Charting a Text

As students move through secondary education and into college, they will be expected to account for the main ideas in a text and articulate how those ideas are constructed. Since charting requires careful reading and a deep analysis of what the author is doing, students can speak or write about a text with greater insight and sophistication.

Charting helps with writing too. Students can analyze a writer's decisions and mimic those academic moves (like introducing sources, interpreting data, or describing a process) in their own writing. "Charting a Text" is an excellent strategy to teach our students because it helps them become better readers and writers.

Assessing the Skill

When assessing students' knowledge of "Charting a Text," teachers could...

• use a rubric to grade how students have charted their texts. (A strategy rubric can be found under the "Resources" tab).
• assess verbally what students' know about the strategy.
• ask students to share the verbs they used to describe what the author is doing in each paragraph.
• collect students' "Charting Tables" and assess their charting statements. If students chart in the margins, have them turn in their texts so that their charting statements can be assessed.
• have students complete a Rhetorical Precis (an argument summary) to assess if students have accurately analyzed the writer's choices. A Rhetorical Precis has four parts: (1) an introduction to the text and the author; (2) a summary of the argument or main ideas in the text; (3) a concise description of the major rhetorical or structural features; and (4) a brief analysis of the author's purpose for writing the text.

Assessing Content Knowledge

If we are going to invest time teaching reading strategies, we should have some idea of how the reading strategy is improving students' comprehension of a text. When assessing students' knowledge of the content, teachers could...

• develop a short series of multiple choice questions that assess students' knowledge of the content. The questions should focus on the reading purpose (or task).
• craft short answer prompts that ask students to articulate--in writing--their knowledge of the content. Short answer prompts should also focus on the reading purpose.
• engage students in a formal conversation like a Socratic seminar, assessing students' knowledge through verbal performance.
• assign a brief, one page paper that asks students to account for the name of the source, relevant source information, main ideas in the text, author's purpose, and his or her intended audience.

Developing a Reading Purpose

If we want our students to analyze the structure of a text, we should develop reading purposes or writing prompts that direct students to do this type of work. For example, in social science, a teacher might want his or her students to analyze how a particular section in the textbook is constructed. The teacher has realized that knowing the structure of the reading will help students comprehend more of the material. For this reading assignment, a teacher might use the following reading purpose.

Read Section 3.1 in your textbook. While reading, write a brief summary for each section. Then, go back through the text and analyze how the section is structured. While charting the section, think about what the section does first, second, and third. How does each subsection relate to the other? What impact does the structure have on the overall meaning or message of the section?

When students are given a purpose for reading, they reach higher levels of success and engagement.

Selecting a Text

Before selecting a text, teachers should read it carefully in order to see what it has to offer. Ultimately, we want to choose a text that lends itself well to the teaching of a particular strategy. In this case, we want to select a text that can be charted. Specifically, we want a text that offers a clear structure that students can analyze. The author's decisions should also be clear. Students should be able to distinguish from one paragraph to the next what the author is doing. Selecting the right text will make teaching this strategy much easier.

Pacing and Supporting the Lesson

• Pre-select charting verbs (available below) that work with the paragraphs in the text. Reducing the amount of verbs that students have to choose from is a great way to support students, ensuring their success.
• Using a document camera, chart paragraphs or sections of text with the whole class.
• Allow students to work together and talk about their charting statements.
• Create opportunities for students to chart in pairs. Charting in small groups can work, too.
• Walk around the classroom while students are reading, rereading, and charting. Assist students who are struggling and focus those who are distracted.
• Give students ample time for a reading task.
• Check-in often. Assess what they know and what they still need to learn.
• Collect students' texts and assess their charting statements. The result of these assessments should guide and drive our instruction.
• Students should rehearse "Charting a Text" all year with various types of texts and structures.
• Reading instruction should be done in class. Expecting students to learn this skill at home is unreasonable.

Learning the Skill

When introducing "Charting a Text," consider the following approaches.

