Maryann Cucchiaramacucchiara@gmail.com

“It seems to me curious, not to say obscene and thoroughly terrifying that it could occur to an association of human beings drawn together through need and chance and for profit into a company, an organ of journalism, to pry intimately into the lives of an undefended and appallingly damaged group of human beings, an ignorant and helpless rural family, for the purpose of parading the nakedness, disadvantage, and humiliation of these lives before another group of human beings.”

From Let us Now Praise Famous Men, James Agee  

What Should We See?

What Do We See?

What Must we Do/Change/Re-vision?

How do we make those Bold Changes?

“Professional development – what little is invested is too often spent on forms of training aimed at improving things at the margins rather than developing structures aimed at causing teachers and administrators to think differently about their work and work differently because of what they come to think.”

(Schlechty, 1990)

Closing the “Opportunity Gap” L2 Stall Fragmented Approaches ESL Teacher Isolation Segregated ELLs Simplified Materials regardless of ESL Level

CCSSs

NYSESLAT ELA State Exams School Report Cards Reading Levels Writing Proficiencies Growing Population of Long Term ELLs

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Too much variability in understanding and beliefs around what ELLs need to meet any standards

Too much confusion from a variety of fragmented and isolated literacy approaches

Far too many long term ELLs, far too many ELLS/SPED, far too many pull-out, and way too much of watered down texts and curriculum

Too much of a “pot luck” approach

Lily Wong Fillmore

“Students who are classified as ELs are usually grouped for instruction. The instruction they are given is generally pitched at a lower level than instruction provided for English proficient students.

The texts used in such classes are usually less complex, less informative, and less demanding than those ordinarily used. As a result such texts rarely if ever provide any exposure to the kind of language students need to learn and use in carrying out academic work;

Less is asked and expected of students in such classes, and many of them lose hope in making academic progress, and sadly––their faith in their own ability to learn.”

Dr. Lily Wong Fillmore

At the heart of these criteria are instructions for

shifting the focus of literacy instruction to center on careful examination of the text itself. In aligned materials, work in reading and writing (as well as speaking and listening) must center on the text under consideration. The standards focus intently on students reading closely to draw evidence from the text and are emphatic about students reading texts of adequate range and complexity.

David Coleman • Susan Pimentel

In addition, to develop reading comprehension and vocabulary for all readers, the selected informational text materials should build a coherent body of knowledge within and across grades.

Materials develop academic vocabulary prevalent in complex texts throughout reading, writing, listening, and speaking instruction.

Reading strategies are not offered as a separate body of material.

Questions and tasks attend to analyzing the arguments and information at the heart of informational text in grades K–5 and literary nonfiction in grades 6–12.

Writing to Sources and Research

Increasing Focus on Argument and Informative Writing

Scaffolds enable all students to experience the complexity of the text, rather than avoid it.

Rather than focusing on general strategies and questions disconnected from texts, strategies should be cultivated in the context of reading specific texts.

Materials make the text the focus of instruction by avoiding features that distract from the text.

Amplify, Don’t SimplifyTeach How and Why Language

WorksPreview and Play with

VocabularyDeconstruct/Reconstruct/Map

Meaning Demystify Figurative Language

CALP Observation Protocols

Along the Pathway Classroom Practices

Teacher Self Evaluation Surveys

The Tea Act of 1773 In May 1773 Parliament passed a law. It

was called the Tea Act. King George wanted to help the British East India Company. The East India Company had 17 million pounds (7.65 million kilograms) of unsold tea. It was stored in English warehouses.

The Tea Act said the East India Company could sell the tea to American colonists. The tea was taxed two times. It was taxed in England. Then it was taxed again in the colonies.

The East India Company sent 1,700 chests of tea to the colonies. The colonists were not pleased. They did not like the tax. They did not want to buy the tea. Many people thought the king wanted to crush the colonists.

The Tea Act, passed by Parliament on May 10, 1773, would launch the final spark to the revolutionary movement in Boston. The act was not intended to raise revenue in the American colonies, and in fact imposed no new taxes. It was designed to prop up the East India Company which was floundering financially and burdened with eighteen million pounds of unsold tea. This tea was to be shipped directly to the colonies, and sold at a bargain price. The Townshend Duties were still in place, however, and the radical leaders in America found reason to believe that this act was a maneuver to buy popular support for the taxes already in force. The direct sale of tea, via British agents, would also have undercut the business of local merchants.

