y o u n g a d u lt l i t e Barbara
r at u r e Moss,
| The Common
editor Core Text Exemplars
page
62
Y o u n g a d u lt l i t e r at u r e
Making the Common Core
Text Exemplars Accessible to
Middle Graders
T
eachers and administrators across
the country are digging deeply
into the new Common Core State
Standards (National Governors’ Association, 2010), realigning their present
standards to address these rigorous new
nationwide benchmarks. The standards
represent a sea change for middle grade
teachers in at least two ways: 1) they require that 55% of texts be informational,
and 2) that disciplinary literacy be emphasized in social studies, science, mathematics, and technical subjects.
Furthermore, the Standards are clearly driving
the profession toward more cross-disciplinary
teaching. The Common Core Curriculum Maps:
English Language Arts Grades 6–8 (Common
Core, 2012), for example, contain sample thematic units that incorporate classic and contemporary literature, readings on science and social
science topics, and texts related to the arts and
music. Sample unit titles include Embracing
Heritage (grade 6), Science or Fiction (grade 7),
and Dramatically Speaking (grade 8).
While the Common Core State Standards
describe the what of curriculum rather than the
how, they do offer recommendations for texts
that teachers might use in their classrooms. For
middle grade teachers, the text exemplars include
stories, drama, poetry, and informational texts
for English Language Arts; History/Social Science; and Science, Mathematics, and Technical
Subjects. (See Appendix B of the Common Core
State Standards.)
While not required, the titles are ones the
authors of the Standards consider grade-level appropriate in terms of length, topic, and difficulty
level. These recommended trade books can often do what textbooks cannot: they offer depth
instead of breadth and include perspectives that
may be excluded from textbooks. These texts also
expose students to different genres and forms,
all of which are potential sources of knowledge.
While many are frequently taught classics familiar to English teachers, others are less familiar.
Exemplars for grades 6–8, for example, include
historical fiction titles like Roll of Thunder, Hear
My Cry (Taylor, 1976) and poems like Frost’s The
Road Not Taken (1920), along with less familiar
texts like John Adams’s Letter on Thomas Jefferson
(1776/2004) or Jon Katz’s Geeks: How Two Lost
Boys Rode the Internet out of Idaho (2000).
Teacher responses to the text exemplars
are often, “But these are so hard! How can our
students read these books?” Carol Jago argues
that these texts create an important challenge
for young readers: “In our effort to provide students with readings that they can relate to, we
sometimes end up teaching works that students
can read on their own [instead] of teaching more
worthwhile texts that they most certainly need assistance negotiating. . . . Classroom texts should
pose intellectual challenges for readers and invite
them to stretch and grow” (Common Core, 2012,
pp. viii–ix). She correctly notes that students will
need teacher assistance in negotiating these texts;
in particular, they will need help in developing
both the background knowledge and vocabulary
expertise requisite for both text-explicit and textimplicit comprehension.
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Savvy teachers recognize that nothing is
more important to student comprehension of
content than the knowledge they already have
about a topic (Marzano, 2004). This knowledge
is the foundation for all future learning, and provides “hooks” on which students can hang new
learning about a topic. However, middle graders
may have less well-developed schema for different topics because they have fewer experiences
than adults, come from different cultures, or lack
exposure to key concepts or vocabulary. Some
students now entering middle school may have
spent little school time on social studies or science during elementary school (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
Early Child Care Research Network, 2005),
which could contribute to their lack of background knowledge for these areas.
The role of the teacher is not to give students
background knowledge about a topic, but to engage students in intentional, purposeful reading
experiences that contribute to their reservoir of
knowledge. One key way to create these experiences for these challenging text exemplars is to
group related texts on a topic. Grouping texts
thematically helps students to:
• see how information is connected,
• view information from different lenses,
• experience a variety of genres,
• develop domain knowledge critical to comprehension development (Hirsch, 2006), and
• gain repeated exposures to academic vocabulary.
The following examples illustrate how teachers
can group texts in ways that scaffold student understanding of text exemplars by using more accessible texts as supports. By pairing easier texts
with challenging ones, teachers stimulate curiosity, help students anticipate text content, and
provide exposure to unfamiliar technical terms.
