Taming the “Beast”: Using Close Reading to Help Secondary Students Tackle Complex Texts

Close reading is an instructional routine that can help your secondary students decode, comprehend, and analyze complex texts. This presentation shares recent research on close reading, demonstrates how you can maximize its instructional impact for all of your students, and equips you with resources that you can use immediately. Participants will be able to: 1. Identify and implement the five components of close reading (text selection, purposeful re-reading, annotation, text-dependent questioning, and peer-to-peer interaction leading to whole-class discussion). 2. Adapt the close reading structure to meet the needs of their students. 3. Understand best practices for designing thematic units, layering texts, choosing extension activities, and creating formative and summative assessments in order to maximize the benefits of close reading.