Photo by Hemera

Being out in the field, talking to teachers and librarians about the Common Core (CC), I’ve learned as much as I’ve taught. My world is often centered in my study (where I research and write), or in the graduate classes that I teach, or in the K–12 classrooms that I visit. In those spaces, I’ve learned, secondhand, about students being told they can only read an “L” or an “R” book—and how parents have demanded that libraries rearrange their collections from A to Z, according to carefully determined reading levels, so their kids can read totally non-frustrating texts. But it took being at a workshop out on Long Island, NY, for me to really understand the fundamental clash between guided reading and Common Core—something that many of you doubtless experience daily.

At the workshop, librarians spoke of their schools being, in effect, taken over by guided reading crews with their alphabet soup of labels and rigid instructions. That type of approach made absolutely no sense to me, so I did my homework. I learned that guided reading began as a good idea: breaking classrooms into groups by reading levels didn’t work since poor readers didn’t improve when they were clumped together, so teachers needed a new way to match individual readers, reading levels, and texts. So far, so good. Indeed, as one reading expert told me, providing a space, say 20 to 30 minutes daily, where, as part of the reading diet, a learner experiences clear sailing seems at worst harmless and at best a step toward success.

But this relatively benign approach has turned into an expensive program complete with minatory reading coaches who run around mandating to librarians what kids should be allowed to read. The second problem is that the steroidal guided reading monster is directly at odds with the Common Core.

As literacy expert Timothy Shanahan pointed out in “The Common Core Ate My Baby and Other Urban Legends,” a recent article in Educational Leadership, limiting students to below-frustration texts doesn’t necessarily help them (see, especially, “Legend 4: Teachers Must Teach Students at Frustration Levels”) nor does CC require all kids to tackle weighty tomes far beyond their previous reading ranges. In the early grades, where students are working to become fluent readers, CC doesn’t demand that they read more complex texts. And it’s precisely in that preK-to-2 band that learners may need some reading time where they don’t have to struggle. And that brings us to content.

The key clash between guided reading and CC is that those A-to-Z labels have nothing to do with content—they are about the ease of decoding. Starting in earnest in second grade, CC stresses that knowledge is a key part of literacy. This cuts two ways. Every elementary school librarian knows that a student who’s passionate about a subject isn’t daunted by the text’s difficulty—the multi-syllabic names of dinosaurs being a prime example. Curiosity drives readers on from one record, one wacky fact, one sports stat, one set of rules on how to care for pets, to another—and the text’s length or structure isn’t a formidable barrier. In turn, the Common Core standards emphasize that in order to read a student must identify details that add up to evidence and tap into modes of thinking that add up to argument and point of view. You can’t build those muscles without what librarians used to call “stretch,” or challenging, books.

Whether young people are on a sports team or practice an instrument, whether they play Minecraft or chess, they realize that to be good at something you have to work at it; you have to test your limits. Reading works the same way: you build muscles through confronting and overcoming a challenge, and you’re drawn to that challenge because you have a specific goal. We in library land know of many reading goals that appeal to students—books they want to tackle because they find them engaging, interesting, and exciting. Common Core adds the goal of preparing students for a successful life after school. That is the sort of guided reading that makes sense to me.

Photo: Stockbyte

Fans of baseball, football, and basketball, you all have something in common: it’s easy for you to tell what team is on the field, which one is off of it, and when players are changing their roles from offense to defense. In baseball, of course, three outs and the team at-bat retreats into the dugout, picks up its mitts, and trots back onto the field. In football, there are many variations and tricks of the trade. For example, a “hurry-up” offense is designed to move so quickly that the defense doesn’t have time to substitute fresh players onto the field. But in general, the exchange of players in our nation’s major sports is a slow and stately process that’s based on principles that kids learn when they first begin playing a particular game. There’s one sport, though, that’s totally different from the others—and I suspect it has a lesson to teach those of us in library land.

Unlike other sports, in hockey, players “change on the fly.” That is, a coach signals a group of players to jump onto the ice even as the others are whizzing off—the exchange happens in the middle of a play, as the puck is speeding down the ice. Hockey is such an exhausting sport that players only last a few minutes playing at full tilt, so a coach is constantly deliberating over whom to put in while trying to outguess the other coach’s moves. It’s a speeded-up, live chess match on ice.

I’m put in mind of hockey because of some recent developments in digital publishing. We’ve long known that Overdrive offers libraries subscriptions, rather than full ownership of books. Now Amazon has gotten into the act, offering its Prime members (who pay an annual fee) an ebook subscription. It strikes me that collection development is similar to the easy ebb and flow of offense and defense that I first described. A librarian knows her collection, sees where she needs to add titles, and from time to time, weeds those titles that have outlived their usefulness. But subscriptions are more like hockey.

