Reading Standards for Mary
These are reading skills and discussion skills that should be expected of Mary now and what she can build up to. These are also things you can specifically ask her teachers about - specifically how they are going to make her stronger (in whatever skill you're interested in asking about).
Where Mary Should Be
1. Determine a theme in the reading. Not only determine the theme, but support the idea of that theme by using specific details from the text.
2. Describe how characters respond or change as the plot moves toward resolution. Also, Mary should be able to analyze whether the main character (and others) are believable and if the changes they experience make sense.
3. Analyze the impact of specific word choice on meaning and tone of the story. Decide whether an author's use of broadstrokes storytelling or detailed storytelling furthered the story or derailed it in instances.
4. Compare and contrast the reading of a story to the viewing of the video, live version or listening to the audio. Is the perception of different characters or plot events different in different modes? Was it better read to you? Seen in a movie/tv?
5. Compare and contrast themes across genres. Compare fiction to poetry to fantasy to historical novels. How are themes treated, displayed and developed in each genre? How must they be different? How can they be similar?
2. Describe how characters respond or change as the plot moves toward resolution. Also, Mary should be able to analyze whether the main character (and others) are believable and if the changes they experience make sense.
3. Analyze the impact of specific word choice on meaning and tone of the story. Decide whether an author's use of broadstrokes storytelling or detailed storytelling furthered the story or derailed it in instances.
4. Compare and contrast the reading of a story to the viewing of the video, live version or listening to the audio. Is the perception of different characters or plot events different in different modes? Was it better read to you? Seen in a movie/tv?
5. Compare and contrast themes across genres. Compare fiction to poetry to fantasy to historical novels. How are themes treated, displayed and developed in each genre? How must they be different? How can they be similar?
What Mary Should Be Able to do throughout Next Year
1. Determine the theme in a text AND analyze its development over the course of the text.
2. Analyze how story elements interact to create a cohesive (or non-cohesive) story (ex. How does setting influence plot? How does character age affect plot development or character development?)
3. Analyze impact of rhymes, alliterations or other repetitions of sounds in poems or stories. The most famous one is "And so it goes." from Kurt Vonnagut's Slaughterhouse Five.
4. Compare and contrast reading of a story to its filmed, staged or multimedia version paying special attention to the techniques available in each medium - lighting, sound effects, color, camera angle (shooting from below to make characters seem larger).
5. Compare and contrast real history to its fictional portrayal in historical fiction stories. How do authors use fiction to alter history? Is it better/worse? Is it responsible?
2. Analyze how story elements interact to create a cohesive (or non-cohesive) story (ex. How does setting influence plot? How does character age affect plot development or character development?)
3. Analyze impact of rhymes, alliterations or other repetitions of sounds in poems or stories. The most famous one is "And so it goes." from Kurt Vonnagut's Slaughterhouse Five.
4. Compare and contrast reading of a story to its filmed, staged or multimedia version paying special attention to the techniques available in each medium - lighting, sound effects, color, camera angle (shooting from below to make characters seem larger).
5. Compare and contrast real history to its fictional portrayal in historical fiction stories. How do authors use fiction to alter history? Is it better/worse? Is it responsible?
This list is not exhaustive, but an overview of what she could be working on in literature. These standards come from The Archdiocese of Chicago Catholic Schools, which they've based their standards, in part on the Common Core standards for Reading.
Appropriate tasks for middle school readers
Mary should be reading all genres including informational texts, more complex fantasy, realistic fiction, traditional literature (myths, legends), biographies, autobiographies, memoirs, mysteries, historical fiction, short stories, genre combinations (hybrids), diaries, and satire. In those texts she should:
- Understand perspectives different from her own. She should be reading books with main characters that are not at all like her and try to understand the human experience in this way.
- Read many texts presenting mature societal issues, especially those important to adolescents (family issues, growing up, questioning authority). Dystopian books become popular in this age range.
- Read books with a wide range of challenging themes that build social awareness and reveal insights into the human condition. This gets into discussions of nature versus nurture, how societies are arranged, how people treat each other and often race and class.
- Analyze how character interpretation is essential to understand the theme in a book.
- Identify and analyze the author’s use of dialogue and description to further a compelling story.
- Read fantasy books incorporating classical motifs (such as “the quest”). This would include King Arthur type texts and other fantasy novels.
- Identify conventions in epic tales (extended simile, the quest, the hero’s tasks, special weapons or clothing, and helpers).
- Read books with themes that evoke alternative interpretations - can disagree on theme and still discuss the book. This causes discussion to ensue using evidence from the text to support your idea of theme.
- Read a full range of literary devices (for example, flashback, stories within stories, symbolism, and figurative language) often without much signaling.
- Understand settings and people far distant in time and space.
- Cite specific evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources.
- Read expressively, out loud.
When You Reach Me, A Wrinkle in Time, and Liar & Spy are right in this competency. Anything by Kate DiCamillo is under-level, but useful in shoring up ideas on theme and learning to discuss books since she will have understood it so well. We'll look for books that will push her a little past this into the next reading behavior level, but first we'll want to see her be proficient in other genres including fantasy and historical fiction.