11th Grade - Gateway 2

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 11 partially meet the criteria that texts are organized around a topic/topics to build students’ knowledge and their ability to read and comprehend complex texts proficiently. Texts are connected by a grade level appropriate topic and/or theme. In these materials, texts are grounded in 11th grade content, specifically, American history and literature. They are mostly compiled by time period or text type genre rather than a focused topic or theme. Texts do build some knowledge across the school year, though it is not clear that the collections of texts are carefully sequenced so that students’ will build knowledge about the world over the course of the year. This is because the topic of each unit, framed by an era of American history, is quite broad. As a result, the texts that are included in each unit are not focused enough to help students build knowledge on a single topic or theme. Since there is no clear, systematic, and sequenced set of texts in each grade level so it is difficult to identify to what extent students will be able to build the prerequisite knowledge and vocabulary to successfully access increasingly complex grade level text independently.

• Texts are connected by a grade level appropriate topic or theme. Units 1 - 4 follow the pattern of an overall theme, an era, and sub-themes in parts 1-3. This is exemplified below:
  • Unit 1 Theme: A Gathering of Voices. Text selections are “Literature of Early America (beginnings to 1800). Each part of the unit has a sub-theme. Part 1 - “Meeting of Cultures”, Part 2 - “The Puritan Influence”, and Part 3 - “A Nation is Born”.
• Unit 1: A Gathering of Voices has a wide collection of texts on the subject of early America (“Museum Indians” by Susan Power, excerpts of the Iroquis Constitution by Dekanawidah and Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God by Jonathan Edwards, and The Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson.) Various parts in the unit are subdivided into text-type collections: Part 3 includes “Extended Study: Speeches”, “Comparing Literary Works” and “Comparing Autobiography Past and Present”.

• Unit 3: Division, Reconciliation, and Expansion has a wide collection of texts about the US Civil War and the expansion of the American West (“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce, from My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass, “Letter to His Son” by Robert E. Lee, from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain, “I Will Fight No More Forever” by Chief Joseph). Various parts of the unit are subdivided into type-type connections: Part 1 includes: “Extended Study: Narrative Nonfiction”, “Comparing Humor Past and Present”.
• Unit 5: Prosperity and Protest has a wide collection of texts either written during or on the subject of literature in the post-war era (1945-1970). Various subtopics provide further topical focus, for example - Part One: War Shock, Part Three Tex Set: Literature of Protest. However, on the whole the unit is not focused on a single topic or theme. The texts include: from Hiroshima by John Hersey, “Backing the Attack” by the editors of the New York Times, “Mirror” by Sylvia Plath, “The Purpose of Theater” by Arthur Miller, “Life in his Language” by Toni Morrison, “A Rock of the Modern Age, Arthur Miller is Everywhere"

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 11 partially meet the criteria that materials contain sets of coherently sequenced higher order thinking questions and tasks that require students to analyze the language (words/phrases), key ideas, details, craft, and structure of individual texts in order to make meaning and build understanding of texts and topics.

After each text or text set there are Critical Reading questions and Close Reading Activities which include key ideas and details, integration of knowledge and ideas, and craft and structure. All three types of questIons can also be found in the Extended Study questions. Students’ opportunities for analyzing language and author’s word choice are very limited. Questions and tasks within the parts provide evidence of student understanding of the definitions and concepts of the components identified in each unit. However, there are no culminating tasks at the end of each part for students to show their understanding of concepts. Also at the end of each unit there are no opportunities for students to show they are building understanding of topics. The tasks at the end of the unit are not necessarily related to key ideas and details or craft and structure, but are often centered around one or two of the Essential Questions of the textbook. The larger tasks do not build understanding of the texts.

