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Page 1 DUCATION LL OD
DEVELOPING CORE PROFICIENCIES ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS / LITERACY UNIT
GRADE
MAKING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
www.odelleducation.com
LL OD DUCATION
7
California Commonwealth Club Address Cesar Chavez
Page 7 DUCATION LL OD
• The teacher presents the purpose of theunit and explains the skill ofmaking EBCs.
• Students independently read part of thetext with a text-dependent question toguide them.
UNIT OUTLINE
PART 1: UNDERSTANDING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
• Students follow along as they listen to thetext being read aloud and discuss a seriesof text-dependent questions.
• The teacher models a critical readingand thinking process for forming EBCsabout texts.
PART 2: MAKING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
• Students independently read part of thetext and look for evidence to support aclaim made by the teacher.
• Students follow along as they listen to thetext being read aloud and discuss a series oftext-dependent questions.
• In pairs, students look for evidence tosupport claims made by the teacher.
• The class discusses evidence in support ofclaims found by student pairs.
• In pairs, students make an EBC of their ownand present it to the class.
PART 3: ORGANIZING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
• Students independently read part of thetext and make an EBC.
• Students follow along as they listen to partof the text being read aloud.
• The teacher models organizing evidenceto develop and explain claims usingstudent EBCs.
• In pairs, students develop a claim withmultiple points and organize supportingevidence.
• The class discusses the EBCs developed bystudent pairs.
PART 4: WRITING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
• Students independently review the text anddevelop an EBC.
• The teacher introduces and modelswriting EBCs using a claim from Part 3.
• In pairs, students write EBCs using one oftheir claims from Part 3.
• The class discusses the written EBCs ofvolunteer student pairs.
• The class discusses their new EBCs andstudents read aloud portions of the text.
• Students independently write EBCs.
PART 5: DEVELOPING EVIDENCE-BASED WRITING
• Students review the entire text and make anew EBC.
• The teacher analyzes volunteer studentevidence-based writing from Part 4 anddiscusses developing global EBCs.
• Students discuss their new claims in pairsand then with the class.
• Students independently write a finalevidence-based writing piece.
• The class discusses final evidence-basedwriting pieces of student volunteers.
Page 8 DUCATION LL OD
UNDERSTANDING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
PART 1
1- INTRODUCTION TO UNIT The teacher presents the purpose of the unit and explains the proficiency of making EBCs.
2- INDEPENDENT READING Students independently read part of the text with a text-dependent question to guide them.
3- READ ALOUD AND CLASS DISCUSSION Students follow along as they listen to the text being read aloud, and the teacher leads a discussion guided by a series of text-dependent questions.
4- MODEL FORMING EBCs The teacher models a critical reading and thinking process for forming EBCs about texts.
TARGETED STANDARD(S):
SUPPORTING STANDARD(S):
ALIGNMENT TO CCSS
ACTIVITIES ESTIMATED TIME: 2-3 days
MATERIALS: Forming EBC Handout Forming EBC Tool EBC Criteria Checklist I Making EBC Tool
OBJECTIVE: Students learn the importance and elements of making evidence-based claims
through a close reading of part of the text.
“Living Under Savage Conditions”
RI.7.1
RI.7.1: Cite several pieces of textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
RI.7.2 RI.7.3 SL.7.1
RI.7.2: Determine two or more central ideas in a text and analyze their development over the course of the text; provide an objective summary of the text. RI.7.3: Analyze the interactions between individuals, events, and ideas in a text (e.g., how ideas influence individuals or events, or how individuals influence ideas or events). SL.7.1: Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 7 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
Page 1
Commonwealth Club Address Cesar Chavez
San Francisco, November 9, 1984
Thank you very much, Mr. Lee, Mrs. Black, ladies and gentlemen.
Twenty-one years ago, this 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 laid unidentified for days. No one,
including the grower who employed the workers, even knew their names. Today,
thousands of farm workers live under savage conditions, beneath trees and amid
garbage and human excrement near tomato fields in San Diego County; tomato fields,
which use the most modern farm technology. Vicious rats gnaw at them as they sleep.
They walk miles to buy food at inflated prices and they carry in water from irrigation
ditches.
