02.18.15Close Reading Case Study: Ellie Strand teaches Animal Farm
As many readers of this blog know, Colleen Driggs, Erica Woolway and I are in the midst of writing a book on reading. Our MO, as always, is to learn what we can by watching teachers in action. Colleen visited a colleague last week to observe her Close Reading lesson and loved what she saw. She shared this reflection.
During a visit to Troy Prep MS yesterday, I had the privilege of observing, Ellie Strand and her 8th graders doing a Close Reading lesson with an excerpt from Animal Farm. In the course of reading the novel, the class had already read this portion of the text, but they were re-reading it for deeper study. And it turns out they re-read it another three times (at least!) in the process of Close Reading it. Here are the top five highlights from an overall extraordinary lesson:
1) Layered Readings: Ellie was deliberate in her choice of layered readings and explicitly stated the purpose of each reading to her scholars:
- Reading 1: “We’re going to read the entire excerpt for comprehension.” Ellie lead a Control the Game reading during which she paused briefly to define three vocabulary words and instructed students to underline key lines that they’d revisit later in the class.
- Reading 2: Ellie directed students to re-read the passage independently—this time their goal was to annotate the text and note motifs they observed and formulate a hypothesis about the central idea/theme of the passage. After they’d done so, Ellie asked them to write about how Orwell used a key line to develop the central idea.
- Reading 3: After students’ independent reading and annotation, Ellie brought the class back together to re-read and study just one sentence with deep focus.
2) Rigorous Text Dependent Questions: In order to help her students unpack and unlock the power of the sentence from the text they were analyzing, Ellie asked a series of useful Text Dependent Questions. Here’s Orwell’s sentence:
“Again the animals seemed to remember that a resolution against this had been passed in the early days, and again Squealer was able to convince them this was not the case.”
And here are some of the questions Ellie asked about it after students had independently analyzed it in their written response:
- What word is repeated? Underline the phrases where you find that word.
- What do you notice about the structure of these (“Again the animals seemed to remember; again Squealer was able to convince them”) phrases?
- Why is “again” repeated?
- Let’s look carefully at the word “seemed.” What does that word mean? What does it imply Orwell use it?
- Why does Orwell include the phrase “in the early days?”
- Let’s look at this phrase: “And again Squealer was able to convince them that this was not the case” What do we learn from it? (Student responses: Squealer continues to justify Napoleon breaking the rules; Squealer was successful in tricking the animals)
- So if Orwell uses this to show us that Squealer was successful, what’s he showing us with the first half of the sentence?
With these questions (as well as others in the lesson) and the annotations Ellie required of her students, she provided them appropriate intermediate steps to the independent Close Reading they’ll do in HS and college. Her word /phrase level questions and her attention to structure help students unpack the meaning of the text and provide a framework for deeper analysis.
3) Intense Focus on a Short Excerpt: Through writing, discussion and revising (which I’ll describe shortly), Ellie’s students spent 15 minutes studying a single sentence from the text!
They repeated the process with just one other line from the text. The messages to Ellie’ students are powerful—both about how we read difficult and important texts as well as how intentionally authors craft their sentences.
4) Writing for Close Reading: In order to help her students analyze the Animal Farm excerpt, Ellie was strategic in the writing that she asked them to do. Her first writing task came immediately after their independent reading and annotation of the text and notably, before discussion! (Front the Writing) Their writing directly from the text happened on three levels:
- Annotation: Text mark up and margin notes to help them better understand the text
- Jotting notes: Students had a box for notes on motifs they observed and were asked to make note of a hypothesis about the central ideas/theme of the excerpt
- Open Ended Response: Longer response to refine their thinking from their notes and deeply analyze one key line that Ellie identified.
Ellie used writing as a tool to help students formulate ideas (they wrote to think) as well as a tool to refine those ideas in a deeper analytical response.
After the discussion (accompanied by a whole lot of annotating and note-taking), Ellie asked students to revise their response—but not the entire response, just their “argument statement.” I thought it was such a smart teacher move–a powerful way to make sure that students were refining their thinking and improving their writing quality, while allowing them to get back to the text relatively quickly.
5) Vocabulary: Ellie’s students were well equipped for quality discussions and writing because she constantly taught and reflected the meaning and nuance of words.
The Close Reading of Animal Farm was preceded by an analysis of Langston Hughes’ poem, “Children’s Rhymes” that students completed for their Do Now that was too impressive not to share (a warm up to her Close Reading if you will):
In the discussion, students effortlessly (and accurately) used words like allusion, hypocrisy, and uncertainty. It’s clear that this didn’t happen by accident; Ellie’s constant reinforcement of words and definitions through Call and Response, Drop it In definitions, and “refining” phrases with vocabulary upgrades has had a major impact. One of my favorite moments was when she spiraled back to a discussion that they’d had about Obama’s speech and asked about the rhetorical device “We the people, we the people…” A student responded “amplification and repetition,” and without skipping a beat she stretched it with “And that’s an allusion to what?” Such a rigorous, rich, and fast sequence!
In case you want to try your hand, here are some of Ellie’s lesson materials. Look for more in our forthcoming book, Reading Reconsidered.
