Reading To Learn

READING TO LEARN
Accelerating learning and closing the gap
2014 Edition
READING TO LEARN
How to use the Teacher Resource Books and DVDs
Reading to Learn (or R2L) is designed to integrate teaching the curriculum, at each stage of school, with teaching
the reading and writing skills that will enable every student to succeed. This is a complex task that involves
significant changes in teaching practice, and significant new knowledge about language and pedagogy. The books
in the Reading to Learn resource package are designed to provide this knowledge about language and pedagogy,
in a form that you can use immediately in the classroom. They are organised to accompany the professional
learning program, but they are also designed to stand alone as self-paced learning materials.
Book 1 Preparing for Reading and Writing
Book 1 is the starting point for the program. It explains how R2L works, to accelerate all students’ learning
and close the gap in the classroom. It sets out strategies for guiding all students in a class to read challenging
texts, to use factual texts to learn, and to engage in stories, and for guiding students to write successful factual
texts, stories and persuasive texts. It also provides models for programming in the early years, primary and
secondary school, for assessing reading, and planning lessons.
Book 2 Selecting and Analysing Texts
Book 2 is the starting point for planning lessons. It sets out the kinds of texts that students read and write in the
primary and secondary curriculum. For each kind of text there is a set of activities that guide you to identify and
analyse their structure so you can teach them explicitly in the classroom. There is also a guide for selecting
appropiate reading texts at each year level, and a list of recommended reading books.
Book 3 Assessing Writing
In R2L, we measure students’ progress by assessing their writing each term. Book 3 sets out the writing as-
sessment we have developed in the program, to show how students language resources grow with our teach-
ing. Example texts show writing standards for junior, middle and upper primary, and junior secondary.
Book 4 Detailed Reading and Rewriting
Detailed Reading and Rewriting are the turbo-charged engines of the R2L program. They enable all students
to read and write high level texts with complete comprehension and fluency. Book 4 explains how Detailed
Reading and Rewriting work for stories and factual texts, by discussing the demonstration lessons on the R2L
DVD.
Book 5 Detailed Lesson Plans
Detailed Reading and Rewriting require detailed planning to work effectively. Book 5 explains how to analyse
texts and plan these lessons. It also contains extended lesson plans for a story and factual text.
Book 6 Intensive Strategies and Early Years
R2L’s most intensive strategies support children to learn foundation literacy skills, in the context of reading and
writing the curriculum. These strategies are also used to teach beginning literacy in the early years of school.
Book 6 sets out these strategies and how to use them in the early years classroom.
Book 7 Patterns in Sentences
Underpinning the R2L program is knowledge about how written language works. Book 7 provides a series of
activities that enable teacher to recognise and name key patterns of language in sentences. The activities are
directly useful to analysing and planning lessons, and teaching knowledge about language to students.
Book 8 Patterns in Texts
Book 8 extends the knowledge about language to patterns in texts, including how information is organised,
how readers keep track of things, how sentences are linked, how meanings are related, and how things are
evaluated. Activities practice finding these patterns in stories, factual texts and persuasive texts.
Book 9 The Language of Maths
R2L has a set of unique approaches to teaching the language of maths, that have proved highly successful for
primary and secondary students. Book 9 explains how these strategies work, and contains a series of lesson
plans using the strategies that are written by teachers.
Acknowledgements
Many teachers, students, consultants and academics have contributed to developing the strategies
in these books, through their practice, theory, support and encouragement. A few I would like
to thank include Claire Acevedo, Janine Barnes, Courtney Cazden, Qammar Cheema, Chang
Chenguang, Margie Childs, Fran Christie, Caroline Coffin, Barb Cook, Wendy Cowey, Murray
Cox, Anna Crane, Sarah Culican, Bev Derewianka, Sally Farrington, Brendan Franzone, Ingrid
Freeman, Carlos Gouveia, Brian Gray, Michael Halliday, Josephine Hand, Lyndall Harrison, Neil
Harrison, Mike Hart, Sandy Hill, Sue Hood, Caroline Hopwood, Phillippa Hughes, Sally Humphrey,
Chen Jing, Pauline Jones, Harni Katika, Jane Kelly, Cheryll Koop, Ann-Christin Lovstedt, Kevin
Lowe, Leah Lui-Chivizhe, Ahmar Mahboob, Mary Macken-Horarik, Rob McCormack, Penny
McLoughlin, Lucy MacNaught, Jim Martin, Carolynne Merchant, Julie Miller, Janet Mooney, Wally
Morrow, Kate Mullin, Ruth Mulvad, Nganyintja, Clare Painter, Christine Okurut, Jeffrey Quinn,
Nicola Rolls, Gerardo de Rosal, Miranda Rose, Joan Rothery, John Shields, Helen da Silva Joyce,
Alyson Simpson, Melissa Sharman, Kerry Sheahan, Arthur Smith, Sue Smith, Maree Stenglin, Fran
Tolhurst, Bruce Underwood, Julie Watson, Cath Watter, Wayne Wearne-Jarvis, Ingrid Westhoff,
Rachel Whittaker, Peter Wignell, Liu Yi.
David Rose 2014
The Reading to Learn teacher resource books are copyright
Please do not copy or distribute without permission
Copies of the resource books and DVDs can be ordered from the website
www.readingtolearn.com.au
Enquiries about the Reading to Learn program can also be made to
d.rose@edfac.usyd.edu.au
Book design by Andrew Rose

Tamale Creative
READING TO LEARN
1
Preparing for Reading
and Writing
Guidance through interaction: teaching/learning
cycles
Teaching all students the skills they need requires careful design of learning activities. In Reading
to Learn, we analyse learning in teaching/learning cycles. We assume that learning happens
through doing tasks, and that learning is most effective if the task is done successfully. If it is
unsuccessful, the learner may experience failure, which reduces
the capacity for learning.
To do a learning task successfully, it needs to be

Task
prepared by a teacher, or by texts that are written
by teachers or authors.
Doing a task successfully opens up learners’

capacity for a higher level of understanding.
We call this third step elaborating.
We can apply the learning cycle to

curriculum units, to activities within each
lesson and to teacher-student interactions
in the classroom. Prepare Elaborate
Curriculum units
A curriculum unit may a whole term, or half a
term’s work around a particular topic. The task at
this scale is to learn the content of the curriculum topic.
Each curriculum unit is planned as a sequence of sub-topics.
These involve reading multiple texts, which we can prepare all students to read with critical
understanding. They also involve writing texts to demonstrate what has been learnt, and we
can prepare all students to write these texts successfully. Elaborating at this scale means the
next step in the curriculum sequence. How has the curriculum been planned to build students’
knowledge and skills in a logical sequence, from topic to topic in the curriculum?
Lesson activities
Each lesson activity involves one or more tasks for students. For example, the task may be
to read a short passage of text. Elaboration may then involve discussing key elements of the
passage, or answering comprehension questions. Have all students been adequately prepared
to read the same text with equal understanding, so they benefit equally from the elaboration? Or
the task may be to answer written problems in science, social studies or maths. Have all students
been prepared to answer these problems with equal success?
In Reading to Learn, we always ask what is the nature of the task that students must do,
then carefully plan how we will prepare all students to do it successfully. We then carefully
plan how we will elaborate on their success. The preparation enables all students to do
the task. The elaboration raises the level of learning, and links it to our curriculum goals.
Apply this learning cycle analysis to the curriculum unit you are currently teaching - what is
the sequence of sub-topics, and what are the tasks for students?
Then apply it to some activities you use in the classroom - what are the tasks for students,
how are they prepared, how is the task elaborated afterwards?
4 Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing

