The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that texts are organized around a theme to build students’ ability to read and comprehend complex texts independently and proficiently.

The instructional materials are organized around themes and build student’s reading comprehension of complex texts. The curriculum for Grade 12 is includes British and American literature so students make connections between British and American history, literature and culture. The themes of the four units are as follows: “Epic Heroes,” “The Human Condition,” “An Exchange of Ideas,” and “Emotional Currents.”

Each unit provides both fiction and nonfiction selections to build student content knowledge; students are required to read and comprehend the complex texts independently and proficiently. At the beginning of each unit, students consider the Big Idea or essential question of the unit, and when they read and analyze the texts in the unit, they face further questions and discussions about this essential question. The reading, writing, and discussion tasks ultimately lead to a culminating task that requires students to synthesize what they have learned about the texts as they relate to the overarching idea of the unit. Examples of texts centered around themes to build student’s ability to read and comprehend complex texts include but are not limited to:

• Unit 1 combines several selections to build student knowledge around the topic “Epic Heroes.” Students explore the characteristics of epic heroes as they read epic poetry, excerpts from novels, nonfiction, poems, and historical texts. Students read about the heroes in Beowulf, The Once and Future King, Le Morte d’Arthur and Lord of the Rings. Texts of different cultures are paired so “students not only better understand the Anglo-Saxon Period and the Middle Ages but also trace the continuity of ideas regarding national heroes and legends from the earliest English literature to the present time” (StudySync ELA Grade Level Overview Grade 12).

• Unit 2 studies the topic of “The Human Condition” and how we express being human. Many of the texts are works from the English Renaissance, so historical information is shared to help students comprehend the more difficult texts, like Hamlet, in the unit. The unit begins with Sonnet 29 by Shakespeare, which shows how a person can have a positive impact on a person’s life and self-worth. Other selections include “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T. S. Eliot, two poems by Queen Elizabeth I, “The Passionate Shepherd to his Love” by Christopher Marlow and “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd by Sir Walter Raleigh.

• Unit 3 combines several selections to build student knowledge around the theme “An Exchange of Ideas.” Students “read literary works primarily from 17th and 18th century England and America, representing Puritanism and the Enlightenment, in order to learn about the political and philosophical ideas that led to the creation of the United States” (StudySync ELA Grade Level Overview Grade 12 29). Texts include, “A Model of Christian Charity” by John Winthrop, an excerpt from American Jezebel by Eve LaPlante, “To My Dear and Loving Husband” by Anne Bradstreet, and excerpts from the Second Treatise of Government by John Locke.

• Unit 4’s theme is “Emotional Current.” Students “read literary works primarily from 19th and 20th century England and America, representing Romanticism, the Victorian Age, and the Modern Age, in order to learn about various literary movements and how they have affected our view of the world” (StudySync ELA Grade Level Overview Grade 12 43). The unit begins with Dark Romanticism and then moves into texts about marriage and society. Included in these are “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Tayler Coleridge, “Young Goodman Brown” and “The Masque of the Red Death” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and excerpts from Pride and Prejudice, The Glass Menagerie and Wuthering Heights.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 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.

The materials offer students several opportunities to use evidence pulled directly from the text as well as make inferences while reading in order to help make meaning of the of the texts provided. Most discussion questions and tasks cover comprehension, summarizing, clarifying, drawing conclusions, making inferences, evaluating, synthesizing ideas, and analyzing and identifying literary devices. Most questions are higher order and ask students to engage with the text directly. The materials do include a range of text dependent questions and tasks throughout each unit, and questions and tasks cover a wide continuum of standards and strategies. Each text in the unit has a sequence of reading opportunities- guiding students in how they should approach each reading of the text. Approaches to reading individual texts within each unit include, but are not limited to: First Read, Skill, Close Read. The First Read is a reading of the text with very little front loading and is more of a surface read of the text and might include tasks and questions that ask students to make inferences and predictions and/or summarize. The Skill reading focuses on a particular skill to think about while re-engaging with the text. Questions and tasks covered in the Skill sections vary and include, but are not limited to: figurative language, argumentation, rhetorical analyses, and technical language. The Close Read brings the student back to the text and often includes questions and tasks that require students to re-engage with the text deeply- citing textual evidence, synthesizing ideas, and/or analyzing author’s purpose/craft.

A detailed example from Unit 4, Emotional Currents, is shared below:

In Unit 4, “Emotional Currents” one of the texts is “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The following text dependent tasks/questions can be found in the “First Read: Discuss.” In this part of the lesson, students are put into small groups to discuss questions they identified while reading. The following questions are included in the teacher’s edition to help facilitate discussions:

• “What is the reason for Young Goodman Brown's journey to the wooded area? Why might the devil be dressed in "decent attire" when he meets Brown?”
• “If you stop reading three paragraphs before the end of the story, what information can help you predict how the night in the woods will change Young Goodman Brown?”

After students discuss the text in small groups or pairs, they move onto the “First Read: Think,” in which they answer short answer questions like the following:

• “How does Goodman Brown change after his night in the woods? Support your answer with textual evidence.”
• “Remembering that the prefix ir- is a variant of the Latin prefix in-, meaning “not,” and the Latin adjective suffix -ible means “capable of,” use the context clues provided in the passage to determine the meaning of irrepressible. Write your definition of “irrepressible” here and tell how you got it.”

In the Skill portion of this lesson, students learn how to understand setting. Within this section, a skill is defined; a model of how a text is analyzed for that skill is shown; and, finally, students answer text dependent questions that illustrate their understanding of the skill. In this lesson, students are taught in the “Identification and Application” section how the setting may be described explicitly or implicitly; that they need to look at key details of the story to determine the setting; and that the setting affects the mood and characters in the story. Then they are asked to read and annotate the Model text by highlighting key points, asking questions, identifying the places where the Model is applying the strategies laid out in the “Identification and Application” section, and commenting on the effect the setting has on the text’s meaning. After reading the Model text, teachers lead a whole-group discussion using the following questions:

• “How does the Model analyze the impact of the setting on the mood of the story?”
• “Aside from the mood of the story, what else does the Model say may be affected by the sinister setting?”
• “In the second part of the Model, what type of imagery is discussed as it relates to the description of the setting?”
• “Based on the points made in the Model, what can you infer is an unusual element of the setting in ‘Young Goodman Brown’?”

