ELA Resources for Text Sets

Resources for Text Sets

Building Background Knowledge About Text Sets

• Text Set Project: Building Knowledge and Vocabulary - This professional development module from Student Achievement Partners focuses on the Text Set Project: Designing and Integrating Expert Packs. The training is for teachers, those who support teachers, librarians, and media specialists to build understanding and experience with Common Core State Standards (CCSS)-aligned instruction and materials. Within the module, there are materials, activities and discussions to enable participants to begin creating and using Expert Packs to support students in building knowledge, vocabulary and the capacity to read independently. (achievethecore.org)
• Text Sets, Deep Learning and the Common Core by Jean Donham - This informational article describes the integral role of text sets in meeting the expectations of the Common Core for deep learning. (posted on academia.edu, originally published in the School Library Monthly)
• "Text Sets: Your Chance to Lead the Common Core" by Marc Aaronson - This blog provides a rationale for implementing text sets that support Common Core Standards. (School Library Journal, 5 Feb. 2014. Web. 26 May 2014)
• "Creating Cross-Curricular Text Sets for the Middle Grades" by Amanda Wall - This blog shares the process for creating cross curricula text sets; it also includes samples of middle school text sets. (Middleweb, April 20, 2014)

Sample Text Sets

• Newsela’s Text Sets -There are several categories: Featured Text Sets, Spanish Text Sets, Text Sets for both literature and Social Studies, and News from Around the World.  (newsela.com) 
• Go Girl! – Women’s History All Year Long - This Text Set created by Debra Rook for Newsela explores stories of women who have made important advancements. Included with the texts are discussion questions concerning identity, diversity, justice, and action. (newsela.com)
• Research Packs/Expert Packs: Building Knowledge and Vocabulary - This website provides targeted grade level text sets on various topics. Materials include graphic organizers and writing scaffolds to support students in acquiring, organizing, and using their new vocabulary and knowledge. A sampling of titles includes, “A History of Toys”, “How Movies and T.V. Programs Are Made”, “The Internet: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow,” and “Life During the Great Depression.” (achievethecore.org)  
• The Learning Network: Teaching and Learning with the New York Times—Text-to-Text passages with corresponding lessons for grades 9-12 can be found on this site. (learning.blogs.nytimes.com)
  • Text to Text "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "History of Lynchings in the South Documents Nearly 4,000 Names"
• K-12 Poetry and Question Sets – instill a love of poetry and improve comprehension. (readworks.org) 
• “The Long & Winding Road to Women’s Rights” by Susan Curtis - The resource collection on this topic includes a variety of primary source materials including photographs, videos, and museum links. (Middleweb, February 20, 2015)
• “Black History Past & Present” by Susan Curtis - The resource collection on this topic includes a variety of primary source materials including photographs, videos, and museum links. (Middleweb, January 23, 2015)
• Grade 4: “Yang the Eldest and His Odd Jobs” and “Out of the Dust” - This mini-assessment is intended to inform instruction about a student’s ability to engage in the close reading of two complex texts (one in prose and one in poetry) in order to demonstrate deep understanding. (achievethecore.org)
• Grade 4: “What’s a Dig?” and “What’s a Midden?” by David White - This mini-assessment is intended to inform instruction about a student’s ability to engage in the close reading of two complex texts on a topic (basic archaeology) in order to demonstrate deep understanding. (achievethecore.org)
• Grade 5:  Analyzing Poetry: Imagery & Emotions - In this video, as part of their Harlem Renaissance unit, a class compares and contrasts two Langston Hughes poems, “Harlem (A Dream Deferred)” and “Dreams”. Throughout the lesson, students deepen their understanding in line-by-line close readings, discussions, and quick writes in various classroom settings. In a culminating activity, small groups work together to create (and then to  share to with the class) a collage that reflects the emotions and meaning of one of the poems. (teaching channel.org)
• Grade 5: “Who was Marco Polo?” by Joan Holub and “The Adventure of Marco Polo” by Russell Freedman - This mini-assessment is intended to inform instruction about a student’s ability to engage in the close reading of two complex non-fiction text excerpts on the same subject to demonstrate deep understanding. (achievethecore.org)
• Grades 9-12: Text-to-Text "To Kill A Mockingbird" and History of Lynchings in the South Documents Nearly 4,000 Names" by Laura Tavares, April 2, 2015.  This recent article situates an excerpt from the novel in its historical context and also raises important questions about race, justice and memory in our society today. (learning.blogs.nytimes.com)

Resources for Educators to Develop Classroom Text Sets

• Bookshare—This site provides access to reading materials and supports for people with print disabilities. It is a free service for all qualified U.S. students who cannot read traditional print books because of a visual impairment, physical disability or severe learning disability. (Beneficent Technology, Inc. with sponsorship by the U.S. Department of Education)
• Brand New Reading Passages for Grades 3-12 –Reading passages and question sets, both informational and literary to help build students’ background knowledge and vocabulary and improve their reading comprehension. (readworks.org)
• K-12 Articles about Exploration (readworks.org)
• Tween Tribune – This news website by the Smithsonian provides daily news articles for students. Articles are selected by professional journalists working in collaboration with teachers and students. As a Smithsonian resource, it has a plethora of science and history focused articles. There are also articles in Spanish, different lexile levels, technology, a junior version for grades K-4 and more. (tweentribune.com)
• CommonLit—A Blog for Innovative Educators. (commonlit.org)
• Teaching Kids News—This site produces kid-friendly news articles that are appropriate for grades 2 to 8. Activities make vocabulary accessible, give a context for each news story, and encourage students to think critically—not only about the story itself, but about the journalist’s possible bias and/or how the story could be written differently by another journalist.  (teachingkidsnews.com)
• Primary Source Sets - These primary source sets, organized by topic by the Library of Congress, include speeches, videos, photos, film footage, federal government reports, cartoons, maps and more.  This resource provides easy access to relevant primary source material for educators as they build lessons around a particular topic. (loc.gov)
• Lit2Go—This free online audio collection of stories and poems provides: an abstract, citation, playing time, and word count for each of the passages. Many of the passages also have a related reading strategy identified. Each reading passage can also be downloaded as a PDF and printed for use as a read-along or as supplemental reading material for classroom use. (Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education, University of South Florida)
• The Classroom Bookshelf—This blog reviews the most recent works of children and young adult literature. Each entry includes three sections: book review, teaching invitations, and further explorations. (theclassroombookshelf.com/)
• Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC)—This website provides original booklists created by the CCBC professional staff on a wide range of themes and topics, including those specifically aligned with the Common Core Standards. (School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison)
• Education Lesson Planning Resources: Text Sets—This site provides information and resources to help educators create text sets. (Milne Library, State University of NY at Genesco)
• Storyline Online—This site features celebrated actors reading popular stories aloud. (sponsored by the Entertainment Industry Foundation)
• American Literature—This online collection of texts includes short stories, classic literature, Shakespeare, children's stories, poems, speeches and essays. (americanliterature.com)
• Open Culture—Over 700 free cultural eBooks and audio books for iPad, Kindle& other devices can be found at this site.  (openculture.com)
• Bartleby: Great Books Online—This site provides unlimited access to books and information on the web, free of charge.  (bartleby.com)
• Project Gutenberg—This site offers over 46,000 free ebooks that can be downloaded or read online. (gutenberg.org)
• Poetry Foundation—This site provides an online collection of poetry. (poetryfoundation.org)