4 Close Reading Strategies

“Close, analytic reading stresses engaging with a text of sufficient complexity directly and examining meaning thoroughly and methodically, encouraging students to read and reread deliberately.” (PARCC, 2011, p. 7)

     This very well may be how "Close Reading" became such an important term as we shift to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).   

     The Common Core urges teachers to expose students to complex texts, exemplary texts, and real documents like the Constitution. Imagine what information can be gleaned from Abraham Lincoln's speech, 'The Gettysburg Address.' 
     
These are a four close reading strategies that you can implement now:

1. Short Reading Passages lend themselves to “close analytical reading” and they are easy to read over and over again. Use quality passages that are worthy of rereading.

2. An TUTOR paragraph or stanza can be pulled out from a long passage or poem, so that students can learn about key ideas, text structure, and author word choices. For KINDERGARTEN and 1ST GRADE, reading passages can be used as a ‘read aloud.' Young students can certainly learn about TEXT FEATURES even if they are not yet fluent readers. 

     
3. Teaching students to glean the meaning of words in context instead of giving them the definition right off is better practice. Let students them “grapple” and "wrestle" with the text to build their own understanding. No more is the teacher doing most of the work.
     
4. The COMMON CORE INITIATIVE expects students to synthesize information from multiple 'related' texts. This could be a biography and a timeline, or an article on a topic and a web source and a table or graph. Passing end of year PERFORMANCE TASKS will depends on these skills. Get your students used to this now.
  

Charlie Chaffin