At the end of the discussion, students are told to answer a multiple choice question which will assess their understanding of the skill. A section of the text is written on the left side of the screen, and the following questions are on the right:

• “Part A: What conclusion does Goodman Brown likely draw based on details of the setting in this section?”
• “Part B: Which excerpt from the section supports the correct answer to Part A?”

During the Close Read portion of the lesson, students are given the opportunity to analyze the setting of a story. Students begin by working with vocabulary found in the text. Then, the teacher models how to close read the text using annotation strategies provided. After modeling, the teacher reads over the Skills Focus question, so the students understand what they should pay close attention to while reading. Then students read and annotate the rest of the text; discuss the Skills Focus question in a large group; and, finally, answer a writing prompt. The Skills Focus questions from this lesson, "Close Read: Young Goodman Brown", include:

• “Identify those aspects of the setting that Young Goodman Brown perceives to be realistic and those aspects that he perceives to be magical or otherwise peculiar. Why do you think the two are intermixed in the same story? How do they relate to the plot? Highlight evidence from the text and make annotations to explain your answers.”
• “Analyze the role of trees as part of the setting of the story. Consider how Hawthorne describes them in various paragraphs. What might the trees represent, and what might the forest as a whole stand for? Support your answer with textual evidence and make annotations to explain your answer choices.”
• “Compare and contrast Goodman Brown’s attitude and behavior when he is in Salem village at the start of the story with his attitude and behavior in the forest in the paragraphs that follow. Highlight evidence from the text and make annotations to explain your response.”
• “Discuss how the setting in “Young Goodman Brown” helps to create the mood of the story and how the setting affects the protagonist. Support your answer with textual evidence and make annotations to explain your answer choices.”
• “Recall the unit’s Essential Question: How have the literary movements of the last two centuries affected us? In what kinds of contemporary stories do we typically see a struggle between good and evil, similar to the one in “Young Goodman Brown”? How does the setting help develop this struggle, in both “Young Goodman Brown” and these contemporary stories? Highlight similar elements in Hawthorne’s story and these contemporary books or movies.”

The text-dependent writing prompt for this lesson is:

• “Discuss how Hawthorne uses descriptions of the setting to create an increasingly frightening mood in ‘Young Goodman Brown,’ up until the last three paragraphs of the story. Support your writing with at least five pieces of evidence from the text.”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials contain a coherently sequenced set of text-dependent questions and tasks that require students to analyze the integration of knowledge and ideas across both individual and multiple texts.

The materials provided students multiple opportunities, through questions and tasks, to analyze the integration of knowledge and ideas across both individual and multiple texts. Each unit contains texts that are represented in more than one format, several texts that explore/represent one theme, and several argumentative prompts that give students the opportunity to state and claim and use evidence from the various texts to support their claim.

The reading, writing, research, and discussion tasks throughout the four units of study require students to complete a thorough, detailed examination of every reading selection. The culminating task for each unit is an Extended Writing Project; the prompts for the informational, argument, and literary analysis writing tasks demand that students cite evidence from multiple texts in the unit. Each unit contains a Research Project that requires that the students put the skills of reading and analyzing texts that they learned throughout the unit into practice. Each unit also contains a Full Text Study which comes with companion texts. This text set becomes the resource for the final activity for the Full Text Study, where students are asked to complete sustained writing tasks in response to prompts that require them to compare and contrast two or more of the texts in the set. Examples of coherently sequenced set of text-dependent questions and tasks that require students to analyze the integration of knowledge and ideas across both individual and multiple texts include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, in the Close Read lesson of Le Morte d’Arthur, students write a constructive response analyzing the character of King Arthur. Within their answer they need to explain how “his actions reflect heroes from other stories,” and then “make a claim as to which traits make Arthur an archetypal hero.”
• In Unit 2, towards the middle of the unit students encounter the poem “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” and the coordinating poem “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd.” In these two poems, students are asked to analyze each poem separately and then apply that understanding to a question that relates to both poems: “Analyze how Christopher Marlowe and Sir Walter Raleigh created different interpretations of the same story in each of their poems. How does Raleigh’s poem challenge the meaning and tone of Marlowe’s poem? Evaluate which poem is a more effective interpretation. Support your writing with textual evidence from both poems.”
• In Unit 3, students study the poem “To My Dear and Loving Husband” by Anne Bradstreet. While completing their Close Read, students are told to “Recall the Essential Question: How did a diversity of views transform American society? From reading Bradstreet’s poem, what can you infer about Puritan colonial women’s views of marriage and God? What do you think Bradstreet’s fellow (or sister) colonists may have gained from reading her poems? Support your answer.”
• In Unit 4, students read “D-Day Prayer,” a speech by President Franklin Roosevelt. During the Close Read lesson, students read and annotate the speech. One of the questions asks them to explain how the “‘D-Day Prayer’ [is] a rejection of the ideals of modernism?"

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that the questions and tasks support students’ ability to complete culminating tasks in which they demonstrate their knowledge of a theme through integrated skills (e.g. combination of reading, writing, speaking, listening).

The materials provide questions and tasks that support students’ ability to complete each unit’s Extended Writing Project in which they demonstrate their knowledge of a topic or theme through a combination of skills; this culminating activity is designed to deepen content knowledge as students return to texts they have already analyzed. The materials achieve this goal by tying the questions that are asked in the Extended Writing Project to the essential questions and theme of the unit. Each unit provides questions that prompt thinking, speaking and writing that focus on the central ideas and key details of the text. Reading and writing (and speaking and listening) are taught as integrated skills. Students are required to read, annotate, argue, discuss, write about, and share their thoughts about each of these texts in multiple ways. Examples of questions and task that support student’s ability to complete culminating tasks include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, the Extended Writing Project focuses on the narrative form. Students write a narrative about a hero or heroine modeled on the style of Le Morte d’Arthur or Beowulf. In preparation for the culminating writing activity, students practice skills necessary for narrative writing. For example, in the Skill: Narrative Techniques lesson, students read the definition and then have a small group or whole class discussion about narrative techniques. Questions, such as “Why would an author adjust the pacing of a story? How do authors achieve pacing and what effect can it have?” are included in the teacher edition to activate thinking. After reading the model, students are instructed to write a short scene that shows the point of rising action in their narrative.

