For students in Years 1-10 in Queensland, Australia, The Arts (hereafter referred to as "arts") is one of eight Key Learning Areas in the core curriculum. Yet, while arts--comprising five strands including music--is a mandatory component of the curriculum, implementation varies widely. This occurs for a range of reasons, one of which is…

Close Reading Exemplars pull together several key shifts within the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in a single methodological approach towards reading texts. Close Reading Exemplars focus on investigating complex texts (Anchor Reading Standard 10) via text dependent questions that rely on evidence and inferences to answer them (Anchor Reading…

What constitutes an informational text covers a broad swath of different types of texts. Biographies & memoirs, speeches, opinion pieces & argumentative essays, and historical, scientific or technical accounts of a non-narrative nature are all included in what the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) envisions as informational text. Also included…