Literacy in Social Studies

1. Literacy in Social Studies Using Lexile Analyzer to increase the amount of literacy practice in my classroom Natalie Williams Iredell Statesville Schools Innovative Showcase December 11, 2013

2. Session’s Learning Targets I can increase the amount of literacy practice in my social studies classroom. • I will find a new primary or secondary source to supplement my current curriculum. • I will use Lexile Analyzer to determine the Lexiled reading level of that source, making sure my text is grade-level (or ability level) appropriate. • I will develop an open-ended assessment question that stems from my found text. • I will create an ACE or Synthesis writing template to guide my students in answering the OE question.

3. I will find a new primary or secondary source to supplement my current curriculum. Spend 5-10 minutes searching for digital text about a current topic of study. Some sources include: Time magazine Smithsonian online History Channel Classroom NCLive Library of Congress Digital History Others listed collectively?

4. I will use Lexile Analyzer to determine the Lexiled reading level of that source. Open Microsoft Word, and type up to 1000 words from the text you are considering. File, Save As, File type is “plain text,” click “Other encoding,” “US-ASCII,” and “Allow character substitution.” Create a free user account at Lexile.com. At the top of the site, click “Use Lexile Measures” and then “Lexile Analyzer.” From the Lexile Analyzer page, click “Choose file,” find the word doc from where you saved it, and click submit. Record the approximate lexiled measurement of your text.

5. For example . . .An approximate lexile of 1200 In a special Saturday session on February 17, 2007, the U.S. Senate took up a Democratic-sponsored resolution disapproving of President George W. Bush’s so-called troop surge in Iraq—his controversial and unpopular decision to send 21,500 more U.S. troops to that war torn country. The 2006 election was decided in the Democrats’ favor essentially because of this issue, and the Democrats in the U.S. House of Representative had earlier been able to secure a large (246 to 182) majority for the same resolution. from Larry Sabato’s A More Perfect Constitution

6. I will use Lexile Analyzer to determine the Lexiled reading level of that source. Determine if the readability is appropriate for your students. If it is not, consider searching for appropriate texts. Remember: 9th-10th “Stretch” Lexile Band, 1050L–1335L 11th-12th “Stretch” Lexile Band, 1185L–1385L

7. I will develop an open-ended assessment question that stems from my found text. Develop an open-ended question for students to answer—from the reading of their text—using a question stem from the revised Bloom’s Taxonomy. RBT Question Stems (The thinking increases in complexity as you move from left to right and down the page.)

8. I will create an ACE or Synthesis writing template to guide my students in answering the OE question. Sample ACE Template Sample Synthesis Template Remember some content “keys” to good writing: all paragraphs support a single main idea, usually found at the beginning of the paragraph details that give more insight to the main idea—or proof—must be included a concise, concluding sentence is helpful if the paragraph is lengthy