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http://esl-bits.net/listening/Media/CesarChavez/default.html
tunnel vision savagedefective sight in which objects not in the center field of vision cannot be properly seen
harsh
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Child labor is still common in many farm areas. As much as 30 percent of Northern
California's garlic harvesters are underage children. Kids as young as six years old
have voted in states, conducted union elections, since they qualified as workers. Some
800,000 underage children work with their families harvesting crops across America.
Babies born to migrant workers suffer 25 percent higher infant mortality rates than the
rest of the population. Malnutrition among migrant workers' children is 10 times higher
than the national rate. Farm workers' average life expectancy is still 49 years, compared to
73 years for the average American.
All my life, I have been driven by one dream, one goal, one vision: to overthrow a
farm labor system in this nation that treats farm workers as if they were not important
human beings. Farm workers are not agricultural implements; they are not beasts of
burden to be used and discarded. That dream was born in my youth, it was nurtured in
my early days of organizing. It has flourished. It has been attacked.
I'm not very different from anyone else who has ever tried to accomplish something
with his life. My motivation comes from my personal life, from watching what my mother
and father went through when I was growing up, from what we experienced as migrant
workers in California. That dream, that vision grew from my own experience with racism,
with hope, with a desire to be treated fairly, and to see my people treated as human
beings and not as chattel. It grew from anger and rage, emotions I felt 40 years ago when
people of my color were denied the right to see a movie or eat at a restaurant in many
parts of California. It grew from the frustration and humiliation I felt as a boy who couldn't
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migrant mortality implements
moving from place to place in search of work
death tools
chattelproperty or personal possession
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understand how the growers could abuse and exploit farm workers when there were so
many of us and so few of them.
Later in the 50s, I experienced a different kind of exploitation. In San Jose, in Los P6
Angeles and in other urban communities, we, the Mexican-American people, were
dominated by a majority that was Anglo. I began to realize what other minority people
had discovered; that the only answer, the only hope was in organizing. More of us had to
become citizens, we had to register to vote, and people like me had to develop the skills it
would take to organize, to educate, to help empower the Chicano people.
I spent many years before we founded the union learning how to work with people. P7
We experienced some successes in voter registration, in politics, in battling racial
discrimination -- successes in an era where Black Americans were just beginning to assert
their civil rights and when political awareness among Hispanics was almost non-existent.
But deep in my heart, I knew I could never be happy unless I tried organizing the farm
workers. I didn't know if I would succeed, but I had to try.
All Hispanics, urban and rural, young and old, are connected to the farm workers'
experience. We had all lived through the fields, or our parents had. We shared that
common humiliation. How could we progress as a people even if we lived in the cities,
while the farm workers, men and women of our color, were condemned to a life without
pride? How could we progress as a people while the farm workers, who symbolized our
history in this land, were denied self-respect? How could our people believe that their
children could become lawyers and doctors and judges and business people while this
shame, this injustice, was permitted to continue?
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Anglo Chicano uniona white American not of Hispanic descent
an American of Mexican descent an organization of workers formed to advance the interests of its members
assertclaim
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Those who attack our union often say it's not really a union. It's something else, a
social movement, a civil rights movement -- it's something dangerous. They're half
right. The United Farm Workers is first and foremost a union, a union like any other, a
union that either produces for its members on the bread-and-butter issues or doesn't
survive. But the UFW has always been something more than a union, although it's never
been dangerous, if you believe in the Bill of Rights. The UFW was the beginning. We
attacked that historical source of shame and infamy that our people in this country lived
with. We attacked that injustice, not by complaining, not by seeking handouts, not by
becoming soldiers in the war on poverty; we organized!
Farm workers acknowledge we had allowed ourselves to become victims in a
democratic society, a society where majority rules and collective bargaining are supposed
to be more than academic theories and political rhetoric. And by addressing this historical
problem, we created confidence and pride and hope in an entire people's ability to create
the future. The UFW survival, its existence, were not in doubt in my mind when the time
began to come.
After the union became visible, when Chicanos started entering college in greater
numbers, when Hispanics began running for public office in greater numbers, when our
people started asserting their rights on a broad range of issues and in many communities
across this land. The union survival, its very existence, sent out a signal to all Hispanics
that we were fighting for our dignity, that we were challenging and overcoming injustice,
that we were empowering the least educated among us, the poorest among us. The
message was clear. If it could happen in the fields, it could happen anywhere: in the cities,
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in the courts, in the city councils, in the state legislatures. I didn't really appreciate it at the
time, but the coming of our union signaled the start of great changes among Hispanics
that are only now beginning to be seen.