Three levels of support
Preparing
Curriculum, for Reading
Text Selec/on,
Reading to Learn
Planning & 1 Detailed
Reading strategies provide three
Evalua/on
2 levels of support for
students to develop
Sentence
3 Making
skills in reading
and writing.
These levels are
shown as three
Se ri/
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layers of teaching
W
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ell cycles in the
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diagram below.

i/
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They can be used
i
on
al
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al
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Level 1: Preparing for Reading, Joint Construction and Independent Writing

The first level is directly connected to learning the curriculum, to how we plan our curriculum
programs, and the texts we select for teaching and for evaluating what students have learnt.
All lesson sequences start with Preparing for Reading. Using this strategy, we can guide
our students to read any and all texts in the curriculum. First, we give the class enough
background knowledge to understand the text in general terms. Second, we give an oral
step-by-step summary of what will happen in the text, and then read it aloud. This provides
more support for students to follow a challenging text as it is read, than simply telling them
what it is about.
The whole text may be read and discussed in class, or part of it may be read in class, leaving
the rest for students to read themselves. Preparing for Reading allows us to work with texts
that may be well beyond some students’ independent reading levels. There is no need to
avoid challenging texts because some students cannot read them independently. Any text
can be read with guidance.
Joint Construction is the strategy for guiding all students to write successful texts. With
factual texts, notes are made while reading, and the teacher then guides the class to write a
new text from the notes. With stories and persuasive texts, a model of the genre (text type)
is used to show the structures of the genre. The teacher then guides the class to constructs
a new text, with the same structure as the model. In Individual Construction, students then
write their own texts, guided by the teacher, using the same notes for a factual text, or
following the same model for a story or argument.

Level 2: Detailed Reading Joint Rewriting and Individual Rewriting
The second level enables all students to read a

short text with complete understanding, and to use
its language patterns in their own writing. It starts
with Detailed Reading, in which a short passage is
selected from the reading text.
The teacher guides students through the passage,

sentence-by-sentence, with the students identifying
and highlighting groups of words as they go. The
teacher then guides the class through Joint Rewriting
of this passage, borrowing the same sophisticated
language patterns from a literary text, or detailed
content from a factual text. Students then practise the
same task in Individual Rewriting.
Joint Construction is focused on using the global structure of model texts, preparing
students to write whole texts with that structure. Detailed Reading and Rewriting focus on
the patterns of language within and between sentences, preparing students to use those
language patterns in their writing. Detailed Reading and Rewriting are usually done before
Joint Construction, as they help students to practise applying these language patterns in the
jointly constructed text. This helps prepare them to use both the language patterns and text
structure in Independent Writing tasks.
Level 3: Sentence Making, Spelling and Sentence Writing
The third level provides maximum support for students to develop foundation skills in
reading with understanding, spelling and writing. One or more sentences are selected from
the Detailed Reading passage, and written on cardboard strips for students to cut up and
manipulate in the Sentence Making activity.
Words are then selected from these

sentences for Spelling. The teacher guides
students to cut these words up into their
letter patterns, and practise writing them
on small whiteboards. Once they can spell
them accurately, they then write them in
whole sentences, in the Sentence Writing
activity. Crucially these foundation skills are
practised on the same texts that the class
is reading in their curriculum. All the above
strategies can be used with whole class or
individual support.
Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 9

Preparing for reading the cells text
This double-page spread covers a sub-topic of a junior secondary science unit. The unit is
on living things, and the sub-topic is about the structures, functions and types of cells across
the kingdoms of life. In this spread there are five short texts, each with a heading, as well
as associated diagrams, tables, and activities designed to test students’ comprehension. To
prepare students to read this text, we could give the following summary, assuming that they
had already learnt about fundamental concepts such as organisms and cells:
This section give us more information about cells. It describes their structures, how they
work, and different kinds of cells. There are five short texts, each with a heading. The first
text is a short report called Cells of the five kingdoms. It is about the five main groups
of living things called kingdoms of life. What kingdoms of living things do you know?
(Discuss animals, plants, fungi, prokaryotes, e.g. bacteria and protists, e.g. algae).
Organisms in each of these kingdoms are shown in the round diagram on the left of the
page.
The next report is called The brain of the cell. It describes the nucleus in the middle of
each cell which controls the cell, like the way our brains control our bodies.
The next report is called All wrapped up. It describes the covering around each cell
called a membrane, and what goes on in the cell - chemical reactions called metabolism.
(Everyone say metabolism).
Under that is a report called Microfactories and departments. It describes the tiny
structures inside cells that produce energy, and make and store food - like tiny factories.
The next report is called One cell or more. It classifies organisms as either single celled,
like bacteria, or multicellular like us. The last report, called How big is small, describes
how small cells are and how they are measured. The little diagrams beside it show type
of single celled organisms, and how big they are.
All this information is grouped together in the table on the bottom left. It shows the
characteristics of cells in each kingdom of life.
This kind of brief summary can support students to read this text with understanding. They
may then read the text themselves, or some or all of it may be read in class. With relatively
easy texts, such as short stories or novel chapters, the whole text may be read aloud following
Preparing for Reading. However, as this is a long complex text, with a lot of information, it
would normally be read paragraph-by-paragraph.
Task
Paragraph-by-paragraph reading also involves a three step
cycle. The students’ Task is to listen and understand the
paragraph as it is read aloud. The teacher Prepares by telling
them what to expect in the paragraph, and then Elaborates by
discussing key points. With a factual text, the Elaboration may
also involve directing students to highlight key information in Prepare Elaborate
the paragraph for making notes later.

Paragraph-by-paragraph reading the cells text
To prepare the first sentence you could say, ‘The first sentence tells us that all living things may
look different, but their cells are similar.’ The teacher or a student then reads the sentence,
and the teacher directs the class to highlight key information. You could say ‘Three words
at the end say how all cells are similar’, ask one student what those three words are (same
basic structure) and then direct the class to highlight them. The meaning of basic could also
be discussed.
To prepare the first paragraph you could say, ‘The first report classifies the five kingdoms
of life. The diagram shows examples of organisms in each life with its scientific names. The
first one is Animalia. Everyone say Animalia.’ Then ask a student, ‘What are the organisms
shown in Animalia?’ This can be repeated for each kingdom in the diagram. The text can then
be read aloud, and all students will follow with general understanding, as they now all know
the technical words, and what they mean. After reading, the teacher can guide the class to
highlight key information, such as variations, classify, five main groups or kingdoms, and the
names of each kingdom. This can be done with meaning cues such as ‘the word that means
differences’, ‘what variations are used for’, ‘what they classify’.
For the second paragraph you could say, ‘The next report describes the nucleus of the
cell and what it does. The nucleus contains information that is used to control the cell. The
information is in structures called chromosomes. Everyone say chromosomes. Most cells
have a covering around the nucleus called a membrane. These cells are called eukaryotes.
Everyone say eukaryotes. Our bodies are made of eukaryotic cells. Prokaryotes like bacteria
have no membrane around the nucleus.’ Again the text can now be read aloud. The teacher
could then guide the class to highlight nucleus, control centre, chromosomes, information,
without a membrane around the nucleus, prokaryotes, membrane around the nucleus,
eukaryotes. The class could also briefly discuss the evolution of prokaryotes and eukaryotes,
mentioned in the text.
For the third paragraph you could say, ‘This report describes the function of the cell
membrane, and the part of the cell inside the cell but outside the nucleus - called the
cytoplasm. Everyone say cytoplasm. Who can remember what the chemical reactions in the
cytoplasm are called? That’s right, metabolism. Everyone say metabolism. Some cells also
have a cell wall outside the membrane.’ After reading aloud, teacher could then guide the
class to highlight membrane, goes into and comes out, supply substances, remove wastes,
cytoplasm, chemical reactions, metabolism, cell wall, protection, support and shape. The
class could also discuss which organisms have cell walls.
The remaining paragraphs in this text can be prepared, read, highlighted and discussed in
the same way. The whole text should take around 20-30 minutes to read. In this way, the
whole class is enabled to learning the content of the topic in depth, through reading it with
guidance.

