This document discusses strategies for teaching students to comprehend informational texts, as required by the Common Core State Standards. It emphasizes increasing students' exposure to informational texts and teaching them text structures, such as compare/contrast, and elements, like author's purpose and main ideas. High impact methods are recommended, like explicit instruction, building vocabulary, and having students summarize within and between texts. Graphic organizers can help students learn about content topics. The overall goal is to help students develop familiarity and skill with informational texts.

1. Read for Real
High Impact Teaching
Using Informational
Text
Barbara A. Marinak, PhD
Mount St. Mary’s University
barbara.marinak@gmail.com

2. Pedagogical Shift
•IDEA 2004 and the CCSS are
suggesting a major shift in
how we approach reading
instruction for all students.

3. Closer Look at CCSS
•Expectations of CCSS
•Impact on core reading
instruction
•Impact on intervention

4. Purpose
• State-led effort coordinated by the National
Governors Association Center for Best
Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of
Chief State School Officers (CCSSO).
• Developed in collaboration with teachers,
school administrators, and experts, to provide
a clear and consistent framework to prepare
our children for college and the workforce.

5. Purpose
• Are aligned with college and work
expectations
• Are clear, understandable and consistent
• Include rigorous content and application of
knowledge through high-order skills
• Are evidence-based

6. English Language Arts
• Establish a “staircase” of increasing
complexity in what students must
be able to read and comprehend in
order to be prepared for the
demands of college and career.

7. English Language Arts
• Reading: Literature and Informational Text
• Writing
• Speaking and Listening
• Language
• Media and Technology
• Range, Quality and Complexity
• Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and
Technical Subjects

8. English Language Arts
• By reading a diverse array of classic and
contemporary literature as well as challenging
informational texts in a range of subjects,
students are expected to build knowledge,
gain insights, explore possibilities, and
broaden their perspective.

9. Informational Text
• Refer to details and examples in a text when
explaining what the text says explicitly and when
drawing inferences from the text.
• Describe the overall structure (e.g., chronology,
comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution) of
events, ideas, concepts, or information in a text or
part of a text.

10. Informational Text
• Compare and contrast a firsthand and secondhand
account of the same event or topic; describe the
differences in focus and the information provided.
• Interpret information presented visually, orally, or
quantitatively (e.g., in charts, graphs, diagrams, time
lines, animations, or interactive elements on Web
pages) and explain how the information contributes
to an understanding of the text in which it appears.

11. Informational Text
• Analyze how two or more texts address similar
themes or topics in order to build knowledge
or to compare the approaches the authors
take.

12. Informational Text
• Determine the main idea of a text and explain
how it is supported by key details; summarize
the text.

13. Impact on Core and
Intervention
• Read deeply and widely from a truly
balanced collection
• Read regularly within in and between
text
• Regular written responding within and
between text

14. Fiction Heavy…Why?
•Perception of difficulty
•Perception of interests
•Perception of turf

15. Result?

16. Informational Text Imperative
• Significantly increase the amount of
informational text students access
• Increase the diversity of informational
text
• Select mentor texts that allow multiple
core standards to be taught
• Teach informational text using high
impact methods

17. High Impact Methods
•Explicit
•Evidence-based
•Portable
•Promote transference

18. So now what?

19. Critical Considerations
• Read within and between text
• Vocabulary
• Compare and Contrast
• Summarization

20. Photo Documentaries:
Within Text

21. Photo Documentaries:
Within and Between Text

22. Between Text and
Website

23. Pay Attention to Words!
• Frontload vocabulary
• Assess vocabulary knowledge

24. Text Impression
Antarctic

25. Text Impression
Antarctic
African

26. Text Impression
Antarctic
African
one

27. Text Impression
Antarctic
African
one
rookery

28. Text Impression
Antarctic
African
one
rookery
herd

29. • Group on land is a waddle or colony
• Nesting group is a rookery
• A group of babies is a crèche
• A group in the water is a raft

30. Text Impression
Antarctic
African
one
rookery
herd
kindergarten

32. Let’s try a Text
Impression!

33. Teach Features of Text!
• Structural Grammars

34. Elements of Fiction
 Characters: The living beings in stories, plays, and poems that speak, think,
and carry out the action. A character can be a person, animal or a
personified object
 Setting: When and where the story occurs.
 Problem: The conflict or goal around which the story is organized.
 Events: One or more attempts by the main character(s) to achieve the goal
or solve the problem.
 Resolution: The outcome of the attempts to achieve the goal or solve the
problem.
 Theme: The main idea or moral of the story.