In the digital subscription world, a librarian isn’t expecting her collection to remain the same for any length of time. She subscribes according to her current needs, knowing that the materials she has made available to today’s patrons may significantly change in the near future. For instance, she wants the latest and greatest of, say, news and financial databases. But in a subscription model, the constant churning and turnover isn’t just a matter of adhering to the latest dateline. A librarian may gain, or lose, an entire chunk of her collection as her subscription funding comes and goes, or as publishers’ digital policies change, or as patrons’ favorite digital devices shift.

What if we embrace a library model that’s part baseball and part hockey? What would such an arrangement look like? Print books, and some databases, would move in and out of the library at a leisurely pace, similar to ballplayers taking and leaving the field between innings. But digital subscriptions would constantly change on the fly: with new materials in, the old out, and the librarian playing the role of a highly tactical hockey coach, constantly matching ever-changing needs to ever-evolving resources. If that’s the case, the question isn’t “What do you own?” it’s “What do you need this very second?”

I can imagine a two-sport library, but there’s one caution. As you hockey fans well know, there’s one thing that can stop the rapid change of lines: when the game itself stops. The NHL and its players spent much of 2012 embroiled in a battle over money, and as a result, the players lost more than half of the current season. The one real danger in a subscription model is that it could break down totally and publishers could turn to some completely different plan. Well, if that happens, then librarian-coaches will just have to change partners and dance—on the fly.

This list of tools and resources from SLJ staff, bloggers, and contributors will enrich your understanding of the national initiative to implement new standards of language arts, information literacy, and mathematics for grades K–12.

SLJ 3-Part Webcast Series: On Common Core

We kicked off a 3-part free webcast series last week on the on how the new Common Core education standards are impacting your library, your school, and your students. You still have time to register for the next session, Librarians, the Secret Weapon, being held on November 20. In these three (3) one-hour webcasts, library, literacy, and education experts from across the country will explore how to effectively implement this nationwide initiative.

All Aboard!: Implementing Common Core offers school librarians an opportunity to take the lead.
By Rebecca Hill

Understanding the Common Core State Standards : A review of John Kendall’s book, a primer on CCSS
By Alicia Eames

CCSS and us: a video Q&A with John Kendall
By Joyce Valenza

Librarian Creates Guide to the Common Core Standards 
By SLJ Staff

Editorials by SLJ  Editor-in-Chief, Rebecca T. Miller on Librarians and the Common Core

‘I Can Help You With That’: Providing solutions puts librarians at the center of Common Core | SLJ June 2012 Editorial

What Creativity Looks Like: Put a Bunch of Librarians in a Room, and Great Ideas Fly | Editorial
Entries from SLJ’s “On Common Core” column by various experts in the education and library fields

By Olga Nesi
The New Standards Dovetail Elegantly with Inquiry, and We Know Inquiry
The Question of Text Complexity: Reader and task trump traditional measures

By Paige Jaeger
Is a Picture Worth $2,500?: Understanding Facts Visually

By Melissa Jacobs-Israel
A Sticker Won’t Do the Job: We need appealing nonfiction that will engage students and build rigor
Making the Parent Connection

By Mary Ann Cappiello, Myra Zarnowski, and Marc Aronson
Cultivating Collaboration
Creating Community

Installments from Christopher Harris’s “The Next Big Thing” column

The End of Nonfiction: Common Core standards force us to rethink categorization
A Librarian’s Tricks for Finding Those ‘Complex Texts’ Cited in the Common Core
We Could Be Heroes: Research plus tech skills are a hot commodity
A Video Hosting Solution for Schools

Related entries from “Consider the Source” blog by author and educator Marc Aronson

The Problem with Common Core’s ‘Appendix B’
The Reign in Spain
The issues and questions raised by Common Core come up abroad as well.
Convergence
Discusses a set of books that looks at one moment in history from three different angles.
Shuffling Off to Buffalo
The role of the librarian in teaching students about “guided inquiry.”