I've traveled through every part of this nation. I have met and spoken with thousands
of Hispanics from every walk of life, from every social and economic class. And one thing I
hear most often from Hispanics, regardless of age or position, and from many non-
Hispanics as well, is that the farm workers gave them the hope that they could succeed
and the inspiration to work for change.
From time to time, you will hear our opponents declare that the union is weak, that
the union has no support, that the union has not grown fast enough. Our obituary
has been written many times. How ironic it is that the same forces that argue so
passionately that the union is not influential are the same forces that continue to fight us
so hard.
The union's power in agriculture has nothing to do with the number of farm workers
on the union contract. It has nothing to do with the farm workers' ability to
contribute to democratic politicians. It doesn't even have much to do with our ability to
conduct successful boycotts. The very fact of our existence forces an entire industry,
unionized and non-unionized, to spend millions of dollars year after year on increased
wages, on improved working conditions, and on benefits for workers. If we were so weak
and unsuccessful, why do the growers continue to fight us with such passion? Because as
long as we continue to exist, farm workers will benefit from our existence, even if they
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don't work under union contract. It doesn't really matter whether we have 100,000 or
500,000 members. In truth, hundreds of thousands of farm workers in California and in
other states are better off today because of our work. And Hispanics across California and
the nation who don't work in agriculture are better off today because of what the farm
workers taught people about organization, about pride and strength, about seizing
control over their own lives.
Tens of thousands of children and grandchildren of farm workers and the children
and grandchildren of poor Hispanics are moving out of the fields and out of the
barrios and into the professions and into business and into politics, and that movement
cannot be reversed. Our union will forever exist as an empowering force among Chicanos
in the Southwest. That means our power and our influence will grow and not diminish.
Two major trends give us hope and encouragement. First, our union has returned to
a tried and tested weapon in the farm workers non-violent arsenal: the boycott. After
the Agricultural Labor Relations Act became law in California in 1975, we dismantled
our boycott to work with the law. During the early and mid '70s millions of Americans
supported our boycotts. After 1975, we redirected our efforts from the boycott to
organizing and winning elections under the law. That law helped farm workers make
progress in overcoming poverty and injustice.
At companies where farm workers are protected by union contracts, we have made
progress in overcoming child labor, in overcoming miserable wages and working
conditions, in overcoming sexual harassment of women workers, in overcoming
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boycott Agricultural Labor Relations Act dismantlerefusal by a group to buy goods or services to show support for a cause
law enacted by the state of California in 1975 to protect,the right of farm workers to self-organize and negotiate the conditions of their employment
take apart
Page 7
discrimination in employment, in overcoming dangerous pesticides, which poison our
people and poison the food we all eat. Where we have organized these injustices soon
passed in history, but under Republican Governor George Deukmejian, the law that
guarantees our right to organize no longer protects farm workers; it doesn't work
anymore.
In 1982, corporate growers gave Deukmejian one million dollars to run for governor
of California. Since he took office, Deukmejian has paid back his debt to the growers
with the blood and sweat of California farm workers. Instead of enforcing the law as it was
written against those who break it, Deukmejian invites growers who break the law to seek
relief from governor's appointees. What does all this mean for farm workers? It means that
the right to vote in free elections is a sham. It means the right to talk freely about the
union among your fellow workers on the job is a cruel hoax. It means that the right to be
free from threats and intimidation by growers is an empty promise. It means that the right
to sit down and negotiate with your employer as equals across the bargaining table and
not as peons in the fields is a fraud. It means that thousands of farm workers, who are
owed millions of dollars in back pay because their employers broke the law, are still
waiting for their checks. It means that 36,000 farm workers, who voted to be represented
by the United Farm Workers in free elections, are still waiting for contracts from growers
who refuse to bargain in good faith. It means that for farm workers child labor will
continue. It means that infant mortality will continue. It means that malnutrition among
children will continue. It means the short life expectancy and the inhuman living and
working conditions will continue.