Petry, Ann. Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad. New York: HarperCollins, 1983. (1955) From Chapter 3: “Six Years Old”

By the time Harriet Ross was six years old, she had unconsciously absorbed many kinds of knowledge, almost with the air she breathed. She could not, for example, have said how or at what moment she knew that she was a slave.

Students analyze in detail how the early years of Harriet Tubman (as related by author Ann Petry) contributed to her later becoming a conductor on the Underground Railroad, attending to how the author introduces, illustrates, and elaborates upon the events in Tubman’s life. [RI.6.3]

Write a book report about the life of Harriet Tubman

Make a diorama about the early life of Harriet Ross

Frogs are outside his house.

They are quiet in the daytime. They are noisy at night. It is nighttime. The frogs are singing. He grabs a flashlight. He goes outside. He shines the light on a frog. It hops. He picks it up. It is soft and wet. It kicks its legs. He puts it down.

Tiny poison dart frogs may only be one inch (2.5 centimeters) long, but they pack a powerful punch—of poison. Weighing less than an ounce (28 grams), these frogs are considered one of Earth's most toxic, or poisonous, species. For example, the golden poison dart frog has enough poison to kill 20,000 mice.

With a range of bright colors—yellows, oranges, reds, greens, blues—they aren't just big show-offs, either. Those colorful designs tell potential predators, "I'm toxic. Don't eat me."

 

After multiple opportunities to read informational texts and use information/facts students will write a report about what they have learned about frogs.

From Remedial Approach to Acceleration From Simplified to Amplified From Everyday to Academic From Pull out to Push in and Co-teach From Isolated ESL Skills to Knowledge

Building From Everyday Topics to Content

Themes From an “Achievement Gap” to an

“Opportunity Gap” From “Near Home” to “Far Away”

Literacy and Language Practices

The “Ls” Ells Need

Learning, Language, Literacy

“Children can only augment their knowledge base when they read IF they can make sense of what they read.”

Integration is consistent with the notion that language is learned through meaningful context

Concurrent teaching and learning of both subject matter and language is a way to accelerate

Non-integrated approach is insufficient for ELLs to succeed in mainstream classes

Situated language within a content curriculum has the potential to support in a continuous and reciprocal manner

Language rich diet of an ELL group can be nourishing for all students

Taken from Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning by Pauline Gibbons

BICS

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CALP

Context Embedded Context Reduced

Cognitively Undemanding

Cognitively Demanding

A B

C D

Integrated, Standards Based ESL

Infrastructure Moves

Instructional Moves

ProfessionalDevelopment

Moves

Integrated Approach to ELA/ESL

Humanities Approach to ELA/Social Studies

Integrated Approach to ELA/Science

Integrated Approach to R/W Workshop

Inclusion of Reading/Writing into Social Studies and Science Courses

NLA and Dual Language Integrated Approach

Look at one “juicy sentence” each day in each content area.

Hold instructional conversations that get learners to pay attention to complex texts

Find engaging ways to use and think about the academic language

Previewing Vocabulary: Emphasis on Tier 2, Rigor and Play

RA/TA: “Landing Places” with the RA/TA to highlight/Amplify text

Shared/Guided reading time which explored language that framed big ideas/concepts within texts

Role of Mini Lesson: “Lifting the text” to study “author’s craft” and the language that he/she uses to frame ideas

Strategy #1

35

Talk It Out! Instructional Conversations

Act it Out! TPR with academic language

Draw it! Building from the base illustrations

Stretch it! Lexical Arrays

Grow it: Generative Words

Feel it: Denotes/Connotes

Distinguish shades of meaning among verbs differing in manner (e.g., look, peek, glance, stare, glare, scowl) and adjectives differing in intensity (e.g., large, gigantic) by defining or choosing them or by acting out the meanings.Common Core Standards: Language

Strands

38

Strategy #2

Deconstruct/Reconstruct/Map Instructional Conversations around how and

why language works and frames ideas Sentence Play----Sentence “Acrobatics” Demystifying Figurative Language Looking at Discourse Specific Language

Functions

Acquire and use accurately grade-

appropriate general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, including those that signal contrast, addition, and other logical relationships (e.g., however, although, nevertheless, similarly, moreover, in addition).

Common Core Standards Language Strand

Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meanings

Interpret figurative language, including similes and metaphors, in context.

