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"Compare and Contrast" Academic Language: Thinking It Through

This academic language example is related to the lesson objective, “All students will be able to compare and contrast concepts of then and now (including past, present, and future) by matching pictures of objects from the past to their current counterparts, getting at least 5 out of 6 pairs correct.” When identifying the academic language demands related to this objective, a teacher may think reflectively through the following:” 

The academic language the students will need to know to be successful in this lesson includes function words: “sort” and “pair up/match”. Students will be using these words when we are working with the past/present matching cards. These words may not be new for all students in the class but I will be sure to show all students an example of what I am asking them to do to make sure they understand. I will do this by doing an example together, then asking a volunteer pair to come up and illustrate how to match a pair together. I am expecting that not all objects from different eras will be familiar to all students. We will be talking about objects shown in the book and discussed together that the students may not know, including “records”, “cassette tapes”, and “CDs”.

Additional language demands include understanding forms related to this lesson in connection with past and present. Key terms include “past”, “present”, “future”, and “then” and “now”, along with a variety of adverbial forms and phrases related to time. Some students may produce adverbs of time such as "last century", "last year", "X years ago", and "today."  I think some students may use these adverbial time words (forms) that show when something happened out of order. This may relate to the semantic meaning or use of the words. Usually, these words work well at the end of the sentence, as in "These cassettes were used in the past".  Most students in my class know how to use correct verb tenses, though "were from/were used" and "are from/are used" verb phrases (syntax) can be reviewed for those students who need it. 

I will display text from our social studies book on the document camera and, together as a class, we will examine the text to look for the words past, present, future, then, and now. We will talk about the syntax that may cause confusion or misunderstanding for students. For example, I think the students may misunderstand what the author is referring to when he writes, “Then and Now” as a heading though it is a common title for this type of comparative activity. Students may not know what or when “then” refers to and we will look for context clues to show us the specific timeframe.If needed, I will use baby and childhood pictures of me representing change over time to show them additional visuals representing “past” and “present”. They do love seeing photos of me when I was young! It is a great way to "hook" them in.

I will use their attention to then read very lengthy sentences together (chorus reading) and create a bulleted list of important concepts in these sentences to model for students how to do close reading to gain the most information by asking volunteers for observations. Some students might otherwise struggle with the long sentences, skim or skip information and as a result miss some important information that is necessary to understanding the entire text. Also, in displaying the text, I will talk about how the author structured the text. It models a compare/contrast text structure related to both syntax and discourse. I will point this out to students to see why the author is using visuals within the text and how the charts relate to the compare/contrast text structure. I will highlight key adverbial time forms (words) and syntax (sentences). We will convert our bulleted list to a T-chart to organize our "then and now" information. This T-chart graphic organizer/poster, also known as an anchor chart, will then later be added to with sentence frames that students can use to demonstrate their ability to perform the compare/contrast function.

To support the students in expressing their understanding of the lesson objective by following directions, I will use the Document Camera to model what it means to “sort” and “pair-up” as I use the above listed forms related to the academic language demands to meet the objective. I will ask students for an example of "sort or match", and perhaps someone will demonstrate how to sort crayons and pair up similar crayons or other similar example based on previous learning experience. We will then proceed to the social studies activity of sorting and pairing up with the "then and now" featured objects.

To further support my students' semantic word understanding and usage, I will help students make connections between “past”, “present”, and “future” to the more familiar words “yesterday”, “today”, and “tomorrow” that we use every day during our Morning Meeting/Calendar routines. We will brainstorm together a list of related adverbial time words or phrases, including "last year", "years ago", "in the present", etc. which people use to talk about past/present/future. Making connections to their prior knowledge in this way will help them understand the meanings of our new academic vocabulary as well as model the correct placement in a sentence (syntax). 

Students will have two specific opportunities to express their understanding of this content and use the academic language associated with it:

1) They will engage in a sorting and pairing-up activity with a partner in which they will use the words, “sort”, “pair-up”, “past”, “present”, and “future” with their partners. Students pairs will also be asked to explain their sorts by using the sentence frame, “I sorted in this way to compare and contrast. This shows the past because___________________. This shows the______________________ because_________________.” and

2) Presenting their sort to another pair, using the following past and present frame as needed, with the expectation that all students will be able to explain their findings in complete sentences, such as: a) "__________________ (were from/were used) (past adverb of time) but now, ________________ (are from/are used)." These frames would be presented as models (i.e. "Cassettes were used many years ago but now most people use a web streaming service like Spotify.") with any correct sentences brainstormed by students which correctly use the frame (both form and syntax) being added to the anchor chart as an example. (past syntax/discourse examples for EdTPA).