• In Unit 2, students study classic works of literature and informational texts as they think about how we express the complexities of being human. The culminating task asks students to write a literary analysis essay that requires them to analyze two to three texts from this unit and examine how the “author uses figurative language and figures of speech to help readers understand a speaker’s or character’s feelings and actions.” The lesson plan for the Extended Writing provides structured supports to help the students complete this writing. Discussion questions like the following are offered: “Is there an example text that will help you write your essay?” These questions will provide the teacher with information needed to determine the students’ readiness to complete the assignment.

• In Unit 3, students read informational text, poetry, and drama that feature different human experiences that explore the essential question: how did people redefine the word ‘American’ during the 20th century? The unit’s Extended Writing Project requires students to choose two texts and then write an argumentative essay that makes a claim about how a diversity of views transforms American society. The questions and tasks for each of the texts in the unit support this ultimate goal. As stated in the ELA Grade Level Overview for Grade 12 “Short constructed responses that accompany all Close Read lessons in the unit help students demonstrate understanding of the specific reading and language skills developed in conjunction with the texts, such analyzing the text structure and the metaphor ‘a city on a hill’ in John Winthrop’s sermon ‘A Model of Christian Charity’ and evaluating Benjamin Franklin’s argument in ‘Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America.’ The prompts also enable students to develop their thinking about American ideals in preparation for their argumentative essays.” The Unit Blasts also support this writing assignment by looking at topics such as “what does it mean to be a feminist today?”

• In Unit 4, the Extended Writing Project requires students to write an informative/explanatory essay that has students write a formal research paper on one author from the unit. The paper needs to “provide information about the author’s life or the time period in which he or she lived, and the literary movement with which he or she is associated. Then explain how the author’s text from the unit is representative of the time period and literary movement as a whole.” The questions and tasks for each of the texts in the unit support this ultimate goal. As stated in the ELA Grade Level Overview for Grade 12 “Short constructed responses that accompany all Close Read lessons in the unit help students demonstrate understanding of the specific reading and language skills developed in conjunction with the texts, such as analyzing how Hawthorne uses descriptions of setting to create an increasingly frightening mood in ‘Young Goodman Brown’ or formulating an argument about whether the Bergson boys should stay on the prairie or leave for Chicago in O Pioneers! The prompts also enable students to develop their understanding and appreciation of the literary selections before they select an author to research.” The unit Blasts also support this research paper by looking at topics such as “what mistakes from previous generations are we still paying the price for today?”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials include a cohesive, year-long plan for students to interact with and build key academic and domain-specific vocabulary words in and across texts.

Language instruction in the StudySync core program provides systematic vocabulary instruction, as well as repeated opportunities for practice and application in reading, writing, speaking, and listening. Students will encounter vocabulary-building opportunities in the Vocabulary Workbook, the Academic Vocabulary link on the Unit Overview page, and across all three lesson types: First Reads, Skill lessons, and Close Reads.

Students are also provided with a Vocabulary Workbook. This gives “students additional opportunities to build and expand their vocabulary” (Study Sync Core Program Guide: Grades 6-12 60). There are twelve units; each unit contains three to four lessons; each lesson consists of ten words related by a concept or theme. The lessons are on topics such as using context clues, prefixes, word families, synonyms, Latin roots, suffixes, Greek Roots, reference skills like using a thesaurus, and reading skills like word parts. Lesson structure, practice activities and assessments are included for each unit.

On the Unit Overview page of each unit, there are a list of readings, key skills and Common Core standards which the unit covers. Within this list, is the heading Academic Vocabulary, which contains links to two to three academic vocabulary lessons. Each lesson contains ten words that are related topically. The lesson is separated into three sections: Define, Model, Your Turn. Define lists the words, their form, their meaning and other meanings in a chart. The Model lesson gives students a sample context and then uses the words in sentences. Your Turn has the students complete an assessment that is self-assessed.

In the First Reads, students are exposed to the challenging vocabulary in the text. They are given opportunities to use context clues and analyze word parts in order to understand the meaning of the words, and teachers are encouraged to model these types of strategies. The materials focus on language development by having students use context clues, word placement, and common Greek and Latin affixes and roots to figure out the meaning of words.

The Skill Lessons focus on domain-specific vocabulary, and students are exposed to these vocabulary words through a variety of media. The vocabulary words are explained by other teens through a video, and there is a written explanation and examples for each term below the video.

The Close Read lesson has students look at the precise meaning of the academic vocabulary and compare it with their initial predictions from the First Read. Misunderstood words are reviewed and students discuss why the context clues or other tools did not help them define the word. Students are then to complete the vocabulary worksheet associated with the lesson.

Examples of opportunities for students to interact with and build key academic vocabulary words in and across texts include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 12 of the Grade 12 Vocabulary Workbook, there are three lessons: Lesson 44: Word Usage, Lesson 45: Prefixes that Show Quantity or Size, Lesson 46: Words from Technology. The words in Lesson 44 “will help [students] gain a perspective on modern life, with all its excitement, opportunity, and uncertainty”; in Lesson 45, all words contain the prefixes macro-, pan-, omni-, oli-, ambi-, and poly-”; in Lesson 46, the words are “technological words that everyone needs to know and understand” (110-114).

• On the Unit 1 Overview Page, the Academic Vocabulary heading has two links: Academic Vocabulary Lesson 61 and Lesson 62. Lesson 61 contains ten words that will “help [students] describe time relationships,” like forthcoming, cease and suspend. Students read the definitions on the Define page, such as “forthcoming, adj, of the relatively near future; adj: at ease in talking to others.” Then they read the words in example sentences on the Model page - “They asked for patience and said the wait wouldn’t be long since the release of the documents was forthcoming.” Finally, they complete three questions in the Your Turn section that can show immediate feedback, like question one that asks students to “drag and drop an example and a non-example of each vocabulary word.”

