Pennington Publishing Blog

One controversial component of the COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS & LITERACY IN HISTORY/SOCIAL STUDIES, SCIENCE, AND TECHNICAL SUBJECTS has been the Language Strand. The Language Strand consists of the following for each grade level: Conventions of Standard English (Standards 1 & 2), Knowledge and Use (Standard 3), and Vocabulary Acquisition and Use (Standards 4, 5, & 6).

The main point of contention, of course, has been the inclusion of Language as a separate strand with grammar, usage, and conventions divorced from writing instruction and vocabulary divorced from reading instruction.

In fact, the writers of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) go out of their away to alleviate the fears of writing-based and literature-based devotees with the following disclaimer: “The inclusion of Language standards in their own strand should not be taken as an indication that skills related to conventions, effective language use, and vocabulary are unimportant to reading, writing, speaking, and listening; indeed, they are inseparable from such contexts (51).” http://www.corestandards.org/assets/CCSSI_ELA%20Standards.pdf

A second issue has received far less attention than the aforementioned point of contention in curricular mapping committees and ELA forums, but has created more rumblings in the educational publishing world. This second issue will perhaps have a greater impact than the first on classroom instruction.

In the Language Strand, at the end of both the K-5 (p. 30) and 6-12 (p. 56) Language Standards is a document titled “Language Progressive Skills, by Grade” with this subheading: “The following skills, marked with an asterisk (*) in Language standards 1–3, are particularly likely to require continued attention in higher grades as they are applied to increasingly sophisticated writing and speaking.”

CCSS Language Progressive Skills Standards

…..

1. L.3.1f. Ensure subject-verb and pronoun-antecedent agreement.
2. L.3.3a. Choose words and phrases for effect.
3. L.4.1f. Produce complete sentences, recognizing and correcting inappropriate fragments and run-ons.
4. L.4.1g. Correctly use frequently confused words (e.g., to/too/two; there/their).
5. L.3.3a. Choose words and phrases for effect.
6. L.4.3b. Choose punctuation for effect.
7. L.5.1d. Recognize and correct inappropriate shifts in verb tense.
8. L.5.2a. Use punctuation to separate items in a series.†
9. L.6.1c. Recognize and correct inappropriate shifts in pronoun number and person.
10. L.6.1d. Recognize and correct vague pronouns (i.e., ones with unclear or ambiguous antecedents).
11. L.6.1e. Recognize variations from standard English in their own and others’ writing and speaking, and identify and use strategies to improve expression in conventional language.
12. L.6.2a. Use punctuation (commas, parentheses, dashes) to set off nonrestrictive/parenthetical elements.
13. L.6.3a. Vary sentence patterns for meaning, reader/listener interest, and style.‡
14. L.6.3b. Maintain consistency in style and tone.
15. L.7.1c. Place phrases and clauses within a sentence, recognizing and correcting misplaced and dangling modifiers.
16. L.7.3a. Choose language that expresses ideas precisely and concisely, recognizing and eliminating wordiness and redundancy.
17. L.8.1d. Recognize and correct inappropriate shifts in verb voice and mood.
18. L.9–10.1a. Use parallel structure.

Analysis and Implications of the CCSS Language Progressive Skills Standards

…..

No Vocabulary Acquisition and Use (Standards 4, 5, & 6) are included-only Conventions of Standard English (Standards 1 & 2), Knowledge and Use (Standard 3). In other words, grammar, usage, and conventions warrant this second document. Compared to previous state standard documents, the CCSS sees these components as specific building blocks to literacy, and not just incidental outcomes learned by some mysterious form of academic osmosis.

Of the 18 CCSS Language Progressive Skills Standards, 14 are Grade 3-6 Standards. Clearly the writers of the CCSS have chosen to notch up the rigor of previous state standards by devolving most of the heavy instructional lifting of grammar, usage, and conventions skills to elementary teachers.

