Units Of stUdy for Teaching Readingassets.pearsonglobalschools.com/asset_mgr/current/201526/RUOS...

Grades K–5 series Overview

u STATE-OF-THE-ART TOOLS AND METHODS

u RESPONSIVE, DATA-BASED INSTRUCTION

u EMBEDDED PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Units Of stUdyfor Teaching Reading A Workshop Curriculum u Grade-by-Grade, K–5

Lucy Calkinswith Colleagues from the Teachers

College Reading and Writing Project

SERIES OVERVIEW CONTENTSAbout the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

The 10 Essentials of Reading Instruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Why Chooose Units of Study for Teaching Reading? . . . . . . . . . 3

What Does the Series Contain? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

A Quick Look at Primary Reading Development . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

A Quick Look at Intermediate Reading Development . . . . . . 8

Unit Summaries, Grades K–5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Reading Workshop Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

• Minilesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

• Conferring and Small-Group Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

• Share . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Trade Book Packs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Reading Aloud, Grades K–5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Shared Reading, Grades K–2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Teaching Tools for Literacy Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Yearlong Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Reading and Writing Connections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Pilot Teachers Report Dramatic Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Professional Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

— L u c y c a L k i n s

I couldn’t be more delighted to be sharing this work with you. It is an understatement of a lifetime to say that Units of Study for Teaching Reading grows out of years of work in thousands of classrooms. The series actually

grows out of decades of work, and out of the greatest minds and most beautiful teaching that I’ve seen anywhere. To write this, we have done what teachers throughout the world do all the time. We’ve taken all that we know—the processes, sequences, wheels, continua, books, levels, lessons, methods, principles, strategies, the works—and we’ve made a path for children, a path that draws all we know into a cohesive, organic progression; a path that brings children along to the place where they can make sense out of text and can live together as joyous thoughtful readers.

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ABOUT LUCY CALKINS, Author and Series Editor

Lucy Calkins is the Founding Director of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Teachers College, Columbia University. For more than thirty years, the Project has been both a think tank, developing state-of-the-art

teaching methods, and a provider of professional development. As the leader of this renowned organization, Lucy works closely with policy makers, school principals, and teachers to initiate and support schoolwide and system-wide reform in the teaching of reading and writing. Lucy is also the Robinson Professor of Children’s Literacy at Teachers College, Columbia University, where she co-directs the Literacy Specialist Program. Lucy’s many books include the seminal texts The Art of Teaching Writing (Heinemann 1994) and The Art of Teaching Reading (Pearson 2000), as well as Units of Study in Opinion/Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing, K–8 (Heinemann 2013–14).

ABOUT THE TEACHERS COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJECTThe mission of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project is to help young people become avid and skilled readers, writers, and inquirers. They accomplish this goal through research, curriculum development, and working shoulder-to-shoulder with students, teachers, and school leaders. The organization has developed state-of-the-art tools and methods for teaching reading and writing, for using performance assessments and learning progressions to accelerate progress, and for literacy-rich content-area instruction.

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Just as Don Murray argued that writers need three things—time, choice, and response—readers also need three things—access to books they find fascinating, time to read, and expert instruction. To make real progress,

students need all three. No matter how expert your instruction, if kids don’t get enough time to read, or don’t have enough books to read, they won’t progress. In the same way, if they have lots of books, but no one teaches them explicitly or confers with them about their reading, introducing them to new challenges and guiding the work they do, they won’t maximize their potential as readers. Neither “untouched” independent reading, nor expert teacher talk alone will shift readers adequately. These ten essential tenets of reading instruction are woven throughout the Units of Study for Teaching Reading workshop structure.

THE 10 ESSENTIALS OF Reading Instruction

1. Above all, good teachers matter.

Learners need teachers who demonstrate what it means to live richly literate lives, wearing a love of reading on their sleeves. Teachers need professional development and a culture of collaborative practice to develop their abilities to teach.

2. Readers need long stretches of time to read.

A mountain of research supports the notion that teachers who teach reading successfully provide their students with substantial time for actual reading.

3. Readers need opportunities to read high-interest, accessible books of their own choosing.

Students need access to lots of books that they can read with high levels of accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. They need opportunities to consolidate skills so they can use skills and strategies with automaticity within fluid, engaged reading.

4. Readers need to read increasingly complex texts appropriate for their grade level.

A consensus has formed around the resolve to accelerate students’ progress so they can read increasingly complex texts. Teachers can find ways to scaffold instruction to provide students with access to these texts when they cannot read them independently.

5. Readers need direct, explicit instruction in the skills and strategies of proficient reading.

The National Reading Panel strongly supports explicit instruction in comprehension strategies, suggesting that the teaching of even one comprehension strategy can lead to improved comprehension, and that teaching a repertoire of strategies can make an even larger difference (National Reading Panel 2000).

6. Readers need opportunities to talk and sometimes to write in response to texts.

Talking and writing both provide concrete, visible ways for learners to do the thinking work that later becomes internalized and invisible.

7. Readers need support reading nonfiction books and building a knowledge base and academic vocabulary through information reading.

The strength of a student’s general knowledge has a close relationship to the student’s ability to comprehend complex nonfiction texts. Students who read a great deal of nonfiction gain knowledge about the world as well as about vocabulary.

8. Readers need assessment-based instruction, including feedback that is tailored specifically to them.

Learners are not all the same, and learners do not all need the same things to progress. Teaching, then, must always be responsive, and our ideas about what works and what doesn’t work must always be under construction.

9. Readers need teachers to read aloud to them.

Read-aloud is essential to teaching reading. Teachers read aloud to open the day, using stories and poems to convene the community and to celebrate what it means to be awake and alive together. They read aloud to embark on shared adventures, to explore new worlds, and to place provocative topics at the center of the community.

10. Readers need a balanced approach to language arts, one that includes a responsible approach to the teaching of writing as well as reading.

The National Reading Panel’s recommendations in 2000 supported the need for children to have balanced literacy instruction. Pressley and his colleagues conducted research in balanced literacy, seeking out examples of exemplary teaching in the primary grades and studying the approach to instruction. In every case, whenever they found a classroom with high literacy engagement, they found balanced teaching in place (Pressley et al. 2002).

(From A Guide to the Reading Workshop, primary and intermediate editions)

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WHY CHOOSE Units of Study for Teaching Reading?

Set High Expectations The Units of Study for Teaching Reading series encour-ages you to hold conversations with colleagues, espe-

cially those teaching at your grade level, so that you settle on some shared expectations

for how students’ entire school experi-ence translates into expectations. For

example, at what point are readers expected to realize that even if a nonfiction text is presented as “the truth,” it actually is that author’s truth, seen from that author’s per-

spective? At what point in a child’s development are you helping the child

become aware of the difference between her opinion and the author’s opinion—and

what are the small steps readers can take toward that awareness? And when does the child in your school go from seeing research as gathering up and synthesizing information with no regard to the nature of those sourc-es, to a process that involves assessing the credibility, bias, and perspective of those sources? The units give kids clear pathways forward toward meeting those and other ambitious goals.

Build Students’ Sense of EfficacyProviding progressions, rubrics, and exemplars that turn elusive standards into concrete, doable behaviors, allows

your children to work with a sense of efficacy—“I can do this, if I work hard.” This is nowhere more important than in reading, because all too often, children come to you believing that their abilities as readers are fixed and beyond their control. “I’m a bad reader,” a child will say. “My sister is the good reader in my family, but I’m bad at it.” “I can read,” a child will say, “but I can’t get those questions.” The units of study send an entirely different message. This series challenges the notion that success in reading is hardwired into a child’s DNA. Instead, the units make it crystal clear to kids that when they apply strategies, work hard, revise their first understandings, and get help, their reading will get visibly and dramatically better, right before their eyes.

Chart a Path to SuccessMore than this, the Units of Study for Teaching Reading provides you, as well as your kids, with that same sense of efficacy and power. In this world of ours, when kids are being asked to do things on high-stakes tests that are so ludicrously ambitious that we, as educators, aren’t sure that we could do those things, it is easy to feel demoralized, overwhelmed, and paralyzed. The Units of Study for Teaching Reading can turn those feelings around by giving you and your colleagues a crystal clear path forward.

—Lucy Calkins

“The units make it crystal clear to kids

that when they apply strategies, work hard, revise

their first understandings, and get help, their reading will get visibly and dramatically

better, right before their eyes.”

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The series has been designed to provide you with a curriculum to lean on and to adapt, as well as with the professional development

that you need to develop a deep knowledge of reading process, and of methods for teaching reading.

Each unit of study includes approximately 17–21 sessions, each representing a day in the reading workshop. Each session contains a minilesson, suggestions for the conferences and small-group work you are apt to do that day, and a possible mid-workshop teaching and share session for that day. Each day’s teaching builds on the teaching from the day before, and is capsulized in an illustrated over-sized Post-it® note or two that you can combine to create anchor charts.

The units also contain extra teaching tools, such as one-day charts, songs and games, bookmarks, cue cards, and scaffolds of various sorts, plus a variety of recommended book lists.

WHAT DOES THE SERIES CONTAIN?

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GRADE-LEVEL BOXES CONTAIN:

u Four Units of Study: Grades K–2 include one foundational unit and three other units to address reading fiction and informational texts. Grades 3–5 each include two units in reading fiction and two in reading informational texts.

u A Guide to the Reading Workshop, Primary or Intermediate Grades: Details the architecture of the minilessons, conferences, and small-group strategy sessions and articulates the management techniques needed to support an effective reading workshop.

u If . . . Then . . . Curriculum: Assessment-Based Instruction, Grades K–2 or 3–5: Contains additional units to support and extend instruction and to prepare students for work in the main units as needed.

u Reading Pathways, Grades 3–5: Puts a system for assessing reading into teachers’ hands and into the hands of students.

u Online Resources for Teaching Reading: A treasure chest of additional grade-specific resources, including bibliographies, short texts, illustrations to show completed anchor charts, reproducible checklists, pre- and post-assessments, homework (grades 3–5), mentor texts, videos, and Web links.

u Large-Format Anchor Chart Post-it® notes: Preprinted Post-it® notes with summarized, illustrated teaching points help teachers create and evolve anchor charts across each band and unit.

u Read-Aloud Post-it® notes, Grades K–2: Preprinted Post-it® notes highlight possible teaching points the teacher might address during the read-aloud.

P R I M A RY G R A D E S

LUCY CALKINS

A Guide to the Reading Workshop

I N T E R M E D I AT E G R A D E S

LUCY CALKINS


Grades K–2

ASSESSMENT-BASED INSTRUCTION

IF... THEN...CURRICULUM

LUCY CALKINS WITH ELIZABETH MOORE AND COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T

Grades 3–5

ASSESSMENT-BASED INSTRUCTION

IF... THEN...CURRICULUM

LUCY CALKINS WITH COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T

LUC Y C A L K IN S WITH ALE X ANDR A MARRON AND COLLE AGUE S FROM THE TE ACHER S COLLEGE

RE ADING AND WRITING PROJEC T

Reading Pathways G R A DE S 3 – 5

Performance Assessmentsand Learning Progressions

Grade 2 shown

Grade 4 shown

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A QUICK LOOK AT Primary Reading Development

Excerpted from GRADE ONE, UNIT 3

Readers Have Big Jobs to Do: Fluency, Phonics, and Comprehension

An Orientation to the Unit: The Intersection of Reading Development and This Unit

“…For the first time, many of your readers will be able to walk into a public library or bookstore and realize the world of texts is opening up to them. All of a sudden, they’ll reach for books like Hattie and the Fox, the Little Critter series books, Fly Guy, or Henry and Mudge, and be able read them. How exciting! However, like training wheels coming off a bike, things can sometimes be a little wobbly at first. New challenges arise and it will be important to understand the work your readers need to do at this stage in their development.