35. Research Findings
• Studies also indicate that children become aware of
and are comfortable with narrative story structure
(characters, setting, problem, events, solution) at an
early age. In other words, due to narrative reading
practice and instruction in story grammar, fiction text
becomes “predictable” (Williams, 2005).

36. • It is just as important that informational reading
practice be increased and that students become aware
of and comfortable with the “predictable” elements
and text structures that occur across informational text
(Marinak & Gambrell, 2007).

37. Informational Grammar
Just as there is a narrative story grammar,
there is also an “informational grammar”
(Marinak & Gambrell, 2007).

38. Five Text Elements of
Informational Grammar
• Author’s Purpose
• Major Ideas
• Supporting Details
• Aids
• Important Vocabulary
(Marinak, Moore, & Henk, 1998)

39. Teach the Text Structures
• Hall, Sabey, and McClellan (2005) and
Williams (2005) found that text structure
instruction promotes informational text
comprehension.
• Text structure awareness has also been
linked to accurate recall and retelling
(Richgels, McGee, Lomax & Sheard,1987).

40. Big Five Text Structures
• Enumeration
• Time Order
• Compare & Contrast*
• Problem/Solution
• Cause & Effect
(Hall, Sabey & McClellan, 2005; Neufeld, 2005; Richgels,
McGee, Lomax & Sheard,1987; Williams, 2005)

41. Compare and Contrast
• Text Map

42. Knowledge of Content
Graphic Organizers
• A small cadre of graphic organizers and/or text
maps should be used carefully
• Should be discipline-specific
• Should always be purposeful…discussion, writing,
etc.

49. Compare/Contrast
Giraffe Emperor Penguin
Supporting Details Attributes Supporting Details
Africa Live Antarctica
One Number of Babies One
Live Type of Birth Egg
Kindergarten Protection of Young Kindergarten

50. Compare/Contrast Summary
We can compare and contrast giraffes and Emperor
penguins. Giraffes live in Africa but Emperor
penguins live in Antarctica. Giraffes have live births.
Emperor penguins lay eggs. Both giraffes and
Emperor penguins have one baby at a time. Giraffes
and Emperor penguins are similar in how they
protect their young. These two animals place their
babies in kindergartens.

51. Compare/Contrast
Giraffe Emperor Penguin
Supporting Details Attributes Supporting Details
Africa
Number of Babies
Kindergarten

54. Anaconda Reticulated African Indian Python Boa
Attributes Python Python Constrictor
Where do they live?
How do they have
babies?
What do they look
like?
How do they catch
their prey?

55. Summarization
• Summarization is the process of restating the
essence of text or an experience in as few
words as possible or in a new, yet efficient,
manner.
• In order to summarize, the student must be
able to process the ideas of the passage and
consider how they are related to one another.

56. Summarization
• Authors structure text in a variety of ways
based on content and topic.
• Many studies indicate that teaching students
to identify text structure and clarifying
important information leads to more effective
summarization.

58. I-Search

59. Response Heuristic
The Response Heuristic asks students to react
to the following three-part format:
2. Text perceptions
3. Reactions to the text
4. Associations with the text

60. Marian Anderson

61. Response Heuristic
• Text Perception: is a summary statement about
important information from the text.
On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939 Marian Anderson sang to a
crowd of 75,000 people on the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial. She sang at the Lincoln Memorial because the
DAR had a "whites only” rule at Constitution Hall.

62. • Reactions to Text: are evaluative statements that ask
students to express their opinion about the text.
I was outraged when I read this book. I had no idea
that the Daughters of the American Revolution
prohibited this great singer from performing at
Constitution Hall.

63. • Associations with the text: are higher level
evaluations that require students to associate
information with their own prior knowledge or
associate current reading with past readings.
It is now clear why Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his
“I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial. Amazing that Dr. King’s speech didn't happen
until August 28,1963!

64. On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939 Marian Anderson
sang to a crowd of 75,000 people on the steps of the
Lincoln Memorial. She sang at the Lincoln Memorial
because the DAR had a “whites only” rule at
Constitution Hall. I was outraged when I read this
book. I had no idea that that the Daughters of the
American Revolution prohibited this great singer
from performing at Constitution Hall. It is now clear
why Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have A
Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
Amazing that Dr. King’s speech didn't happen until
August 28, 1963!

65. Good teaching is forever being on the cutting
edge of a child’s competence.
Jerome Bruner