• Use the "Strategy Slides" below to introduce the strategy.
• Use a document camera or overhead projector to model how to analyze and chart individual paragraphs. Help students understand the thinking behind your charting statements.
• Hand out the "Charting Verbs" list (see below) and ask students to refer to the list as they chart paragraphs.
• Explain the importance of the strategy. Students need to know why they are charting texts.
• Assign specific paragraphs for students to chart, reducing the amount of material they have to reread and analyze.
• Model for students how to write charting statements in the margins of the text.
• Have students use the "Charting Table" (see below) as they learn how to analyze the choices writers make.
• Develop text-specific verb lists that students can use to chart the texts they are reading.

Developing the Skill

When deepening students' understanding of the skill, consider the following approaches.

• Have students chart paragraphs in pairs, transfering the skill from teacher to students.
• Ask students to write about or discuss their charting statements.
• Have students share their charting statements with students in the class.

Mastering the Skill

Mastery of any skill takes time, lots of practice, and a solid understanding of the strategy Consider applying some of the following approaches when developing students' mastery of "Charting a Text."

• Ask students to independently chart a text with little to no support.
• Ask students how they would use the skill in their other classes.
• Have students chunk paragraphs that do similar work. Sometimes, authors will use multiple paragraphs to communicate an idea. If the author is "doing" the same type of work (i.e., interpreting data, sharing an anecdote, or making a claim) in a number of paragraphs, students should group (or chunk) these paragraphs and describe what these paragraphs are doing, collectively.
• Teach students how to utlize this strategy when taking state and local exams.

School Wide

In order to make a strategy transferable through a department and across a school, the name of the strategy must stay the same and it must be implemented and talked about in the same way. Although reading purposes may change from class to class, unit to unit, the work behind a strategy must be predictable and consistent for our students. When a set of effective literacy strategies are implemented throughout the school day, students gain a deep knowledge of how to use the strategy, when to use it, and most importantly, why to use it. The goal for school-wide literacy, therefore, is to develop students' mastery of a select set of strategies so that they can independently and strategically employ them in rigorous academic and professional environments.

English Description

In the English classroom, analyzing text structure is not a new concept. When reading poems for example, we teach our students to analyze stanzas or sections in a poem and ask them what the poet is doing. And while reading fiction, we ask our students to think about plot structure and how time and sequence impacts the story. While many of us might feel comfortable analyzing structural features in the literature we ask our students to read, we must also teach our students how to analyze non-fiction in the same way. We should teach our students how to chart individual paragraphs in essays, articles, or speeches. Students need practice studying how writers construct meaning through language and organization. Students can use the "Charting a Text" strategy for almost all of the reading assignments in the English classroom. Let's show them how.

Math Description

Publishers of math textbooks make deliberate decisions about text features, reading aids, and overall layout. Students can use the "Charting a Text" strategy to analyze how each unit or section is constructed. Why is this important? Consider the following example.

Chapter 2 begins with unit objectives. Then it defines key terms. Before each exercise, sample problems are provided.

If students can articulate what the chapter does, they will have a better idea of how to use the textbook. A second benefit to charting a math textbook is the deep reading that the strategy requires. In order to describe what the chapter does, students have to read and reread sections of the text and analyze the purpose of each text feature. When students engage in careful reading, they think more critically about the words and concepts in a chapter.

Science Description

Like lab reports, science textbooks organize ideas in very specific ways. We can use the "Charting a Text" strategy to chart the organization of each chapter or section. This type of deep reading will support students' learning of the concepts in the chapter while helping them make connections from one section of the book to another.

One option is to assign specific paragraphs or sections for students to read. For each section assigned, have students summarize the main ideas and describe what each section is doing. Students should use the "Charting a Text: Organizer" to help them organize their charting statements.

Social Science Description

In social science, students are exposed to two types of non-fiction texts: textbooks and primary documents. "Charting a Text" can help students make sense of our challenging textbooks while giving students a tool that they can use to analyze the writings of various historical figures.

When charting a textbook, have students look for organizational clues in the introduction to the chapter. These clues can provide a "road map" for our students as they work through the text. As they read sections of a chapter, have them summarize the main ideas and account for what each section is doing. The "Charting a Text: Organizer" can help students manage their charting statements.

While reading primary documents, students can chart individual paragraphs. The can write their summary sentences and charting statements in the margin of the text or they can use the charting organizer provided below.

Standardized Exams Description