Simple Strategies for Accessing Complex Texts NYCAAPSE October

Simple Strategies for Accessing Complex Texts NYCAAPSE October 21, 2014 Suzane Thomas

Essential Questions How do we develop strategies for teaching complex texts to ALL readers? How do we bridge the gap between where they are and where they need to be? Why not only teach students books that are at their reading level? How are assessments making it harder for students to ‘catch up’? How do we ‘use’ the book instead of ‘teaching the book. ’

Answers ² Be the student. ² Teach them. ² Because then they won’t get to college and if they do they won’t stay and graduate. ² They aren’t. ² Plan thematic, skills based units aligned to the Common Core.

Let’s Be the Student Individually and then with a partner – Read the article “The Origin of Negation” by Jean Paul Sartre.

Complexity Discuss. Is this a ‘complex’ text? Why? What strategies did you use? What information would you need in order to fully understand the argument? What questions arise?

Does This Make it Easier? “Man is the being through which nothingness comes into the world. ” (59) Consider Sartre’s discussion of ‘negatites’ (negativities). Sartre defines negatites as that which “indicate an aspect of being as it appears to the human being who is engaged in the world. ” A negitate is unique in the sense that is fundamentally produced by human reality – it is used instrumentally. Human reality produces these negatives to explain and alter the world. Consider the distance from your car to your house. The distance, in this sense, is a ‘negatite’. The distance is a negation of space such that you can traverse from your car to your house. Other examples of negatites is simple questioning: “Are my keys in my wallet? ” This simple question reveals the possibility of non-being, it also reveals how we as “beings-in-the-world” are the origin of Nothingness.

Texts I Have Taught A Doll’s House – 9 th grade level 2 & 3 Students In Search of our Mother’s Gardens by Alice Walker – 9 th grade level 2 & 3 Students The Man Who Lived Underground and Readings by Existentialists – 12 grade students who failed the ELA Regents Exam.

Strategies Build a unit around a central theme or unit to anchor the texts, i. e. ‘The Role of Women in 20 th century society. ” Build Background Knowledge. Teach Students to Build their Own Background Knowledge. Read articles/Watch Documentaries about the Author and Historical Events. Visual Vocabulary In-class readings aloud with guiding, open-ended questions. Close reading, annotating, questioning the text, multiple re-readings. Literary Circles. Socratic Seminars

The Results? Student work is provided to you for review. Any Questions?