The CCSS defines grammar, usage, and conventions as “skills.” Skills are to be applied to the writing craft. National Writing Project, Writers Workshop, and Writing Process advocates have been loath to accept this skills/craft instructional distinction.

Tacit acknowledgement is made that these grammar, usage, and conventions skills must be reviewed at each grade level. In other words, the cyclical nature of skills acquisition is affirmed. Unlike many previous state standards documents, the CCSS writers seem to get the fact that “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” The examples in Appendix A of the CCSS document are helpful in this regard.

Although the writers of the CCSS document have been careful to leave methodological autonomy to teachers, the inclusion of a separate language strand, the labeling of grammar, usage, and conventions as “skills,” and the review component of the 18 Langauge Progressive Skills Standards certainly promote some means of both direct and differentiated instruction in the Standards themselves.

The grammar, usage, and conventions skills require deep instruction, not just review practice, as with Daily Oral Language or Daily Language Review methodologies. And that means intensive, direct instruction and guided practice following an instructional sequence that includes the review components as scaffolding to build onto with new skills. Periodic “mini-lessons” are just not going to cut it. Each of the 18 Language Progressive Skills Standards cries out for diagnostic assessments and differentiated instruction for the sake of instructional efficiency and individual mastery.

For upper elementary, middle school, and high school teachers looking at a stand-alone grammar, mechanics, and spelling curriculum that is aligned to the language strand of Common Core State Standards, please check out the author’s Teaching Grammar and Mechanics. Throw away the ineffective D.O.L. or D.L.R. “openers” and get 64 no-prep, interactive Sentence Lifting lessons-each designed with basic and advanced skills. Each of the 64 lessons has Teacher Tips and Hints for the grammatically-challenged, simple sentence diagrams, sentence modeling, grammar cartoons, and dictations. Also get 72 Grammar and Mechanics Worksheets to differentiate instruction, according to the results of the Grammar and Mechanics Diagnostic Assessments.

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing CCSS, CCSS Grammar, CCSS Grammar Standards, CCSS Language, Common Core, Common Core State Standards, grammar standards, Language Strand, Progressive Language Skills Standards

I’ve already detailed sixteen reasons Why Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.) Doesn’t Work in a related article; however, readers of my blog have added “fuel to the fire” by identifying two more problems with Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.) that merit attention.

Although teachers modify the Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.), to suit their tastes, here are the three basic Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.) Procedures:

1. The teacher displays or writes two error-filled sentences on the board. Next, the teacher calls upon students to come up to the board and write corrections and proofreading marks.
2. The teacher displays or writes two error-filled sentences on the board. The teacher passes out a D.O.L. worksheet with the error-filled sentences. Each student writes the corrections and proofreading marks on the worksheet. Next, the teacher calls upon students to come up to the board and write corrections and proofreading marks.
3. The teacher displays or writes two error-filled sentences on the board. Students write out the corrected sentences on binder paper or in a composition notebook. Next, the teacher calls upon students to come up to the board and write corrections and proofreading marks.

With each of the three approaches, as the students mark the board, the teacher orally reviews the relevant mechanics, spelling, and grammar rules and verifies the accuracy of the sentence edits. With Procedures #2 and #3, students self-edit their own corrections and proofreading marks during this review.

Problems with the Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.) Instructional Approaches

…..

1. With Procedures #2 and #3, students are required to multitask their own sentence edits while watching the board edits and listening to the teacher review the relevant rules.

Analysis: Doing two things at once is not good instructional pedagogy. My take is that none of us can chew gum and walk at the same time as well as we can do one isolated activity. Listening is a full time job; discussion is as well.

2. Procedures #1, 2, and 3 review the “rules” orally and not in written form.

Analysis: Oral review is just not effective instruction and is a key reason why teachers complain that students do not retain the skills reviewed in Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.). After all, the reason we bother teaching mechanics, spelling, and grammar is to help students improve their writing. It makes sense that students should write down relevant rules and examples and then apply these rules to both to authentic writing, such as mentor texts (What’s right?), as well as to edit error text designed with specific mistakes connected to the rules for the purposes of error analysis (What’s wrong?).