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Are these make-believe threats? Are they exaggerations? Ask the farm workers who
are waiting for the money they lost because the growers broke the law. Ask the farm
workers who are still waiting for growers to bargain in good faith and sign contracts. Ask
the farm workers who have been fired from their jobs because they spoke out for the
union. Ask the farm workers who have been threatened with physical violence because
they support the UFW, and ask the family of Rene Lopez, the young farm worker from
Fresno who was shot to death last year because he supported the union as he came out of
a voting booth. Ask the farm workers who watch their children go hungry in this land of
wealth and promise. Ask the farm workers who see their lives eaten away by poverty and
suffering.
These tragic events force farm workers to declare a new international boycott of
California grapes, except the three percent of grapes produced under union contract. That
is why we are asking Americans, once again, to join the farm workers by boycotting
California grapes. The newest Harris Poll revealed that 17 million Americans boycotted
grapes. We are convinced that those people and that goodwill have not disappeared. That
segment of the population which makes the boycotts work are the Hispanics, the Blacks,
the other minorities, our friends in labor and the Church. But it is also an entire generation
of young Americans who matured politically and socially in the '60s and the '70s, millions
of people for whom boycotting grapes and other products became a socially accepted
pattern of behavior. If you were young, Anglo and/or near campers during the late '60s
and early '70s, chances are you supported farm workers.
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15 years later, the men and women of that generation are alive and well. They are in
their mid 30s and 40s. They are pursuing professional careers, their disposable
incomes are relatively high, but they are still inclined to respond to an appeal from farm
workers. The union's mission still has meaning for them. Only today, we must translate the
importance of a union for farm workers into the language of the 1980s. Instead of talking
about the right to organize, we must talk about protection against sexual harassment in
the fields. We must speak about the right to quality food and food that is safe to eat. I can
tell you the new language is working, the 17 million are still there. They are responding
not to picket lines and leafleting alone, but to the high-tech boycott of today, a boycott
that uses computers and direct mail and advertising techniques, which has revolutionized
business and politics in recent years. We have achieved more success with a boycott in
the first 11 months of 1984 than we achieved in the last 14 years, since 1970.
The other trend that gives us hope is the monumental growth of Hispanic influence
in this country. And what that means is increased population, increased social and
economic clout and increased political influence. South of the Sacramento River,
Hispanics now make up now more than 25 percent of the population. That figure will top
30 percent by the year 2000. There are now 1.1 million Spanish-surnamed registered
voters in California. In 1975, there were 200 Hispanic elected officials at all levels of
government. In 1984, there are over 400 elected judges, city council members, mayors,
and legislators. In light of these trends, it's absurd to believe or to suggest that we are
going to go back in time as a union or as a people.
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disposable surnameavailable the family or last name
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The growers often try to blame the union for their problems, to lay their sins off on
us, sins for which they only have themselves to blame. The growers only have
themselves to blame as they begin to reap the harvest of decades of environmental
damage they have brought upon the land: the pesticides, the herbicides, the soil
fumigants, the fertilizers, the salt deposits from thoughtless irrigation, the ravages of years
of unrestrained poisoning of our soil and water. Thousands of acres of land in California
have already been irrevocably damaged by this wanton abuse of nature. Thousands more
will be lost unless growers understand that dumping more and more poison from the soil
won't solve their problems on the short or on the long term.
Health authorities in many San Joaquin Valley towns already warn young children
and pregnant mothers not to drink the water, because of nitrates from fertilizers
which has poisoned the ground water. The growers have only themselves to blame for an
increasing demand by consumers for higher-quality food, food that isn't tainted by toxics,
food that doesn't result from plant mutations or chemicals that produce red luscious-
looking tomatoes that taste like alfalfa. The growers are making the same mistake
American automakers made in the '60s and '70s when they refused to produce small
economical cars and opened up the door to increased foreign competition.
Growers only have themselves to blame for increasing attacks on the publicly
financed handouts and government welfare: water subsidies, mechanization
research, huge subsidies for not growing crops. These special privileges came into being
before the Supreme Court's "one person, one vote" decision, at a time when rural
lawmakers dominated the legislature and the Congress. Soon, those handouts could be in
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wanton subsidiescareless, undisciplined money granted by the government
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jeopardy as government searches for more revenue and as urban taxpayers take a closer
look at front programs and who they really benefit. The growers only have themselves to
blame for the humiliation they have brought upon succeeding waves of immigrant
groups that have sweated and sacrificed for a hundred years to make this industry rich.