• There are few questions that support students in analyzing author’s language and word choice. Most of the questions focus on key ideas and details, structure, and craft. The questions that do focus on language or word choice do not support students to analyze its effect on the text. Unit 4, Close Reading Activities, There is an activity called Vocabulary Acquisition and Use, Vocabulary: Synonyms. Students are asked to “review the words from the vocabulary list on page 706. Then, choose the letter of the word that is the best synonym, or word with a similar meaning, for the first word. Explain your thinking”
• Each text contains a Critical Reading section along with a Literary Analysis piece where students are asked questions such as Key Ideas and Details. In one of the first stories, When Grizzlies Walked Upright by Modoc, students are not asked any structure or craft questions. They are simply focused on details and key ideas.
• In 11th grade each unit is centered around a topic. For example, Unit 1: A Gathering of Voices is based off of Literature of Early America (Beginnings to 1800), Unit 2: A Growing Nation is based off of Literature of the American Renaissance (1800 to 1870), Unit 3: Division, Reconciliation, and Expansionis based off of literature of the Civil War and the Frontier (1850 to 1914), Unit 4:Disillusion, Defiance, and Discontent is based off of Literature of the Modern Age (1914 to 1945), and Unit 5: Prosperity and Protest which is based off of Literature of the Post-War Era (!945 to 1970). Within each of these units are three different text sets centered around different topics. There is not one place specifically where the teacher knows whether students are making meaning or building understanding of the texts.
• At the end of the unit there is a Research Task along with a Writing Workshop. In Unit 1 Writing Workshop it asks students to “Choose an event from your life that is meaningful to you, interesting to readers, and not awkward or painful to share”. This activity does not prove students have made meaning or have built understanding or knowledge of the texts and topics at hand.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 11 partially meet the criteria that materials contain a coherently sequenced set of text-dependent and text-specific questions and tasks that require students to build knowledge and integrate ideas across both individual and multiple texts. The integration of knowledge and ideas does not change from the first to the last tasks in the materials.

Most questions support student analysis of a given text, but not often in the service of building knowledge and ideas about larger topics or themes. This is partially because there are not coherent topics or themes across the materials. There are answer keys for the Critical Reading and Close Reading Activity questions. These might help guide teachers to support students’ answers, though it is unclear in the materials how teacher should use these answers. There are process guidelines for multiple readings. Some questions are provided across texts, but these are often not well-aligned to the complexity, themes, language, etc. of the texts and so are not quality questions and tasks. None of the text sets listed in the table of contents have questions that bridge between all the texts in the set. Assessment questions at the end of each unit often require students to only choose one text to analyze.

• Questions that build knowledge and ideas are found throughout the text selections. For example:
  • Unit 4, Part 2,Critical Reading, Key Ideas and Details, “(a) According to Faulkner, will humanity endure or prevail? (b) Define: In what ways does Faulkner define the difference between enduring and prevailing?”
  • Unit 6, Part 3, Integration of Knowledge and Ideas, “Based on these two memoirs, what does the idea of homeland mean? Use at least two of these Essential Question words: global, natural, formative, environment, exile.”
  • Unit 6, Part 3, Close Reading Activities, Key IDeas and Details, “(a) Identify two events that Momaday describes in this excerpt. (b) What connects these events to the cultural theme he introduces in the opening paragraph?”
• The integration of knowledge and ideas does not change from the first to the last tasks in the materials. In fact, the integration of knowledge and ideas is present in the assessment tasks for unit 1 and not present for the assessment tasks in unit 6. For example: Unit 1, Performance Tasks, “Write an essay in which you analyze one of the Foundational U.S. documents that appears in this unit, identifying its theme, purpose, and key rhetorical features.” For the Unit 6 Performance Tasks, there are no questions that require students to integrate any specific information. Instead, each task is focused on a single text and asks students to analyze author's word choice and tone, author’s rhetoric, or the structure of a literary work.
• Various sections of each unit pair one or more text into small sets and include questions that bridge these texts. For example:
  • Unit 4, part 1, there is a pair of E.E. Cummings poems preceded by informational text on the author. One task at the end of the set asks students to use information from 2 or 3 of these texts: Close Reading Activities, Writing to Sources - Informative Text “Imagine that E.E. Cummings will be giving a poetry reading at a bookstore in your town. As the organizer of the event, write an introduction that provides background about the poet and prepares the audience for the poetry they will hear. Select the most relevant and interesting facts about Cummings and include at least one eloquent quotation from the poet. Use a conversational style appropriate to the setting and purpose of the event. “
  • Unit 5, part 3, Comparing Literary Works: Rhetorical Devices pairs John F. Kennedy’s “Inaugural Address” with an excerpt of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham City Jail”. One question of the ten at the end of this set connects the two texts. Comparing Literary Works (a) Which text - Kennedy’s speech or King;s letter - makes more frequent use of parallelism and antithesis? (b) Explain why each author’s use of these devices is appropriate to the kind of document he is writing and to its method of deliver.
  • Unit 6, Close Reading Activities for Technical Report and Mission Statement,, Timed Writing, Argument (40 Minutes). “Both the Technical Report and Mission Statement touch on the idea of heritage. Names represent the heritage of families and ethnic groups, while museums preserve our shared historical and cultural heritage. Write an argumentative essay in which you discuss who should bear the most responsibility for preserving heritage sites. Consider the government, the general public, non-profit organizations, or another institution. Cite information from the Technical Report and Mission Statement to support your ideas.”
• Text Sets listed in the Table of Contents for each unit (three sets for each unit) do not have questions that bridge between all the texts in the set at the end of each set. There are tasks under the ‘Text Set Workshop’ section at the end of each unit. Some of these tasks are text-dependent, yet none of them are text specific. Few are of the quality that support students to provide analysis across various texts.
  • Unit 5 Text Set Workshop, “Work with a partner to create documentary slide shows that present multimedia interpretations of literary works. Develop one presentation about one of the Anchor Text poems, and one about a Part 2 selection that you see as thematically related. Conduct research and analyze the texts to answer questions such as: What is the history of each work?; What does a close reading of each work reveal about its meaning? Gather video clips and images such as photograms, paintings, and illustrations. Use sound when possible. Embed the video files or links to videos in you slide show. Share your documentaries with your classmates.”
  • Unit 6, Text Set Workshop, “Develop and defend a claim about the ways in which one or more characters in this text, particularly in the Anchor Text, use the past to create a sense of identity. As a way of exploring this idea, consider how an everyday item, experience, or encounter connects a person to hise or her heritage. Use textual evidence and background information to support your claim.”
• There are some questions that are labeled as bridging between texts that do not, in fact, require students to integrate information from multiple texts in the selection. For example, in Unit 6, Part 2, Close Reading Activities for “Traveling Through the Dark”, “The Secret”, and “The GIft”, question 7 ‘Integration of Knowledge and Ideas’: Follow these steps to interpret each of these lyrical poems: “a)Identify the central image or event in each poem. (b) List two pieces of new information you learned about this image over the course of the poem. (c) Explain how your understanding of the image changes. (d)Interpret the poem by telling what you think each central image means to the speaker.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 11 partially meet the criteria for providing a cohesive, year-long plan for students to interact and build key academic vocabulary words in and across texts. Materials include a consistent approach for students to regularly interact with word relationships and build academic and figurative language in context.