First, it’s critical that children learn to monitor their read-ing effectively. This is nothing new. Since kindergarten, your students have been taught to check that their reading makes sense, sounds right and looks right. After all, you can’t fix up a problem if you don’t know there’s something wrong. With practice, and as the books they read become more challenging, kids need to get better at monitoring for sense. At levels E/F, children are still learning to look at all the parts of a word. They may not notice that something is wrong in their reading until well past the error. At levels G/H, there is usually less dis-tance between the error and the correction, and by level I, most readers are skilled enough at looking closely at words, while still keeping in mind the meaning of the story, that they will usually stop and fix up their read-ing at the point of error. Keep in mind, that monitoring

one’s reading involves both checking the accuracy of the words a reader says as well as noticing when mean-ing breaks down across longer parts of text. Your readers will need to know that it’s their job to read with all cyl-inders firing, attending closely, and stopping as soon as they find something wrong.

All of your readers, regardless of their level, will need to think about meaning and structure when solving words, so this is why you’ll start by highlighting these strategies in the unit. You’ll then move to helping kids use visual information. In the beginning of the school year, you taught children to be flexible with letters and sounds. Now you will teach them to have even more flexibility in decoding. They will face tricky vowel clusters and will need to be flexible with parts of words, not just letters and sounds. But this adaptability can be challenging for first graders. Persistence, then, is important within this unit, but so is flexibility. You will need to push your first graders to draw on their collection of strategies and try something else when their first attempt doesn’t work. This means that your children will be working hard to orchestrate all the individual strategies they’ve learned, to do them all and do them with more automaticity. …”

ELIZABETH DUNFORD FRANCO ◆ HAVILAH JESPERSEN ◆ LINDSAY BARTON

Readers Have Big Jobs to Do

LU C Y C A L K I N S , S E R I E S E D I TO R

Grade 1Unit 3

FLUENCY, PHONICS, AND COMPREHENSION

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line encompasses so much more than a reading level. Instead, it’s about the level of processing kids are doing in their reading and the mind-set they have about what can sometimes feel like hard work. Think back to that second-grader and what you observed. Chances are it wasn’t the level of the book that stood out to you, but the way the reader took on the work of reading with joy and independence. This unit sets children up to be able to read increasingly complex texts with accuracy, comprehension, and fluency, all of which require the development of great problem-solving skills. Think of this as the book that helps you dismantle the training wheels. “Watch out for the bumps,” you’ll say, “but I know you can do this. Go on!”

your main goal then, is to help your students realize that they’re ready to take on the important jobs a reader needs to do. They have strategies to be in charge of their own reading, to set their own agenda, and to get through the hard parts all by themselves. They can move past the initial impulse to say “Help me!” when faced with a tricky word or when meaning breaks down and can take a deep breath, have a little courage, and say, “I can solve this myself!” you’ll show your first-graders that they can be the bosses of their reading, solv-ing their own reading dilemmas by drawing on the tools and strategies they’ve learned from minilessons and small-group work. And you’ll teach them to balance their reading energies between word solving and meaning making so that their experiences with texts are well-rounded and thoughtful, efficient, and meaningful.

This is important work, worthy of teaching to your whole class, not just relegated to small-group work. There is something incredibly powerful about sharing learning as a classroom community. Think of the children who one day, in collective astonishment, witnessed a butterfly emerge from a chrysalis. “Remember?” they say to each other months later, recalling their fascinated observations. Learning together builds a sense of identity as a community. So, go ahead, tap into this as you teach about the reading process. When

I T’S PROBABLy HARD TO BELIEVE that the children in front of you are the same children that first appeared at your classroom door in September. Back then, they looked, acted, and read so much more like

kindergartners. Take a moment to think back and be proud of just how far they have come. Now think about where you’re headed next. To best under-stand this, you may want to walk down the hall to the second-grade room and acquaint yourself with a proficient second-grade reader. They’re easy to spot. They’re the ones with their nose in a book, entirely lost in a story. Watch how they take charge of themselves as readers, approaching texts with confidence and enthusiasm. Talk to them and you’ll discover that they draw from a deep reservoir of ways to tackle trouble, solving words and confusing parts flexibly and creatively. Listen in to the child read a page and marvel at the way it sounds. And as you talk, laugh, and wonder together, relish their enthusiasm for a great book. Now take these observations with you, all the way back to your first-grade class and use them to help you envision the foundation you’ll need to build, right here and now, at this critical juncture in the lives of your readers.

It will be hard work. And so, your very first order of business in this unit will be to recruit help. “I think you’re finally ready,” you’ll say to your class dramatically. “I think you’re ready for some new and important jobs. And these aren’t jobs like being a line leader or a closet monitor. Oh no. These jobs are so much bigger and more important than that. These are the jobs that readers do to read harder and harder books. And here’s what’s even more special about these reading jobs—yOU are the boss! you are in charge of your reading, not me!”

This unit, all about the reading process, comes at a time in the year when your readers will need to develop independence to make it to the finish line. While it’s commonly accepted that kids have “made it” as first-grade readers if they reach the benchmark of reading level I/J/K texts, in reality that finish

An Orientation to the Unit

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An�Orientation�to�the�Unit� vii

check that their reading makes sense, sounds right, and looks right. After all, you can’t fix up a problem if you don’t know there’s something wrong. With practice, and as the books they read become more challenging, kids need to get better at monitoring for sense. At levels E/F, children are still learning to look at all the parts of a word. They may not notice that something is wrong in their reading until well past the error. At levels G/H, there is usually less distance between the error and the correction, and by level I, most readers are skilled enough at looking closely at words while still keeping in mind the meaning of the story that they will usually stop and fix up their reading at the point of error. Keep in mind, that monitoring one’s reading involves both checking the accuracy of the words a reader says as well as noticing when meaning breaks down across longer parts of text. your readers will need to know that it’s their job to read with all cylinders firing, attending closely and stopping as soon as they find something wrong.

Once students realize there’s a problem, then it’s up to them to do some-thing about it. To do this, readers need to have a repertoire of strategies they know how to use. The good news is that first-graders are collectors. They spread out their sports cards, their Beanie Boos, or their Pokemon cards, delighting in the number and variety they’ve gathered. And so in this unit, you will lean into this impulse and invite them to spread out not their base-ball cards, but their reading strategies. Halfway through this first-grade year, your students will have a beginning repertoire of these strategies, and you’ll reinforce the importance of remembering and drawing upon them.

All of your readers, regardless of their level, will need to think about mean-ing and structure when solving words, so this is why you’ll start by highlighting these strategies in the unit. you’ll then move to helping kids use visual infor-mation. In the beginning of the school year, you taught children to be flexible with letters and sounds. Now you will teach them to have even more flexibility in decoding. They will face tricky vowel clusters and will need to be flexible with parts of words, not just letters and sounds. But this adaptability can be challenging for first-graders. With their growing sense of “I can do this!” can come an equally strong sense of “There’s only one way to do it!”—and if the one way they know doesn’t work, they’re stuck. Persistence, then, is important within this unit, but so is flexibility. you will need to push your first-graders to draw on their collection of strategies and try something else when their first attempt doesn’t work. This means that your children will be working hard to orchestrate all the individual strategies they’ve learned, to do them all and do them with more automaticity.

you meet on the carpet and teach that all readers read carefully, monitoring for when something doesn’t make sense or doesn’t match the print on the page or doesn’t sound quite right, you make this the mission of the group. Now your readers belong to a community of readers that see themselves as the kind of people that watch out for problems and try to solve them. And regardless of the levels children are reading, they’ll leave that carpet with a little more independence and a greater willingness to work through difficulty. It’s a game changer.

In the first bend of this journey, you’ll start the unit by helping your class develop the mind-set needed to take charge of their own reading. Children will learn to stop as soon as they encounter difficulty, draw from the strate-gies they’ve been accumulating all year to solve a problem, and then check to see that they’ve got it right. This portion of the unit is all about monitoring one’s reading and initiating action. It’s then in the second bend that you’ll focus on strengthening and expanding students’ word-solving strategies, add-ing more tools to their toolkits, and reminding students to draw from multiple sources of information in their problem solving. you’ll review some of the work from earlier units, and now teach your readers how to use these strategies in higher-level texts, with longer, more complex words. The third bend shifts the attention toward monitoring for meaning. Children will learn strategies for maintaining meaning across large parts of text as well as strategies for develop-ing an understanding of new vocabulary words. you’ll bring the unit to a close with the fourth bend that asks your readers to pull together everything they’ve learned to problem solve on the run and read with fluency.

The InTersecTIon of readIng developmenT and ThIs UnIT

For the first time, many of your readers will be able to walk into a public library or bookstore and realize the world of text is opening up to them. All of a sudden, they’ll reach for books like Hattie and the Fox or Little Critter, Fly Guy, or Henry and Mudge series books and be able read them. How exciting! However, like training wheels coming off a bike, things can sometimes be a little wobbly at first. New challenges arise, and it will be important to under-stand the work your readers need to do at this stage in their development.

First, it’s critical that children learn to monitor their reading effectively. This is nothing new. Since kindergarten, your students have been taught to

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A QUICK LOOK AT Primary Reading Development

Excerpted from GRADE TWO, UNIT 2

Becoming Experts: Reading Nonfiction


“…The times, they are a-changin’. Bob Dylan sang those words a long time ago, but they hold true today. And it is not just the times that are a-changin’—but the books are a-changin’ as well. And the skills needed to navigate those books and the readers choosing those books are a-changin’—and all at rapid speed. Buckle up.

Those same readers who started the year on coltish legs are now making their way to more complex texts full of complex topics, vocabulary, and structures. As you shift to this second unit of study, you’ll expect most of your readers to be reading levels J/K independently and to be ready to move to up a notch. The jump to levels K and L is a dramatic one. Here’s why: there is a noted increase in complexity of text content requiring higher level comprehension. The texts contain longer parts (chapters, sections, and paragraphs), and they require more accumulation of information across the entire book. And it is not just that the books and the sections of the books are longer, but also the sentences are longer and contain complex language structures. Meanwhile the number of polysyllabic words increases dramatically, requiring readers to read across the word, breaking the word into syllables, in order to use parts of words they know to figure out the difficult words. This makes heavy demands on students’ skills and requires them to reach for new strategies.

As second-graders continue to read texts that are longer, they need to learn to navigate text structures that are more complicated and varied for nonfiction than for fiction texts at these levels. As fiction readers, your children have become accustomed to leaning on the structure of stories and on their knowledge of the character to anticipate the plot’s typical trajectory. Now that readers are reading nonfiction, they’ll learn that nonfiction readers work hard to put key details together to determine the subject’s main topic so they can learn what the pages or parts of a book are striving to teach. They’ll find, however, that different texts work in different ways. Your students will learn that to do their best learning from the texts, they should use the structure of the texts to support them in organizing what they learn. … ”

Becoming Experts

AMANDA HARTMAN ◆ CELENA DANGLER LARKEY ◆ LINDSAY WILKES

RE ADING NONFIC TION

Grade 2Unit 2











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Excerpted from GRADE THREE, UNIT 2

Reading to Learn: Grasping Main Ideas and Text Structures


“…This unit is one of many in this series that supports students in developing a rich life of nonfiction reading, along with the skills to do that reading well. In fact, this unit could be titled, “Foundational Skills of Nonfiction Reading” because it addresses skills that are essential to reading nonfiction and that were, until recently, overlooked by many.

All too often, children come into your class, expecting that it is okay to read nonfiction and pull from it cool facts and juicy tidbits—whether or not those are important to the text. Being able to read an informational text in such a way that you can turn around and teach the main idea and the supporting points to someone else is a foundational skill. Without this, it is hard for a reader to compare texts, to think critically, to apply information learned. You’ll see, then, that this unit places enormous emphasis on helping third-graders determine the main idea(s) of texts.