For generations, they have subjugated entire races of dark-skinned farm workers.
These are the sins of growers, not the farm workers. We didn't poison the land. We
didn't open the door to imported produce. We didn't covet billions of dollars in
government handouts. We didn't abuse and exploit the people who work the land. Today
the growers are like a punch-drunk old boxer who doesn't know he's past his prime. The
times are changing; the political and social environment has changed. The chickens are
coming home to roost, and the time to account for past sins is approaching.
I am told these days farm workers should be discouraged and pessimistic. The
Republicans control the governor's office and the White House. There is a
conservative trend in the nation. Yet, we are filled with hope and encouragement.
We have looked into the future and the future is ours. History and inevitability are on our
side. The farm workers and their children and the Hispanics and their children are the
future in California, and corporate growers are the past. Those politicians who ally
themselves with the corporate growers and against farm workers and the Hispanics are in
for a big surprise. They want to make their careers in politics; they want to hold power 20
and 30 years from now. But 20 and 30 years from now, in Modesto, in Salinas, in Fresno, in
Bakersfield, in the Imperial Valley and in many of the great cities of California, those
communities will be dominated by farm workers and not by growers, by the children and
grandchildren of farm workers and not by the children and grandchildren of growers.
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subjugateto control; to make submissive
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These trends are part of the forces of history which cannot be stopped. No person
and no organization can resist them for very long; they are inevitable. Once social
change begins it cannot be reversed. You cannot un-educate the person who has learned
cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. You cannot oppress the people
not afraid anymore. Our opponents must understand that it's not just the union
we have built -- unions like other institutions can come and go -- but we're more than
institutions. For nearly 20 years, our union has been on the cutting edge of a people's
cause, and you cannot do away with an entire people and you cannot stamp out a
people's cause. Regardless of what the future holds for the union, regardless of what the
future holds for farm workers, our accomplishments cannot be undone. La causa, our
cause, doesn't have to be experienced twice. The consciousness and pride that were
raised by our union are alive and thriving inside millions of young Hispanics who will
never work on a farm.
Like the other immigrant groups, the day will come when we win the economic and
political rewards, which are in keeping with our numbers in society. The day will come
when the politicians will do the right thing for our people out of political necessity and
not out of charity or idealism. That day may not come this year. That day may not
come during this decade, but it will come someday. And when that day comes, we shall
see the fulfillment of that passage from the Book of Matthew in the New Testament: "The
last shall be first, and the first shall be last." And on that day, our nation shall fulfill its
creed, and that fulfillment shall enrich us all. Thank you very much.
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Page 13 DUCATION LL OD
MAKING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
PART 2
1- INDEPENDENT READING AND FINDING SUPPORTING EVIDENCE Students independently read part of the text and use the Making EBC Tool to look for evidence to support a claim made by the teacher.
2- READ ALOUD AND CLASS DISCUSSION Students follow along as they listen to the same part of the text being read aloud and discuss a series of text-dependent questions.
3- FIND SUPPORTING EVIDENCE IN PAIRS In pairs, students use the Making EBC Tool to look for evidence to support additional claims about the text made by the teacher.
4- CLASS DISCUSSION OF EBCs The class discusses evidence in support of claims found by student pairs.
5- FORMING EBCs IN PAIRS In pairs, students use the Forming EBC Tool to make an evidence-based claim of their own and present it to the class.
TARGETED STANDARD(S):
SUPPORTING STANDARD(S):
ALIGNMENT TO CCSS
ACTIVITIES ESTIMATED TIME: 1-3 days
MATERIALS: Making EBC Tool Forming EBC Handout Forming EBC Tool EBC Criteria Checklist I TCD Checklist
OBJECTIVE: Students develop the ability to make evidence-based claims
through a close reading of the text.
“We organized!”
RI.7.1
RI.7.1: Cite several pieces of textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
RI.7.2 RI.7.3 SL.7.1
RI.7.2: Determine two or more central ideas in a text and analyze their development over the course of the text; provide an objective summary of the text. RI.7.3: Analyze the interactions between individuals, events, and ideas in a text (e.g., how ideas influence individuals or events, or how individuals influence ideas or events). SL.7.1: Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 7 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
Page 14 DUCATION LL OD
Students follow along as they listen to the same part of the text being read aloud and discuss a series of text-dependent questions.
