with student interests, but it does help to do so when possible, especially in the early stages of developing strong close readers. If students like the style and content of a text, they are likely to engage more as they discover the authorial moves, those choices an author intentionally makes in a text and on which we want our students to focus. If students can learn to closely read texts they enjoy, they can apply the skill to other texts and expand their ideas of what makes a text important and worthy of reading. There are many methods for discovering the interests of students and applying them to the text selection. Early in the school year, a student-background survey might provide a teacher with insights about the activities and interests of his students, and this can be invaluable information as he chooses the texts he will teach.
There are many types of background surveys. See figure 2.1, which exemplifies the types of questions that might be on a survey. Such surveys will reveal much more than the specific interests of students, and teachers can use them in many ways. However, in selecting texts that meet with student interests, the survey information can be invaluable.
Source: Marzano Research, 2016c.
Figure 2.1: Sample survey questions.
Visit marzanoresearch.com/classroomstrategies for a free reproducible version of this figure.
In addition to student interest, teacher interest is important when selecting a text. Like any person, teachers love certain texts, those filled with words that jump off the page because of their own close reading and deep engagement. Teachers who bring that enthusiasm to students’ interaction with a text are likely to engender some similar level of appreciation in their students. On the other hand, any teacher will have to use texts they find uninspiring, and some of those texts may be ones they are supposed to like. When possible (and it isn’t always possible), teachers should avoid selecting these texts for close reading because prejudices are likely to show through as they share the texts with students. As a personal example, I have a lifelong relationship with William Shakespeare, not only as a teacher but also as an actor and a director. When I teach using Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Twelfth Night, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, I know my enthusiasm for these master works as a whole and for the numerous short passages I have students close read helps them appreciate the superb level of writing. Yet I avoid teaching Julius Caesar, not because I think it is a flawed play, but because I know I would lack the enthusiasm to do it justice. Being careful about one’s own feelings in the text selection is important to providing students with the best close reading experience possible.
At the same time, all teachers will encounter situations where required texts fail to inspire them. There are reasons some texts are in the curriculum; at some point, someone saw the value of that text. Teachers might revisit a text with an eye toward finding ways to be enthusiastic about it (or at least appreciate it). Literature teachers might read some literary criticism of the text to help discover its value and support their own growing appreciation of it. Social studies teachers could review the historical moment of a text or read an expert analysis of its impact to perhaps change their opinions. Teachers of any subject area can converse with colleagues about ways to connect with a text. When dealing with an uninspiring text, teachers should do their best to prevent their biases from impacting students’ experiences with that work.
Level of Complexity
Although student interest is an important factor, so is the level of complexity. The text must appropriately challenge students to increase their reading and analytical abilities (McKeown, Beck, & Blake, 2009). Obviously, students just starting to learn the close reading process need to practice it with less challenging texts. As students improve in their abilities to read closely, as measured by a proficiency scale, teachers will want to present them with ever more challenging texts. (See chapter 6, page 87, for more about proficiency scales.)
An important consideration is the reading level of the text. Tradition sometimes dictates that certain texts are taught at a certain grade level, perhaps without due consideration of the text’s reading level. Here is an example of a challenging text traditionally taught in either seventh or eighth grade:
It’s a wonder I haven’t abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart. It’s utterly impossible for me to build my life on a foundation of chaos, suffering and death. I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness, I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too, I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty will end, that peace and tranquility will return once more. —July 15, 1944 (Frank, 1947/1997, pp. 12–13)
This excerpt from Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl will be familiar to many. Though a traditional middle school text, its reading level is tenth grade (Flesch-Kincaid 10.2). Flesch-Kincaid reports readability at typical grade levels for U.S. public schools. This is not to say teachers shouldn’t teach the book in middle school, but it does demonstrate why many middle school students struggle to understand the text. When choosing texts, teachers should start with a clear understanding of students’ abilities and decide whether to connect with their current reading level or challenge them a bit to go beyond it. Further, it is important to examine texts traditionally taught at each grade level and understand the challenge each work represents to readers in each grade. It’s possible some texts should be taught at higher grade levels than they are, while others, though above the grade level, stay there for other important pedagogical reasons (such as preparing students for the next level of instruction). A good example is Shakespeare’s (1595/1997b) Romeo and Juliet. This text, traditionally taught to ninth graders, represents a reading level far beyond ninth grade. For example, the opening prologue speech, a Shakespearean sonnet, has a Flesch-Kincaid reading level of 14.2, which suggests its reading level is second-year college. Yet it is an important text to teach in the first year of high school to introduce students to the complexities of Shakespearean writing as preparation for other forms of that writing in the years ahead. Recognizing that the text is very challenging to ninth-grade readers would suggest to teachers that asking students to independently read and understand the entire play is probably beyond their abilities. Thus, we approach a complex text such as Romeo and Juliet in a different manner, often reading portions of it rather than the entire text.
At the same time, teachers should not be afraid of presenting students with complicated passages that challenge their understanding and appreciation of a writer’s craft. In close reading, the focus is on an author’s style and craft in addition to content. In a high-quality text, the author’s craft will support and inform the content. One may read a classical author for many reasons, and often those reasons are related to content—though style should not be ignored. Virginia Woolf, the amazing early–20th century British writer, is often seen as an important feminist movement writer, and rightly so, but one should not ignore the stylistic power of an author who can craft writing like this:
Strife, divisions, difference of opinion, prejudices twisted into the very fibre of being, oh, that they should begin so early, Mrs. Ramsay deplored. They were so critical, her children. They talked such nonsense. She went from the dining-room, holding James by the hand, since he would not go with the others. It seemed to her such nonsense—inventing differences, when people, heaven knows, were different enough without that. The real differences, she thought, standing by the drawing-room window, are enough, quite enough. She had in mind at the moment, rich and poor, high and low; the great in birth receiving from her, half grudgingly, some respect, for had she not in her veins the blood of that very noble, if slightly mythical, Italian house, whose daughters, scattered about English drawing-rooms
