Common Core State Standards

Mutual Cadre Standards

Learn, plan, and implement Mutual Cadre in your classroom. Use the Resources Correlations tool to find Common Cadre-aligned resource from Reading A-Z, the ELL Edition, Writing A-Z, or Science A-Z or view all correlated resources at once. We have besides provided information on primal CCSS topics, why they are important, and how Reading A-Z can be used to implement elements of CCSS.

Resource Correlations

Foundational Skills

What Are Foundational Skills?

The Mutual Core State Standards (CCSS) have identified a prepare of skills that students must master earlier they tin can become fluent readers and comprehend what they are reading. Since these skills are at the very foundation of becoming a skilful reader, they are chosen foundational skills. These skills are taught somewhat sequentially, with some natural overlapping of skills:

  • Alphabet
  • Concept of print
  • Phonological awareness
  • Phonics
  • Loftier-Frequency Words
  • Fluency

Common Core State Standards Foundational Skills video

Alphabet

Students demand to know the English linguistic communication is presented using 26 letters. They must be able to recognize, proper name, and grade these messages in social club to read and write.

Impress Concepts

When introducing students to written language they must empathise the basic organization and features of print: read left to correct; top to lesser; letters create words and words create sentences; spaces betwixt words; ending and beginning punctuation. Children frequently come up to sympathize these concepts through owning their outset books.

Phonological Awareness

This foundational skill is nearly recognizing the sounds of linguistic communication. It begins with word sensation and being able to recognize, for example, the number of words that make up a spoken judgement. Secondary mastery of these skills includes recognizing rhyme and syllables. At the nearly detailed level, the phoneme level, students tin can discern the sounds that make up a word. They tin segment the sounds within a word, blend sounds together to make a word, and substitute sounds to make new words.

Phonics

Students must friction match a unit of sound (a phoneme) to the letter or messages that make the sound. Separating the written word into its individual sounds and blending the individual sounds of letters to brand words is the foundation of reading.

High-Frequency Word Recognition

Students must be able to recognize and read a collection of high-frequency words by sight and do and so with increasing automaticity.

Fluency

Students must be able to read and cover text on-level – accurately, at the appropriate rate and with the correct expression. This is best achieved by repeated readings of text passages of increasing complexity while tracking the reading rate and accurateness.

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Why Are Foundational Skills Important?

Students must chief foundational skills before they tin become fluent readers and comprehend text. Foundational skills instruction is the first reading instruction that students should receive. Each skill should be consistently reinforced. Foundational skills are essential for students to larn how to both read and write. They are the skills that help them to decode unknown words and use discussion noesis to comprehend more than complex writing across varying levels and genres.

How Do Reading A-Z Resources Support Teaching Foundational Skills?

Reading A-Z provides easy access to a rich collection of resources necessary to assistance all students develop strong Foundational Skills in reading. Many of these resource are available in printable and projectable formats.

  • Alphabet Books and activities build skills in letter naming, recognition, and formation.
  • Books, lesson plans, and activities address all phonics and phonological awareness elements.
  • Loftier-Frequency Word Books and the Most Common Word Flashcards provide students the opportunity to work with words in isolation and in context.
  • Leveled Fluency Passages and Reader'south Theater Scripts support practicing fluency.

Also available:

  • Shared Reading Books and lessons teach foundational skills, including concepts of impress and a variety of reading strategies.
  • 1,000+ Leveled Books and lesson plans back up reading at 29 different levels.

Advisory Text

What Is Informational Text?

The Common Cadre State Standards (CCSS) defines "informational text" as a broad category of nonfiction resources, including: biographies; autobiographies; books about history, social studies, scientific discipline, and the arts; technical texts (including how-to books and procedural books); and literary nonfiction. The CCSS stress the importance of focused education using informational text with students in the unproblematic grades.

Watch the Common Core State Standards Informational Text video

Informational text is designed to get in easier for the reader to find information. This includes using such eye-catching features equally section heads, assuming-faced terms, tabular array of contents, glossary, captioned photos, art, and info-graphics (graphs, tables, charts and diagrams, etc.)

Watch the Common Core State Standards Visual Devices video

When selecting advisory resource for children, text quality should be judged for its accuracy, the expertise and credibility of the author, and the currency of the information presented. The developmental appropriateness of the writing, clarity and directness of the language should too exist considered.

Scout the February webinar on Informational Text: You volition demand to create a costless Go To Meeting account to see the webinar video.

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Why Is Increasing The Reading Of Informational Text Important?