Note Making from factual texts
Following paragraph-by-paragraph reading of a factual text, the words that have been
highlighted in the text can be written as notes on the board. Students take turns to write the
notes, as other students dictate and spell. To make the notes clear, they put a dot point for
each sentence, and a dash between each chunk of information in the sentence.
Joint note making is an extremely valuable learning activity. It teaches cooperation, as the
dictator must watch the scribe, and guide with the words, pronunciation and spelling, and the
scribe must listen carefully and write legibly. After each dot point is written, all students write
it in their books.
The students are in control of the note making, but the teacher is still the guide. The dictator
may be guided to spell words in chunks, particularly syllables (see Book 6). All students’
spelling rapidly improves through this whole class practice. The scribe may also be guided
with handwriting, if needed. As the notes are written, the teacher can re-define words, re-
explain concepts, and reinforce understandings through discussion.
Once the board is filled with notes, the teacher can discuss how the information is organised,
and label each of the stages and phases. Students then write the same labels in their books.
Here are the notes made after paragraph-by-paragraph reading of the cells text. This type of
text is called a report, whose function is to classify and describe things (see Book 2). A report
starts with a Classification stage, followed by a Description stage. Within the Description
here, there are two phases that describe the nucleus and cell membrane.
See if you can write these labels beside the notes, as a teacher would do on a class
whiteboard. Lines are drawn between each stage and phase to guide you.
• cells - same basic structure

• variations - classify - five main groups or kingdoms
• Animalia - Plantae - Fungi - Prokaryotae - Protista
• nucleus - control centre,
• chromosomes - information
• without a membrane around the nucleus - prokaryotes
• membrane around the nucleus - eukaryotes
• cell membrane - goes into and comes out
• supply substances - remove wastes
• cytoplasm - chemical reactions - metabolism
• cell wall - protection, support and shape
The first section is the Classification stage, and the next two sections are the Description
stage. Within the Description, the first section describes the nucleus, and the last section
describes the cell membrane.

Joint Construction from notes
With factual texts, Joint Construction uses the information from the notes, and follows
the stages and phases labelled on the notes, but the information is re-organised in new
sentences, carefully guided by the teacher. It may also include other information discussed
during reading. Eventually you should be able to combine information from multiple texts.
The notes have to be on the board so the teacher can point to them as the new text is written.
One way to do this is write notes on one side of a long board, and the new text on the other
side. Or use two small boards, such a smartboard for the notes and a whiteboard for the new
text (whiteboards are easier to write on).
You can start by discussing how the information could be re-organised. Then guide the class
to choose a title, then the beginning of the first sentence and so on. You should avoid asking
open questions like ‘How could we write that in a new sentence?’, because the task may be
too hard for most students, and you may get ideas you don’t want. Instead, work with each
chunk of information in the notes, and discuss how we could add it to the sentence. It often
helps to suggest sentence beginnings and other ideas yourself. The process will flow much
more smoothly if you have practised making notes and writing a new text yourself before
the lesson. This makes guiding the students much easier, enabling us to ask the right kinds
of questions to get the ideas we want from the class. Otherwise you are likely to run into
problems that are hard to solve on the run.
As each sentence is written on the board, students can copy it into their books. As each new
stage and phase of the text is completed, it can be labelled on the board, and in students’
books, and its function discussed again. When the text is complete (or the board is full), the
students can read the new text aloud.
Here is an example of a Joint Construction written from the notes from the cells text. Read
it closely, and label its stages and phases. How has the new text been changed from the
original?
The Structure of Cells

The structure of cells in all living things is basically the same. However,
scientists use differences in their structures to classify organisms into five
kingdoms of life. These kingdoms are Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Prokaryotae and
Protista.
In the centre of the cell is the nucleus, which controls the cell. In the
nucleus are chromosomes that contain information to control the cell. Cells that
have a membrane around the nucleus are known as eukaryotes. Prokaryotes have
no nuclear membrane.
All cells are covered in a thin skin called a membrane, which controls what
enters and exits the cell. Substances enter that the cell uses and wastes exit
through the membrane Inside the cell membrane is the cytoplasm. Chemical
reactions in the cytoplasm are known as metabolism. Some cells have a cell wall
around the membrane, which protects the cell, supports it and gives it shape.
Plant cells have a cell wall.
Following Joint Construction, students can do their own Individual Constructions. First the
Joint Construction is rubbed off the board, but the notes are left up. Students’ task is now
to write a new text with the same content, stages and phases, but to make it as different as
they can. Top students will write better texts than they ever have before, while the teacher
circulates and helps weaker students with ideas for new sentences.

