Scandinavians Seek Land, Students Seek Meaning

Goals for Today

Review curricular challengesAnd curricular supportsIn three key domains:

• Academic language• Perspective-taking• Complex reasoning

Why these domains?

• Relevance to reading comprehension and to academic writing– Science, math, social studies texts require

academic language skill– Literature and history texts require perspective-

taking– Understanding/producing the lines of argument

appropriate to science, social studies, and math requires complex reasoning skill

CCLS and Academic Language

• CCLS require extensive reading of challenging texts

• CCLS require analysis of claims and evidence• CCLS require sophisticated writing in which

arguments are explicitly articulated• All of this means students need to navigate

‘academic language’• And we need to predict where they might

struggle

Academic Language

• Much more than vocabulary• Actually, more than language• Includes a perspective on knowledge• Incorporates a new persona – the

authoritative voice

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

Read the entire passage and at your table…

• Mark the words your students might not know• Mark the sentences they might struggle with• Note some presupposed background

knowledge they are likely not to have

8 min

only!

WORD Sift is a free web-based tool that identifies general- and content-specific academic vocabulary. (wordsift.com)

General Academic Vocabulary Words from Scandinavia passage:restrictedeventuallyproportionregion

General Academic Vocabulary Words from Germany passage:achievedconflictculturetraditional

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

What is the antecedent?

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

What is the antecedent?

Coreference!

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

What is the antecedent?

Coreference!

Nonanimate subjects.

Scandinavians Seek Land

Public land in America was sold for $1.25 an acre, which lured thousands of Scandinavians. At first, their governments tried to keep them at home. A Swedish law of 1768 restricted the right to emigrate. But growing poverty in Scandinavia caused officials to cancel this law in 1840.

What is the antecedent?

Coreference!

Nonanimate subjects.

What is this?Who are they?

Scandinavians Seek Land, p 2

Scandinavian clergymen also tried to halt the emigration. At first, they warned their church members against leaving the homeland. Eventually, though, the preachers realized their words had little effect. Some of them even went to America themselves.

Scandinavians Seek Land, p 2

Scandinavian clergymen also tried to halt the emigration. At first, they warned their church members against leaving the homeland. Eventually, though, the preachers realized their words had little effect. Some of them even went to America themselves.

Why definite reference?

Scandinavians Seek Land, p 2

Scandinavian clergymen also tried to halt the emigration. At first, they warned their church members against leaving the homeland. Eventually, though, the preachers realized their words had little effect. Some of them even went to America themselves.

Why definite reference?

Coreference!

Scandinavians Seek Land, p 2

Scandinavian clergymen also tried to halt the emigration. At first, they warned their church members against leaving the homeland. Eventually, though, the preachers realized their words had little effect. Some of them even went to America themselves.

Why definite reference?

Coreference!

What is this? Why ‘even’?

Germans Pursue Economic Opportunity, p 1

Like the Scandinavians, many Germans moved to the Midwest. Germans especially liked Wisconsin because the climate allowed them to grow their traditional crop of oats. Some moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin because the Catholic bishop there was German. (In the 1800s, German Christian immigrants included both Catholics and Protestants.)

Germans Pursue Economic Opportunity, p 1

Like the Scandinavians, many Germans moved to the Midwest. Germans especially liked Wisconsin because the climate allowed them to grow their traditional crop of oats. Some moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin because the Catholic bishop there was German. (In the 1800s, German Christian immigrants included both Catholics and Protestants.)

Unlike the Scandinavians?

Germans Pursue Economic Opportunity, p 1

Like the Scandinavians, many Germans moved to the Midwest. Germans especially liked Wisconsin because the climate allowed them to grow their traditional crop of oats. Some moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin because the Catholic bishop there was German. (In the 1800s, German Christian immigrants included both Catholics and Protestants.)

Unlike the Scandinavians?

Aha, Germans are not Scandinavians!

Germans Pursue Economic Opportunity, p 1

Like the Scandinavians, many Germans moved to the Midwest. Germans especially liked Wisconsin because the climate allowed them to grow their traditional crop of oats. Some moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin because the Catholic bishop there was German. (In the 1800s, German Christian immigrants included both Catholics and Protestants.)

Unlike the Scandinavians?

Aha, Germans are not Scandinavians!

And what does this have to do with economic opportunity?

What does this have to do with Word Generation?

• Extremely engaging texts that display academic language

• Explicit teaching of academic vocabulary• Explicit teaching of academic language more broadly• Writing with academic language• Recurrent opportunities to practice academic

language in discussion/debate

Just wait and see!