Instead of Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.), I prefer the Sentence Lifting approach in which students write down (or are provided) the mechanics, spelling, and grammar  “rules” and then discuss these in the context of both exemplary mentor text and text that requires error analysis and/or sentence manipulation. As the formative assessment, the teacher dictates sentences which require students to apply each “rule.” Students then correct and self-edit their sentences.

For example, if teaching a lesson on gerunds:

1. Students copy down (or are provided) this “rule”: A gerund is an “____ing verb” that is used as a noun.
2. Teacher reads the “rule” and elicits examples from students: “Running is good exercise. ” “Listening to Mr. Pennington makes me sleepy.” “Smoking cigarettes causes cancer.” Notice the variety of sentence constructions in the examples.
3. Discuss the use of the gerund in this literary model (a quote by Dave Barry displayed or written on the board): “Skiing combines outdoor fun with knocking down trees with your face.” Identify the gerund, discuss the use of the gerund in terms of syntax, meaning, and style. “What makes this so funny?” Elicit and discuss possible revisions.
4. Discuss this sentence (displayed or written on the board): “A necessary skill has become driving.” Identify the gerund, discuss the use/misuse of the gerund in terms of syntax, meaning, and style. Elicit and discuss possible revisions.
5. Dictate this sentence and refer students to look at their “rule” for assistance: “Revise this sentence by placing a gerund at the beginning of the sentence: The product 28 results when you multiply 4 times 7.”
6. Display this answer and require students to correct and self-edit: “Multiplying 4 times 7 results in the product 28.” Discuss any other possible revisions and set expectations for students to use and highlight gerunds in their writing assignment today.

Further Note: I add on a simple sentence diagram, a student model, and a related cartoon to the instructional mix. Teaching (note use of gerund ) one mechanics, one spelling, and one grammar “rule” with this Sentence Lifting approach takes me 15-20 minutes. I teach Sentence Lifting twice per week to my seventh graders. I use an instructional scope and sequence derived from the new Common Core State Standard Language Strand.

For upper elementary, middle school, and high school teachers looking for a comprehensive grammar, mechanics, and spelling curriculum that is aligned to the language strand of Common Core State Standards, please see the author’s Teaching Grammar and Mechanics. This no more than one hour per week program provides 64 no-prep and no-correct, interactive Sentence Lifting lessons-each designed with basic and advanced skills. Each of the 64 lessons has Teacher Tips and Hints for the grammatically-challenged, simple sentence diagrams, sentence modeling, grammar cartoons, and dictations. Also get 72 Grammar and Mechanics Worksheets to differentiate instruction, according to the results of the Grammar and Mechanics Diagnostic Assessments.

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing Common Core Grammar, D.O.L., D.O.L. directions, D.O.L. procedures, Daily Language Review, daily oral language, DLR, DOL, grammar instruction, grammar openers

Most of us would agree with reading researchers that vocabulary development is critically important to improving reading comprehension (e.g., Anderson & Freebody, 1981; Baumann, Kame‘enui, & Ash, 2003). However, not all vocabulary instruction is effective or efficient.

The Weekly Vocabulary Word List

In many classrooms the predominant means of vocabulary instruction is weekly vocabulary word list. Pass it out on Monday; have students look up and write down definitions, make flashcards, do a crossword puzzle, do a word sort, write context clue sentences, etc. Then test on Friday. The problem is that this approach does not work. It’s ineffective and inefficient.

It’s ineffective.

Students memorize the list for the Friday test and forget half of them by the next week. “Rote memorization of words and definitions is the least effective instructional method resulting in little long-term effect (Kameenui, Dixon, Carine 1987).”

It’s inefficient.

Even if students were to remember all of the, say 20 words, on the weekly vocabulary word list for the entire school year, they would only have mastered 600 words. But, the American lexicon is over 800,000 words. The SAT® word bank is over 30,000. 600 words won’t make a dent in those numbers.