Joint Construction of story texts
With stories, Joint Construction follows the structures of a model text. The model text is
projected so that the class can see it, and the teacher can point to each of its elements as
they are discussed. Each student also has a copy of the model text. As each stage and phase
is identified, the teacher writes a name for it on the projected text, and the students write the
name on their copies. This activity is sometimes called ‘Deconstruction’ of the model.
For example, here is an extract from Fantastic Mr Fox by Roald Dahl (p18-20). This passage
is an excellent narrative model, with an Orientation, Complication and Resolution stages
The Complication starts with the words ‘Just then’, and the Resolution starts with ‘The smoke
from the three guns’. Label these three stages on the text (use Capitals for genre stages).
Mr Fox crept up the dark tunnel to the mouth of his hole. He poked his long handsome
face out into the night air and sniffed once.
He moved an inch or two forward and stopped.
He sniffed again. He was always especially careful when coming out from his hole.
He inched forward a little more. The front half of his body was now in the open.
His black nose twitched from side to side, sniffing and sniffing for the scent of danger.
He found none, and he was just about to go trotting forward into the wood when he heard
or thought he heard a tiny noise, a soft rustling sound, as though someone had moved a foot
ever so gently through a patch of dry leaves.
Mr Fox flattened his body against the ground and lay very still, his ears pricked. He
waited a long time, but he heard nothing more.
‘It must have been a field-mouse,’ he told himself, ‘or some other small animal.’
He crept a little further out of the hole . . . then further still. He was almost right out
in the open now. He took a last careful look around. The wood was murky and very still.
Somewhere in the sky the moon was shining.
Just then, his sharp night-eyes caught a glint of something bright behind a tree not far
away It was a small silver speck of moonlight shining on a polished surface. Mr Fox lay
still, watching it. What on earth was it? Now it was moving. It was coming up and up . . .
Great heavens! It was the barrel of a gun! Quick as a whip, Mr Fox jumped back into his
hole and at that same instant the entire wood seemed to explode around him. Bang-bang!
Bang-bang! Bang-bang!
The smoke from the three guns floated upward in the night air. Boggis and Bunce and
Bean came out from behind their trees and walked towards the hole.
‘Did we get him?’ said Bean.
One of them shone a flashlight on the hole, and there on the ground, in the circle of
light, half in and half out of the hole, lay the poor tattered bloodstained remains of . . . a
fox’s tail. Bean picked it up. ‘We got the tail but we missed the fox,’ he said, tossing the
thing away.
There is also a series of problems and character’s reactions that build tension. The Orientation
starts with setting the scene, but then there is a small problem when Mr Fox heard a noise.
Label these phases as setting and problem (use lower case for these phases, see Book 2).
Tension can be intensified by characters’ reactions. How does Mr Fox react to the noise?
Label this as reaction. Tension can also be released by solutions. What does Mr Fox tell
himself? Label this as solution. The author then re-sets the scene, describing the wood and
the moon. Label this as setting.
The Complication contains three worsening problems. What are they? My Fox reacts to
the first two problems, but the last is the guns firing. Label these three problems and two
reactions. The Resolution starts with another setting, and the last paragraph contains the
solution. Label these phases. What is the solution?
Joint Construction of argument texts
Arguments and text responses are often called ‘persuasive writing’ (see Book 2). The strategy
for guiding students to write them successfully is similar to that for stories, using model texts
for Joint Construction. As for stories, the teacher guides the class to deconstruct and label
the structures of the model, and then use the same structures for a new text with different
content. The content of an argument is the issue being discussed, so the new text will be
about an issue the class has been studying. The content of a new text response (e.g. a book
review) is about a text the class has been studying (book, play, movie, painting, music).
The model argument here is called a discussion, as it discusses two sides to an issue. In a
discussion, the introduction states the issue, so label this as Issue, the body give the sides
of the debate, so label this as Sides, and the conclusion resolves the debate, so label this
as Resolution.
Whenever we turn on the TV or radio, we are dazzled by sports heroes celebrating their vic-
tory by drinking alcohol or smoking tobacco. At first, we may think it is entertaining and harm-
less, but if we examine - the issue more closely, questions arise in our minds about the effect
these advertisements have on people.
There are several reasons why sporting heroes should promote alcohol and tobacco products.
Firstly, there would be more income for the tobacco, brewing and advertising communities
to spend on sporting facilities, bodies and teams. This would lead to greater sponsorship and
promotion of sport. Secondly, people themselves have to make the decision whether they want to
smoke or drink. Advertisements cannot force you.
On the other hand, there are many reasons why sporting heroes should not promote tobacco
and alcohol products. One important reason is that it - may be a cause of under-age drinking and
smoking, as it encourages sports fans to feel good about these behaviours. Secondly, it appears
that sporting people promoting these products are not showing respect for their own bodies.
Finally, smoking and drinking are hazardous to health, and young people should be discouraged
from taking them up.
Even though there seem to be reasonable arguments for sporting heroes - promoting such
products, the advertising of these products may be bad for the health and well-being of young
Australians. Therefore it has more disadvantages than advantages.
The first sentence states the issue, so label this as issue statement. What is the issue?
Highlight these words. The next sentence previews what the sides will be, so label this as
preview. What conjunctions tell us there are two sides? Highlight these (at first, but).
Label the second paragraph as side1 and the third paragraph as side2. What conjunction
tells us this is the other side? Highlight this (on the other hand). Within these paragraphs,
label the first sentence as topic, and remainder as elaboration. How many reasons are
given for each side? What are the conjunctions that tell us this? Highlight these.
In the Resolution stage (last paragraph), which sentence resolves the discussion? Highlight
the conjunction that tells you this (therefore). Label this last sentence as resolving. The
previous sentence reviews what the two sides were, so label this as review. Highlight the
conjunction that signals two sides (even though).
Now try writing a discussion about a different issue, following exactly the same stages and
phases as the model. For example ‘Should fast food be promoted to young people?’. Ideally,
argument texts should be written about issues that have been studied by the class, but you
can also practice with various issues that students know something about. They can then
write their own Individual Constructions about another issue.
Tasks in reading and writing
Reading and writing are hugely complex tasks that involve recognising and using patterns of
language at three levels:
• At the level of the text, readers must recognise what a text is about and how it is organised,
for example as sequences of events in stories, or as chunks of information in factual texts.
• At the level of the sentence, we must recognise how words are sequenced in chunks of
meaning.
• At the level of the word, we must recognise what each word means, and how letters are
arranged into patterns that spell the word.
To read with fluency and comprehension, all of these patterns must be recognised and
interpreted simultaneously. Likewise, to write successfully, we must have all these language
patterns at our disposal.
• At the level of the text, writers must be able to select all the elements of a story or factual
text, and organise them into coherent sequences.
• At the level of the sentence, we must select words that are appropriate to the topic and
arrange them in meaningful sequences.
• At the level of the word, we must have a variety of appropriate words to choose from and
know how to spell them.
context
text
sentence
word
Beyond the text is its context, including:

• what it’s about - its subject matter
• who is involved - such as writer & readers, teacher & students, parent & child
• how the meanings are made - spoken, written, visual, manual
• the social purpose of the text - what people are trying to achieve.
This model of language as ‘text-in-context’ comes from the theory of systemic functional
linguistics (SFL). It seems like common sense because SFL is a theory of how people make
meaning in language (Halliday 1994, Martin & Rose 2007, see Further Reading p30).
In SFL, what the text’s about is called field, who is involved is tenor, how the meanings are
made is mode, and the overall social purpose is genre (e.g. informing, engaging, persuading).
Patterns of patterns in language
Within each of these three levels of language are more complex patterns, for example:
• A text is not just a string of sentences. It includes phases of meaning that are often
expressed as paragraphs in writing.
• A sentence is not just a string of words. It is made up of word groups or phrases that
present chunks of meaning, such as who or what the sentence is about (e.g. A frog), what
they were doing (was swimming), where (in a pond), and when (after a rainstorm).
• A word is not just a string of letters. It consists of one or more syllables (rain-storm), and
each syllable consists of letter patterns (st-orm), that make up the English spelling system.
A text consists of patterns of sentences, which consist of patterns of words. Patterns within
the word are known as spelling, patterns within the sentence are
known as grammar, and patterns within the text are
known as discourse.
We can use this model to interpret
reading behaviours as follows:
$%,-(.-
• Decoding means recognising
the patterns of syllables !"##$%&' -(.-
in each word, and the ()#*)&+#*$+#$,#
patterns of letters in
each syllable.
!"#$%&'#( /*'*)'*/0
• Literal
comprehension !"##$%&'
#(,-(,$(
means recognising ()#*)&+#*$
the patterns of '$&#$&-$ 1%'!2)'%&/
meaning within each )'*++*'
sentence - who it’s
about, what they are 1%'!
doing, where, when
and how. !"##$%&'
()#*)&+#*$
#344*54(
• Inferential comprehension
(.%/
means inferring connections 4(--('2/*--(',
#/(44",)
between meanings across a
text, from sentence to sentence, and
paragraph to paragraph.
• Interpretive comprehension means interpreting

connections between meanings in the text and the context it
refers to - its social purpose, subject matter, and the relations it enacts between people.
Often learners can decode the words in a text, but can’t recognise enough of their meanings
to comprehend the text. This requires both knowledge of word meanings, and the reading
skill to infer their meanings from the co-text. Or they can read the words literally, but can’t
infer many of the connections, and cannot follow what it is about. This often occurs with texts
that are more highly written, that use written patterns which are unfamiliar to less experienced
readers. But even if we are experienced readers, if we are unfamilar with the subject matter,
we may struggle to interpret its meanings. Teaching reading must thus address all of these
levels.