Tools profiled in Joyce Valenza’s column, “Neverending Search”

New from AASL: Best Websites for Teaching and Learning
New Google Education Search Hub
You’re gonna want to share ShareMyLesson

Informational texts, novels, ideas, and websites that align with the Common Core

The Wild World of Steve Jenkins | An Author Study
By Barbara Auerbach

On the Radar—Top Picks from the Editors at Junior Library Guild: New Science Nonfiction Supports Common Core
By Deborah B. Ford

To Infinity and Beyond | New Sci-Fi Titles for Teens
By Joyce Adams Burner

Underneath the glitz of spaceships, extraterrestrials, and techno bling, these young adult sci-fi novels feature complex characters exploring the question of what it means to be human. Incorporate them into social studies, technology, and literature classes, and blast off into discussions touching on politics, culture, science, the environment. The possibilities are limitless!

Afghan Days, Afghan Dreams
By Daryl Grabarek

The resources are ideal for teachers looking to educate students about Afghanistan while also embracing the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

Kno Launches K–12 E-Textbooks, Geared Toward Parents, Home Use
By Kathy Ishizuka

Education software outfit Kno has partnered with publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt to offer interactive textbooks for K–12 students. The digital titles, which align with Common Core subjects, are available for $9.99 or less for a one-year rental.

At the Core: Audiobooks Promote Critical Reading Habits | Listen In
By Sharon Grover and Lizette Hannegan

Finding a Voice | Writers’ Guides
By Vicki Reutter
These three guides make the often daunting task of writing a little easier by instructing students how to write in a variety of genres, including journalism, poetry, humor, and more.

Libraries, Ebooks and Beyond: Library “Makers” Share How It’s Done
By The Digital Shift

Searching for some great ways to get kids hooked on creating digital content? Attendees at the October 17 Digital Shift event got some great tips from Wes Fryer, Melissa Techman, Liz Castro and Erin Daly, all participants in a panel on “Makers in the Library.”

Get Kids Designing with Student-Created Games | The Gaming Life
By Brian Mayer
A program that gives students a new avenue to display mastery-level understanding of the curriculum while incorporating 21st-century skills as well as the Common Core Standards.

What Is the Future of Reference?
By Henrietta Thornton-Verma

Christopher Harris, of New York’s Genesee Valley Educational Partnership, and Wendy Stephens, of New Market, Alabama’s Buckhorn High School led a spirited discussion of the merits of print vs. digital learning, the impact of those Common Core guidelines on publishers’ plans, and other timely and vexing topics.

News Bites: Support Common Core with a New Nonfiction Program from Scholastic
By Phyllis Levy Mandell

Wii Learn: Surprise elementary grade students with a fun way to learn math
By Matthew C. Winner and Meghan Hearn

Viewing the video game console through the eyes of an educator opens up a world of mathematical applications through which students can master concepts, teachers can align with the Common Core Standards, and classrooms can reflect students’ experiences and interests.

Common Core in the news:

Romney Doesn’t Support Fed Dollars for Common Core
By Rocco Staino

Study: Teacher Support for Common Core Standards Growing; Public Awareness Still Lags
By Debra Lau Whelan

Kentucky First to Adopt Common Core State Standards Initiative
By Lauren Barack

Watch Steve Jenkins in his studio »»»

The idea came to me last fall as I sat in a high school auditorium in Brooklyn, New York listening to award-winning author Marc Aronson address a group of school librarians on the Common Core and its emphasis on nonfiction—not the “safely bland” texts that so many teachers seem to favor for their brevity or simplicity, but well-crafted “literary” nonfiction that engages and offers a point of view. He explained that as information specialists it was our job to provide teachers with the resources they would need to support this new curriculum.

I started thinking about my nonfiction collection and all of the authors that embody the qualities Aronson had described. How could I sell these more complex, nonfiction picture books to the teachers and students I served? Traditionally, elementary author studies invoked names such as Eric Carle, Leo Lionni, or Patricia Polacco. Why not broaden the practice to include nonfiction writers with a significant body of work? Since most teachers at my school tend to assign animal research reports to introduce nonfiction, I chose Steve Jenkins for my first nonfiction author study—a writer whose books can be found in most classrooms and libraries.

Not unlike Leo Lionni, Jenkins grew up with a menagerie at home—lizards, mice, insects—“My father was a scientist and encouraged my interest in the natural world.” Jenkins also loved to draw and paint; his signature cut-and-torn paper collages make his books easily identifiable to young readers. The author collects handmade papers from around the world, and even makes his own. He has written and/or illustrated dozens of award-winning books, many with his wife, Robin Page.

While the average Lexile level of his books falls in the mid-800s—around a 4th grade level—the copious illustrations and clear, straightforward text make them accessible to students in the 2nd and 3rd grades as well. In addition, many titles offer “…two levels of text, one that can be managed by a beginning reader and a second that can be read by a more proficient reader, or aloud, by an adult if a younger child is interested in finding out more.” Teaching vocabulary and assigning and modeling clearly defined tasks render the texts even more accessible. Visit Jenkins’s website for biographical information, a gallery of his work, and an excellent slideshow titled “Making Books.”