Depending on scheduling and student ability, students can be assigned to read and complete the tool for homework. Teachers should decide what works best for their students. It’s essential that students have opportunity to read the text independently. All students must develop the habit of perseverance in reading. Assigning the reading as homework potentially gives them more time with the text. Either way, it might be a good idea to provide some time at
the beginning of class for students to read the section quietly by themselves. This ensures that all students have had at least some independent reading time.
Also depending on scheduling and student ability, some students might choose (or be encouraged) to read ahead. Instructional focus should follow the pacing outlined in the activities, but students will only benefit from reading and re-reading the text throughout the duration of the unit.
Students independently read part of the text and use the Making EBC Tool to look for evidence to support a claim made by the teacher.
ACTIVITY 1: INDEPENDENT READING AND FINDING SUPPORTING EVIDENCE
ACTIVITY 2: READ ALOUD AND CLASS DISCUSSION
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
Read the text aloud to the class while students follow along. Alternatively, students could be asked to read aloud to the class. Work through the text using the following three text-dependent questions.
Students independently work on paragraphs 6-19 of Chavez's Commonwealth Club Address.
Students follow along as they listen to paragraphs 6-19 read aloud and discuss three text-dependent questions:
1- Beginning in paragraph 6, Chavez describes how to overcome the unfair treatment of farm workers. What solution does Chavez discover to the problem the farm workers faced?
2- Chavez introduces the United Farm Workers union in paragraph 9. What are some of the things the union did and how did it affect the Chicano society in general?
3- After a long description of the successes of the UFW, Chavez discusses Governor George Deukmejian. What effect does Chavez say that Governor George Deukmejian had on the farm worker’s movement?
Page 15 DUCATION LL OD
ACTIVITY 2: READ ALOUD AND CLASS DISCUSSION (CONT’D)
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
1- Beginning in paragraph 6, Chavez describes how to overcome the unfair treatment of farm workers. What solution does Chavez discover to the problem the farm workers faced?
Organization, as a word, and as a concept, makes frequent appearances early in Chavez’s address, which serves as a build-up to the climactic moment when Chavez proclaims that organization was the farm workers’ response to exploitation by the farm owners: “We organized!” (64). Chavez suggests early in his address that organizing will play a role in the farm workers’ response to exploitation when he says that his dream of overthrowing the farm labor system was developed in his early days of organizing (P4). Chavez links his success with organizing the farm workers to the experience of learning how to use organization as a tool of empowerment for the community of Mexican American people in San Jose against the oppression by the non-Hispanic, Anglo majority: “I began to realize what other minority people had discovered: That the only answer—the only hope—was in organizing […] and people like me had to develop the skills it would take to organize, to educate, to help empower the Chicano people” (P6). Track how Chavez’s skill of organization developed, helping students identify the instances of when “organization” is used in the address before Chavez’s climatic exclamation in line 64. Discuss how the story of its development in Chavez’s life, as well as the repetition of the word, serve to lead up to and increase the memorability of one of Chavez’s most critical points, i.e., organization as the way for minorities to resist oppression.
2- Chavez introduces the United Farm Workers union in paragraph 9. What are some of the things the union did and how did it affect the Chicano society in general?
The United Farm Workers union, or UFW, had a positive effect on the Hispanic population in general. Chavez says that the very fact the union existed at all was a message to Hispanics everywhere that “we were challenging and overcoming injustice” (74-76). By ceasing to continue allowing themselves to be victims, Chavez asserts, the farm workers “created confidence and pride and hope in an entire people’s ability to create the future” (65-66, 68- 70). Chavez enables the listener/reader to anticipate that this positive effect would be felt by Hispanic people at large in a slightly earlier portion of the text when he states that farm workers were symbolic reminders to the Hispanic people of their history in the United States: “All Hispanics—urban and rural, young and old—are connected to the farm worker’s experience [….] We shared that common humiliation” (47-49). Guide students in connecting the positive effect the UFW had for Hispanics in general back to Chavez’s implicit reasoning for why it would have this effect, helping students trace the progression of Chavez’s thought with evidence from the text. Help students discuss the effect this has on the reader/listener, how it helps the reader/listener to (implicitly) make connections across different parts of the text, which prepares the reader/ listener to understand (by drawing an inference) why non-farm working Hispanics also benefitted by the creation and existence of the UFW without Chavez explicitly repeating this information.