These easier books can “prime the pump” for
students, helping them to anticipate and mentally
prepare for the content of difficult texts. These
groupings can involve pairing picturebooks with
text exemplars, using text sets to build background, and grouping and laddering text exemplars by difficulty.
Elizabeth Partridge’s (2002) excellent work,
This Land Was Made for You and Me: The Life
and Songs of Woody Guthrie, is a text exemplar for
middle graders. From this book, students learn
about how Guthrie used music to give voice to
the oppressed during the Depression, and they
are often surprised to learn that the familiar song
in the title was not simply an anthem to America,
but also a protest song. For students to understand the life and times of Woody Guthrie, they
must understand the world in which he lived.
They need background knowledge related to the
Dust Bowl, California during the Great Depression, and the plight of those who fled Oklahoma.
Teachers might begin student study of the period through a gallery walk of primary source
photographs from the Partridge text; ask them
to reflect on what they see in the many poignant
photos. From this introduction, students can
consider what life was like during this time.
The study of a group of historical fiction
texts set during the Great Depression provides an
excellent opportunity to build schema. Literature
circles or book clubs centered around Esperanza
Rising (Ryan, 2000), Bud, Not Buddy (Curtis,1999),
A Jar of Dreams (Uchida, 1981), Out of the Dust
(Hesse, 1997), or the graphic novel Storm in the
Barn (Phelan, 2009) let students explore the experiences of Hispanics, African Americans, Japanese Americans, and poor whites during this era.
By jigsawing these titles, students can also share
what they learn about social and economic issues of the time, music, government programs,
and concepts like protest, strikes, and the New
Deal, all of which are crucial to comprehending
the Partridge text. Following the reading of the
Partridge text, students can address RL standard
7.0 (compare and contrast a fictional portrayal of
a time, place, or character with an historical account of the same period) by comparing one of
the historical fiction titles with the text exemplar
through a multimedia presentation or an essay.
Another excellent text exemplar is the Nar-
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rative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American
Slave, Written by Himself (Douglass, 1845/2001),
a memoir that combines a compelling portrait of
American slavery with a powerful anti-slavery argument. While today’s students are familiar with
the horrors of slavery through film and other
media portrayals, they may lack appreciation for
how revolutionary the book was when published
in 1845. Laws against teaching slaves to read and
write, deeply held views about the intellectual
inferiority of blacks, and beliefs that slaves were
contented and happy are unfamiliar concepts to
today’s students.
The picturebook Words Set Me Free: The
Story of Young Frederick Douglass (Cline-Ransome
& Ransome, 2012) pairs perfectly with the text
exemplar, portraying the central role that literacy played in Douglass’s life. It recounts how
his owner’s wife illicitly taught him to read and
the dangers associated with this act. It emphasizes the power that words held for Douglass and
the critical role they played in his evolution from
slavery to freedom. The book ends with a cliffhanger, briefly detailing his first failed attempt
to escape the South by writing a pass that would
secure his passage to Baltimore. Because it follows the outlines of the text exemplar but stops
at a strategic point, it will spark student curiosity
about Douglass’s ultimate fate as a slave and motivate reading of the target text.
For teachers who want to expand into a unit
on slavery or the Civil War, additional topic-related text exemplars in different genres include
Virginia Hamilton’s haunting The People Could
Fly: The Picture Book (2004), a classic retelling
of an African American folktale in which slaves
elude their masters by taking flight, and Ann
Petry’s Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad (1955).
Russell Freedman’s Abraham Lincoln and
Frederick Douglass: An American Friendship (2012)
can provide a bridge to exploration of Lincoln’s
life and presidency. Another exemplar text, “O
Captain! My Captain!” (1900), Walt Whitman’s
plaintive metaphorical poem about the assassination of Lincoln, engages students in further study
of the period through a new genre. After reading these texts, students can evaluate the texts in
small groups, identify the most powerful of the
texts they read, and cite evidence to support their
opinions (RL 6.9: Compare and contrast texts in
different forms and genres in terms of their approaches to similar themes and topics).