According to reading research, students need to learn 3,000 new words per year just to make year-to-year grade level progress (Honig 1983). So learning only 600 words is a very small drop in a very big bucket. But it is a bucket we desperately need to fill-especially for educationally disadvantaged students, whose “word poverty” (Louisa C. Moats) dooms them to the “Matthew Effect” (Keith Stanovich) in which the poorer tend to get poorer.

To teach students 3,000 words a year, students would have to learn 17 words each school day (3,000 words over 178 school days). However, classroom intervention studies suggest that only 8 to 10 words can be retained through direct instruction in one week (Stahl & Fairbanks, 1986). That works out to about 300 words per year-hardly enough.

So, if vocabulary word lists are ineffective and inefficient. What does work to teach those 3,000 words per year?

Three Effective and Efficient Methods of Vocabulary Instruction

1. Independent Reading

Let’s use Luis as our example. Reading 30 minutes per day for homework at a rate of 200 words per minute, for a total of 132 days (4 days per week in a typical school year), means that Luis would be exposed to 792,000 words (30 x 200 x 132). If Luis reads text at the recommended 5% unknown words* level of word recognition recommended by reading researchers (Stahl, 1999), this means that he would be exposed to 39,600 unfamiliar words per year (792,000 x .05). Because students learn between 5 and 10 percent of previously unknown words in a single reading (Stahl, 1999), Luis will have learned between 1,980 and 3,960 new words at home! Not to mention reading in class.

*That 5% unknown words level is critically important. If students read texts below their current reading levels, even lots of reading won’t result in measurable vocabulary growth (Carver, 1994).

2. Greek and Latin Word Parts

Reading researchers suggest that learning Greek and Latin word parts is an effective and efficient method for acquiring vocabulary (e.g., Anglin, 1993; Biemiller & Slonim, 2001). Over 50% of all academic vocabulary contains one or more Greek or Latin prefix, root, or suffix. Unlike memorizing vocabulary word lists, memorizing word parts produces enormous pay-offs because one prefix, root, or suffix may be a component of hundreds of words. Learning these word families provides significant utility for the reader, especially those word parts with the highest utility.

Just 9 prefixes constitute 75% of words with prefixes (White, Sowell, & Yanigihara, 1989). Comprehensive frequency studies have not been completed on roots; however, there is general consensus as to utility of a few hundred roots. There is less agreement on the value of teaching suffixes. Suffixes can often have vague meanings such as “the state of”; suffixes are often merely inflectional forms; they also tend to vary spellings. However, some study of suffixes that have specific meanings is certainly warranted. Check out a great list of Greek and Latin word parts for instruction here.

3. Tier One, Two, and Three Words (Beck et al., 2002)

Some words do not need to be taught. Tier One Words are high utility words that will become part of a student’s lexicon incidentally through oral language or reading. Tier Three Words are rare, specific-to-the-subject words that can sometimes be learned through effective application of context clues.

But some words do need to be taught. When reading a literature selection, certain words that are important to building comprehension or understanding of the text are essential to learn, especially if these words are used in a variety of forms, in other contexts or subjects of study, or are precise uses of generally-understood concepts. These are Tier Two Words.

For example, examine this sentence: The happy child was fortunate to have such a sunny disposition.

Tier One Words: happy, child, sunny

Tier Two Word: fortunate

Tier Three Word: disposition

The approach would be to assume that the reader knows the Tier One Words and leave the reader to use context clues to derive a basic understanding of the Tier Three Word. The Tier Two Word would be the word that deserves the instructional attention.