Language Strands: CCSS

The Role of Text Complexity The Role of NF The Role of Vocabulary The Language Standards The Role of Staying on Topic Within a

Grade: Building Knowledge Systematically

The Role of the RA for Informational Texts

EQs

AcademicVocabulary

Focus on Academic Language

Performance Assessments: Conveying and/or Convincing

Alternate Text Sets

Aligned to CCSS

Essential Questions are the focus of the Curriculum Design

Investigative/Inquiry Based Curriculum Investigation requires routine reading and

writing of complex texts that go to the heart of the matter

Diverse Alternate Texts: Fiction and NF Assessments that highlight student’s ability

to write argumentatively and/or in an explanatory manner

Routine Attention to Complex Texts and the Language of the texts, i.e. Vocabulary, Figurative Language and Language Functions/Grammatical Aspects

Alignment to ELA CCSSs and/or Literacy in History/Science CCSSs

Engage all students in at least one literacy task and one math task aligned to strategically selected CCSS.

In literacy, students will complete a task that asks them to read and analyze informational texts and write opinions and arguments in response.

Multiple entry points for all learners including students with disabilities and ELLs.

What is confounding? Language, Literacy, Learning

How do we provide access, attention and engagement with such complexity in language, literacy and learning?

What types of scaffolding would be necessary for comprehension and production?

In a sun-dappled pool not far from the clamor of Waikiki Beach, two female dolphins poke their heads out of the water, waiting for a command. "O.K.," says Louis Herman, founder and director of the Kewalo Basin Marine Mammal Laboratory, "now let's try a tandem creative." Two graduate students, positioned at opposite ends of the 50-ft. tank, throw full body and soul into communicating this message to the animals, Phoenix and Akeakamai. First the humans ask the dolphins to pay attention by holding a finger high in the air. Then they tap the index fingers of each hand together, forming the gesture that has been taught to mean tandem. Next they throw their arms up in an expansive gesture that signifies creative. The dolphins have just been told, "Do something creative together.”

From Time: “Can Animals Think?”

In a sun-dappled pool not far from the clamor of Waikiki Beach, two female dolphins poke their heads out of the water, waiting for a command. "O.K.," says Louis Herman, founder and director of the Kewalo Basin Marine Mammal Laboratory, "now let's try a tandem creative." Two graduate students, positioned at opposite ends of the 50-ft. tank, throw full body and soul into communicating this message to the animals, Phoenix and Akeakamai. First the humans ask the dolphins to pay attention by holding a finger high in the air. Then they tap the index fingers of each hand together, forming the gesture that has been taught to mean tandem. Next they throw their arms up in an expansive gesture that signifies creative. The dolphins have just been told, "Do something creative together."

Talk It Out! Instructional Conversations dip and submerge Act it Out! TPR with academic language Open and expansive Draw it! Building from the base illustrations A yell vs ….

Stretch it! Lexical Arrays scream yell clamor uproar shout

Grow it: Generative Words forethought

Feel it: Denotes/Connotes

Once they are in synch, the animals leap into the air and simultaneously spit out jets of water before plunging back into the pool.

In order to spit, for instance, they both must take water into their mouths before they leap into the air -- a trick that takes some forethought. Other requests for tandem creatives have yielded a variety of results, including a synchronized backward swim culminating in a simultaneous wave of the tails.

TASK: Write an essay in which you explain how Linden develops his point of view on the question, “Can animals think?”. Begin by introducing and explaining Linden’s point of view. Then, explain how Linden develops that point of view from the beginning through the middle and to the end of the article. Cite relevant textual evidence to support your analysis of Linden’s point of view. End your essay with a statement that follows from the information you presented on how Linden developed his point of view.

ESL Stand-Alone Co-Teaching ESL/ELA Co-Teaching ESL/Social Studies/Science Bilingual and Dual Language Classrooms Intervention Classes Enrichment Classes

“It was within this culture of the lab sites that ideas were exchanged and adapted and through conversations and collaborations, new ideas and thinking beyond whatever the formal sessions uncovered were created.”

Lab sites ensure that all players,

instructional leaders and teachers would have access to the “culture of practice” either directly -lab site staff - or “peripherally”, indirectly – observers of the practices.

ALLAN COLLINS, JOHN SEELY BROWN, AND ANN HOLUM

School Report Cards Extra Credit for “Closing the Achievement

Gap for ELLs Significant NYSESLAT Gains Movement in State ELA exams Comprehension Gains on Running Records,

Reading Inventories