The article outlines these 5 practices as the biggest shifts in teaching CCSS:
- Lead high-level, text-based discussions
- Focus on process, not just content
- Create assignments for real audiences and real purposes
- Teach argument, not persuasion
- Increase text complexity
A lot of these shifts can be taught using a close reading technique. However, it seems that everyone has different ideas about what close reading means - and that's ok! To me, close reading is reading the text more than once for different purposes each time. The Wonders program outlines a close reading structure with their leveled readers, which are Lexiled for text-complexity. With each step, have the children re-read the story.
To better facilitate the first step, I taught my students how to annotate with post its. I made them bookmarks to write their ideas on, then they flag the correct part of the book with a post-it.
Here is a freebie for you to try it out!
Click the
image to download!
If you are teaching Wonders, as well, I have some
units for sale in my store to help you implement the program!