R2L’s integrated approach
A more effective way to manage the complexity of the reading and writing task is to teach
all its components, not simply as a ‘balanced’ collection of activities, but as an integrated
sequence, from the top down. This approach works because a text only makes sense if we
recognise its purpose (genre) and what it’s about (its field), so that we understand what is
happening at each step of the text. If we know what the text’s purpose is and what it’s about,
then we have a good idea of what to expect as we read, and where
we are going as we write.
Likewise a sentence only makes sense in relation

!"#$%&$
to the other sentences that come before it
and after it in a text. If we understand the $%&$
text, we will have a good idea what each
sentence is about. And each word only '()(*)('+
makes sense within groups of words in
a sentence. If we understand the text
and the sentence, we will have a good
,%#$%#!%
idea what each word means.
-")./*)"0'
Most abstract of all are spelling
and sound patterns, which are -").
meaningless,except in the context of
words we are familiar with, in texts we ,122(32%
understand.
2%$$%)/'($$%)#
So to teach reading we start by telling
students what a text is about as it unfolds
through each step. This is known as Preparing
before Reading. And instead of making struggling
learners read, we may read the text to them. Even the
weakest readers can then follow with general understanding,
and this comprehension provides a foundation for then supporting them to read the text
themselves.
To support their reading we tell students what each sentence is about, and guide them to
read and understand each sentence, by telling them what each group of words mean. As they
identify each word group, its meaning may be defined, explained or discussed. This process
of Detailed Reading enables every student to read the text with complete understanding.
Then as they are thoroughly familiar with each word in the text, we may then show them how
to recognise and write spelling patterns, which now become meaningful in the context of the
words they know.
To teach writing we can build back up, from the words that they can now spell automatically,
to writing sentences and paragraphs fluently, to creating whole new texts. We show students
how to borrow written language patterns from the texts they are reading, at all levels from the
word to the sentence to the text, and use these patterns in their own writing. Our teaching
sequence is thus integrated by our model of how language works to make meaning.

READING TO LEARN
2
Selecting and
Analysing Texts
Genre families
On the next page is a map of the range of texts that all students need to read and write across
the curriculum. The map is set out as a series of choices, about the purposes of the texts we
are reading or writing. All texts have multiple purposes; the major purpose is the genre.
The overall purpose of stories is to engage and entertain readers, so the focus of teaching
stories is on the language that authors use to engage readers. The overall purpose of
factual texts is to inform readers, so the teaching focus is on key information. The purpose
of evaluating texts is to evaluate texts, in the case of text responses, and issues or points
of view, in the case of arguments. So the teaching focus is on the evaluative language that
accomplished writers use to evaluate and persuade.
This map is your first step in lesson planning. Use it to work out the genres of the texts
you are using for teaching reading and writing. Each part of the map is set out as a set of
questions about the social purpose and structure of each text, which you can ask to identify
the genre. Then see the table on page 4 for the stages expected for each genre.
Engaging: stories
Is it a news story? News stories are grouped as ‘engaging’ because they start with a ‘Lead’
event, that is designed to engage readers, and then report different angles on it, so they
are not sequenced in time. If a story is sequenced in time, is it organised around a major
complication? If not it may be a personal recount, which simply recounts a series of events.
If it is organised around a complication, is it resolved? In a narrative the characters resolve a
complication. If it is not resolved, the major purpose of an anecdote is to share feelings about
an event, but the major purpose of an exemplum is to judge people’s behaviour.
Informing: recounts, chronicles, explanations, reports, procedures
Is it about events that recur (e.g. animal behaviour)? We call these generalised recounts. If
it recounts major events in the writer’s life, it is an autobiographical recount. If it recounts
the stages in a person’s life it is a biographical recount. If it sets out stages in a period
of history, it is an historical recount. If it explains historical stages it is called an historical
account. These genres chronicle events in a person’s life or a period of history.
Does it explain causes and effects? If it explains a sequence of events, it is a sequential
explanation. If it explains multiple causes for one effect, it is called a factorial explanation. If it
explains multiple effects of one cause, it is a consequential explanation. If it explains effects
that depend on contingent causes (if a then b, if x then z), it is a conditional explanation.
Does it direct the reader in the steps to do an activity, such as experiments and observations,
using technology, or making things? These are called procedures. Or does it tell what to do
and not to do, such as rules, warnings or laws? These are types of protocols. Does it recount
the steps done in a procedure, such as an experiment? These are procedural recounts.
Does it classify and describe things? Reports are about things, so that are not sequenced in
time. A descriptive report classifies and describes one kind of thing, a classifying report
classifies different types of things, a compositional report describes parts of wholes.
Evaluating: arguments and text responses
Does the text argue about one or more points of view? Expositions argue for a particular
position, but discussions debate two or more positions on an issue.
Does it evaluate texts, including verbal, visual or musical texts? Personal responses simply
express feelings about a text. Reviews usually describe the text and its context, and make a
judgement about it. Or is the purpose to interpret the messages or themes of texts?
2 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

not sequenced in time - news story! sharing feelings – anecdote!
unresolved!
engaging! judging behaviour - exemplum!
complicating!
sequence! resolved - narrative!
of events!
no complication – personal recount!
recurrent events – generalised recount!
my signiﬁcant life events – autobiographical recount!
chronicles! stages in a life (set in time) – biographical recount!

stages in time! temporal- historical recount!
stages in history (set in time)!
!
causal- historical account!
sequence of cause & effect - sequential!

explanations! contingent causes (if/then) - conditional!
causes & effects!
multiple causes for one outcome - factorial!
Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

social! !
informing! multiple outcomes from one cause - consequential!
purposes!
one type of thing - descriptive!
reports! different types of things - classifying !
describing things! parts of wholes - compositional!
!
how to do an activity - procedure (recipe, experiment, algorithm)!
procedural! what to do and not to do – protocol (rules, warnings, laws)!
directing! how an activity was done - procedural recount (experiment report)!
!
supporting one point of view - exposition!
arguments! discussing two or more points of view - discussion!
evaluating issues!
evaluating! ! expressing feelings about a text - personal response!
3
text responses! evaluating a text (verbal, visual, musical) - review!
evaluating texts! interpreting the message of a text - interpretation!
!
Genres, purposes and stages
Use this table to identify the stages expected for each genre. If the stages don’t match the
genre you identified for your text, check the genres again in the map on page 3.
genre purpose stages

recount recounting events Orientation

Record of events
Orientation
narrative resolving a complication in a story Complication
Resolution
Stories
Orientation
exemplum judging character or behaviour in a story Incident
Interpretation
Orientation
anecdote sharing an emotional reaction in a story Remarkable event
Reaction
Orientation
autobiographical recount recounting life events
Record of stages
Chronciles
Orientation
biographical recount recounting life stages
Record of stages
Background
historical recount recounting historical events
Record of stages
Background
historical account explaining historical events
Account of stages
Phenomenon
sequential explanation explaining a sequence
Explanation
Explanations
Phenomenon
conditional explanation alternative causes & effects Explanation
Phenomenon:outcome
factorial explanation multiple causes for one effect
Explanation:factors
consequential Phenomenon:cause
multiple effects from one cause
explanation Explanation:conseq.
Purpose
procedure how to do experiments & observations Equipment
Procedures
Steps
Purpose
protocol what to do & not do
Rules
Purpose
procedural recount recounting experiments & observations Method
Results
Classification
descriptive report classifying & describing a phenomenon
Description
Reports
classifying & describing types of Classification

classifying report
phenomena Description:types
Classification
compositional report describing parts of wholes
Description:parts
Thesis
Arguments
exposition arguing for a point of view Arguments