• In the Unit 2 First Read lesson of “Sonnet 29,” students are told to make predictions about the five vocabulary words found in the text based on context clues. The teacher models this skill with the word “beweep” by thinking aloud and asking questions - “I know the word "weep"means "to cry," so "weep"may mean something similar.” Students then predict the rest of the words on their own, with a partner or in small groups.

• The Skill Lesson for “United States v. the Amistad” in Unit 3 includes a Concept Definition video that defines reasons and evidence. After the video, there is a small group or whole class discussion about the terms with questions like, “What are some words and phrases that relate to reasons?” Students then watch a SkillsTV video that has teens discussing the domain specific vocabulary. While watching, the teacher stops periodically and asks discussion questions like, “Katie notes the power of Adams's reasoning. Describe the type of reasoning discussed here in your own words.” Students are then taken to the model and asked to identify where the Model applies the strategies of reasons and evidence. After an individual analysis, the teacher leads a whole group discussion that helps students understand how to analyze and evaluate reasons and evidence with questions like, “The Model notes Adams's use of deductive reasoning. How does this type of reasoning make an argument "hit home"? Finally, students are asked a comprehension question to assess their understanding of the domain specific vocabulary - “What reasoning leads Justice Story to the conclusion that the Africans should be freed?”

• The Unit 4 Close Read of an excerpt from Mrs. Dalloway has the teacher “project the vocabulary words and definitions onto the board or provide students with a handout so they can copy the vocabulary into their notebooks . . . [have] students compare the precise meaning of a specific word with their vocabulary predictions from the First Read. Review words defined incorrectly to understand why students were unable to use context clues or other tools to develop usable definitions.” Once this exercise is completed, the student complete the vocabulary worksheet attached to the lesson.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials support students’ increasing writing skills over the course of the school year, building students’ writing ability to demonstrate proficiency at grade level at the end of the school year.

The materials supports students’ growth in writing skills over the course of the school year. To achieve this goal, instructional materials include well-designed lesson plans, models, and protocols for teachers to implement and monitor students’ writing development. Direct instruction on the writing process builds as the year progresses. Within the unit, students write in response to driving questions in Blasts, comprehension questions in First Reads, and discussion questions in Close Reads. These informal writing opportunities prepare students to write more formally as part of each unit’s Extended Writing Project and Research assignments. For Research, students discuss, plan, research, write, and deliver presentations. In the Extended Writing Project, students complete a writing project in one of the three primary modes of writing with the help of a student model, graphic organizers, rubrics, and extensive scaffolding of writing skills. The students engage in all phases of the writing process. Examples of materials supporting students’ increasing writing skills over the school year include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, the Blasts, comprehension questions in First Reads and writing prompts in the Close Reads scaffold throughout the texts as students are asked to complete more advanced understanding of the topics and texts throughout their writing. The unit begins with a Blast that introduces students to the ideas of the unit. In the case of Unit 1, students are asked to consider the following: “Where does history end and legend begin?” Students are asked to discuss, investigate through some research, and then respond to the question in a Blast post of their own using 140 characters or fewer. Mid-way through the unit, students are asked to read a selection from Le Morte d’Arthur and then they are asked to do the following in the First Read: “At the end of the selection, the author says that King Arthur gets on a barge and goes ‘into the Vale of Avalon.’ What is really happening in this scene? How do you know?” This question leads the students through the process of analyzing a complex text in order to explain what is happening in the text. Students are also reminded to use strong textual evidence to support their answer. This is the first prompt in a series of short answer prompts that support them in developing a more thorough understanding. At the end of the text in the Close Read, students are asked to analyze the character of King Arthur. “What words and phrases does the author use to describe his words and actions? In what way do his actions reflect heroes from other stories? Then make a claim as to which traits make Arthur an archetypal hero. Use your understanding of story elements to build your analysis.” This supports the students in developing, through writing, a stronger understanding of the hero, and continue to explore history and legends. At the end of the unit, students are asked to write a narrative about a hero modeled on the style of Le Morte d’Arthur or Beowulf, which builds on the student’s previous work and study in the unit.

• In Unit 2, the Extended Writing Project focuses on a literary analysis argumentative writing, and instruction focuses on an introduction to this form. The Extended Writing Project provides a Student Model that contains the essential features of the literary analysis essay and offers an example of a structured academic grade-level response to the prompt. The Student Model is used to help students better understand how the elements work together to create an effective literary analysis, to identify and label the seven features of literary analysis writing (clear thesis, logical organizational structure, supporting details/textual evidence, cohesive relationships between ideas that build an argument, rhetorical devices to support assertions, citations and sources, and a conclusion), and to think about how they can apply these ideas to their own writing. Direct instruction is provided on writing thesis statements, organization, supporting details, introductions, body paragraphs and transitions, conclusions, and sources and citations.

• In Unit 3, the Extended Writing Project focuses on argumentative writing, and instruction focuses on an introduction to this form. The Extended Writing Project provides a Student Model that contains the essential features of the argumentative essay and offers an example of a structured academic grade-level response to the prompt. The Student Model is used to help students better understand how the elements work together to create an effective argument, to identify and label the eight features of argumentative writing (logical organization, clear thesis, relevant supporting details, transitions, rhetorical devices that support assertions, formal style, citations of sources, and a conclusion), and to think about how they can apply these ideas to their own writing. Direct instruction is provided on writing thesis statements, supporting details, organization, introductions, body paragraphs and transitions, conclusions, and sources and citations.

• In Unit 4, the Extended Writing Project is an informative piece. It provides a Student Model that contains the essential features of the informative/explanatory form and offers an example of a structured academic grade-level response to the prompt. The Student Model is used to help students better understand how the elements work together to create an effective essay, to identify and label the nine features of informative writing (clear thesis, credible sources with formal citations, relevant facts, analysis of the details, logical organization, precise language and domain-specific vocabulary, formal and objective style, conclusion, and a works cited page), and to think about how they can apply these ideas to their own writing. Direct instruction is provided on research and note-taking, thesis statements, organization, supporting details, introductions and conclusions, body paragraphs and transitions, and sources and citations.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials include a progression of focused research projects to encourage students to develop knowledge in a given area by confronting and analyzing different aspects of a topic using multiple texts and source materials.