To do the work of discerning the main idea(s) and key details, it helps enormously to pay attention to the underlying structure of the text. If one notices that a text first describes a problem and then offers two possible solutions, e.g., problem/solution text structure, that can help the reader to better figure out what is most important and what the main idea(s) might be. Thus,

even though your students are not expected to be able to describe the overall structure of a text until next year in fourth grade (by both the Learning Progression and the CCSS), we have taught into text structures in these third-grade nonfiction units, both to support students in better discerning main idea(s) and also to prepare them for that major expectation of fourth grade. …”

A QUICK LOOK AT Intermediate Reading Development

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LUCY CALKINS ◆ K ATHLEEN TOL AN

Grade 3Unit 2Reading to Learn

GR A SPING MAIN ID EA S AND TE XT STRUC TURE S

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Excerpted from GRADE FIVE, UNIT 2

Tackling Complexity: Moving Up Levels of Nonfiction


“…By fifth grade, the nonfiction texts that your students are reading are becoming more complex. Students who read these more challenging texts will need to be ready to embrace complexity. No longer will students see the whole text working to support one fairly explicit and clear idea. Instead, it’s much more likely that they’ll need to be open to following different threads as they read an informational text. It is important that fifth-graders approach texts with the expectation that those texts will advance more than one main idea and that they can discern several main ideas in complex texts. This expectation is detailed within the Main Idea(s) and Supporting Details/Summary strand of the Informational Reading Learning Progression. This is also a critically important skill on the Common Core State Standards and on many other high-stakes assessments.

This need to embrace more complexity crosses over and relates to more than just the Main Idea(s) and Supporting Detail/Summary strand. This unit supports essential comprehension skills, skills that fall within the Literal Comprehension portion of the learning progression, and you’ll see these strands regularly mention the need for students to be more flexible as they read more complex texts. This need for flexibility will relate to students’ Orienting work.

When fifth-graders preview a text, it’s important for them to recognize that the text may contain a long and winding introduction before turning to the focus of the text or might in other ways reveal its focus slowly. Your whole-class and small-group instruction across this unit will support students in the skills of previewing increasingly complex texts.

Students will need to carry this flexibility with them to their Monitoring for Sense work, recognizing that they may need to carry unanswered questions as they read, or do significant work to determine how two seemingly unrelated parts fit together. This mindset will also relate to students’ Fluency work, as the mood and tone of a text may be tricky to figure out at the start (Is the author being sarcastic? Dramatic?), or may shift and change, and readers will need to notice clues and think, “How does the author probably want this to sound?” Taken together, a major thrust of your teaching across Bend I aims to support students in reading ever-increasing, more complex texts with strong literal comprehension.

Your fifth-graders will also need to add to their repertoire of ways to think interpretatively and analytically about expository texts, and your teaching across Bend II will particularly support this work. …”

A QUICK LOOK AT Intermediate Reading Development

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Tackling Complexity Grade 5Unit 2

MOVING UP LEVEL S OF NONFIC TION


K AT I E C L E M E N T SWITH COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T










10

UNIT SUMMARIES Kindergarten

UNIT ONE

We Are Readers

The most important message in this, your children’s first-ever unit is that yes, they can read! You’ll know that this unit has succeeded if, by the end of it, your kinder-garten students declare, “We are readers!”

Early in the unit, you’ll invite children to read infor-mation texts and later, you’ll add storybooks to the mix. Because children won’t yet have the stamina for sustained independent reading, shared reading, read-aloud, and word study will be especially important to this unit. Of course, most children will be doing emergent rather than conventional reading, which doesn’t mean that their skills won’t develop in leaps and bounds—they will. Children will develop concepts of print (that is, an understanding that books are read from cover to cover, left to right, top to bottom), phone-mic awareness (learning to rhyme, to hear component sounds in a word), phonics (learning letter names and sounds), and the knowledge necessary to use story language to support their approximations of reading.

UNIT TWO

Super PowersReading with Print Strategies and Sight Word Power

This unit glories in children’s love of play. You’ll drama-tize the idea that to read, people call on super powers, just like superheroes do, thus imbuing this unit with a spirit of fun and accessibility. Instead of conveying, “Let me instruct you in how to read,” you’ll say, “Oh my gosh, we have to use our powers to read this book!” Equally important will be the message that “Superheroes don’t give up in a jam!”

At the beginning of the unit, you’ll spotlight “pointer power,” helping children point as they read, tapping each word just once, checking that their reading makes sense, and anchoring their pointing by not-ing the words they know “in a snap.” Then, you’ll add to students’ repertoires of super powers (strategies), teaching them to search for meaning, use picture clues, and use the sound of the first letter of a word to help them read. At the end of the unit, you’ll invite students to draw on all of their super powers as they work to make their voices smoother (fluency), and to communicate their understanding of the text (mean-ing). Partners will share favorite parts of books during book talks.

Grade KUnit 1We Are Readers

NATALIE LOUISLU C Y C A L K I N S , S E R I E S E D I TO R

Super PowersREADING WITH PRINT STR ATEGIES AND SIGHT WORD POWER

LUCY CALKINS ◆ AMANDA HARTMAN ◆ ELIZABETH DUNFORD FRANCO

Grade KUnit 2

WITH COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T

11

UNIT SUMMARIES Kindergarten

UNIT THREE

Bigger Books, Bigger Reading Muscles

At this time of the school year, your kindergarten read-ers are moving from rereading mostly familiar texts to attempting more difficult books with greater indepen-dence. Some readers will be approaching levels where they must use meaning and syntax, and check the beginnings and endings of words to understand what is happening.

With all of this learning to do, it’s not only the children who have their work cut out for them! At the start of the unit, you’ll prepare readers for the new work they need to do as readers. You’ll equip them with strategies for tackling breaks in patterns, and you’ll teach them to use their pattern power to think more deeply about what a book is really saying. Then you’ll rally students around the work of using their knowledge of letters and sounds—their sound power—to read tricky words. The last part of the unit supports students in orches-trating all the strategies they’ve developed to read more complex books with accuracy, fluency, and com-prehension. You will also emphasize the importance of thinking and talking more deeply about books.

UNIT FOUR

Becoming Avid Readers

This unit bookends the first unit, We Are Readers, as once again you help your youngsters role-play their way into being the readers you want them to become. At the beginning, the rallying cry was “You are readers!” Now it’s “You are avid readers!”

Early in this unit, you’ll move your students further toward independence by helping them explore what it means to be an avid reader. They’ll set goals for themselves as they read fictional stories, paying close attention to characters, setting, and plot. The next sec-tion parallels the work you’ve done earlier in the unit, but now you’ll support children in becoming avid read-ers of nonfiction texts. They will become experts on a chosen topic as they read alongside others in reading clubs. The last part of the unit has a celebratory feel as students explore poetry, play with rhyme and rhythm, and innovate on existing poems and songs. All the while, they’ll be developing their fluency as they con-tinue to read alongside others in their clubs.

Your children will end kindergarten believing they are avid readers as they play and learn their way into a powerful reading identity that will help them transi-tion to first grade.

Bigger Books, Bigger Reading Muscles

LUCY CALKINS ◆ K ATIE M. W E ARS

REBECCA CRONIN ◆ ANGELA BÁE Z

Grade KUnit 3

Becoming Avid Readers

LUCY CALKINS ◆ MARJORIE MARTINELLI ◆ CHRISTINE HOLLEY

Grade KUnit 4

12

UNIT SUMMARIES First Grade

UNIT ONE

Building Good Reading Habits

The start of first grade is a time for dusting off the skills and habits that children learned during kindergar-ten. The theme “readers have good habits” unites all the various reminders you will be giving kids so these reminders are more easily remembered.

At the start of this unit, you remind readers about the good habits they already use at the beginnings, the middles, and the ends of books. For example, you’ll remind them to preview books so their word work happens with an awareness of the entire story. First graders must become more efficient and flexible word solvers. Later, you will emphasize word solving as you teach your students to draw upon good habits for getting unstuck as they read. Once students begin to develop those good habits, you’ll establish abil-ity-based partnerships that tap into the social power of peers working together to help each other become more strategic as readers.

UNIT TWO

Learning About the WorldReading Nonfiction

In this unit, you’ll appeal to children’s natural curiosity. You’ll explain, “We’re going to learn about the world. We’re going to swim with sharks. We’re going to travel back in time. We’ll hold baby monkeys and crystals in our hands!” Then, you’ll unveil a new section of your classroom library, filled with nonfiction books.

It’s early in first grade, so to support continued read-ing growth, this unit balances support for nonfiction with support for reading processes. You’ll teach chil-dren strategies to get smart on nonfiction topics, but you’ll also be teaching comprehension strategies such as previewing, predicting, noticing text structures, and synthesizing information from multiple sources (the picture, the print, the text boxes). You’ll spotlight word solving and vocabulary, helping first graders develop the flexibility they need to make extraordinary progress over the course of this year. Later in the unit, you’ll shift your emphasis to building fluency and studying craft, teaching students to reread, to sound like an expert, and to notice craft moves.

LUCY CALKINS ◆ ELIZABETH DUNFORD FRANCO

Building Good Reading Habits Grade 1Unit 1


Grade 1Unit 2Learning About the World


AMANDA HARTMAN

13

UNIT SUMMARIES First Grade

UNIT THREE

Readers Have Big Jobs to DoFluency, Phonics, and Comprehension

This unit, all about the reading process, sets children up to be able to read increasingly complex texts with fluency, accuracy, and comprehension, all of which require the development of great problem-solving skills. Many first graders are avid collectors; in this unit, you will invite them to gather the reading strategies they’ll need to have at their fingertips when the going gets rough.

You’ll begin the unit by helping your readers develop the mind-set to take charge of their own reading. Children will learn to stop as soon as they encounter difficulty, draw from the strategies they’ve been accumulating all year, and then check to see that what they’ve done makes sense. Then you’ll focus on strengthening and expanding students’ word-solving strategies, remind-ing them to draw from multiple sources of information. The unit then shifts the attention toward monitoring for meaning. Children will learn strategies for maintain-ing meaning across large parts of texts, as well as for understanding new vocabulary. To close the unit, you’ll help readers put their learning together to problem solve on the run and read with fluency.

UNIT FOUR

Meeting Characters and Learning LessonsA Study of Story Elements

As you are getting ready to send your first-graders off into the rest of their lives, the best gift you can give them is the knowledge that books can lift them off their feet and set them down in new places, new times. After a sequence of units focused tightly on reading process, now you’ll spotlight story elements and the skills that are foundational to literal and inferential comprehension.

This unit teaches empathy, imagination, envisioning, prediction—all comprehension skills that add up to engagement. The first sessions invite readers to track story events and to make predictions grounded in the text. You’ll also teach strategies for holding onto longer and more complex stories and for determining impor-tance. Later you’ll shift to a closer study of characters. You’ll teach children to draw from text details to grow ideas about characters and to read in a way that brings them to life. At the end of the unit you’ll pave the way for interpretation by teaching students to consider the messages in stories. You’ll teach that stories contain life lessons, that cracking open a book is like cracking open a fortune cookie and finding a message hidden within.

ELIZABETH DUNFORD FRANCO ◆ HAVILAH JESPERSEN ◆ LINDSAY BARTON

Readers Have Big Jobs to Do


Grade 1Unit 3

FLUENCY, PHONICS, AND COMPREHENSION

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Meeting Characters and Learning LessonsA STUDY OF STORY ELEMENTS

Grade 1Unit 4

ELIZ ABE TH DUNFORD FR ANCOLU C Y C A L K I N S , S E R I E S E D I TO R

14

UNIT ONE

Second-Grade Reading Growth Spurt

In this unit, you’ll spotlight your students’ movement from a “little-kid” focus on print to a “big-kid” focus on meaning. A main goal is to rally your students around the work of outgrowing themselves as readers.

At the beginning of the unit, you’ll teach that to grow, readers need to take charge. This portion of the unit highlights the importance of goals and the magical combination of fluency and comprehension. Then, you’ll let your children know that grown-up readers don’t wait around for others to help them with the hard parts, that they draw on everything they already know to figure out hard words. You’ll teach your children that every time they react in their books—every time they giggle or gasp or sigh—it’s because the author did something in the writing to evoke that reaction.