The Common Core text exemplars include
informational texts focused on often-neglected
content areas like art, architecture, and technology. Careful laddering of different text exemplars can build students’ cumulative background
knowledge about these topics. By starting with
easy text exemplars and gradually moving to
more challenging ones, teachers can scaffold
student understanding of new concepts. Greenberg and Jordan’s Vincent Van Gogh: Portrait of
an Artist (2001) introduces background related to
painting and explores concepts related to color
and form and artistic movements like Impressionism. David Macaulay’s Cathedral: The Story
of Its Construction (1973), an historically accurate
rendering of the building of an imaginary medieval Gothic cathedral, contributes to knowledge
of architecture, design, and construction. The
Building of Manhattan (Mackay, 1987) details the
building of Manhattan over time, both above and
underground. Taken together, these three books
prepare students for reading the text exemplar A
Short Walk around the Pyramids and through the
World of Art (Isaacson, 1993). This sophisticated
treatment of varied forms of visual art, including painting, sculpture, and architecture, emphasizes the connections between these different
art forms. Students can select an artist from the
book, analyze the language used to describe each
one, and read additional resource materials about
the artist and her style. This can culminate in
the writing of an informative text that explores
this artist and her work (Common Core, pp.
164–165; Standard W 8.2: Write informative/
explanatory texts to examine a topic and convey
ideas, concepts, and information throughout the
selection, organization, and analysis of relevant
content).
The Common Core text exemplars repre-
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sent a rich resource for teachers committed to
creating classroom learning experiences that allow students to explore life’s essential questions
through a multiplicity of texts. By effectively supporting students as they engage with these texts,
teachers can ensure their successful mastery of
the Common Core Standards and the development of literacy skills that will last a lifetime.
References
Adams, J. (2004). Letter on Thomas Jefferson. In P. M.
Zall (Ed.), Adams on Adams (pp. 74–76). Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky. Original
work published 1776.
Cline-Ransome, L., & Ransome, J. (2012). Words set me
free: The story of a young Frederick Douglass. New
York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
Common Core. (2012). The common core curriculum
maps: English language arts grades 6–8. San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass.
Curtis, C. P. (1999). Bud, not Buddy. New York, NY:
Random House.
Douglass, F. (2001). Narrative of the life of Frederick
Douglass, an American slave, written by himself.
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Original
published 1845.
Freedman, R. (2012). Abraham Lincoln and Frederick
Douglass: The story behind an American friendship.
New York, NY: Clarion.
Isaacson, P. M. (1993). A short walk around the pyramids and through the world of art. New York, NY:
Random House.
65
Katz, J. (2000). Geeks: How two lost boys rode the
Internet out of Idaho. New York, NY: Villard.
Macaulay, D. (1973). Cathedral: The story of its construction. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.
Mackay, D. (1987). The building of Manhattan. New
York, NY: Harper & Row.
Marzano, R. (2004). Building background knowledge for
academic achievement. Alexandria, VA: Association
for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
National Governors Association Center for Best
Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers.
(2010). Common core state standards for the English
language arts and literacy in history/social studies,
science, and technical subjects. Washington, DC.:
Author.
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Early Childhood Care Research Network.
(2005). A day in the third grade: A large scale
study of class quality and teacher and student behavior. Elementary School Journal, 105, 305–323.
Partridge, E. (2002). This land was made for you and
me: The life and songs of Woody Guthrie. New York,
NY: Viking.
Petry, A. (1955). Harriet Tubman: Conductor of the
underground railroad. New York, NY: Crowell.
Phelan, M. (2009). The storm in the barn. Somerville,
MA: Candlewick.
Frost, R. (1920). The road not taken. In Mountain
interval (p. 1). New York, NY: Henry Holt.
Ryan. P. M. (2000). Esperanza rising. New York, NY:
Scholastic.
Greenburg, J., & Jordan, S. (2001). Vincent Van Gogh:
Portrait of an artist. New York, NY: Delacorte.
Taylor, M. D. (1976). Roll of thunder, hear my cry. New
York, NY: Puffin.
Hamilton, V. (2004). The people could fly: The picture
book. New York, NY: Knopf.
Uchida, Y. (1981). A jar of dreams. New York, NY:
Aladdin.
Hesse, K. (1997). Out of the dust. New York, NY:
Scholastic.
Whitman, W. (1900). O captain! My captain! In Leaves
of grass (pp. 262–263). Philadelphia, PA: McKay.
Hirsch, E. D. (2006). The knowledge deficit: Closing the
shocking education gap for American children. New
York, NY: Houghton Mifflin.
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