Each of the four units in the Grade 12 materials include multiple opportunities for students to engage in research activities and present their findings. Each unit begins with a Big Idea Blast that gives students their first opportunity to draft a response to the driving question of the unit. The Blast includes multi-media research links that are related to the theme, and as students interact with the research links in the Blasts throughout the unit, they formulate a broader understanding of the theme, the texts in the unit, and the issues that surround them. The First Read of many selections in the unit includes a Build Background activity that asks students to work collaboratively on a small scale research inquiry that complements the text they are reading.

Each unit also includes an extensive, multi-step Research Project that is related to the unit’s theme and is a culmination of the skills that the students have practiced over the course of the unit and the knowledge they have gained. After sharing and discussing the results of individual members’ research findings, each group plans and then delivers a formal presentation in either the narrative, argumentative, or informative mode using multimedia elements such as videos, graphics, photos, and recordings to reinforce its main ideas.

If students are working on a topic that is informative, they present evidence to develop the subject matter. If students are working on a topic that involves presenting an argument in support of a claim, they use evidence that both supports their opinion and answers opposing viewpoints, or counter arguments. The Speaking & Listening Handbook is provided during this phase of the Research project both for speakers and for listeners, who are required to respond critically and constructively to the work of their peers. Each unit provides suggested topics for each research project. Examples of focused research projects to encourage students to develop knowledge in a given area include but are not limited to:

• The Big Idea Blast in Unit 1 has students considering the unit’s essential question, “Where does history end and legend begin?” Included in this are research links that have the students explore different the impact of myths, including the clips “Joseph Campbell on the Importance of Mythology” and “George Lucas on Mentors and Faith, and the text “The Use of Myth in U.S. History.”

• An example of Build Background can be found in the Unit 4 First Read of “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe. The students work in pairs or small groups to “research different aspects of the plagues that affected medieval Europe.” Each group or pair is assigned a topic from the following: The Black Death of the 1300s, Italy in the 1300s, Medieval medical practices, Depictions of the plague in literature.

• The Research Project in Unit 3 has students research “How did we get to where we are today? What do you think was the most significant factor in the path we’ve taken? Choose one event, person, or idea and argue why it had the most significant impact on making American society what it is today.” There is a suggested list of topics for the small-group research project and provided links are found in the Blasts throughout the unit. This is a multi-step project that includes reviewing and discussing the topic, conducting the research, presenting the research and responding to the presentations.This research can be used as a resource for the Extended Writing Project, which is an argumentative essay that argues why a particular text in the unit is the best embodiment of one of the “key ideals of the United States today, such as equality, self-sufficiency, individuality, and so on.”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials provide a design, including accountability, for how students will regularly engage in a volume of independent reading either in or outside of class.

The Core Program Overview includes a structured guide titled “Building an Independent Reading Program.” This section provides an overview of why independent reading is important, and it gives details on how to set up such a program in the classroom. Teachers are also given a five step plan to implement an independent reading program that provides choice for students to select texts and read independently at home and at school. This includes referring students to the StudySync Library where they can explore other titles in the library that share the same themes as addressed by the units.

Suggestions for accountability include reading logs, notebooks, online reflections, and informal conversations; having students do end-of reading activities such as filling out a Google Form, pitching books, producing movie trailers, writing reviews on GoodReads, designing movie posters, and participating in a book club style chat. Examples of opportunities for students to regularly engage in a volume of independent while being held accountable include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, the StudySync Library includes several additional texts related to the theme Epic Heroes. Additional texts include The Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome: Theseus, by E.M. Berens, The Odyssey, by Homer, Ulysses, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, Epic of Gilgamesh, Ozymandias, by Percy Bysshe Shelley, Idylls of the King, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, Self-Made Men, by Frederick Douglass, Into Thin Air, by Jon Krakauer, Richard III, by William Shakespeare For each of these texts, there is a mini unit that includes an Overview, an Introduction to the text, Vocabulary found in the text, an excerpt to Read, Think questions to aid comprehension, and Write prompts that require deeper analysis and practice with skills taught in the unit.

• In Unit 2, the pacing guide offers outside reading selections related to the theme, The The Human Condition and Hamlet. “The Young Adult novel Falling for Hamlet presents Ophelia’s perspective in an updated telling of her involvement with Hamlet and the royal family. Meanwhile, the nonfiction book Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls, emblemizes [sic] Hamlet’s tragic heroine in an analysis of the social pressures faced by young women in a post-feminist age. Tom Stoppard’s absurdist 1966 play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, sees the events of Hamlet from the ill-informed perspective of two of the more minor characters in Shakespeare’s tragedy. To further delve into the world inhabited by Hamlet’s deceased father, students will find an intriguing and engaging viewpoint in the full text of Liz Winter’s For the Love of Spirit: A Medium Memoir” (15). These independently read comparative texts are specifically referenced in the Teacher’s Reading Guide for the full text study of he Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which is divided into sections covering different chapters of the novel. At the end of the reading guide are two writing prompts that revisit The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and reference the comparative texts.

• In Unit 3, the theme is Modern Times. The Core Program Guide states, “Your independent reading program should be ongoing, so it’s important to set up a system for recording what students are reading. This can be easily done using a Google Form to create an online reading log. As students finish each book, they should complete a form providing basic information about their book, a rating and a written review.” The pacing guide gives suggestions for further and independent reading including Don Quixote by Cervantes, The Time Machine by H.G. Wells, The Chronicles of Narnia series by C.S. Lewis, The Lost Horizon by James Hilton, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

• In Unit 4, students are encouraged to read texts on the theme of Seeking Romance during independent reading. Students are expected to read independently both in school and at home. The Core Program Guide states, “In addition to the time you spend reading in class, it’s important to set clear expectations for independent reading outside of the classroom. Students should read outside of class for a set amount of time each day. As students become stronger readers, the time spent reading outside of class should also increase.” Teachers are encouraged to request parent signatures on a reading log or ask students to keep an ongoing log of their reading in their notebooks or online where they reflect on their reading each week. Questions should be provided to direct student reflections. The Core Program Guide stresses that it is important for a teachers to decide on an amount of time appropriate for independent home reading for their student population, then communicate that expectation clearly to both students and parents.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials contain a teacher’s edition with ample and useful annotations and suggestions on how to present the content in the student edition and ancillary materials. Where applicable, materials include teacher guidance for the use of embedded technology to support and enhance student learning.