Throughout this unit and this year, you’ll invite readers to share their opinions, to debate with each other, to figure things out together, to prove their points—to collaborate.

UNIT TWO

Becoming ExpertsReading Nonfiction

By the time you start this second unit of second grade, your writing workshop will be off and running. As this unit begins, you will tell your students they will shift from reading fiction to reading nonfiction. You’ll set readers up to read many different books on different topics. You’ll challenge them to live wide-awake lives, to learn more about familiar topics, and to grow under-standing of new topics.

As the unit progresses, you’ll begin teaching resource-ful word solving and vocabulary development. Here, one of the challenges for your readers will be to zoom in and pause to solve a challenging word, while not drop-ping their grip on the larger ideas in the book they’re reading. Later, students will be ready to choose a topic to read about and to compare and contrast information across texts.

In this unit, you are teaching your students that they can learn about a topic in the world through reading, that books can be their teachers.

Grade 2Unit 1

LUCY CALKINS ◆ SHANNA SCHWART Z

Second-Grade Reading Growth Spurt

Becoming Experts

AMANDA HARTMAN ◆ CELENA DANGLER LARKEY ◆ LINDSAY WILKES


Grade 2Unit 2


UNIT SUMMARIES Second Grade

15

UNIT THREE

Bigger Books Mean Amping Up Reading Power

At the start of this unit, you’ll inform your readers that researchers have found that second grade is a time for readers to experience enormous growth. This is an important message to communicate, because as expectations on third-graders skyrocket, it has become especially important that second-graders maintain a steady growth curve.

Each of the three parts of this unit focuses on an import-ant foundational reading skill. In the first part, the focus is on fluency—what researcher Tim Rasinski refers to as the bridge between phonics and comprehension. In the second part, you’ll help children explore figurative lan-guage. You’ll teach them to read closely and to monitor for sense so that when they reach figurative language passages, they’ll stop to ponder the author’s intent. In the third part, you’ll teach comprehension strategies to help your students capture what has happened in one part of a text and carry that forward as they read on in longer, more complicated books. Finally, children will choose reading goals for themselves and will work with a club in pursuit of those goals.

UNIT FOUR

Series Book Clubs

Your second-graders have blossomed into almost-third-graders, and will be tackling series books in this last unit. You’ll invite children to slow down, study texts carefully, and think more deeply about messages found in texts and about author’s craft.

Students will begin reading a series with a partner, col-lecting information about the main characters of their books. Then, you’ll form clubs by joining sets of two partnerships to continue to study the series together. In discussing books with their clubs, your students will develop bigger ideas than they would have developed on their own. Later, students will start rereading a book in their series and engaging in inquiry, thinking about the craft the writer employs. They’ll study ways authors use word choice, figurative language, punctuation, and even patterns to construct a series and evoke feelings in readers. At the end of this unit, you’ll teach students to invent ways to share their books with others. You’ll also teach them to hold debates inside their clubs as another way to share and grow ideas about books.

Grade 2Unit 3Bigger Books Mean Amping Up Reading Power

LUCY CALKINS ◆ LAUREN KOLBECK ◆ BRIANNA PARLITSIS

Series Book Clubs Grade 2Unit 4


AMANDA HARTMANWITH COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T

UNIT SUMMARIES Second Grade

16

UNIT ONE

Building a Reading Life This unit launches not just third grade, but also your kids’ lives as upper elementary school readers. Your students will collaborate with each other and with you to turn the classroom into a good place for reading, devising systems for book recommendations and organizing the classroom library. As your children begin to read up a storm, they’ll use performance assessments and learn-ing progressions to accelerate their skills in visible ways.

You’ll build children’s love of reading as you read aloud Stone Fox (or another book of your choice) and your chil-dren read within-reach fiction books they’ve chosen. Students will learn ways to check their comprehension and use fix-up strategies when they’ve lost the thread of the story. You’ll provide kids with strategies for tackling multisyllabic words and figurative language, and you’ll also provide the fluency support they need to tackle more complex sentences.

The unit also supports envisionment and prediction—two foundational skills that allow readers to walk in the shoes of a character. As they read, kids will anticipate and co-construct the story line. This unit will help your students learn to keep in mind both the page at hand and the entire book—to read with their minds on fire!

UNIT TWO

Reading to LearnGrasping Main Ideas and Text Structures

This unit supports students in developing a rich life of nonfiction reading by addressing essential foundational skills. You’ll teach youngsters that skilled nonfiction readers read with fluency, taking in long stretches of text, and pausing when necessary to grasp what the author highlighted as especially important. Readers then construct mental summaries of the text, complete with big ideas and supporting information.

Early in the unit, children learn to read expository non-fiction with eagerness, interest, and fluency, identifying the main ideas and supporting information, and recog-nizing the text infrastructure. Then they go further to compare texts, think critically, and apply what they have learned. Children learn to read differently, knowing they will participate in conversations, and you’ll help them know they can have those conversations in their minds as well as with others.

Finally, you will help children navigate narrative nonfic-tion texts. You’ll be amazed at how your children’s grasp of biographies improves when they stop recording iso-lated facts and instead use their knowledge of story structure to help them determine importance, noticing their subject’s traits, motivations, challenges, and ways of overcoming challenges.


Building a Reading Life Grade 3Unit 1


Grade 3Unit 2Reading to Learn

GR A SPING MAIN IDEA S AND TE XT STRU C TU R E S

UNIT SUMMARIES Third Grade

17

UNIT THREE

Character Studies

This unit begins with a close study of characters. Talk to any avid reader about the book he or she is read-ing, and that reader will tell you about the characters. Characters lure us into books and keep us reading. In the first bend, children will study characters deeply, investigate patterns that reveal deeper traits and motivations, and articulate evidence-based theories. Readers will use those theories to make predictions as they follow their character on a journey that takes the shape of a predictable story mountain, considering the big lessons that characters learn and how those les-sons relate to the larger message a story conveys.

This unit continues to support students in the founda-tional skills that were front and center during the first fiction unit of the year. You’ll assess your students’ abili-ties to be resourceful word solvers, and to envision and predict, and you’ll ask students to assess their predic-tions against the learning progression.

Finally, students will learn to do important com-pare-and-contrast work. They will compare and contrast not only characters, but also the problems characters encounter and their reactions to those problems. They’ll think, also, about ways setting and themes in similar books are the same and different.

UNIT FOUR

Research ClubsElephants, Penguins, and Frogs, Oh My!

This is more than a unit on information reading—it is a unit on research. The work your kids undertake in this unit will be challenging, but has the power to change their lives, because they will learn to learn—perhaps the single most important academic skill you can offer your students as you send them out into the world.

To begin, kids form clubs to study an animal. They’ll preview a collection of texts on their animal, then each club member will read about a subtopic across several books, developing background knowledge first by reading easier texts, then progressing to more chal-lenging texts. You’ll teach club members to synthesize and organize what each of them is learning individu-ally, using the learning progression to ratchet up their skill levels as they read for the main idea and engage in cross-text synthesis.

At the end of the unit, clubs transfer what they learned into the study of a second animal. Eventually you’ll teach children to compare and contrast across animals and apply their newly acquired knowledge to solve real-world problems.

JULIA MOONEY ◆ KRISTIN SMITH

Character Studies


Grade 3Unit 3

LUCY CALKINS ◆ K ATHLEEN TOLAN

ELEPHANTS, PENGUINS, AND FROGS, OH MY!

Grade 3Unit 4Research Clubs

UNIT SUMMARIES Third Grade

18

UNIT ONE

Interpreting Characters The Heart of the Story

In fourth grade, you’ll help students delve into complex texts and see significance in details. They’ll go beyond simple character traits to study the complexity of char-acters, seeing complications and flaws, and they’ll build on their ideas about characters in order to also explore the themes those characters advance. They’ll trace a theme through different parts of the story, and grow skills such as inference and interpretation.

Setting their own goals, they’ll learn that with deliberate, goal-driven effort, they can form interpretations sup-ported across a whole text and find meaning in recurring images, objects, and details. You will teach them to draw on their knowledge of fictional genres to read actively and intensely from the start. For a mystery, they’ll try to collect clues so they solve it. For a fantasy, they’ll expect to learn about a quest. Whatever the genre, this unit will help your students become more alert to even nonse-quential story structures.

UNIT TWO

Reading the Weather, Reading the World

This unit engages students in the nonfiction reading work highlighted in every iteration of twenty-first-cen-tury standards. Students begin by reading far and wide in nonfiction texts, moving from easy texts to more challenging ones. You’ll teach them that when expos-itory texts are organized into text structures such as problem/solution or compare-and-contrast, they can use their knowledge of structures to figure out what is and isn’t important, becoming readers who, by dis-tilling the main ideas and important points, are able to summarize.

Later, children form research teams to delve into topics about extreme weather and natural disasters. You’ll help teams to research a topic, reading across source material to learn about causes and effects of hurricanes, torna-does, floods, and other disasters. You’ll teach them to alter their reading when tackling dense scientific texts. You’ll teach cross-text synthesis, channeling kids to think about how new information can add to or chal-lenge prior knowledge.

Then at the end of the unit, students consolidate and apply all they’ve learned as they explore a related, but different, topic. Students study authorial tone and craft, and practice close reading, comparing and contrasting, and evaluating sources to determine credibility.


Interpreting CharactersTHE HEART OF THE STORY

Grade 4Unit 1

LUCY CALKINS ◆ EMILY BUTLER SMITH ◆ MIKE OCHS

Reading the Weather, Reading the World Grade 4Unit 2

UNIT SUMMARIES Fourth Grade

19

UNIT THREE

Reading HistoryThe American Revolution

This is a unit on researching history, using the American Revolution as a case in point. You’ll teach your students to build knowledge by reading accessible texts, lean on text structures to organize notes and thinking, syn-thesize new information with prior knowledge, and tackle primary sources.

As students conduct their research, preparing to debate the question of independence from Great Britain, you’ll teach that historians study multiple points of view to gain a complete picture of events. Students gather and angle evidence to support sides and then hone their skills to support a position with reasons and evidence.

Then students work with partners to research the period after the Second Continental Congress. You’ll teach strategies to tackle complex texts, preview and paraphrase, and study all parts of a text to extract main ideas. Vocabulary will have a special empha-sis, including strategies for learning and using new domain-specific words. You will also teach students to consider new questions and answers about their top-ics, drawing on their growing knowledge to see how the past and present are connected.

UNIT FOUR

Historical Fiction Clubs

In this final fourth-grade unit, students practice read-ing analytically, synthesizing complicated narratives, comparing and contrasting themes, and incorporating nonfiction research into their reading. This can be a beautiful intellectual journey, where the stories sweep children along with their exciting dramas. Each club reads several novels set within a historical time period, supported by researching nonfiction.

At the beginning of this unit, readers analyze compli-cated settings and multiple plotlines, moving up levels of text complexity. They learn to consider how one part of a text is related to other parts, thinking and talking deeply about craft and structure. The next part of the unit shines a light on interpretation, helping students to engage in ambitious intellectual work and building on earlier work on interpreting characters. Later, read-ers think about how the information from nonfiction texts enlarges their historical knowledge, as well as their understanding of characters’ struggles, perspec-tives, and insights. Children learn to think across fiction and nonfiction, across story and history, across the books they have read, and across their own lives.

LUCY CALKINS ◆ JANE T STEINBERG ◆ GR ACE CHOUGH

Reading History Grade 4Unit 3

T H E A M E R I C A N R E VO LU T I O N

LUCY CALKINS ◆ MARY EHRENWORTH

Historical Fiction Clubs Grade 4Unit 4

UNIT SUMMARIES Fourth Grade

20

UNIT ONE

Interpretation Book ClubsAnalyzing Themes

This unit goes for the gold, teaching students the best of what it means to read literature and conveying that this is a time for intellectual independence. In the first part of the unit, you’ll teach students strategies to lift the level of their writing about reading. You’ll remind them to draw on a repertoire of ways for reading closely, alert to how story elements interact and details that seem to represent big ideas. Students read through the lens of tentative ideas and questions to help them develop evidenced-based theories.