Prehistoric Actual Size (Houghton Mifflin, 2005) presents young readers with striking images of 18 creatures. Single- and double-page spreads, including two dramatic gatefolds, portray all or part of the animal, depending on its true size. Images include one or two sentences about the creature along with information about when it lived and its length in standard and metric measure. One or two paragraphs with a small picture of the complete animal appear at the back.

Introduce the book by passing around a variety of small plastic dinosaurs for students to examine and identify. Explain that these toys do not represent the relative or actual size of these prehistoric creatures. Ask students how we know the size of animals that no longer exist (vocabulary: archaeologist, fossil, skeleton). Read the book, ask “What did you notice? Turn and talk to your neighbor about something that surprised you…Why do you think the illustrator sometimes shows only part of the animal?”

As a follow-up activity, groups of students can choose one animal from the book to research. With a roll of brown kraft paper, they might like to sketch and color the entire animal or an impressive part …actual size. They can label their drawings with the creature’s name and measure and add a short description of when and where it lived, what it ate, and any other facts they would like to include.

Though dinosaurs are gone forever, Almost Gone: The World’s Rarest Animals (HarperCollins, 2006) introduces the concept of endangered species. Single- or double-page spreads offer a textured collage of the animal accompanied by its name, where it lives, and the number left—from as few as one (the Abington Island tortoise) to nearly 500 (Bactrian camel). A large-print paragraph describes the species and what threatens its survival. An introduction explains the consequences of extinction: “Every living thing is connected to many other living things, often in ways we don’t understand or even suspect. And once an animal or plant is gone, it can never come back. All the living things that interact with it will never be the same….”

Before reading the book, have students name one animal that is extinct. Introduce vocabulary such as  “endangered” and “rare.” Ask the class why they think a species becomes endangered. Present a short slideshow of photographs of some of the animals mentioned in the book such as the California condor, Yangtze River dolphin, or Miami blue butterfly. Explain that these species are headed toward extinction like the dinosaurs. As you read, ask students to record at least one cause of endangerment in their notebooks or on a post-it; create a list of these causes including items such as overhunting, loss of habitat, pollution, etc. Query  students about how we can protect animals and why it is important to do so.

Living Color (Houghton Mifflin, 2007) explores the vibrant hues of the animal kingdom. The introduction explains that, “If an animal is very colorful, it is likely that its brilliant skin, scales, or feathers somehow help it stay alive.” Each color is allotted one or two full spreads with five to seven monochromatic images of creatures with a paragraph about each. As there are two levels of text here, teachers can read the simpler, more provocative text to prompt discussion. “Blue says …Don’t touch! Look at me! Don’t eat me…I’m here to help. I’m a mystery. Now you see me, now you don’t.”

Children can guess what each message means. Back matter thumbnail illustrations of each animal accompany information about size, habitat, diet, and more. Introduce the book by asking students their favorite color. Challenge them to think of an animal that is that color. After sharing the simple text, divide the class into seven groups: red, blue, green, yellow, orange, purple, and pink). Each group is responsible for reading and reporting on the different ways their color helps animals survive. Watch the video “Steve Jenkins on creating Living Color” on TeachingBooks.net. In their color groups, have each student choose an animal and create a collage illustration in the way that Jenkins does. Include a caption with the creature’s name and what purpose its color serves. Your bulletin board will be a rainbow of the natural world.

In I See a Kookaburra!: Discovering Animal Habitats Around the World (Houghton Mifflin, 2005) Jenkins and co-author Robin Page introduce children to six habitats. They explain that living things “…thrive in all these habitats because, over many generations, animals adapt. They change their size, shape, and habits to fit different conditions.”

Each environment considered opens with an “I Spy” spread featuring eight partially hidden animals. “In the desert I see…” Students can first locate the living things on the page and describe what they see using adjectives and prepositions: “I see an orange-and black-striped creature hiding behind some rocks and cactus on the right.” Have children guess what the animal might be. Then turn the page to view each one featured with its name and a descriptive phrase such as “…a stinging anemone hitching a ride.”

More details about each creature are available at the back of the book. Divide students into six groups and assign each a different habitat. Have them create a group mural with each student responsible for drawing or creating a paper collage representation of one animal from the designated locale. They can write a brief riddle to help viewers identify each species: “Though I am only two or three inches long, my big red eyes scare off predators. I like to hop from tree to tree. Can you find me?”