Detailed lesson plans are provided for each text within the units. Access Paths, Blasts, First Reads, Close Reads, and Skill Lessons are provided along with detailed instructions, activities, and answer keys for each task suggested in the lesson plans. Embedded technology includes Tech Infusions, which are extension activities that incorporate technology such as Padlet, Diigo, PollEverywhere, etc. Another technological feature is Blast activities. This feature allows students to participate in a classroom version of social media, beginning with a driving question and a shared reading of background on a topics. Students then response to the driving question in a public forum. They participate in a poll, and review live research links to learn more about the Blast’s topic. Blast responses go live in real time, providing an opportunity for students to give each other feedback, select favorite responses, and reflect on the driving question again in response to ideas shared by their peers. Examples include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, in the Close Read for The Canterbury Tales, teachers are given the following detailed instructions in the lesson plan: “Read the Skills Focus questions as a class, so your students know what they should pay close attention to as they read. Then have students read and annotate the excerpt. Ask students to use the annotation tool as they read to: respond to the Skills Focus section, ask questions about how textual evidence leads to making inferences, identify examples of figurative language and explain how they relate to themes in the text, note unfamiliar vocabulary, and capture their reaction to the ideas and examples in the text. As they reread the text, remind students to use the comprehension strategy of summarizing that they learned in the First Read.”
• In Unit 2, in the First Read of "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” the teacher is provided with the following embedded Tech Infusion activity: “Build Background. In pairs or small groups, ask students to use devices to research modernism and changes in the early 20th century that prompted it. Assign each group a topic to investigate: Modernism in visual art (cubism, Dadaism, surrealism), Modernism in poetry, and Technological changes between 1890 and 1930, and Literature and World War I.”
• In Unit 3, in the Skill Lesson: Media of United States v.The Amistad, the teacher is provided with the following extended Tech Infusion activity: “Extend Tech Infusion Comparing Media. Have students think of a recent event or activity for which they have digital photographs on a computer or device. First, have them write a brief summary of the event or activity. Then, have them create a brief, 30-second film using Animoto (http://animoto.com). Have students compare their written summary with their brief video and discuss their findings. How are the messages in each different? How does the medium influence or cause the differences?”
• In Unit 4, in the Skill Lesson: Theme for Wuthering Heights, the teacher is provided with guided questions for a classroom discussion: “Either in small groups or as a whole class, use these questions to engage students in a discussion about theme. Why do fables often state the theme at the end of the text? How are fables different from novels? How can analyzing the structure of a text help you determine its theme? When is it important to rely on textual evidence to determine theme? Think about another text you have read in this class. Ask yourself, What is the text really about? What factors help you determine the answer to this question?”

The materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials contain a teacher’s edition that contains full, adult-level explanations and examples of the more advanced literacy concepts so that teachers can improve their own knowledge of the subject, as necessary.

In each lesson plan, teachers are provided full explanations and examples of the more advanced literary concepts in the following sections of the Teacher’s Edition section entitled, Instructional Path. The Access to Complex Text section includes information to access the complex text by providing actual literary concepts and examples found in the featured text. The Overview section provides a summary of the text, and identifies the literary concepts included in the featured text. Answer Keys are provided with all activities, along with Access to Complex Text features for each text. This assists the teacher is scaffolding instruction for the students, so that they all may access the complex text. A Teacher’s Glossary is included in each unit which includes linguistic, grammatical, comprehension, and literary terms. Examples of explanations and examples include but are not limited to:

• In Unit 1, in the First Read of Grendel, the teacher is provided with the following information in the lesson plan to help students access complex text: “To help students understand the main character of Grendel and the internal and external conflicts he faces, use the following ideas to provide scaffolded instruction for a first reading of the more complex features of this text: Genre - This is a narrative retelling of the epic poem Beowulf. Students who are already familiar with the events and characters of Beowulf may be confused by the change in these story elements in this excerpt. In this version, Grendel is not the cruel beast he is in the epic, and Hrothgar's men are not the epic heroes readers may expect them to be. Connection of Ideas - The characterization of Grendel as the first-person narrator of this retelling is complex. He can be seen as both a protagonist and an antagonist in the text. He is the main character, but he is also critical of and trapped by his own monstrousness. For example, he says "My heart was light with Hrothgar's goodness, and leaden with grief at my own bloodthirsty ways." This juxtaposition may be challenging for readers who expect Grendel to be a cold-hearted villain. Specific Vocabulary - Complex vocabulary, such as belligerent and posturing, and figurative language, such as "the thought took seed in Hrothgar's mind," may present a challenge to some readers. Prior Knowledge - Students who are not familiar with the characters and plot of Beowulf may struggle to understand the characters and plot of Grendel. Encourage these students to revisit Beowulf, or provide them with a short summary.”
• In Unit 2, in the Close Read of Utopia, the teacher is provided with the following information in the lesson plan to help students access complex text: “This excerpt from Utopia discusses the marriage customs of that society, along with those of the author Sir Thomas More's society. More presents the "absurdities" of Utopia, which in truth, point out the absurdities of his own society.”
• In Unit 3, in the Grade 12 ELA Overview, the teacher is provided with the following context to help students access the complex text, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: “Students may be surprised that an essay billed as feminist would acknowledge that women are physically weaker than men and focus on women as wives and mothers. Explain that this text was written for a male audience and that Wollstonecraft needed to convince those in power that improvements in women’s education would also benefit them.”
• In Unit 4, in the Grade 12 ELA Overview, the teacher is provided with the following context to help students access the complex text, The Glass Menagerie: “Some students may wonder why Amanda wants Laura to nd a husband rather than a job and why meeting men is limited to receiving “gentleman callers.” Explain that Amanda was raised in the South in the early 1900s and has traditional views about marriage and gender roles.”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials contain a teacher’s edition that explains the role of the specific ELA/literacy standards in the context of the overall curriculum.