Then, each reading club will work with a novel that has nuanced characters and multiple subplots. You’ll ask, “What might this book really be about?” After students name the most important thing a text teaches, you’ll prompt them to think of others, considering more than one overarching theme and weighing which details best support each theme and which theme is most import-ant in a story.

You’ll teach students to read analytically and notice how different authors develop the same theme and to compare and contrast texts that develop a similar theme. When students step back from a text and think, “How does this part contribute to the whole text?” or “Why might the author have done this?” the payoff is immense, both in reading and in their own writing.

UNIT TWO

Tackling ComplexityMoving Up Levels of Nonfiction

This unit teaches students to embrace the complex-ities of their high-interest nonfiction texts. Students will investigate the ways nonfiction texts are becom-ing more complex, and they’ll learn strategies to tackle these new challenges, such as expecting to encounter multiple main ideas, some taught implicitly. Instruction emphasizes the strong foundational skills, such as flu-ency, orienting to texts, and word solving, that are required to read complex nonfiction.

Students will pursue independent inquiry projects, drawing on all their skills to tackle complex texts. You’ll extend the teaching from Unit 1 on writing about fiction reading, to help students write about their non-fiction reading in ways that are similarly engaging and productive.

Reading analytically is critical for fifth-graders. You’ll support students in analyzing differences in perspec-tive across texts, particularly differences that tie into the author’s craft or structure decisions. You’ll also support skills such as cross-text synthesis. Your fifth-graders will make their own connections and spark their own ideas as they think deeply about a text, so they can contrib-ute their own thinking to conversations on their topics. Across this unit, you’ll communicate to students that following their interests matters and is valued in your classroom.

Interpretation Book ClubsA N A LY Z I N G T H E M E S

Grade 5Unit 1

LUCY CALKINS ◆ ALE X AN DR A MAR RON

Tackling Complexity Grade 5Unit 2

MOVING UP LEVEL S OF N ONF IC TION


K AT I E C L E M E N T SWITH COLLEAGUE S FROM THE TEACHER S COLLEGE READING AND WRITING PROJEC T

UNIT SUMMARIES Fifth Grade

21

UNIT THREE

Argument and AdvocacyResearching Debatable Issues

This unit helps children tackle more difficult informa-tional texts with greater agency and independence. The unit begins with a one-day intensive “boot camp” on analyzing arguments. Students work in research groups to study a debatable issue, first learning about both sides of the issue, then choosing a position to research in greater depth, and finally debating the issue and reflecting on their learning to develop new questions and insights.

Next, you’ll help your students raise the level of their research to develop deeper questions and ideas and engage in more complicated conversations. Students will read more difficult texts with a critical eye, consider-ing perspective and craft while evaluating arguments. A debate highlights students’ growth and knowledge, and builds momentum for the final part of the unit.

Later, students select a new issue to study. They’ll think about patterns and connections across issues they have studied and consider larger issues of power. By the end of this unit, students will have learned how to compare the ideas and perspectives of many authors and how to formulate their own evidence-based, ethi-cal positions on issues.

UNIT FOUR

Fantasy Book ClubsThe Magic of Themes and Symbols

In this final unit of fifth grade, students will work in clubs to become deeply immersed in the fantasy genre and further develop higher-level thinking skills to study how authors develop characters and themes over time.

Students read analytically as they consider how authors begin a book by establishing the setting as both a physical and a psychological place. You’ll lead students to think metaphorically as well as analyti-cally, teaching them to explore the quests and themes within and across their novels. You’ll also help students engage more deeply by considering the implications of conflicts, themes, and lessons learned.

Later in the unit, you’ll focus students on dealing with the challenges that harder novels pose. Kids will work on their habits as readers—going outside the book to build knowledge, or studying how authors introduce hard words and using strategies to learn new vocab-ulary as they read. In addition, readers investigate fantasy as a literary tradition and study how the think-ing developed through reading fantasy novels will apply to other genres.

Argument and AdvocacyRE SEARCHING DEBATABLE ISSUE S

Grade 5Unit 3

LU C Y C A L K I N S , SERIES EDITOR

K E L LY B O L A N D H O H N E

Fantasy Book Clubs Grade 5Unit 4

THE MAGIC OF THEME S AND SYMBOL S

LU C Y C A L K I N S , SERIES EDITOR

M. COLLEEN CRUZ ◆ MARY EHRENWORTH

UNIT SUMMARIES Fifth Grade

22

In many ways, reading workshop can be compared to the process of knitting a cardigan. The structure of a

cardigan is simple and basic: a cardigan has a left front, a right front, a back, and two sleeves. But that simple structure allows the designer to incorporate a seemingly infinite variety of elements: different necklines, sleeve lengths, textures, and colors. This flexibility allows the designer to tailor the cardigan to the person who will wear it.

Likewise, the reading workshop has a simple and basic structure. This predictable structure accommodates the ever-changing and complex work that students will do, and it allows you to tailor each day’s teaching to the learning needs of your students

For the bulk of time during each reading workshop, students carry on with their reading. As they do so, they draw upon a growing repertoire of skills, tools, strategies, and habits. The whole-class instruction adds to that repertoire of skills and strategies, and the units of study organize the larger projects that give direction to students’ reading.

(From A Guide to the Reading Workshop, Intermediate Grades)

READING WORKSHOP INCLUDES:

u Minilessons

u Independent work time

u Conferring and small-group work

u Mid-workshop instruction

u Shares during which partnerships or clubs work together

READING WORKSHOPFramework

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READING WORKSHOPSuggested 60-Minute Block

WORKSHOP COMPONENT TIME FRAME LOGISTICS TEACHER STUDENTS

MINILESSON 10–12 min.The teacher gathers students in the meeting area next to their partners.

Whole-group instruction • Connection• Name the teaching point• Teaching• Active engagement

(guided practice)• Link to the work students will do

Listening, then actively engaged in applying new learning

INDEPENDENT READING

CONFERRING AND SMALL-GROUP

WORK

30–40 min.Students find comfortable spots to read.

One-on-one and small-group teaching• Assess• Observe• Question• Listen• Coach• Demonstrate• Encourage

Practicing strategies learned throughout the unit in independent, partner, or book club books

MID-WORKSHOP TEACHING

2–3 min. Students’ eyes are on the teacherExtends the minilesson or reminds students of ongoing habits

Pausing to reflect, then refocusing to resume reading

SHARE 5–10 min.

The teacher gathers students in the meeting area or calls for their attention while they remain at their reading spots.

Sets students up to share and celebrate the work they did that day

Sharing and extending their learning with partners, clubs, or the whole group

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8 Grade�2:�Becoming�Experts

In thIs sessIon, you’ll teach children that as nonfiction readers notice details and put them together to learn about a topic, they find that questions come up.

G E T T I N G R E A D Y

✔✔ Collect pennies (one for each student or partnership) to study and read. You’ll distribute them at the beginning of today’s session (see Connection).

✔✔ Display the “Nonfiction Readers Grow Knowledge” anchor chart begun in Session 1, with a new strategy—“Ask questions.”—ready to add (see Connection and Link).

✔✔ Reuse the enlarged chart from the demonstration book. We use the castle from Knights in Shining Armor, by Gail Gibbons (see Teaching).

✔✔ Distribute the collection of texts and objects from Session 1 for students to study and question (see Active Engagement).

✔✔ Make available leveled nonfiction books in bins. The books should be highly engaging and cover a variety of topics.

✔✔ Make sure to have a book baggie for each child so readers are ready to shop for their own books (see Share).

✔✔ Provide a copy of the reading log for each child (see Share).

session 2

Nonfiction Readers Notice, Learn, and Question

MINILESSON

CONNECTION

Remind readers that they learned yesterday to notice details and think about how to put together knowledge about the topic while they read.

“Readers, this morning, I heard about reading work you did last night at home. Tony read his family’s mail—it wasn’t opened yet, but he could still read the envelopes and learn a lot. His family gets a lot of different kinds of mail! Tony didn’t just read the words on all those envelopes. He also did a lot of brainy thinking. How many of you have realized that nonfiction reading involves not only reading the words but also doing a lot of thinking?” Lots of children signaled that they’d learned that.

“Last night, I told my friend about your ability to pay close attention, reading in a way that lets you notice things and to think a lot. I bragged to my friend that you are so brainy as readers that you could probably read a penny and get a lot of knowledge from it.”

Distribute a new text—a penny—to study.

“I’m hoping I wasn’t exaggerating. Do you think you could use all that you learned yesterday to get a lot of knowledge from a penny? Do you?” Kids nodded. Gesturing to yesterday’s chart, I listed the points across my fingers.

G2B2_6542.indd 8 5/16/15 2:13 PM

Each session begins with a concise statement of what will be taught.

A handy checklist helps teachers prepare to teach each session. Online resources are indicated with an icon. Parenthetical note shows teachers when they will use each resource.

Reading workshops open with the teacher teaching the class a minilesson that usually includes a

quick demonstration of a powerful reading strategy. The minilesson is meant to equip learners with a strategy they can use not only that day but whenever they need it. Each unit of study contains seventeen to twenty-one minilessons, written in the words Lucy and her colleagues have actually used to teach each lesson. After the ten-minute minilesson, the teacher says those all-important words: “Off you go!” And students turn to their ongoing independent reading work, which might be a club book, a partner book, or an independent book to apply the reading strategy that was just taught.

(Example from Grade 2, Unit 2: Becoming Experts.)

MINILESSON At the beginning of this minilesson, the teacher describes how today’s instruction relates to learning from the previous session.

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Session�2:�Nonfiction�Readers�Notice,�Learn,�and�Question� 9

Nonfiction Readers Grow Knowledge

• Pay attention to details.• Put the parts of the text together in your mind.

ANCHOR CHART

You’ll want to decide whether to give a penny to each child instead of each partnership. It’s not easy to hold a penny between two people and read together, but on the other hand the point is made even if the penny is shared.

I distributed pennies into cupped hands and said, “You ready? Go!” As children worked in pairs, I listened.

Name the teaching point.

“Today I want to teach you that as readers notice details and try putting things together to learn about a topic, ques-tions often come up. Readers keep those questions in mind as they read.”

TEACHING

Note that some of the children generated questions while reading the penny.

“I noticed that when you read the penny, many of you not only noticed details, putting what you noticed together to learn some things, but you also asked questions. When you saw a man’s face on the penny, did any of you ask, ‘Whose face is that? Why is it here?’ That’s what readers do. They notice, they learn, and they question.”

Return to the diagram from the previous session and model how noticing details and putting those details together can prompt the reader to ask questions.

“Let’s read our diagram of the castle again,” I said. “Let’s reread, noticing and putting what we notice together to learn about castles.” I projected the chart of the castle we studied yesterday and began rereading.

I gave children a moment to do this. I voiced over, “Yesterday we noticed this,” and I pointed to the moat, “and these,” and I pointed to holes in the walls, presumably designed for shooting out arrows. “We put what we saw together and developed the knowledge that castles have a lot of ways to protect people. That work—the work we did yesterday—is what nonfiction readers do; they try to put things together in their minds.

“Now, let’s reread and see if questions come to mind.” I reread the diagram, and this time generated related questions: “Why were they—the people inside—in such danger? Who was trying to get inside the castle? That’s what I wonder. Were you wondering that?

“You know what else I’m wondering? I get how the outside of the castle tries to protect people, but does the inside of the castle protect people too? I’m going to look at this diagram more closely to see if I can figure out if the inside of the castle protects people too.

D

Fig. 2–1 Distribute pennies to each student or to each partnership.

G2B2_6542.indd 9 5/16/15 2:13 PM

MINILESSONDetailed coaching notes at point of use raise the level of teaching and support reflective practice.