Traditional M-6 reading instruction has always relied heavily on literature and fictional text. Studies testify that only seven-15% of classroom time is spent studying informational text. Yet by sixth grade, most of what students are required to read is nonfiction. What'southward more than, 80% of all adult reading is devoted to expository or nonfiction text.

If students are to ameliorate comprehend science, social studies, and math text - as well every bit meet the common core reading and writing requirements for graduation - so we need to increment their exposure to informational texts early in their formal schooling.

Instruction students the skills and strategies to successfully read and comprehend informational text is disquisitional to their futurity success in higher education and the workplace.

The English Language Arts [ELA] Common Core Country Standards recommend more reading of informational text with a ratio of literary to advisory as follows:

Grade Span Literary Informational
K-4 50% l%
5-eight 45% 55%
nine-12 30% lxx%

How Does Reading A-Z Accost the Need for Advisory Text?

Reading A-Z offers an extensive collection of 800+ nonfiction books, including advisory texts in a variety of genres roofing an array of topics. All books are available in both printable and projectable formats, and the Learning A-Z Text Leveling Organisation ensures books gradually increase in complexity over 29 levels.

  • Leveled Books with lessons target specific skills and strategies along with supporting worksheets, a graphic organizer, a set of discussion cards and a comprehension quiz.
  • Mutual Core Supplements for both nonfiction and fiction Leveled Books address specific cardinal shifts of Common Core instruction.

Also available:

  • Shared Reading nonfiction books ensure early readers piece of work with informational texts.
  • Our Close Reading Packs contain a large option of informational text to back up reading multiple, short texts closely.
  • Visual Devices feature explicit instruction on text elements, such as graphs, charts, maps, schedules, or other visual texts.
  • Content Area Reading organizes leveled books into featured groups of common content area topics.

Text Complexity

What Is Text Complexity?

Text complexity is what the term implies: how challenging is the material for the child at their specific form level. The Mutual Core State Standards use iii factors to make up one's mind the complication of a text:

  • Qualitative Measures
  • Quantitative Measures
  • Considerations relating to the reader and chore

Watch the Common Core State Standards Text Complexity video

Qualitative measures examine text attributes that can only be evaluated past the person that is reading the book or passage. The reader is required to consider such factors as:

    Levels of significant: Is the purpose explicitly stated or is it vague? Does it have a single level of meaning vs. multiple purposes?

    Clarity and conventions of linguistic communication: Is the language clear or is it vague and purposefully misleading? Is the language contemporary and familiar or is it unfamiliar and archaic? Is the text conversational or academic? Is in that location broad use of figurative language, idiomatic expressions, etc.? Is the text cohesive or does it lack cohesion?

    Knowledge demands: Is information technology a single-themed text and relatively simple as opposed to multiple-themed and complex? Does the text deal with mutual everyday experiences or does it present experiences that are likely vastly different from those of the reader? Is the text presented from single or multiple perspectives? Are there frequent changes in the setting? How many, if whatsoever, references to other texts does the text contain?

    Construction: How is the text organized - chronologically or in another logical fashion? Is it randomly arranged with complex and loosely connected content? Does the structure and organization make sense? Are sections and features clearly labeled? Is the text free from unnecessary distractions?

    Visual device complication: Are graphical devices relatively simple or are they complex? Are the graphics more "for bear witness" rather than necessary to help the student understand the material being presented?

Quantitative measures are what publishers traditionally relied upon to determine the difficulty of a text. In that location are dozens of formulas used to figure text difficulty. Many of these formulas consider but two factors: sentence length and the number of hard or unfamiliar words or they look at sentence length and syllable count. Needless to say, these factors are fairly limiting when it comes to determining the complexity of a text.

Considerations relating to the reader and tasks is the vital third component. Each reader brings different skills, background, and motivation to the human activity of reading. For case, a student who is interested in the topic being read is likely to bring more than background knowledge to the reading job and want to learn more than.

The importance of the consignment itself tin also influence the reading activeness. Skimming a book or article for a key slice of information or reading leisurely places less demand on the reading task than if a student is preparing for an exam, assembling a piece of equipment, or reading for long-term memory.

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Why Is Text Complexity An Outcome?

Over the past 50 years the text that students have encountered in center and high school had decreased in complexity, while textbooks in colleges, universities, and the workplace have become more than complex. Equally a result too many students graduating from loftier school lack sufficient skills required to comprehend the text they run across in college and the workplace. The authors of the Common Core State ELA Standards have taken steps to ensure that greater attention is paid to gradually increasing the complexity of the text students read and comprehend as they motility through school.

How Does Reading A-Z Address Text Complexity?