Mark Pennington, MA Reading Specialist, is the author of the comprehensive reading intervention curriculum, Teaching Reading Strategies. Designed to significantly increase the reading abilities of students ages eight through adult within one year, the curriculum is decidedly un-canned, adaptable to various instructional settings, and simple to use—a perfect choice for Response to Intervention tiered instructional levels. Get multiple choice reading assessments, blending and syllabication activities, phonemic awareness and phonics workshops, comprehension worksheets, multi-level fluency passages, 390 flashcards, posters, activities, and games. Everything teachers need to teach a diagnostically-based reading intervention program for struggling readers at all reading levels is found in this comprehensive curriculum. Ideal for ESL and Special Education students, who struggle with language/auditory processing challenges. 364 pages

Reading, Spelling/Vocabulary context clues, Greek and Latin, prefixes, roots, SAT words, suffixes, syllables, vocabulary, vocabulary word lists

How can we effectively assess student writing? Should we grade upon effort, completion, standards, achievement, or improvement? Is our primary task to respond or to grade?

Here’s my take. We should grade based upon how well students have met our instructional objectives. Because each writer is at a different place, we begin at that place and evaluate the degree to which the student has learned and applied that learning, in terms of effort and achievement. But, our primary task is informed response based upon effective assessment. That’s how to grade writing.

For example, here may be an effective procedure for a writing task as it winds its way through the Writing Process: Read more…

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing direct writing assessment, essay strategies, essay structure, essays, five paragraph essay, five paragraph essays, how to teach thesis statements, MLA, on demand writing, on-demand writing assessment, Six traits, step up to writing, thesis statement practice, timed writing, writing conferences, writing mini lessons, writing process, writing rules, writing strategies

Remember using Warriner’s English Grammar and Composition back in high school and Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style back in college? Each resource provided tips on grammar, usage, mechanics, spelling, and composition. Many students found these resources to be indispensable writing partners for essays and term papers. Writing Guides, English Handbooks, and Style Manuals all provide useful tools to students and professional writers alike. However, print copies are often out of date as soon as they are published. With commonly accepted guidelines in flux, the resources of the web are much better suited to the needs of today’s writers.

Constantly updated, The Pennington Manual of Style has been designed to serve as a complete writer’s reference guide (not merely a guide to citation formatting) for fourth-twelfth grade students and their teachers… with one major improvement over the old Warriner’s English Grammar and Composition and The Elements of Style: This style manual is fully interactive with 438 downloadable essay e-comments to make essay response efficient and comprehensive. Teachers can SAVE TIME GRADING ESSAYS AND GIVE STUDENTS BETTER COMMENTS with this resource. Plus, teachers are licensed to print Read more…

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing e-grading, essay grading, essay revision, essay rubrics, grammar book, grammar reference, grammar rules, how to grade essays, Strunk and White, style manual, writers guide, writing style

Good teachers know that students need detailed, prescriptive, and personal comments on their essays throughout the writing process to make significant improvement. However, the process can be time-consuming and frustrating. It would not be unusual for a teacher to spend 15 minutes to red-mark and write comments on the rough draft of a five-paragraph essay, then repeat the process to evaluate the final draft. Even with that significant amount of time, comments would have to be concise and rely upon abbreviations and diacritical marks. The focus has to be limited to identifying what is wrong, not explaining why it is wrong. No time for examples or suggestions as to how to improve the writing. Maybe a quick positive comment. Exhausting!

Additionally, frustration mounts as the teacher has to write the same comments over and over again throughout a stack of student papers. Only to be exacerbated when, after receiving their graded essays, students simply glance at their final grades before cramming the essay into the bottom of their backpacks. There has got to be a better way… Read more…

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing computer grading, e-grading, essay grading, essay revision, essay rubrics, how to grade essays

Thought I’d share how I started using computers to grade essays and offer fellow teachers a great resource to provide better essay response and cut grading time by half. Years ago I played around with the Insert Comments feature of Microsoft Word® and learned how to put in and format the bubble comments. I started using these comments to respond to and grade student writing submitted by email. At first, I only assigned a holistic rubric score, made a few comments, and patted myself on the back for learning how to insert audio files for brief summary responses. Students loved this paperless process. Read more…

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing computer grading, e-grading, essay grading, essay revision, essay rubrics, grammar checker, how to grade essays, spelling checker