The teacher works with students to build and evolve an anchor chart to support and reinforce learning throughout the unit.

Before launching into teaching, the teacher explicitly names the teaching point of the session.

Instruction is extremely clear, focused, and efficient. Several methods are used to teach the minilessons including: • demonstration • guided practice • inquiry • explanation with examples

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“Are you starting to have questions, too, about this diagram? I’m sure you are. Do you see how noticing the details and raising questions helps us grow more knowledge about our topic, castles?”

ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT

Channel students to revisit the topic they studied in yesterday’s minilesson, this time paying special attention to the questions that surface as they grow their knowledge.

“Readers, will you get into your quadrant groups again? And I’m going to distribute the same texts that you read yesterday. Today, begin by doing the work you did yesterday. Read, noticing details, specifics, saying ‘I notice . . .’ Try to put together what you notice to make knowledge about your topic, and this time, let questions, musings, come to mind as well.”

As the children worked, I circled between the groups, voicing over tips and reminders such as these:

“I’m noticing . . .”

“I’m learning . . .”

“I’m wondering . . .”

As children talked, I recorded some of their questions and soon reconvened the class to repeat some of what I’d heard.

LINK

Repeat the teaching point as you send readers off to read.

“Whenever you read nonfiction texts, remember that you read by noticing details, by putting what you notice together to learn about your topic, and by asking questions.” I added the new strategy to the anchor chart. “Off you go to read your texts!”

Nonfiction Readers Grow Knowledge

• Pay attention to details.• Put the parts of the text together in your mind.• Ask questions.

ANCHOR CHART

You may want to offer a tool to support students as they talk about their thinking. In addition to telling students ways to talk, you might offer a “Ways to Talk about Your Thinking” card, with the prompts written for students to use.

Fig. 2–2 Ways to Talk about Your Thinking cards.

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Once the teacher has named and elaborated on the teaching point, she guides students to try what they have learned using either the class read-aloud or another shared text, or their independent reading books.

After the teacher has guided students through the active engagement part of the minilesson, she returns to the main teaching point to reinforce what students have learned, once again connecting it to previous learning, and to help students understand when they will use this learning.

Preprinted, large-format Post-it® notes with engaging illustrations and key teaching points make creating powerful anchor charts quick and easy.

MINILESSON

Examples of tools, charts, and graphic organizers are provided.

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Session�2:�Nonfiction�Readers�Notice,�Learn,�and�Question� 11

the parts, all the specifics, together so the reader comes up with a big idea or a big understanding. Is your rereading helping you know or understand something about your topic?”

Of course, once students are reading books, after the mid-workshop teaching point, the work readers are doing will alter a bit, and the things you celebrate will also change. for example, if you see a child read the table of contents, celebrate. If you see a child look back to something that was read earlier, celebrate. You’ll find lots of reasons to say, “I’m glad that we’re at the start of a nonfiction unit, because I can tell that this unit really brings out the best in you! It’s like you are a born nonfiction reader!”

Don’t worry that children aren’t all that great just yet. Celebrating the strengths they bring to the table is the very best way to accentuate those strengths.

A T THE START Of READING TIME TODAY, your students will be reading the materi-als—charts, diagrams, brochures, pennies—in their bins, and your goal during

this time will be to help them make a lot of meaning out of relatively small amounts of print. Nudge them to thoughtfully notice the smallest of details, putting the information together to construct knowledge. You’ll also want to support children in the process of being curious about the information they see, asking and answering questions that will help set them up to construct even more knowledge. You might conduct quick “dip in, dip out” conferences, offering lean prompts such as “What do you notice? Why might it be that way? What does it make you think? What does it make you wonder?” The key to any one of those questions is that you ask it with commitment, not throwing all those questions out at a rat-tat-tat clip, and that you listen intently to the reader’s response and extend it.

As you confer with kids who are reading from their bins—full of charts, diagrams, and so on—remember to notice and admire whenever a reader does something you want to support. Dr. Spock’s advice on child rearing pertains to your teaching as well: “Catch your kids in the act of doing good,” he says. Once you distribute nonfiction books to your kids (midway through today’s workshop), you’ll see that reading becomes harder for your kids. Many of them may get a bit mired down in those books, struggling with the challenges that nonfiction poses, so for now, build your students’ self-concepts as nonfiction readers by celebrating what they do when reading nonfiction texts—even those that contain few words.

for example, you will see some children rereading what they read yesterday. Celebrate this: “I’m seeing that you are going back to the same text. Are you rereading it again, this time looking for the questions you have?” The youngster is apt to say yes, because that is the work you have set the class up to do. “That’s a big deal—developing the habit of rereading! It’s so important. Most people go through life reading only one way—forward—but not you.” You could add, “Rereading can help a person put all

CONFERRING AND SMALL-GROUP WORK

Celebrating the Nonfiction Reading Skills Your Children Bring

MID-WORKSHOP TEACHING Extending the Work of Nonfiction Reading to Books

“Readers, let me have your eyes,” I said as I held up three books in my hands. “At your tables I have placed bins of just-right nonfiction books! Just like you’ve been studying and thinking carefully about your maps, diagrams, and directions, noticing all the details and raising questions about them, you can do the same thing with the books that you read! Doing these same things in books will help you to grow . . . knowledge! for the next fifteen minutes, will you choose a book and read it in this careful and thoughtful way? When you finish, you can either reread the book or pick another just-right book from the bin near you!”

G2B2_6542.indd 11 5/16/15 2:13 PM

Mid-Workshop TeachingConferring and small-group work will be punctuated with mid-workshop teaching that the teacher delivers to the whole class, part way through reading time. Often this teaching builds on the minilesson, extending it by providing a next step or a follow-up point. Other times, the mid-workshop teaching counterbalances the minilesson or broadcasts lessons being taught in conferences or small groups.

Lucy and her coauthors model possible conversations teachers could have with students, demonstrating how to reinforce what they are looking for and suggesting appropriate language.

Each session includes a section on conferring and small-group work to discuss what teachers are apt

to observe and do during the work time that day. This section serves as a miniature professional development workshop, showing ways to anticipate the challenges students are likely to encounter and offering principles and methods for responsive teaching.

CONFERRING ANDSMALL-GROUP WORK

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Channel partners to share what they noticed in and learned from a text and to pose questions, helping each other notice, wonder, and say more.

“Readers, stay where you are for our share today, because you’ll be working with your partner most of the time. Yesterday you learned that ‘It takes two to read.’ How many of you found that when you and your partner both read a text together, you noticed more and thought more?

“Today when you do this, I know you’ll generate questions, too.

“So, Partner 2, will you share your book with Partner 1? find the part that you want to read a bit of and talk about. Just like before, say, ‘I noticed . . . and I also noticed . . .’ Partner 1 will chime in, perhaps saying, ‘I also notice . . .’

“Partner 1, will you give me a thumbs up? I have a special job for you. You and your partner will want to talk not only about what you notice but also about what you wonder. And that takes real thinking. It isn’t easy to raise questions. When you do this, you end up having to come up with possible answers, to say things like, ‘Maybe . . .’ Your job is to get your partner to say more, more, and more.”

As readers began working, I stopped everyone to voice over, “When your partner says just a little bit, show your partner that you want to hear more. Gesture like this.” I modeled, rolling my hand, much like my mother used to do to me when she was trying to get me to “come along.” “Try it!” The chil-dren assigned to the listener roles did this. Then I signaled for the conversations to continue.

“Readers, I think you are ready to fill up your book baggies with lots of great topics about which you want to become knowledgeable. Will you go back to your bins of books and choose a whole bunch of books that you are interested in reading? And get a brand new reading log to go along with your new book baggie. You’ll want to keep a record of your reading life. By the end of the week, you will have read them all. That way you will grow a lot of knowledge about the world!”

SHARE

Encouraging Students to Notice and Wonder Even More

May be reproduced for classroom use. © 2015 by Lucy Calkins and Colleagues from the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project from Units of Study for Teaching Reading (firsthand: Portsmouth, NH).

1Reading LogName: ____________________________________________________________________________

Date School/Home

Title Minutes Parent’s initials

Fig. 2–3 A new log for the new unit

G2B2_6542.indd 12 5/16/15 2:13 PM

A brief introduction helps teachers set students up for productive conversations with their partners.

By taking this time to ask students to reflect on and share their work, Lucy and her coauthors offer teachers the opportunity to again reinforce the teaching point and model the minilesson—all the while keeping ownership of the learning firmly in the hands of the students.

SHARE

The workshop ends with a small amount of time during which partnerships or clubs work

together. This time is framed by a teeny bit of teacher talk, and sometimes takes the form of celebrating what a few readers have done in ways that apply to other readers in other instances. Or you may provide follow-up to the topic addressed in the day’s minilesson, or introduce a simple rubric and invite students to self-assess their own work. Lucy and her coauthors help you to plan these shares, because how a workshop ends is as important as how it begins. Those minutes set children up for the work they’ll continue outside of class. It’s often a perfect time to reinforce transfer, agency, and independence.

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Each Units of Study for Teaching Reading Trade Book Pack includes grade level-appropriate books that are

used as demonstration texts for teachers to model the skills and strategies they want students to try, and for read-alouds and shared reading.

KINDERGARTEN

u The Beetle Alphabet Book by Jerry Pallotta

u Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin

u The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss

u Can You See the Eggs? by Jenny Giles

u Dragonflies by Margaret Hall

u Gossie by Olivier Dunrea

u Honey Bees by Martha E. Rustad

u Honey for Baby Bear by Beverley Randell

u In the Garden from Rigby

u Mouse Has Fun by Phyllis Root

u Mrs. Wishy-Washy by Joy Cowley

u My Bug Box by Pat Blanchard and Joanne Suhr

u Not Norman: A Goldfish Story by Kelly Bennett

u So Much! by Trish Cooke

u The Three Billy Goats Gruff by Paul Galdone

u Wake Up Dad by Beverly Randell

GRADE 1u The Dinosaur Chase by Hugh Price

u Frog and Toad Are Friends by Arnold Lobel

u Gossie and Gertie by Olivier Dunrea

u Hang On, Monkey! by Susan B. Neuman

u Iris and Walter and the Field Trip by Elissa Haden Guest

u Ish by Peter Reynolds

u Kazam’s Birds by Amy Ehrlich

u Mr. Putter & Tabby Drop the Ball by Cynthia Rylant

u Ollie The Stomper by Olivier Dunrea

u George and Martha: One More Time by James Marshall

u Owls by Mary R. Dunn

u Zelda and Ivy: The Runaways by Laura McGee Kvasnosky

u Super Storms by Seymour Simon

u Tumbleweed Stew by Susan Stevens Crummel

u Upstairs Mouse, Downstairs Mole by Wong Herbert Yee

GRADE 2

u Days with Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel

u Happy Like Soccer by Maribeth Boelts

u Houndsley and Catina and the Quiet Time by James Howe

u Katie Woo Has the Flu by Fran Manushkin

u Knights in Shining Armor by Gail Gibbons

u Mercy Watson to the Rescue by Kate DiCamillo

u Minnie and Moo Go Dancing by Denys Cazet

u Owl Moon by Jane Yolen

u The Stories Julian Tells by Ann Cameron

u Those Darn Squirrels! by Adam Rubin

u Tigers by Laura Marsh

u Tigers by Valerie Bodden

GRADE 3u Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo

u Frogs! by Elizabeth Carney

u Frogs and Toads by Bobbie Kalman

u Gorillas by Lori McManus

u The Life Cycle of an Emperor Penguin by Bobbie Kalman and Robin Johnson

u The Life Cycle of a Frog by Bobbie Kalman and Kathryn Smithyman

u Make Way for Dyamonde Daniel by Nikki Grimes

u The Penguin, a Funny Bird by Beatrice Fontanel

u Penguins by Bobbie Kalman

u Peter’s Chair by Ezra Jack Keats

u Stone Fox by John Reynolds Gardiner

GRADE 4

u The American Revolutionaries: A History in Their Own Words, 1750–1800 by Milton Meltzer

u Every Living Thing by Cynthia Rylant

u Hurricane and Tornado by Jack Challoner

u King George: What Was His Problem? by Steve Sheinkin

u Liberty! How the Revolutionary War Began by Lucille Recht Penner

u Number the Stars by Lois Lowry

u The Revolutionary War by Josh Gregory

u Rose Blanche by Cristophe Gallaz

u The Split History of the American Revolution by Michael Burgan

u The Tiger Rising by Kate DiCamillo

u Weather by Kathy Furgang

GRADE 5

u Alien Deep by Bradley Hague

u Every Living Thing by Cynthia Rylant

u Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting

u Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate

u Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe

u The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch

u The Thief of Always by Clive Barker

u When Lunch Fights Back: Wickedly Clever Animal Defenses by Rebecca L. Johnson

TRADE BOOK PACKS

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READING ALOUD

Reading aloud to your students provides them with numerous benefits. This is especially true for students who may have a

more limited exposure to texts outside of school. Besides offering a chance to model proficient reading behaviors, read-aloud time can also expose students to new vocabulary, concepts, and text structures. This ongoing exposure to varied language and texts is essential for students as they continue to explore the world of books and build their social skills.