Reading A-Z offers books designed and written to 29 levels of difficulty. Slap-up care has been taken to analyze each and every book using multiple quantitative and qualitative factors. Teachers can present these materials with confidence, knowing that each leveled volume meets the required Mutual Core standards.

  • Read about our Text Leveling Organisation to learn how we accurately and reliably measure out the complexity of a text.
  • Our Level Correlation Nautical chart shows how Learning A-Z Levels compare to other common leveling systems.

Close Reading

What Is Shut Reading?

Close Reading is a central focus of the Common Cadre Country Standards (CCSS). It requires students to get truly involved with the text they are reading. The purpose is to teach them to notice features and linguistic communication used by the author. Students volition be required to think thoroughly and methodically well-nigh the details in a text.

Watch the Common Core - 5 Tips for Close Reading video

Shut reading isn't the one-time "students read, teacher questions and evaluates" model. While it is initially modeled and then guided by a teacher, over fourth dimension the teacher releases the responsibleness of close reading to the student. Teachers help students determine how a text is organized, and empathize the effect of the author'due south word option in a certain passage. Close reading goes "deeper than the text". Information technology mines what is under the surface of the words. Students eventually evaluate or critique what is written.

Watch the Common Core State Standards Close Reading video

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Why Is Close Reading Of import?

Close reading teaches students to seek out micro-levels of understanding. It'southward more than being able to retell a story or provide a main thought or supporting details from a text. When students are taught to read a text closely they become more skilled at locating evidence inside a sentence or a paragraph or a page of a text or story. Then orally or in writing, they can justify answers to text-dependent questions based on prove. These are basic close reading skills as outlined by the Common Core English language language arts Standards that every pupil must know to succeed in higher and career.

Every bit educators, we're concerned virtually students' lack of comprehension, especially of informational text. Today many students are barely grazing the surface of the text they read. They typically don't take the time to sympathise and brand connections to the text. Shut reading is being emphasized by the CCSS to ensure today's students dig deeper into the text, and kickoff making those connections.

How Tin Reading A-Z Resource Back up the Pedagogy of Close Reading?

Reading A-Z'due south close reading materials depict students into the text and become them involved in examining the facts and details.

  • Close Reading Packs offering multiple re-readings of a short text for different purposes in social club to find evidence to answer a Key Question.
  • More one,500 Leveled Books at 29 levels of difficulty enable teachers to provide developmentally appropriate texts for students to practice the skills and strategies of shut reading.
  • Graphic organizers and comprehensive lesson plans for leveled books support close reading educational activity and practice.
  • Shared Reading Books aid our youngest learners begin reading text more closely. Each five-day lesson program includes a section devoted to text-dependent questions. A 2nd projectable version of each book includes grapheme prompts. The characters ask the reader to complete tasks and interact with the book.
  • Comprehension Skill Packs provide straight and explicit instruction on upward to sixteen dissimilar comprehension skills to support educatee'due south close reading of whatsoever text.
  • Our Paired Books lessons include a set of text-dependent questions that crave students to closely read and compare and contrast 2 related texts.

Text-dependent Questions

What Are Text-dependent Questions?

Text-dependent questions are those that can only be answered by referring dorsum to the text being read. The Mutual Cadre State Standards (CCSS) crave students to "read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to brand logical inferences from it. They must as well cite pertinent evidence from the text when responding orally or when writing an answer to questions about the text. Students can no longer rely solely on prior cognition or personal experience.

Watch the Common Core State Standards Text-dependent Questions video

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Why Are Text-dependent Questions Important?

Good text-dependent questions guarantee careful investigation of text. They volition frequently lead students to discover something important that may have been overlooked the first time they read the text. They guide students to dive deeper into the text, and to respond or place the cadre understandings or insights that are essential.

Text-dependent questions can be used by the instructor to promote discussion and help students to sympathize even better what they are reading. They can be used to start pupil discussions and give students opportunities to discuss the text with each other and voice their opinions.

The Common Cadre ELA Standards crave moving instruction away from generic questions such as, "What is the principal idea and three supporting details? to questions that crave students to clarify what they are reading. An instance of a text-dependent question would be something like "The article describes the male emperor penguin equally 'tough'. Give ii pieces of data from the article that demonstrates how they are tough.

How Does Reading A-Z Back up Teaching/Using Text-Dependent Questions?

Text-dependent questions that students answer to verbally or in writing can be found in a multitude of supporting instructional resources across Reading A-Z.