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ACTIVITY 2: READ ALOUD AND CLASS DISCUSSION (CONT’D)
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
Once the class has reached a solid understanding of the text, connect it to the skill of making claims and supporting them with evidence by presenting a few main claims. Pass out the tools and have students work in pairs to find evidence to support the claims.
Collect each student’s Making EBC Tool with the evidence they found for the first claim. These should be evaluated to get an assessment of where each student is in the skill development. Students should use their tools for their work in pairs—repeating the first claim and refining their evidence based on the read aloud and class discussion. Even though students are not finding the evidence independently, they should each fill in the tools to reinforce their acquisition of the logical structure among the ideas. Students should get into the habit of using quotation marks when recording direct quotes and including the line numbers of the evidence.
The instructional focus here is developing familiarity with claims about texts and the use of textual evidence to support them. Students should still not be expected to develop complete sentences to express supporting evidence. The pieces of evidence should be as focused as possible. The idea is for students to identify the precise points in the text that support the claim. This focus is lost if the pieces of evidence become too large. The tools are constructed to elicit a type of “pointing” at the evidence.
One approach for ensuring a close examination of claims and evidence is to provide erroneous claims that contradict textual evidence and ask students to find the places that disprove the claim. Students could then be asked to modify it to account for the evidence.
In pairs, students use the Making EBC Tool to look for evidence to support additional claims about the text made by the teacher.
ACTIVITY 3: FIND SUPPORTING EVIDENCE
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
3- After a long description of the successes of the UFW, Chavez discusses Governor George Deukmejian. What effect does Chavez say that Governor George Deukmejian had on the farm worker’s movement?
Chavez describes how after 1975, the conditions of the farm workers dramatically improved under the passage of the Agricultural Labor Relations Act, which, Chavez says, “helped farm workers make progress in overcoming poverty and injustice […] in overcoming child labor, in overcoming miserable wages and working conditions, in overcoming sexual harassment of women worker” (114-121). The UFW, consequently, shifted its focus from using boycotts to further improve farm workers’ conditions to winning elections in the political arena. These improved working conditions for the farm workers, however, were undermined in 1982, when George Deukmejian was elected governor of California. According to Chavez, Deukmejian, instead of enforcing the law, invited farm owners who broke the law “to seek relief from the governor’s appointees” (128-129). Thus, because it was not enforced, the law that guaranteed the rights of farm workers to organize was rendered impotent and no longer protected farm workers (122-123). Guide students in tracking the cause and effect relationship of these events, i.e.: the passage of Agricultural Labor Relations Act => improved working conditions; election of Governor Deukmejian => undermining of Agricultural Labor Relations Act => loss of improved working conditions. Ask students to specifically identify how conditions worsened for the workers under Deukmejian’s governorship, including, for example, how workers lost protection from threats and intimidation by growers, how they were cheated out of back pay, and how child labor continued (P18). Help students understand the connection between these worsening conditions and the undermining of Chavez’s central strategy for minorities to resist exploitation—organization.
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After students have finished their work in pairs, regroup for a class discussion. Have pairs volunteer to present their evidence to the rest of the class. Discuss the evidence, evaluating how each piece supports the claims. Begin by modeling the evaluation, referring to the checklist, and then call on students to evaluate the evidence shared by the other pairs. They can offer their own evidence to expand the discussion. Carefully guide the exchanges, explicitly asking students to support their evaluations with reference to the text. These constructive discussions are essential for the skill development. Listening to and evaluating the evidence of others and providing text-based criticism expands students’ capacity
to reason through the relationship between claims and evidence. Paying close attention to and providing instructional guidance on the student comments is as important to the process as evaluating the tools and creates a class culture of supporting all claims (including oral critiques) with evidence.
Using the Text-Centered Discussion Checklist is one way of talking about and supporting student participation in class and pair discussions, especially if students are already familiar with the TCD checklist from previous units. If not, time can be taken (if desired) to introduce them to some or all of the criteria of effective text-centered discussions.
