Extended Vocabularies: Words in American Textbooks

(Zeno et al., 1995)

% of 17.25 million words

Word ZonesTM

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 6=135,473 5=13,882 4=2980 3=1676 2=620 1=203 0=107

The Staircase of Vocabulary in the CCSS Exemplar

0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 Gr 2-3 Gr 4-5 Gr 6-8 Gr 9-10 Gr 11-CCR Zones 1-5 Zones 6-8

Henry and Mudge

Henry used to walk to school alone. When he walked he used to worry about tornadoes, ghosts, biting dogs, and bullies. He walked as fast as he could. He looked straight

• ahead. He never looked back. But now he walked to

school with Mudge. And now when he walked, he thought about vanilla ice cream, rain, rocks, and good dreams.

Alice’s Adventure

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, and what is the use of a book, thought Alice without pictures or conversation? So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

But as they sat feasting, one who had not been invited was suddenly in their midst: Eris, the goddess of discord, had been left out because wherever she went she took trouble with her; yet here she was, all the same, and in her blackest mood, to avenge the insult. All she did--it seemed a small thing--was to toss down

• n the table a golden apple. Then she breathed upon the

guests once, and vanished.

The Black Ship

The Gettysburg Address

Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion

• f it as the final resting place of those who here gave their

lives that that nation might live.

 Most words are in the core vocabulary

because they are versatile. They are versatile in:

 Meaning  Part of speech  Use in idioms (literary)  Use in complex phrases (content areas)

4.2 Meanings Compound words Complex phrase Collocations U D

active

• adjective:
• always doing things
• involved in an organization/

activity by doing things for it

• working in the expected way
• noun
• the active (voice)
• active volcano
• active verb
• active member of the

Republication Party

• active in the Democratic party
• active seniors

56 0.90 atmosphere

• noun:
• feeling that an event/place gives

you

• physics: mixture of gases that

surrounds Earth or another planet

• the air in a room
• atmospheric

pressure

• a (smoky, hostile) atmosphere

50 0.64 battle

• noun:

a fight between two armies or groups

• situation where people

compete/argue with each other

• an attempt to stop something
• verb
• to try hard to achieve something
• battlefield
• battleship
• battleground
• legal battle
• in battle
• the battle for (control of the

Senate)

• losing battle
• battle against (cancer)

53 0.74 chain

• noun
• series of metal rings
• group of stores, hotels owned by

same company

• series of related events
• series of similar things in a line
• verb
• use a chain to fasten one thing

to another

• chainsaw
• chainsmoke
• bicycle chain
• chain of events
• mountain chain
• chain of

command

• chain reaction
• chain letter
• chain store
• a chain of (islands, mountain
• chained to (a fence)

47 0.86

Anglo-Saxon Common, everyday, down-to-earth words EX: cold, sweat, dirt New Words through compounding: cold-blooded, cold-natured, cold- drink, cold-running Greek/Latin Specialized words used mostly in science EX: thermometer, geography New Words through compounding

• f word parts:

thermosphere, geopolitical Romance 1066 (Norman Conquest)-1399 (Henry IV, a native Anglo-Saxon speaker assumes throne): French is spoken by upper classes; English by lower-classes. French loan words remain. EX: frigid, perspiration, soil New Words through derivations: frigidity, frigidness, refrigerator

(from Calfee & Drum, 1981)

Teaching distinctions in the Anglo-Saxon & Romance layers of English

Sample Text from 4th Grade NAEP (2007)

“I must get help,” said Rosa to

• herself. But how? I don't know
• anyone. Mama told me not to speak to
• strangers. Besides, I don't know how

to ask in English. Rosa had an idea. She rushed back to the street, walked to the traffic light, then raced around the corner and back to the school yard.

Sample Text from 4th Grade NAEP (2009)

Were these his own footprints? Yes! He could follow them back to the path. Hooray! Willy shouted. Then he remembered the nuts. I'll come back for them. But, no, on second thought he didn't really want to come here again.

How are students doing with the core vocabulary?

 National Assessment of

Educational Progress (2009):

 non-ELL: 223  ELL: 188

0% 25% 50% 75% 100% NAEP 4th gr.