KINDERGARTEN THROUGH SECOND GRADE

Each of the K–2 units outlines a suggested 5-day plan for the first few days of read-aloud work, with suggestions for the questions and skills the teacher might highlight before, during, and after reading the recommended text. Teachers can use the template to complete the entire book and then read other texts.

The Guide to the Reading Workshop, Primary Grades includes guidance to help teachers use the read-aloud to immerse children in rich, complex texts and to teach the skills of proficient reading. Preprinted Post-it® notes highlight possible teaching points the teacher might address during the read-aloud.

THIRD GRADE THROUGH FIFTH GRADE

Reading aloud is also a vital component of instruction in grades 3–5. These grade levels provide read-aloud support in both the Guide to the Reading Workshop, Intermediate Grades and in the units themselves. Pacing Guides for selected units help the teacher plan read-alouds across the unit, both before the minilessons and during reading workshop.

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SHARED READING, Grades K–2

Each K–2 unit of study in the series includes a suggested 5-day plan for shared reading. These plans highlight one text and

revolve around repeated readings. This process models the ways readers return to a text again and again, each time discovering more and more.

5-DAY SHARED READING PLAN

day 1Book Introduction, Comprehension, and Word Solving

day 2Cross-Checking

day 3Word Study

day 4Fluency

day 5Orchestration/Comprehension

Just as reading workshops are highly structured to help students take on new and challenging work with confidence, your shared reading sessions will follow a similarly predictable structure, beginning with a warm-up, followed by a choral reading of a chosen text, and ending with an activity to respond to or extend the text.

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TEACHING TOOLS for Literacy Development

Anchor Charts

Anchor charts evolve across each bend and unit. Each book supplies large-format Post-it® notes that provide clear visuals and accessible language to support students’ independent practice and help them build a repertoire of reading strategies.

Supports for Read-Aloud and Shared Reading

In the kindergarten through second grade units, there are shared reading and read-aloud lesson plans. Each unit also includes preprinted read-aloud Post-it® notes that highlight important skills a teacher might address across the read-aloud. These Post-it® notes are transferable to support planning of subsequent interactive read-alouds across the unit.

ChartsArtistic renderings of charts can be printed for students’ personal use or displayed in your classroom to reinforce routines and promote ongoing independent practice of strategies.

May be photocopied for classroom use. © 2015 by Lucy Calkins and Colleagues from the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project from Units of Study for Teaching Reading (Heinemann: Portsmouth, NH).



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TEACHING TOOLS for Literacy Development

Student ToolsStudent tools including individual reading mats, reading logs, bookmarks and games help support daily reading routines and increase reading volume and stamina.

Rubrics and Learning ProgressionsReproducible illustrated rubrics and learning progressions for third, fourth, and fifth grade students support self-assessment and goal-setting.

Poems, Songs, and RhymesPoems, songs and nursery rhymes are used during whole-group and small-group instruction to support routines and key skills. Children can be given copies of these materials to bolster their independent reading work.

And More . . .Additionally, there are samples of student work, bibliographies with suggested novels and text sets, as well as links to web-based resources including articles and video clips.

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4

Reading�Pathways,�Perform

ance�Assessments�and�Learning�Progressions:�G

rades�3–5

May be photocopied for classroom

use. © 2015 by Lucy Calkins and Colleagues from

the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project. Reading Pathw

ays, Performance Assessm

ents and Learning Progressions: Grades 3–5 (Heinem

ann, Portsmouth, NH).

grad

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Student RubricGrade 3 Unit 2: Nonfiction Performance Assessment

Grade 2 Grade 3

Q1: Summary/Main Idea(s) and Supporting Details

□ I named the topic (but not the idea) that the text tells about.

□ My summary is brief. □ I captured the whole text.

□ I wrote about the main idea(s). □ I wrote about the supporting

details. □ I wrote a brief summary. □ I left out any unimportant

information.

Q2: Cross Text(s) Synthesis

□ I added what I learned from one part of text onto what I learned from another part of text.

□ I put together information on a subtopic from different texts or parts of a longer text.

6547_Reading_P

athways.indd 214

5/26/15 9:40 AM

Name ____________________________________ Reading log Month of ____________________________________

*Date

*Title and Author’s Last Name *Level *Start Page

End Page *Start Time

End Time Minutes Read

*Home or School

*Fill out these columns BEFORE you start reading.


Informational Reading Learning ProgressionGrade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5

LITERAL COMPREHENSION

Envisioning I read narrative and expository texts differently. As I read narrative nonfiction, I picture what I’m reading as a mental movie (like when reading fiction). When I read expository text, I create images/models in my mind (boxes and bullets, timelines, diagrams). I add on to these images as I get more information.

I continue to read expository and narrative texts differently, creating mental movies or images/models in my mind. As I read, I draw on details from the text and my prior knowledge to add to what I’m picturing. When reading expository texts, my mental models (boxes and bullets, timelines, diagrams) act as places to catch all of the new information I am getting.

I’m flexible as a reader of nonfiction. When reading narrative nonfiction, I can make a mental movie similar to the way I would as a fiction reader, drawing on details from the text and my prior knowledge. With expository text, I envision a combination of mental models to capture and organize what I am learning (outlines, boxes and bullets, diagrams). I revise and add to these models as I get new information.

Monitoring for Sense

When I can’t keep the main ideas straight or figure out how the information goes together, I reread, stopping after each chunk to review what I have read. I ask, “Is this a new subtopic or does it add onto what I have already learned?”

I read, expecting the parts of the text to fit together in such a way that I can understand the main ideas. To check my comprehension, I try to make sure that as I move from part to part, I ask, “How does that part fit with my overall picture of the topic?” When a part feels disconnected from the rest of the text, I reread to see if I missed something or I read on, carrying questions.

I realize that in more complicated nonfiction texts, I sometimes need to read on with questions in my mind. The texts I’m reading now will sometimes contain many different parts, and it can take work to figure out how those parts go together. I especially try to think about what is most important and how the parts fit into that.


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ASSESSMENT

Workshops, by definition, are places in which you are engaged in continual assessment. The simplicity and predictability of the

workshop will free you from constant choreographing, allowing you time to observe, listen, and teach into each student’s zone of proximal development. As you get to know your students, you’ll construct a portrait of each reader in your class. This will be based on your running records and performance assessments, and it will also draw on your studies of behaviors during reading workshop, when you scan the room to see whose eyes are focused on text and whose are roaming the room, as well as your analysis of students’ Post-it® notes and observations of talk. You will want to draw on these broad understandings of data as you design your instruction.

P R I M A RY G R A D E S

LUCY CALKINS


GRADES K–2 ASSESSMENT

In grades K–2, detailed assessment guidelines are provided in A Guide to the Reading Workshop and embedded within the units. Assessment in the primary grades centers on running records. A Guide to the Reading Workshop, Primary Grades offers detailed guidelines for:

• Choosing assessment tools and getting organized

• Getting to know readers at the start of the year

• Using running records to inform classroom instruction

• Establishing benchmarks that correlate to assessment windows for running records

• Analyzing a class set of data

• Gathering notes during conferring and small-group work

• Using phonics and high-frequency word assessments in kindergarten, and first and second grade

• Assessing reading volume and stamina

• Assessing book talk and writing about reading

• Setting assessment-based goals with students

• Adjusting teaching based on your data

A Guide to the Reading Workshop, Primary Grades includes chapters describing assessment systems that make teaching and learning more robust, goal-directed, data-based, and responsive.

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Lucy provides practical advice and support to help you select tools for conducting running records and use them as a regular part of your reading workshop.

When you analyze your students’ running records, look for patterns throughout the class at the individual, small-group, and whole-class level.

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ASSESSMENT Grades 3–5

In grades 3–5, Reading Pathways: Performance Assessments and Learning Progressions and related online resources offer grade-level appropriate tools to support continuous assessment, timely feedback, student self-assessment, and goal setting.

Reading Pathways, Grades 3–5 provides teachers with a comprehensive assessment system that can make intermediate-level teaching and learning robust, goal-directed, data-based, and responsive.

Assessment tools include:

• Learning Progressions for narrative and informational reading to support skill development

• Student assessment samples

• Performance assessments to be used before and after each unit of study—and sample student responses

• Simple, illustrated kid-friendly rubrics, grounded in the learning progressions

• Tools for collecting data on reading volume and reading habits

• A simple, streamlined system for conducting running records

• Downloadable digital versions of the assessment tools are available in the online resources

LUC Y C A L K IN S WI T H ALE X ANDR A MAR RON AN D COLLE AGUE S F RO M T HE TE ACHE R S COLLEGE

R E ADING AN D WR ITING PROJEC T

Reading Pathways G R A DE S 3 – 5

Performance Assessmentsand Learning Progressions

Learning progressions in reading narrative and informational texts support students’ progress along a dozen all-important skill progressions. Learning progressions are written in clear, straighforward language to communicate expectations to students and their teachers.

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Illustrated, kid-friendly rubrics allow children to self-assess their work on performance assessments.

Performance assessments, used before and after each unit of study, inform students about key skills they’ll need to develop across the unit and show them a clear path along which to improve.

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YEARLONG Planning

If . . . Then . . . CurriculumAssessment-Based Instruction, Grades K–2 and 3–5

In addition to the four units of study for each grade level, you will find If . . . Then . . . Curriculum: Assessment-Based Instruction, a book that helps teachers go from assessing students to planning a yearlong sequence of units. The If . . . Then . . . book helps teachers look at their data and think about ways to alter the suggested sequence in the units accordingly. For example, in a fifth–grade classroom where students have no previous experience with units of study, what do the authors recommend? If a class is operating well below or well higher than benchmark, how should the teacher vary the sequence of units? This text provides the coauthors’ thoughts in response to questions such as these.

The If . . . Then . . . Curriculum book also offers shortened versions of almost half a dozen additional units of study—units that can be taught before, after, or in between the units provided in full. For example, if a teacher is worried that her students need to be prepared for poetry questions on the high-stakes test, she may decide to teach a unit on poetry. If she thinks her students need more experience reading narrative nonfiction, she might decide on a unit on biography. The curriculum described in the full-length books supports a portion of the reading curriculum, so these additional units are provided for teachers to adapt and use to meet the specific needs of their own classrooms.

The units in the If . . . Then . . . Curriculum book help teachers build a plan that makes sense for students based on the data at hand. In addition to the If . . . Then . . . Curriculum units, teachers may also want to consider borrowing units—or selected bends—from the grade above and the grade below as they adapt the curriculum to meet students’ needs.