  • Leveled Volume Mutual Core Lesson Supplements contain a section devoted to text-dependent questions.
  • Every Leveled Book has a consummate guided reading lesson plan, comprehension quiz, and gear up of word cards (levels A-Z2). Each discussion card is tagged with the specific reading skill information technology targets, such as:
    • Compare and contrast
    • Crusade and result
    • Make inferences/describe conclusions
    • Analyze and evaluate
  • All Shared Reading Books come up with a five-day lesson plan, with a section devoted to text-dependent questions. Each Shared Reading Projectable Volume with Prompts offers opportunities for readers to complete tasks and interact with the projectable tools to answer text-dependent questions.
  • A text-dependent Key Question is the focus of every Close Reading Pack. Multiple re-reads of the text encourage students to closely read in lodge to answer the Key Question.
  • Our Paired Books lessons include a fix of text-dependent questions that require students to closely read and compare and contrast two related texts.

Bookish Vocabulary

What Is Bookish Vocabulary?

The Common Cadre Country Standards (CCSS) ascertain academic vocabulary words every bit the words that are traditionally used in academic dialogue and text. Specifically, it refers to words that are not necessarily common or that children would see in conversation. These words oftentimes relate to other more familiar words that students utilize. For example, rather than sentinel, find. They are also words that help students understand oral directions and classroom instructional dialog. They also help students to comprehend text across dissimilar content areas- including math, science, and social studies/history.

Vocabulary words are often categorized into three tiers.

Tier 1 words: These words are basic vocabulary or the more than mutual words well-nigh children will know. They include high-frequency words and usually are not multiple meaning words.

Tier 2 words: Less familiar, yet useful vocabulary found in written text and shared between the teacher and pupil in conversation. The Common Cadre State Standards refers to these as "general academic words." Sometimes they are referred to as "rich vocabulary." These words are more precise or subtle forms of familiar words and include multiple pregnant words. Instead of walk for example, saunter could be used. These words are establish across a diversity of domains.

Tier three words: CCSS refers to these words as "domain specific;" they are critical to understanding the concepts of the content taught in schools. Mostly, they have low frequency use and are limited to specific knowledge domains. Examples would include words such as isotope, peninsula, refinery. They are all-time learned when teaching specific content lessons, and tend to be more common in advisory text.

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Why Is Teaching Academic Vocabulary Of import?

Vocabulary's link to comprehension has been extensively researched and the importance of directly didactics vocabulary has been firmly established. Unfortunately, in recent years the didactics of vocabulary has not been frequent or systematic in schools. The Mutual Cadre includes vocabulary instruction and reinforcement in the English Language Arts [ELA] standards. The standards dealing with vocabulary focus on "understanding words and phrases, their relationships, and their nuances and on acquiring new vocabulary."

The Common Core ELA standards stress the need to provide direct and explicit instruction for academic vocabulary. When didactics vocabulary, it is best not to brand students await up words in a dictionary or a glossary and write out the definition. They unremarkably pick the first choice, and information technology ofttimes isn't the right ane.

Nosotros recommend the half-dozen steps that Robert Marzano presents in his book Building Academic Vocabulary (2004).

Step one: Teacher provides a description, explanation or example of the new term
Step 2: Students restate an explanation of the new term in their ain words
Step iii: Students create a nonlinguistic representation of the term
Step iv: Students periodically do activities that help add to their noesis of the vocabulary terms
Step five: Students are periodically asked to discuss terms with one some other
Step 6: Students are periodically involved in games that let them to review terms

How Does Reading A-Z Back up Teaching Academic Vocabulary?

Each Leveled Book Mutual Core Lesson Supplement features academic vocabulary words important to discussing the book. Words are listed whether they are used in the book or in the lesson plan to ensure students can be successful with the instruction.

Writing

What Is Writing?

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) require students to exist able to write effectively and proficiently. In order to ensure college and career readiness, students must be able to write for a variety of purposes, cite prove from text, research and present cognition on a topic, and produce and publish writing in a variety of formats.

The common core standards focus on three writing categories:
1. explanatory/advisory
ii. narrative
3. opinion/argument

Writing assignments are not what they used to be. Not so long ago, many teachers had students concentrate on fictional or personal narrative writing. Very petty attending was paid to how they interpreted and wrote informational text.

However, key shifts in writing objectives have been made by CCSS. Students must now exist able to confidently write nearly a text. They must be able to compose more than all-encompassing pieces where they have a chance to write information technology, read it, review it and revise it. Wherever possible, technology needs to be a part of the educational activity likewise — whether it is for the writing itself or to access multiple sources of information.

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Why Is Writing Important?