Materials do not provide teacher guidance outlining a cohesive, year-long vocabulary development component. Select words are listed before text sets and students or teacher are prompted to record the words, noting how well they know the words before and then after reading the text. These same words are defined in the margins of the text. Vocabulary tasks most often separate from these words are provided at end of text. The tasks that are embedded in the text do not enhance the understanding of the text itself (only of the listed terms). Words are not used across texts. Attention is not paid to vocabulary essential to understanding the text and to high value academic words. Few tasks require students to use certain words when writing or speaking, but those that do use words that are not from the text; it is unclear what is the purpose of using the words. It is also unclear that these tasks are sophisticated enough for 11th grade students. There are no tasks that require use of vocabulary in the assessments. There are no opportunities for students to learn, practice, apply and transfer words into familiar and new contexts.

Often, the vocabulary terms and tasks are not associated with a text. For example;

Unit 4, Part 1: Building Knowledge and Insight, Vocabulary, “You will encounter the words listed here in the text that follows. Copy the words into your notebook. Which words a verb? How can you tell? dispersal, plodding, embankment, frantic”. Also, in Close Reading Activities, Vocabulary: Word/phrase relationships, students are asked to “Use your knowledge of the words from the vocabulary list to determine whether the relationships between the italicized words below and the phrases that follow them are logical. Explain your reasoning. embankment - the bottom of a lake, plodding - tired during a hike, dispersal - collection of garbage, frantic - nerves before a test

In Unit 6, Part 3: Building Knowledge and Insight, Vocabulary, “The words below are important to understanding the text that follows. Copy the words into your notebook and note which words are nouns: mundane, induce, savagery, revelations, prosperity. Then, in Close Reading Activities, Vocabulary Acquisition and Use, students, “Use New Words, For each item below, write a sentence in which you use the word or word pair correctly. 1. mudane, 2. induce/savagery 3. revelation/prosperity”

Text embedded vocabulary tasks are often weak. For example:

Unit 5, Part 3, Close Reading Activities, Using Resources to Build Vocabulary, Theatrical Words: Words for Cueing Action, “In the stage directions, Miller includes modifiers to describe the way he envisions actions speaking, reacting, and moving on the stage. Here a few of them: suspiciously, instantly , prayerfully, politely, feverishly, hysterically. Review these words by rereading the relevant lines in them. Then, use a print or electronic thesaurus to find a synonym for each word. For example, a synonym for politely might be courteously. On your own paper, rewrite the stage directions in which the word appears, replacing the word with your own synonym. Reread the stage directions. In a few sentences, explain why Miller would choose vivid words to direct the speech and movement of actions.”