Proficient+ Basic Below Basic

Blue Old Metrics recommendations Red CCSS Recommendations

Hiebert, E.H. (October, 2010). Anchoring Text Difficulty for the 21st Century: A Comparison of the Exemplars from the National Assessment of Educational Assessment and the Common Core State Standards (Reading Research Report 10.02). Santa Cruz, CA: TextProject, Inc.

The CCSS Staircase of Text Complexity

450-600 600-750 750-900 900-1,050 1050-1200 1200-1350

2-3 4-5 6-8 9-10 11-CCR

First-Grade Texts: 1962 & 2007 (Lexiles)

• 200
• 100

100 200 300 400 500 Beginning Middle End 1962 2007

Focusing the curriculum on E.D. Hirsch Jr.’s perspective

• n the western

canon— without giving students an understanding

• f the role of

the text in current society

The Optimal “Staircase” of Complex Vocabulary

0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1 2-3 4-5 6-8 9-10 Zones 1-5 Zones 6-8

Stepping Up Complexity: Building Capacity with Core Vocabulary

95+% of words in texts fall into these categories

50 most frequent words & words with ≤3 letters 100 most frequent words & words with ≤4 letters 300 most frequent words & words with ≤4 letters 500 most frequent words & words with ≤5 letters 1,000 most frequent words & words with ≤5 letters 3,000 most frequent words & words with ≤6 letters 5,500 most frequent words & words with ≤7 letters

Step 2: 100 most frequent words & words with ≥4 letters

Can a cat be pink? No. Can a cat be green? No. Can a cat be black and white? Yes! I play ball with my cat and dog. Get the ball, cat. No, cat, no. Get the ball, dog. Yes, dog, yes! Dogs can run. They run and run. Dogs can dig. They dig and dig. Dogs cannot fly. Birds can fly and fly.

Step 4: 500 most frequent words & words with ≥5 letters

Toad came walking by. "What a fine garden you have, Frog," he said. "Yes," said Frog. "It's very nice, but it was hard work." "I wish I had a garden," said Toad. "Here are some flower seeds. Plant them in the ground," said Frog, and soon you will have a garden." "How soon?" asked Toad. "Quite soon," said Frog. Toad ran home. He planted the flower seeds.

Step 6: 3,000 most frequent words & words with ≥6 letters

Sometimes, schools cut music programs when there is a shortage of

• money. The members of school boards

are faced with hard choices when money is limited. One choice might be between music programs or larger classes. In situations like this, school board members are faced with a hard choice. Music programs can be costly. Violins, trumpets, and pianos are expensive to buy. They are also expensive to repair. Further, usually not all of the students in a school take music classes. When faced with the choice of larger classes or music programs, school leaders will often focus

• n math, science, and language arts.

A Curriculum of Core Knowledge in the Contexts of Today

 Blood, Toil, Sweat, and Tears—yes but with:

Cesar Chavez’s speech to the Commonwealth Club

http://esl-bits.net/listening/ Media/CesarChavez/default.html

Twenty-one years ago last September, on a lonely stretch of railroad track paralleling U.S. Highway 101 near Salinas, 32 Bracero farm workers lost their lives in a tragic accident. The Braceros had been imported from Mexico to work on California farms. They died when their bus, which was converted from a flatbed truck, drove in front of a freight train. Conversion of the bus had not been approved by any government agency. The driver had "tunnel" vision. Most of the bodies lay unidentified for days. No

• ne, including the grower who employed the

workers, even knew their names.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/

story.php?storyId=95791737

Margaret Chase Smith

• First U.S. Senator to speak out against

McCarthyism in the U.S. Senate: the Four Horsemen of Calumny (1950)

• First woman to have her name on the

ballot of a major party for its nomination of presidential candidate (1964) “As an American, I want to see our nation recapture the strength and unity it once had when we fought the enemy instead of

• urselves”

Lou Gehrig: The Iron Man of Baseball

http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=_SKyfGK9brs

"Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about the bad break I got. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth. I have been in ballparks for seventeen years and have never received anything but kindness and encouragement from you fans…. So I close in saying that I might have been given a bad break, but I've got an awful lot to live for."

Steve Jobs

Commencement address to Stanford class of 2005: http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=D1R-jKKp3NA “Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay

• Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I

have always wished that for

• myself. And now, as you

graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.”

And there’s humor in speeches...

 Dr. Seuss’s

Commencement address at Lake Forest College, June 4, 1977

www.textproject.org