Reiteration
Issue
discussion discussing two or more points of view Sides
Resolution
Evaluation
personal expressing feelings about a text
Text Responses
Reaction
Context
review evaluating a literary, visual or musical text Description of text
Judgement
Evaluation
interpretation interpreting the message of a text Synopsis of text
Reaffirmation
Stories
There are five main kinds of stories. Stories usually (but not always) begin with an Orientation
stage, that sets the context and characters. But the stages that follow depend on the specific
purpose of the story. Stories can be about people’s actual experiences, or fiction.
1 The purpose of a recount is to recount a series of events, so its stages include an
Orientation and Record of events.
2 The purpose of a narrative is for the central characters to resolve a complication, so
its stages include Orientation, Complication and Resolution. There is also usually an
Evaluation following the Complication, that expresses the characters’ feelings about what
has happened.
3 The purpose of an anecdote is to share feelings about a complicating event, that is not
resolved. The stages of an anecdote include Orientation, Complication and Evaluation,
that evaluates the narrator’s feelings about what has happened (although the Evaluation
can be left implicit).
4 The purpose of an exemplum is to judge a person’s character or behaviour. Its stages
also include Orientation, Complication and Evaluation, but this evaluates the person’s
character or behaviour. Anecdotes and exemplums differ from narratives because they
have no Resolution. But they are just as common as narratives.
5 The purpose of a news story is to report angles on a newsworthy event. News stories are
not sequenced in time. Rather news stories begin with a Lead paragraph that summarises
the story, and then come back to it from various Angles.
Story phases
Phases in stories are the basic building blocks that authors use to construct the plot of a
story, and engage the reader. They can be used in many different ways, in all types of stories.
Common types of story phases are as follows.
setting presenting people, activities, places, times

description describing people, places, things
episode sequence of events that is expected
problem unexpected event creating tension
solution unexpected event releasing tension
reaction participants feelings about problems, descriptions
comment narrator’s comments on people, activities
reflection participants’ thoughts about meanings of events
We can classify these phases in three groups. Setting and descriptions are describing
phases: settings present characters, events, times and places at the start of a text stage;
descriptions elaborate the story by describing people, things and places. Episodes, problems
and solutions carry the action forward: episodes are expected by what has gone before;
problems and solutions are unexpected events. Reactions, comments and reflections
evaluate what is happening: reactions express characters’ feelings, reflections are what
they think about events and people, but comments are intrusions by the narrator.

Analysis practice
Label the genre, stages and phases in the following stories. First try to work out
the type of story genre. Is it organised around a major Complication? If not it’s probably a
recount. One or more of the events in a recount can be a problem, but it is not the major
organising stage of the story. If the story is organised around a major Complication, is it
resolved (i.e. a narrative)? If not is its central purpose to share feelings (anecdote) or judge
behaviour (exemplum)?
If you are not sure what to call a phase, this is not a problem. It is more important that you
have identified the phase and have an idea about what its function is in the story.
To get you started, the first story is a narrative, by the Indigenous Australian author Terri
Jaenke. The Orientation includes a setting, problem, reaction, description, and a second
problem. The Complication starts with Later, on the beach... (Starting a sentence with a
time and/or place is a common technique for signalling a shift to a new stage of a text.)
The Complication includes a problem and reaction. The Resolution include a solution and
comment. Label each of these stages and phases in the text.
Butterfly Song by Terri Jaenke
I can see the beach where we used to go swimming as kids, in the colder months,
before the stingers came out. I remember how my blue swimming togs always held
a pile of sand in the crotch. Somewhere in the dunes I lost my red bucket.
It was the day we deliberately left Nobby at the beach. The three of us kids cried
a lot.
Nobby was a stray mongrel dog that had moved into our house. Clarissa, Shane
and I wanted to keep him. Dad said he was a bad dog because he jumped up and
grabbed clothing, like Dad’s work socks, off the clothesline. Nobby also chased cars
and gave the postman on his bicycle a hard time. So that day, we left the beach
without him.
The next weekend, when we went back for a swim, Nobby was still there,
hanging around the car park. He looked very sad and dejected.
Dad made us act as if we couldn’t see him. ‘Pretend he’s invisible.’
Later, on the beach, we set up our picnic. Shane had just learnt to walk - well,
really he went straight to running. Dad was having a swim and my mother was
making sandwiches when Shane disappeared. We searched the beach and the car
park and could not find him.
Nobby was still there, so my frantic mother said to him, ‘Shane, help us find
Shane.’ She had watched too many Lassie movies.
Nobby barked and headed towards the estuary. Sure enough, Shane was there,
within metres of the deep water. ‘We have to take the dog,’ my mother insisted.
That’s how Nobby won his place in our family. To think that was around twenty
years ago - but the beach looks just the same.
Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts 7

The next story is an extract from Paul Jennings’ short story A Good Tip for Ghosts (from
Uncanny 1984). The short story is a serial narrative, and this extract is one of its five
Complications (the Orientation is left out). It builds tension through a series of worsening
problems (starting with I thought I heard a noise), characters’ reactions to these problems,
and a description of the thing that frightened them. The tension is partly released by a solution,
but there is another problem...
A Good Tip for Ghosts by Paul Jennings
A little way off behind some old rusting car bodies, I thought I heard a noise.
Pete was looking in the same direction.
I was too terrified to move. I wanted to run but my legs just wouldn’t work. I
opened my mouth to scream but nothing came out. Pete stood staring as if he was
bolted to the ground.
It was a rustling tapping noise. It sounded like someone digging around in the
junk, turning things over. It was coming in our direction.
I just stood there pretending to be a dead tree or post. I wished the moon would
go in and stop shining on my white face.
The tapping grew louder. It was coming closer.
And then we saw it. Or him. Or whatever it was. An old man, with a battered
hat. He was poking the ground with a bent stick. He was rustling in the rubbish. He
came on slowly. He was limping. He was bent and seemed to be holding his old,
dirty trousers up with one hand. He came towards us. With a terrible shuffle.
Pete and I both noticed it at the same time. His feet weren’t touching the ground.
He was moving across the rubbish about 30 centimetres above the surface. It was the
ghost of Old Man Chompers.
We both screeched the same word at exactly the same moment. “Run!”
And did we run. We tore through the waist-high rubbish. Scrambling.
Screaming. Scrabbling. Not noticing the waves of silent rats slithering out of our
way. Not feeling the scratches of dumped junk. Not daring to turn and snatch a
stare at the horrible spectre who hobbled behind us.
Finally, with bursting lungs, we crawled into the back of an old car.
It had no doors or windows so we crouched low, not breathing, not looking, not
even hoping.
The passage on the next page is an extract from the novel Follow the Rabbit Proof Fence. It
is a pivotal passage in the novel, in which the girls are taken from their family by a policeman.
Phases include a setting, a series of problems for the family and the policeman, their reactions,
and a comment by the author. Obviously the girls getting taken is the major Complication, but
is it resolved? Where does the Complcation begin and end?

Reports
Reports classify and describe things, so they have two predictable stages, Classification
and Description. The Classification may be a paragraph or just a sentence at the beginning.
There are three common kinds of reports.
• A descriptive report classifies and describes one kind of thing, and the phases in the
Description depend on what is being described. Reports about animals usually include
phases on appearance and behaviour. Reports about societies usually include phases
on geographic location, economy, social organisation, religion and so on (e.g. the
Kulin Nation report above).
• A classifying report classifies different types of things, so each phase in the Description is
usually one type of entity.
• A compositional report describes parts of wholes, so each phase in the Description stage
is usually one part of the whole.
report type purpose Description phases
descriptive classifies and describes one kind of thing e.g. appearance, behaviour
classifying classifies different types of things types
compositional describes parts of wholes parts
The term ‘report’ is also used for many other kinds of texts – news reports, experiment
reports, and so on, but we use it specifically for those texts that classify and describe things.
These are also often called ‘information reports’.
Label these types of reports, and their stages and phases.
Goannas
Australia is home to 25 of the world’s 30 monitor lizard species. In Australia,

monitor lizards are called goannas.
Goannas have flattish bodies, long tails and strong jaws. They are the only
lizards with forked tongues, like a snake. Their necks are long and may have loose
folds of skin beneath them. Their legs are long and strong, with sharp claws on their
feet. Many goannas have stripes, spots and other markings that help to camouflage
them. The largest species can grow to more than two metres in length.
All goannas are daytime hunters. They run, climb and swim well. Goannas
hunt small mammals, birds and other reptiles. They also eat dead animals. Smaller
goannas eat insects, spiders and worms.
Male goannas fight with each other in the breeding season. Females lay between
two and twelve eggs.