Another husband-wife collaboration, sisters & brothers (Houghton Mifflin, 2008), examines animal siblings. Once again there are two levels of text: a header or footer offers a word or phrase that characterizes the relationship such as “quadruplets,” “sibling rivalry,” or “stepsisters and stepbrothers.”

Bold images of the young animals pop against the white background of the pages. The short cryptic captions in large print such as “Exactly alike,” “Girls rule!,” “I’m having my family for dinner…,” or “Friends for life” are great conversation starters. Before reading the book aloud ask youngsters, “How many brothers or sisters or cousins do you live with? How do you get along? Turn and talk to your neighbor about something you enjoy doing together and something you fight about.” Introduce the word “sibling” and explain that animals have brothers and sisters too—sometimes just one and sometimes thousands! After reading the book, have students work with a partner or in a group to either write or improvise a skit about animal siblings that captures and reveals their special relationship. Beforehand, distribute the longer explanation that also appears on each spread. They can make masks or puppets to enhance their skits.

Jenkins says, “I believe we should teach science as a process…not just a collection of facts. It’s a tool that allows children to test their own theories and to trust their own conclusions.” This is just what the Common Core dictates; children need to learn to think for themselves and process new ideas, not simply to summarize them. The books and activities mentioned above do just that.

Many of the ELA reading, writing, speaking and listening standards for K-5 informational texts are incorporated into the lessons described. The titles and activities suggested above reference the following Common Core State Standards:

RI.2.1 Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text.
RI.2.6 Identify the main purpose of a text, including what the author wants to answer, explain, or describe.
W. 2.2 Write informative/explanatory texts in which they introduce a topic, use facts and definitions to develop points, and provide a concluding statement or section.
W. 2.7  Participate in shared research and writing projects.
SL. 2.2 Recount or describe key ideas or details from a text read aloud.
RI. 3.5 Use text features and search tools (e.g., keywords, sidebars, hyperlinks) to locate information relevant to a given topic efficiently.
RI. 3.7 Use information gained from illustrations…and the words in a text to demonstrate understanding of the text.
W. 3.1 Write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting appoint of view with reasons.

Related TeachingBooks.net resources »»»

Watch Steve Jenkins in his studio »»»

Las Ramblas in Barcelona, Spain. Photo by Oh-Barcelona.com

I’m writing this piece from Barcelona, an ocean away from American public education and our Common Core (CC) standards. And yet all around me, I see connections rather than differences.

Barcelona was built as a Roman walled city, and added more walls down through much of the 1800s. Throughout those 1,800 years, walls defined and protected the city. But in the late-19th century, the walls were torn down and a new city began to spring up—a city where the fortunes that were made in the textile mills sponsored artists such as Antoni Gaudi, whose buildings are a marvel to this very day. And now Barcelona is almost too open to the world: it’s become the fourth most-visited city in Europe, trailing only London, Rome, and Paris. Being here in August, when many locals leave on vacation, exaggerates the presence of tourists, but walking down Las Ramblas—the vast, outdoor pedestrian mall—you’re mobbed by everyone from everywhere—and that’s only part of the internationalization that’s happened.

What was it—40 years ago?—when the formerly Italian, Greek, and Jewish fruit stands and delis in New York City were all run by Koreans? Then 20 years ago, the Koreans began to hire Mexicans, and now some Indians have joined them. Here in Barcelona, these businesses are run by South Asians—New York is the world and the world is New York. Opening out to the world has lead Barcelona in two opposite and familiar directions. Those who could join the global bandwagon did very well for a while, less so now that Spain is struggling economically, but they’re still doing OK. Those who were less fortunate were left behind and they’ve become poorer and poorer. The city veers between being open-minded on the one hand, and inward-turning and Catalan nationalist on the other.

Thinking of how to prepare for the future, the city has decided to focus K–12 education on training and inspiring students to become innovators, creating with an eye on the whole world. In other words, Barcelona faces the same challenges and offers the same types of solutions we do. We, too, are wide open to the world, with a gap between those for whom this is an opportunity and those for whom it is a growing threat. We, too, see both intermarriage and narrow nationalism growing.

We, too, are trying to prepare our young people to become problem solvers—that’s the essence of CC. My vision is that our students should be working digitally with their peers here in Spain—and also with those in Amsterdam, Paris, London, Delhi, Tel Aviv, and beyond. If we face the same international moment, let’s meet it as an international educational opportunity. Breaking down the walls of our schools may bring us our own new global Gaudi.