Kindergarten • Emergent Reading: Looking Closely at Familiar Texts (available online)• Growing Expertise in Little Books: Nonfiction Reading • Readers Are Resourceful: Tackling Hard Words and

Tricky Parts in Books • Readers Get to Know Characters by Performing Their Books • Word Detectives Use All They Know to Solve Words

First Grade • Growing Expertise in Little Books: Nonfiction Reading • Readers Are Resourceful: Tackling Hard Words and Tricky Parts in Books • Readers Get to Know Characters by Performing Their Books • Word Detectives Use All They Know to Solve Words • Studying Characters and Their Stories (available online)• Reading Nonfiction Cover to Cover: Nonfiction Book Clubs • Reading and Role-Playing: Fairy Tales, Folktales, Fables, and Fantasy

Second Grade • Growing Expertise in Little Books: Nonfiction Reading • Readers Get to Know Characters by Performing Their Books • Word Detectives Use All They Know to Solve Words • Studying Characters and Their Stories (available online)• Reading Nonfiction Cover to Cover: Nonfiction Book Clubs • Reading and Role-Playing: Fairy Tales, Folktales, Fables, and Fantasy

Third Grade • Learning through Reading: Countries around the World• Nonfiction Book Clubs: Author Studies• Solving the Mystery before the Detective: Inference, Close Biography Book Clubs • Little Things Are Big: Making Meaning from Poems and Poetic Craft in Literature

Fourth Grade • Nonfiction Book Clubs: Author Studies• Solving the Mystery before the Detective: Inference, Close Biography Book

Clubs • Little Things Are Big: Making Meaning from Poems and Poetic Craft

in Literature• Social Issues Book Clubs: Applying Analytical Lenses across Literature and

Informational Texts • Author Study: Reading Like a Fan

Fifth Grade • Little Things Are Big: Making Meaning from Poems and Poetic Craft in Litera-ture

• Social Issues Book Clubs: Applying Analytical Lenses across Literature and Informational Texts

• Author Study: Reading Like a Fan • Historical Fiction Book Clubs and Related Informational Reading:

Tackling Complex Texts• Learning through Reading: Westward Expansion

GRADE LEVEL IF… THEN… UNITS

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READING AND WRITINGConnections

T he Units of Study for Teaching Reading and the Units of Study in Opinion, Information, and Narrative

Writing were planned so that when a school is ready to embark on both, the units will support each other. The series are related in the content they teach, the hab-its they instill, and the strategies that are taught. The methods of instruction are similar, so that not only will teachers be familiar with the classroom structures and assessment tools, children will be, too. That familiarity saves instructional time and increases student agency.

CONTENTThe reading units are planned to support the writ-ing units, and vice versa, when the content will best help the growth of young readers and writers. There are times when interconnected reading and writing units makes a tremendous amount of sense. For exam-ple, children might be researching a social studies topic in reading workshop while composing research reports in writing workshop. There are also times when what’s best for children as readers and what’s best for them as writers don’t correspond as directly. This will especially be true in the early grades and at the begin-ning of the year. For example, while starting the year

with personal narrative writing makes a tremendous amount of sense for third-grade writers, the units don’t limit third-grade readers to reading only personal nar-ratives at the start of the year.

HABITSOne of the strongest ways the reading and writing units work together is in how they approach teaching toward independence across the year and up the grade levels. In addition, both the reading and writing units teach students to self-assess, set goals, strive to excel, work wisely with partners and clubs, explain ongoing work to the teacher, receive and apply feedback, and develop homework and study skills. Most importantly, the habits of reading a lot and writing a lot are empha-sized in every grade and every unit.

STRATEGIESThe reading and writing units of study focus on teach-ing the strategies that will sustain children throughout their reading and writing lives—and these strategies are often interconnected across reading and writ-ing. For example, strategies connect when students are doing text-based writing. Teaching students

interpretation skills is also part of teaching them to write literary essays. Teaching research skills and crit-ical reading skills is part of teaching students to write information pieces and arguments. In the same way, to be better readers, students often need to be better at writing about reading, and so the reading units include strategies for writing to think, writing to collect notes and evidence, and writing to develop ideas. Reading and writing strategies also connect in the area of self-assessment. Just as students are taught strategies for using checklists to internalize qualities of writing, and to evaluate their own writing, they’ll learn to use tools to internalize qualities of reading and to evaluate their own reading work.

INSTRUCTIONAL METHODSBecause we know that how you teach matters as much as what you teach, both the reading and writing units put a tremendous emphasis on instructional methods. The same major methods elucidated in the reading units are also found in the writing units, including methods of demonstration, inquiry, guided practice, assessment, and feedback.

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“The children loved the unit! They especially enjoyed playing the ‘games’ with reading partners. In fact, they continued to play the games and sing the songs long after we completed the pilot. I have observed an increase in the application of certain skills. For example, one of the lessons teaches ‘sight words in disguise.’ The children still use this term when decoding new words while reading. I also noticed the reading partnerships are stronger and they really use partners as someone to go to for help. I noticed skills learned in reading workshop carried over to writing workshop. It was amazing.

“The units fit nicely within my balanced literacy program in kindergarten. They include whole-group lessons for reading workshop and ideas or guidance for guided reading groups, one-to-one conferences, or reading partners. The units also include lessons for shared reading, interactive read-aloud, and interactive writing. The reading units flow nicely into writing workshop for a well-connected literacy block.”

—Allison Hepfer, Kindergarten Teacher

“The content of the units pushed my students to stretch their thinking and also question author’s purpose. ‘What was this author really trying to teach me?’ ‘What is the take-away message from this text?’ The content also challenged my students to search for symbols and life lessons. And the knowledge they gained transferred into their other reading.

“My students could not wait for reading workshop every day so they could discuss what was happening in their readings. They pushed each other to read way more pages than if I had assigned them. It was a pleasure to listen to their conversations; the students really pushed others in the group by challenging their ideas and questioning to make them look deeper into the text. They were also excellent at using the text as evidence to support their answers.”

—Sarah Binversie, Grade 5 Teacher

“Unit 2, Super Powers: Reading with Print Strategies and Sight Word Power, gave my students a collection of ‘super reading powers’ and the knowledge of when to use, or ‘activate,’ them. The unit was highly engaging for my students and easy for me to differentiate for various levels in my classroom. The sessions fit easily into my literacy block from the beginning of the unit and beyond as students built reading stamina and reading fluency. I also appreciated the ability to modify the sessions to follow student progress. Lucy Calkins and her team have given teachers the tools to support their early kindergarten readers from the tiniest first step in the beginning of the year to the confident leap they will make to first grade.”

—Connie Finkestein, Kindergarten Teacher

“The units provide clear and concise goals and teaching points, as well as an amazing selection of easily accessible resources to use within the units, such as anchor charts, mentor texts, and student exemplars. Each lesson is de-veloped with multiple opportunities to differentiate and customize throughout the sixty-minute workshop frame-work. The high literacy expectations in the new units offer teachers a solid path aligned to ELA Standards, but also the opportunity to embrace their expertise with pacing and responsive teaching for the growth of all students.”

—Rachon Miller, K–5 Literacy Specialist

PILOT TEACHERS REPORT Dramatic Results

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PROFESSIONAL Development

Implementation and ProfessionalDevelopment OptionsThe Units of Study books are a curriculum—and more. Lucy Calkins has embedded professional development into the curriculum, teaching teachers the “why” and “how” of effective reading instruction. Through regular coaching tips and detailed descriptions of teaching moves, essential aspects of reading instruction are underscored and explained at every turn. The professional development embedded in this series can be further enhanced through the following opportunities.

IN YOUR SCHOOL OR DISTRICT

Units of Study Days

Through a one-day intensive session, teachers can get started unpacking the series’ components, grasping the big picture of effective workshop teaching, and gaining an understanding of how to integrate assessment into the curriculum.

Contact Judith Chin, Coordinator of Strategic Development [email protected] Phone: 212-678-3104

Multi-Day Institute for 40–300 educators

Invite a Reading and Writing Project Staff Developer to work in your school or district, helping a cohort of educators to teach reading and/or writing well. Host a “Homegrown Institute” for writing instruction, reading instruction, or content literacy. Tailored to your district’s needs, the instruction and materials are specialized for K–2, 3–5 or 6–8 sections.

Contact Kathy Neville, Executive Administrator [email protected] Phone: 917-484-1482

Leadership Support

Topics include planning for large-scale implementation, establishing assessments across the school or district, learning from walk-throughs, designing in-house staff development, and instituting cross-grade alignment.

ONLINE FROM TCRWP

Classroom Videos

Dozens of live-from-the classroom videos let you eavesdrop on Lucy and her colleagues’ instruction in literacy workshop classrooms. These clips model the minilessons, conferences, and shares you will engage in as you teach the units of study.

View these videos at: readingandwritingproject.org/resources/units-of-study

Resources

The Project posts important and useful resources throughout the year, including examples of student work.

Visit readingandwritingproject.org/resources

Twitter Chats

On Wednesdays from 7:30 – 8:30 P.M. EST join TCRWP and our colleagues for live chat sessions on topics supporting literacy instruction. Follow them at @TCRWP or search #TCRWP.

Twitter.com/tcrwp

Distance Learning Teacher-Leader Groups in Writing

TCRWP’s online Teacher-Leader Groups bring together potential teacher-leaders from schools across the nation. Led by Senior Staff Developers, each grade-specific group convenes for five two-hour sessions at crucial times throughout the year. These sessions enable teacher-leaders to think across the units of study in writing and to explore methods of facilitating student transfer of skills from one unit to the next.

Visit readingandwritingproject.org for full support.

AT TEACHERS COLLEGE

Multi-Day Institutes at Teachers College

Teachers College offers eight institutes each year. Each of these is led by teacher-educators from the project, with other world-renowned experts joining as well. Institutes include keynotes, small- and large-group sections, and sometimes work in exemplar schools.

• Summer Institutes on the Teaching of Reading and Writing

• Literacy Coaching Institutes on the Teaching of Reading and Writing

• Content Area Institute

• Argumentation Institute

For registration and application information go to:readingandwritingproject.org/services/institutes

ACROSS THE COUNTRY

Each year, the Reading and Writing Project and Heinemann offer several one-day workshops for teachers and administrators. These off-site seminars are held in selected locations across the country and focus on units of study for teaching reading and writing. The workshops are delivered by TCRWP leaders and are open enrollment events.

For dates, locations, and registration information go to:readingandwritingproject.org/services/one-day-events/conferences and heinemann.com/PD/workshops

Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

525 W 120th St, Box 77New York NY, 10027readingandwritingproject.org

Learn more at unitsofstudy.com/teachingreading

Lucy Calkins with Colleagues from the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

UNITS OF STUDY for Teaching Reading A WO R K S H O P C U R R I C U LU M u Grade-by-Grade, K–5

Following on the success of the Units of Study in Opinion, Information, and Narrative Writing, K–5, the new grade-by-grade Units of Study for Teaching Reading, K–5:

◗ provide state-of-the-art tools and methods to help students move up the ladder of text complexity

◗ build foundational reading skills and strategies

◗ support the teaching of interpretation, synthesis, and main idea

◗ provide all the teaching points, minilessons, conferences, and small-group work needed to teach a comprehensive workshop curriculum

◗ Include the resources to help teachers build and evolve anchor charts across each unit

◗ help teachers use learning progressions to assess students’ reading work, develop their use of self-monitoring strategies, and set students on trajectories of growth

◗ give teachers opportunities to teach and to learn teaching while receiving strong scaffolding and on-the-job guidance

@HeinemannPub

Heinemann.com | P 800.225.5800 | F 877.231.6980

NEW from Lucy Calkins

GRADE 2 SHOWN

780325 0779949

90000 >ISBN 978-0-325-07799-4

“This series builds on decades of teaching and research—in literally tens of thousands of

schools. In states across the country, this curriculum has already given young people

extraordinary power, not only as readers, but also as thinkers. When young people

are explicitly taught the skills and strategies of proficient reading and are invited to

live as richly literate people do, carrying books everywhere, bringing reading into

every nook and corner of their lives, the results are dramatic.” —Lucy Calkins

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