One of the toughest tasks we face as teachers, especially teachers of English, is to show kids how to read complex texts, texts with words way, way above their pay grade. This is true in any subject, really--for example, have you ever actually tried to read the full text of the Declaration of Independence? Here's a taste, in case it has been awhile and you have forgotten:
...to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
Yeah. Try reading that with a group of high school juniors at 2:30 on a Tuesday afternoon, and just see how attentive and excited they are about learning about our Founding Fathers.
But what if I told you that there was a way to show students how to get at a main idea in a difficult text like the Declaration, and they only had to, say, understand maybe 1/8 of the words?
But what if I told you that there was a way to show students how to get at a main idea in a difficult text like the Declaration, and they only had to, say, understand maybe 1/8 of the words?
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