StudySync’s Program Overview states, “The core program was built from the ground up to fully align with the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts. The program’s instruction targets requirements of these standards.” The program offers a variety of high-quality texts. The selections presented in each unit and grade offer a balance of literary and informational texts. These texts offer complex themes and ideas as well as compelling characters and language. Alignment is evident in the Scope and Sequence. In this chart, texts are listed in order by unit. For each text, the materials identify which standards are being practiced and which ones are being taught and practiced. This is indicated by an “o” and an “x” respectively. At a glance, teachers can tell which Reading Literature, Reading Informational Text, Writing, Speaking and Listening, and Language standards are being addressed by each text.

The materials reviewed for Grade 9 meet the criteria that materials contain explanations of the instructional approaches of the program and identification of the research based strategies.

The materials provide a document in the Core Program Guide titled, “Research-Based Alignments.” In this document, the publisher provides an overview of the research upon which the instruction in StudySync was built. The document provides a summary of key research findings and recommendations for best practices of instruction in English Language Arts, focused on Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening, Language, Media and Technology. The document summarizes key research findings and research-based recommendations related to effective reading instruction from several key sources. Some of the key sources are as follows:

• Reading Next-A Vision for Action and Research in Middle and High School Literacy: A Report to Carnegie Corporation of New York 2nd Edition (Biancarosa & Snow, 2006). Written in conjunction with staff from the Alliance for Excellent Education, this document describes 15 key elements of effective adolescent literacy programs. Designed to improve adolescent achievement in middle and high schools, the elements are subdivided into instructional improvements and infrastructural improvements.

• Improving Adolescent Literacy: Effective Classroom and Intervention Practices: A Practice Guide (Kamil, Borman, Dole, Kral, Salinger, & Torgesen, 2008). This report provides clear and evidence-based recommendations for enhancing literacy skills in the upper elementary, middle, and secondary levels. An analysis of the quality of the evidence supporting each claim is provided.

• Reading for Understanding: Toward an R&D Program in Reading Comprehension (2002). This review of the research on reading comprehension instruction was conducted by the Reading Study Group for the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Education Research and Improvement.

• Writing to Read: Evidence for How Writing Can Improve Reading. A Report from the Carnegie Corporation of New York (Graham & Herbert, 2010). This document provides a meta-analysis of research on the effects of specific types of writing interventions found to enhance students’ reading skills.

• Writing Next: Effective Strategies to Improve Writing of Adolescents in Middle and High Schools. A Report from the Carnegie Corporation of New York (Graham & Perin, 2007). This report provides a review of research-based techniques designed to enhance the writing skills of students in grades 4-12. Additionally, specific findings have been incorporated from other recent, reputable related research.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials regularly and systematically offer assessment opportunities that genuinely measure student progress.

The materials contain formative and summative assessments that can be used to measure student progress. There is a placement test that can be given at the beginning of the unit. Each unit has a summative assessment that tests comprehension, skills, vocabulary, and writing. Teachers use the responses in the First Read, the Skills lessons, Close Reads, Blasts, and Extended Writing Projects to conduct ongoing formative assessments. These formative assessments contain a variety of assessment types including multiple choice, short answer, discussion, and extended response. Formative assessments are found throughout the unit, and the End of Unit summative assessments are found in the Core ELA Assessment materials.

The materials provide Placement and Diagnostic Assessments, which are typically given at the beginning of the school year. These assessments focus on fluency and spelling, including an upper-level spelling inventory. The materials also provide oral reading and maze fluency assessments.

In the final portion of a Skills lesson, students respond to two short questions about a different passage of text from the First Read. These assessments provide teachers with immediate feedback on student performance, and the program contains guidance to teachers on how to alter instruction based on that performance.

Throughout each unit, students are assessed on their understanding of key instructional content along with their ability to write to sources. The results of these summative assessments provide teachers with data to track year-long progress and inform instructional decisions.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that assessments clearly denote which standards are being emphasized.

Formative assessments are built into each unit through Blasts, First Reads, Close Reads, and Skills Activities. Each formative assessment includes notations of the standards that are being addressed. The Teacher Introduction portion of the Core ELA Assessments document describes each assessment's key areas of focus. The answer key at the end of each downloadable paper copy of the assessments provides item-specific information such as content focus/skill, Common Core State Standard, and Depth of Knowledge (DOK) level. The online version of the assessments offers the same metadata for each item along with tech-enhanced item functionality.

For example, in Unit 4, in the First Read of O Pioneers!, students answer the following questions: “Highlight and annotate pieces of textual evidence from Part I, Chapter IV that suggest many settlers wished they hadn’t moved west. Do these details support the inference that no one should have moved to the frontier? Why or why not?” and “Use context to determine the meaning of demoralized as it is used in O Pioneers! Write your definition of ‘demoralized’ and tell how you arrived at it.” These questions serve as a summative assessment and support teachers to identify mastery of RI.11-12.1 and L.11-12.4.A.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that assessments provide sufficient guidance to teachers for interpreting student performance and suggestions for follow up.

At the culmination of each unit, students are assessed on key instructional concepts and their ability to write to prompts. The information that these assessments reveal informs the teacher about grouping, future instruction, and the need for remediation and/or reteaching. End-of-unit assessments also generate reports for students and parents on strengths, deficiencies, standard and skill proficiency levels, and across-unit growth. End-of-year assessments also indicate students' readiness for state testing.

The Core ELA Assessments component is an integral part of the complete
assessment program aligned with StudySync Core ELA instruction and the California
Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The component contains four Unit Assessments, an
End-of-Year Assessment, an End-of-Year Performance Task Assessment, scoring rubrics, and
charts that point to possible instructional modifications based on student assessment results.
The Core ELA Assessments report on the outcome of student learning.

As students complete each unit of the reading program, they will be assessed on their
understanding of key instructional content and their ability to write to source texts/stimuli.
The results serve as a summative assessment by providing a status of current achievement
in relation to student progress through the CCSS-aligned curriculum. The results of the
assessments can be used to inform subsequent instruction, aid in making leveling and
grouping decisions, and point toward areas in need of reteaching or remediation. Student
performance in the end-of-year assessments can act as a signal of student readiness for the
demands of high-stakes testing, as well as provide a snapshot of student progress toward
end-of-year goals.