The class discusses evidence in support of claims found by student pairs.
ACTIVITY 4: CLASS DISCUSSION OF EBCS
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
Once the claims and evidence have been discussed, students return to the pairs and use the tool to make an evidence-based claim of their own. Pairs should make a single claim, but each student should fill in his or her own tool. Regroup and discuss the claims and evidence as a class. Pairs can use their tool to present their claims and evidence orally.
Talk through the process modeled in the tool, including the nature of the details that stood out to students, the reasoning they used to group and relate them, and the claim they developed from the textual evidence. Draw upon the Forming EBC Handout and EBC Criteria Checklist I to help guide discussion.
In pairs, students use the Forming EBC Tool to make an evidence-based claim of their own and present it to the class.
ACTIVITY 5: FORMING EBCS IN PAIRS
INSTRUCTIONAL NOTES
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The Making EBC Tools should be evaluated to assess the development of the student’s grasp of the relationship between claims and textual evidence. They should show progress in the relevance and focus of the evidence. The Forming EBC Tools are students’ first attempts at making their own claims with the help of a peer. Basic claims are fine at this point. Use the EBC Criteria Checklist to structure the evaluation and feedback to students. Evaluation should focus on the validity and clarity of the claim and the relevance of the evidence. Recording the “thinking” part of the tool is important in order to strengthen the student’s reasoning skills as well as provide them with the academic vocabulary to talk about them.
Evidence should be in quotation marks and the reference recorded. Using quotation marks helps students make the distinction between quotes and paraphrases. It also helps them to eventually incorporate quotes properly into their writing. Recording references is critical not only for proper incorporation in writing, but also because it helps students return to text for re-evaluating evidence and making appropriate selections.
The Text-Centered Discussion Checklist can be used to evaluate student participation in discussions for formative and diagnostic information. Teachers and students can get a sense of areas where development in speaking and listening skills are needed.
INDEPENDENT READING ACTIVITY
ASSESSMENT OPPORTUNITIES
Students read paragraphs 20-29 of the speech and use the Forming EBC Tool to make a claim and support it with evidence. This activity overlaps with the first activity of Part 3 and can be given as homework or done at the beginning of the next class.
MAKING A CLAIM
I state a conclusion that I have come to and can support with evidence from the text after reading and thinking about it closely.
My claim about the text:
CONNECTING THE DETAILS
What I think about detail 1: What I think about detail 2:
I re-read and think about the details, and explain the connections I find among them.
How I connect the details:
What I think about detail 3:
FINDING DETAILS Detail 1 (Ref.: ) Detail 2 (Ref.: )
I find interesting details that are related and that stand out to me from reading the text closely.
Detail 3 (Ref.: )
Name Text
FORMING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMSDUCATION LL OD
(Reference: ) (Reference: ) (Reference: )
Supporting Evidence Supporting Evidence Supporting Evidence
CLAIM:
(Reference: ) (Reference: ) (Reference: )
CLAIM:
Supporting Evidence Supporting Evidence Supporting Evidence
Name Text
DUCATION LL OD
MAKING EVIDENCE-BASED CLAIMS
Knowledge)) ))
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Qualitative)Features)of)Complex)Text)• Subtle)and)frequent)transitions)• Multiple)/subtle)themes)and)purposes)• Density)of)information)• Unfamiliar)settings,)topics,)events)• Lack)of)repetition,)overlap,)or)similarity)of)words)and)sentences)• Complex)sentences)• Uncommon)vocabulary)• Lack)of)words,)sentences)or)paragraphs)that)pull)the)meaning)
together)• Longer)paragraphs)• Any)text)structure)which)is)less)narrative)• A)mix)of)text)structures)
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Creating)Text)Dependent)Questions)1. Identify)the)standards)that)are)being)addressed)2. Identify)the)core)understandings)and)key)ideas)of)the)text)3. Target)small)but)criticalJtoJunderstand)passages)4. Target)vocabulary)and)text)structure)5. Tackle)tough)sections)headJon:)notice)things)that)are)confusing)
and)ask)questions)about)them)6. Create)coherent)sequences)of)textJdependent)questions)7. Create)the)assessment)
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