Studies testify that learning to present important information in an organized piece of writing helps students generate a greater understanding of a text. In addition, it helps to improve both their reading comprehension and their writing skills. With the implementation of the Common Core English language arts Standards, students will be required to use writing skills to incorporate the skills of citing testify from text. They will learn to clarify content using right English language rules of grammar. They will exist encouraged to develop a highly academic and rich vocabulary, and to written report findings on the subjects they choose to embrace.

Writing near texts will also eternalize overall comprehension and meaning backside the text through building noesis nearly a topic or reflection. This includes written responses to text-dependent questions.

For example, in form iv of the common cadre writing standards (West.4.1), students should be able to write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons and information. In brusque, information technology says that students must be able to do the following:

  • Introduce a topic or text clearly, state an opinion, and create an organizational structure in which related ideas are grouped to support the writer's purpose
  • Provide reasons supported by facts and details
  • Link opinion and reasons using words and phrases
  • Provide a concluding argument or section related to the opinion presented

How Do Reading A-Z's Resources Support The Teaching Of Writing?

Reading A-Z books offer first-class models of how to organize ideas in order or to explain or persuade with one'south writing.

  • Leveled Books from diverse genres or text types provide models of writing explanatory/informational, narrative, or stance/argument texts.
    • To Drill or Not to Drill? is an example of pro/con writing.
    • How to Make Ice Cream is an example of a how-to book.
    • Wordless Books for titles from levels aa-J provide writing do for even the youngest readers.
  • All Leveled Book quizzes for books level C and above characteristic at least one extended response question. Students must write an answer to the open-ended question using sound reasoning.
  • Writer's Responses for select titles from levels East-Z encourage students to reflect on the deeper meaning of each book read. Prompts back up writing that applies, synthesizes, or evaluates a book'due south enduring understanding.
  • Poesy Writing Lessons include straight pedagogy for 11 types of verse. Each lesson includes instruction details, and examples of each verse type with scaffolded writing worksheets for the student.
  • Mutual Core Supplements and Close Reading Packs require students to detect evidence from multiple places inside a text or from multiple texts to write an answer to a Key Question.

Assessment

What Is An Assessment?

An assessment is any formal or informal measurement of pupil progress used to meliorate overall learning. As of the 2014-2015 school year, about of the electric current formal end-of-year country tests will be replaced by a new exam created by ane of two consortiums that evaluates students against the set of new Common Core Land Standards (CCSS).

The common core assessments created by the consortiums volition mensurate both student achievement and progress on the CCSS. These assessments include:

  • Interim/benchmark assessments
  • Determinative assessments
  • Functioning assessments
  • Summative assessments

The criteria for these new Common Cadre ELA assessments will include:

  • An intense focus on the close examination of text
  • Mastery of complex literary and advisory reading
  • The power to infer pregnant from what is read
  • The power to both answer text-dependent questions and build arguments using evidence from the text

Students will exist required to demonstrate a greater depth of knowledge within subject areas, cite testify from the text in support of answers, and use technology to answer certain questions.

The types of assessment formats will be enhanced from traditional state testing items (such as multiple choice questions) to likewise include operation tasks, technology items, and synthetic responses. In addition, writing nearly texts will be required to improve overall comprehension and meaning backside the text.

Three writing types will specifically be covered within the new CCSS framework: explanatory/informational, narrative, and opinion/argument.

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Why Are Assessments Important?

The purpose of CCSS and common core standards assessments are to ensure that the expectations and objectives at each grade level are the aforementioned across every school, district, and state. However, the standards withal permit educators the flexibility to teach in ways that meet the needs of their item pupil population. The CCSS assessments will require students to employ learning in more than circuitous ways. This will help students to ameliorate set up for both college and for making their mode in the workplace.

Reports will exist supplied to teachers and administrators, providing specific information on how students are progressing in meeting CCSS requirements. These requirements include: demonstrating independence; edifice potent content knowledge; responding to the varying demands of audition, task, purpose, and field of study; comprehension and critiques; valuing evidence; using technology and digital media strategically and capably; and understanding other perspectives and cultures.

How Practice Reading A-Z Resource Support the New CCSS Assessments?

The vast drove of resources at Reading A-Z supports a range of skills that many students will be assessed on under the Common Core standards. Every resources listed as support for a item Common Cadre key topic will aid make students more than successful.

  • More than than 1,500 Leveled Books have quizzes with a range of text dependent multiple-choice and extended response questions. The diverseness in cognitive rigor, depth of cognition, and question types allows educators to measure an assortment of reading skills.
  • Benchmark Books and Passages with accompanying Running Records provide teachers with assessment tools at every level to determine the developmentally appropriate reading level for each educatee and to monitor progress.