The goal of each assessment is to evaluate student mastery of previously-taught material. The expectation is for students to score 80% or higher on the assessment as a whole. Within this score, the expectation is for students to score 75% or higher on each section of the assessment (and 7+ on the PT full-write).

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials should include routines and guidance that point out opportunities to monitor student progress.

The StudySync materials provide for ongoing review, practice, and feedback. The Core Program Guide explains that assessments available in StudySync ELA allow for monitoring student progress, diagnosing possible issues, and measuring student achievement in relation to their understanding of previously taught skills. Assessments included within the program help teachers gather data to address students’ instructional needs. They also measure the critical components of reading. Assessment options are grounded in research. Each unit has a Research and an Extended Writing Project, which include routines and guidelines that help teachers monitor student progress in writing. Routines and guidance include but are not limited to:

• Placement and diagnostic assessments to support decision-making about appropriate instructional levels for students. The assessments serve as a baseline and help teachers to monitor student progress throughout the school year.
• Each Unit provides teachers with lesson plans that “point teachers toward minute-to-minute formative assessment opportunities.” First Reads, Skills, Close Reads, and Extended Writing Projects offer “medium cycle assessment opportunities for students and teachers to chart progress toward key learning outcomes. End of unit assessments and performance tasks test key skills and measure progress summatively.”
• Each chapter of the Language and Composition Handbook focuses on a specific grammar or usage skill. Each chapter begins with a pretest, followed by instruction and practice, and ends with a post test.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials provide teachers with strategies to meet the needs of range of learners so content is accessible to all learners and supports them in meeting or exceeding grade-level standards.

Throughout each instructional Unit, differentiated lessons are provided for teachers to use. This Access Path provides differentiated lessons classified as emerging, intermediate, advanced, and approaching. The lesson plans include a column of suggestions to help teachers adequately differentiate the lesson. Student grouping is suggested in many lessons. Differentiated worksheets are provided. ELL students may be provided with additional sentence frames while receiving access to the same materials.

Each lesson includes a full set of Access Handouts. Access Handouts are differentiated through the use of sentence frames, graphic organizers, glossaries, and many other activities. Access handouts provide students with support to complete core assignments alongside their on-grade level classmates.

Teachers can create multiple online classes and custom learning groups. This allows teachers to assign texts and the weekly Blast based on Lexile levels. Teacher can customize the directions and requirements for entire classes, smaller groups, or individual students. Teachers can “modify prompts, turn on audio readings, and extend due dates” to help students meet learning goals.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials regularly provide all students, including those who read, write, speak, or listen below grade level, or in a language other than English, with extensive opportunities to work with grade level text and meet or exceed grade-level standards.

Students read grade-level texts through the support of teacher modeling and scaffolded instruction. Students work as individuals, in small groups, and as a whole class. Student Models are provided via multimedia introductions. These show students how to interact with the text. Reading skills are supported by explicit grammar and vocabulary instruction. The instructional materials include ways teachers can adapt instruction to meet the needs of diverse learners.

For each Unit, teachers may choose the Core unit or EL Unit. The EL Unit includes materials and assessments for beginner, intermediate, and advanced learners. All lessons contain a Core Path and an Access Path for teachers along with Access handouts for students to support instruction in the Access Path. The program provides instructional materials that may be used for pre-teaching, reteaching, remediation, and small group instruction. Documents include the following: Grammar, Language, and Composition Workbook, Vocabulary Workbook, Spelling Workbook, Standard English Learners Handbook, and Foundational Skills.

The materials provide supports for reading texts, such as Audio Options, Audio Text Highlight Tool, Audio Speed controls, Video Content with Closed Captioning, Text Enlargement, and Keyboarding. The materials include supports for English language learners and for students learning Standard English, with tools such as Contrastive Analysis Drills, Translative Drills, and Discrimination Drills.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials regularly include extensions and/or more advanced opportunities for students who read, write, speak, or listen above grade level.

There are activities specific to students reading beyond grade level in the Access path for each unit. These activities aim to guide high ability students further into the core path content should they complete the activity before other students. Along with scaffolds that differentiate instruction for English learners in the access path, suggestions are provided that stretch learners' thinking. For example, students may have additional opportunities for collaborative and creative engagement. Core path questions support the use of reading comprehension strategies, inference techniques, and the application of textual evidence. The beyond-level activity may, for example, ask students to brainstorm how two characters might talk their way out of trouble. Technology may also be leveraged to support these students.

For example, in Unit 2, the Access Path’s Beyond section for Brave New World offers students a Thoughts vs. Actions. Advanced students are asked to work in pairs or small groups and “complete the Thoughts vs. Actions chart on the Access 3 handout, referring to the SyncTV video as needed to clarify their answers. Sample answers appear at the end of this lesson plan.”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade 12 meet the criteria that materials provide opportunities for teachers to use a variety of grouping strategies.

Throughout each instructional unit, students are encouraged to learn in groups. Students participate in collaborative conversations about texts, and receive instruction in whole group, small group, and one-on-one settings. Students also watch StudySyncTV group discussions, which serve as models,

Throughout every instructional unit, the lesson plans include a column with suggestions for the teacher to differentiate the lesson. Differentiated worksheets are included. Grouping suggestions are provided in many lesson plans. ELL students may utilize additional sentence frames and still receive access to the same materials. Examples of scaffolds and differentiation include:

• In the Close Reads for each text, students express their ideas in collaborative conversation groups before planning and writing a short constructed response.

• The Access Path guides teachers to leverage technology tools, such as Closed Captioning and Audio Text Highlight to engage and instruct learners. Additionally, the Access Path guides provide suggestions for alternating between whole group, small group, and one-on-one instruction.

• At each grade level, the Speaking and Listening handbook is divided into four sections: Collaborative Discussions, Critical Listening, Research Using Various Media, and Presentation Skills. Each section is comprised of a comprehension lesson plan, including student handouts, checklists, and rubrics. Each section contains formative assessments that can be used and repeated for the following activities: engaging in small or large-group discussions, listening critically and responding to information and ideas shared by others, conducting research and assembling findings, and presenting in the narrative, informative, and argumentative modes using multimedia elements.