Producers and consumers
We have seen that organisms in an ecosystem are first classified as producers or
as consumers of chemical energy.
Producers in ecosystems are typically photosynthetic organisms, such as plants,
algae and cyanobacteria. These organisms build organic matter (food from simple
inorganic substances by photosynthesis).
Consumers in an ecosystem obtain their energy in the form of chemical energy
present in their ‘food’. All consumers depend directly or indirectly on producers for
their supply of chemical energy.
Organisms that eat the organic matter of producers or their products (seeds,
fruits) are called primary consumers, for example, leaf-eating koalas (Phascolarctos
cinereus), and nectar-eating honey possums (Tarsipes rostratus).
Organisms that eat primary consumers are known as secondary consumers.
Wedge-tailed eagles that prey on wallabies are secondary consumers.
Some organisms consume the organic matter of secondary consumers and are
labelled tertiary consumers. Ghost bats (Macroderma gigas) capture a variety of
prey, including small mammals.
Transport in the body

Transport systems are needed inside the body of all living things. In humans
the blood or circulatory system carries digested food and other materials around the
body.
The blood contains 20 billion tiny cells floating in a liquid called plasma. The
cells are of two different kinds red cells which carry oxygen and white cells which
attack germs. Platelets which are microscopic discs, help in blood clotting.
Red blood cells are made in bone marrow. They live for about 100 days and then
they are destroyed by the liver. The bone marrow makes new cells to replace the
destroyed cells. White blood cells protect the body against toxins and infections. The
chemicals into which food has been broken-down are carried to all the body’s cells
in the blood. Blood also carries waste away from the cells.
The blood moves through a series of tubes called blood vessels. The tubes could
be compared with the road network of a country. However there are no head-on
crashes as the tubes are strictly one-way.
Blood is pumped around the body by the heart. Tubes called arteries carry blood
away from the heart. Except for the artery to the lungs they carry bright red blood,
rich in oxygen.
Tubes called veins bring blood back to the heart. Except for the vein from the
lungs they carry dark red blood, short of oxygen.
The smallest arteries and veins are linked by tiny tubes called capillaries.
Through their fine walls, oxygen and the chemicals from food are delivered to the
cells all over the body, and waste products are collected.

Arguments
We use the term ‘argument genres’ for texts that argue for a point of view or discuss two or
more points of view. There are two main argument genres.
• Expositions argue for a point of view, by stating a position, or Thesis, then supporting it
with a series of Arguments, and concluding with a Restatement of the Thesis.
• But discussions debate two or more points of view about an issue. They begin by stating
the Issue, and then give the different Sides to the debate, concluding with a Resolution of
the debate, judging which side is more valid.
argument type purpose stages
Thesis
exposition arguing for a point of view Arguments
Restatement
Issue
discussion debating two or more points of view
Sides
Resolution
Phases in expositions include supporting arguments, that can be labelled argument1,

argument2 and so on. Phases in discussions include different sides, that can be labelled
side1, side2 and so on. In longer argument texts, there can be phases such as evidence,
examples, grounds, conclusions, and so on.
The following two texts were written by school students. Work out which is a
discussion or exposition, and write the names of each stage beside the text.

Should sporting heroes promote sport and alcohol
Whenever we turn on the TV or radio, we are dazzled by sports heroes celebrating
their victory by drinking alcohol or smoking tobacco. At first, we may think it is
entertaining and harmless, but if we examine the issue more closely, questions arise
in our minds about the effect these advertisements have on people.
There are several reasons why sporting heroes should promote alcohol and
tobacco products. Firstly, there would be more income for the tobacco, brewing and
advertising communities to spend on sporting facilities, bodies and teams. This would
lead to greater sponsorship and promotion of sport. Secondly, people themselves
have to make the decision whether they want to smoke or drink. Advertisements
cannot force you.
On the other hand, there are many reasons why sporting heroes should not
promote tobacco and alcohol products. One important reason is that it may be a
cause of under-age drinking and smoking, as it encourages sports fans to feel good
about these behaviours. Secondly, it appears that sporting people promoting these
products are not showing respect for their own bodies. Finally, smoking and drinking
are hazardous to health, and young people should be discouraged from taking them
up.
Even though there seem to be reasonable arguments for sporting heroes
promoting such products, the advertising of these products may be bad for the
health and well-being of young Australians. Therefore it has more disadvantages
than advantages.
In Favour of Progress
We must not stand in the way of progress because it has benefited our world
in many ways. It has improved our standard of living and has made things easier
for us. We have more leisure time, communication is easier, our entertainment has
improved, and services are quicker.
Firstly progress has made life easier in the home. For example, cooking is made
a lot easier with gas or electric stoves and microwaves. We can have more leisure
time instead of having to go outside on a windy night to chop wood and make a fire.
Secondly the invention of advanced forms of communication has saved many
people. We are able to use telephones to help people who are injured or in danger.
All we have to do is pick up the phone, and police, ambulance or fire brigade can be
contacted. Furthermore, telephones help people to communicate with friends and
relatives. We can simply ring someone instead of travelling to see them.
Thirdly, television is another great product of technological progress. If we have
nothing to do at home, we can turn on the television and watch movies, comedy or
cartoons. In addition, the news on television shows us what is going on around the
world as it is happening.
Finally, activities like banking takes less time because we have quicker service,
thanks to technological advanves such as teller machines. Instead of waiting in
a queue to sign our name on pieces of paper, we now have plastic cards that are
recognised by these teller machines.
In conclusion, progress has created technologies such as appliances that give us
more leisure time, telephones to improve our communication, television to provide
entertainment and information, and teller machines to save time. All these things
have improved our standard of living and made life easier for us.

READING TO LEARN
4
Detailed Reading
and Rewriting
Designing interactions in Detailed Reading
Now let’s look at an example of a Detailed Reading lesson, in which the teacher carefully
prepares each interaction, so the students always respond successfully. This is from the
lesson shown on the Reading to Learn DVD, in the chapter on Stories.
In the first cycle the teacher Prepares the meaning of the sentence, then reads it aloud. Then
she Prepares the students to Identify the first wording in the sentence, by telling them where
to look ‘right at the beginning’, and what to look for ‘what the earthquake did’. She Affirms
the response, and Instructs them to highlight the exact words she wants.
Teacher So if we look at that very first sentence, the writer begins by describing the Prepare
sound to us, OK, and just where the sound came from. So if we have a look [sentence]
at it, it says, It started with a long low roar that seemed to be approaching
from the north of the city.
So in that very first sentence, right at the beginning it tells us what the Prepare
earthquake did. [wording]
What did it do? Chanila? Focus
Student It started with a long low roar. Identify
Teacher That’s great, fantastic. So It started. Affirm
So let’s highlight It started. Instruct
Notice that the teacher does not start with a question. Rather she first tells the students what
to look for (Prepare), and then asks them to find it (Focus). Like the mother in parent-child
reading she is not testing their knowledge, but telling them what they need to know about
the text.
Elaboration
Next the teacher Elaborates by discussing the pronoun ‘it’. But she does this by Preparing
the students to recognise that ‘it’ refers to ‘an earthquake’ earlier in the story, and she asks
them to Identify the word in the text. When they Identify ‘it’, she Elaborates again by saying
why we can use ‘it’. Then she asks them to repeat what ‘it’ refers to.
Teacher Now I used the word earthquake, because we know its an earthquake. Prepare
What have they used instead of earthquake, what’s the word they’ve used Focus
there to begin that paragraph? Bonita?
Student It. Identify

Teacher It. Affirm
And we can use It because we already know what It is. Elaborate
It is…? Focus
Student The earthquake. Propose
Teacher OK, fantastic. Affirm
Notice that the students first Identify the word in the text ‘it’, but then they Select a word from
what they know ‘the earthquake’. When students respond to teacher questions, the task is
either to Identify words in a text, or Propose words from their experience.
Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting 8

The teacher prepares the next wording with its meaning, a ‘sort of sound’, and where to look,
‘it started with something’.
Teacher Now, so the earthquake started, now when it started what sort of sound Prepare
did it make? It tells us it started with something.
What was it that it started with? Chanila? Focus
Student Long low roar. Identify
Teacher Fantastic. Affirm
So let’s highlight long low roar. Direct
Elaboration
Now he teacher elaborates the phrase ‘a long low roar’ by getting the students to imagine
the kind of sound it refers to. The students select a range of roaring sounds from their
experience. The purpose is to encourage the students to bring their experience to reading,
and to recognise the ways that literary language creates images.
Teacher Now can you think of something else? What else do we associate with that Focus
roar sound? What do you think?
Student A lion roar. Propose
Teacher OK, a lion roars. Affirm
What else do we associate with a roar? Another thing? Focus
Student The sea can roar. Propose
Teacher The sea, Affirm
on a really stormy day. Yes it does give a bit of a roar. Elaborate
Teacher Justin? Focus
Student A tornado? Propose
Teacher Yes. Affirm
Those other natural disaster types of sounds. Yes. Elaborate
Finally the teacher steers the discussion to a particular kind of sound that ‘starts off low,
and builds up’, so the students recognise this subtle quality, that is important for building up
tension in the story.
Teacher Ever heard a jet? Oh, you’ve all been to the airport. The roar of the engine? Focus
Student An airshow. Propose
Teacher The airshow, exactly. Affirm
The whole ground starts to shake. Exactly. So that sound vibration even Elaborate
makes the ground move, doesn’t it? Affirm
Yes, fantastic. Elaborate
And it starts off low, and builds up, doesn’t it?
So we have this roaring sound, but it starts off long…low.
This may all seem very complex when we analyse lessons so closely, but it shows exactly
what teachers and students do all the time in the classroom. We ask students to identify
things in texts (like Hasan identifying the words ‘red’ and ‘one square face’), and we ask
them to select things from their experience. We then elaborate by explaining or discussing
9 Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting

the students’ experience. The elaboration is either about the topic (such as is information in
graphs or Venn diagrams, or images in stories), or it is about language (such as pronouns
like ‘it’). The important difference with Detailed Reading is that these interaction cycles are
carefully planned, so that all students’ responses are always successful, and our elaborations
always build on successful responses.
Types of interaction moves in the classroom
We have found that all classroom interactions can be analysed into the following kinds of
moves.
Prepare teacher gives information to enable successful responses
Focus teacher focuses students’ attention on the text, usually with a question
Identify students identify element in a text
Propose students select elements from experience
Affirm teacher affirms student responses (or students concur)
Reject teacher rejects response by negating, ignoring or qualifying it
Elaborate define new terms, explain new concepts or relate to experience (by the
teacher or through discussion with students)
Direct teacher directs an activity
Prepare
language Identify
Elaborate Task
context Propose
Preparations open the door for all students to engage in the text:
1 To identify wordings or images in the text
2 To select ideas from their experience.
Elaborations raise the level to extend all students understanding and skills:
1 To learn something new about language
2 To learn more about the context, including the fields that the text is about.
How you prepare depends on the needs of your students.

How you elaborate depends on your purpose for the lesson.

Analysis practice
Here is the next sentence from the Stories lesson on the DVD. Label each move
as either Prepare, Focus, Identify, Affirm, Instruct, Elaborate, Select.
Teacher Now the next sentence tells us that some people were awake, not all. Prepare
Remember they said, this was happening about 2 in the morning? So most sentence
people would be asleep, but some people were awake, and they heard a
sound that was a bit like a storm coming our way. OK, and as the earthquake
got closer, the ground started to shake. So that’s what will be talked about
in this next sentence. So if we have a look at that it says, Those people who
were awake heard a sound like distant thunder, and as the first ripples of the
earthquake sped towards the city the ground beneath their feet started to shake.
It’s a pretty long sentence, so we’ll have a look at it, and we’ll break it up into
little bits.
Teacher First of all who heard and felt this earthquake approaching?
Bonita?
Student People?
Teacher People. Fantastic,
Let’s highlight people.
Teacher I’m not moving ahead, I’m still here at people.
Which people? Anita.
Student Those?
Teacher Fantastic, those people.
So let’s highlight those as well.
So it’s identifying a group. It’s not all, it’s a only a small defined group, those
people.
Teacher Then it tells us, why those people heard the sound.
Why did those people here it? Than?
Student They were awake.
Teacher Right, they were awake.
So let’s highlight awake.
So if it was a sort of long low sound, probably those people who were
asleep didn’t notice it at first. OK? But those who were awake did.
Teacher Now, what was it they heard? It says those who were awake heard.
Heard what? William?
Student A sound like distant thunder?
Teacher Fantastic,
So let’s highlight sound like distant thunder. Brilliant.
Teacher Now we’ve got there that the sound was like distant thunder.
Can anyone tell me what they call that, just before we move on? When
something is said to be like something else.
Student A simile?
Teacher A simile. Right fantastic,
So they’re saying the sound is like thunder. It isn’t the thunder, but it’s like
thunder. OK? So we’ve talked about similes before.

Teacher The next part of the sentence, it’s using a word that tells us that something is
happening at the same time, as this distant thunder. It’s only a little word.
Student And?
Teacher And means something else is happening
Student As.
Teacher Brilliant, you’ve hit the jackpot.
So let’s highlight as. Brilliant.
Very important word there, OK. Something else is happening and it’s happening
at the same time.
Teacher We’re going to go through, in the next couple of sentences, a series of
movements that they describe. And we get here, and they’re talking about a first
movement, that’s associated, that’s got to do with this earthquake. So it was a
sound like distant thunder, and at the same time.
Who can see the words that tell us this first movement that comes along?
Wanilla.
Student First ripples of the earthquake.
Teacher Fantastic, first ripples of the earthquake.
OK we’ll do the whole lot, first ripples of the earthquake. [check weaker student]
You right Chris? First ripples of the earthquake? Keep going all the way to
earthquake.
Teacher Ripples. When do we normally think of ripples?
Student Water?
Teacher Water! Yes,
The waves sort of move out (demonstrates). These ripples were caused by the
earthquake.
Teacher It says as the first ripples of the earthquake.
What did they do? What’s that word there? Chanila?
Student Sped.
Teacher OK, sped.
Let’s just do sped.
So they’re getting faster.
Teacher What are they speeding towards? What are they getting close to? Before they
mentioned approaching.
What are they getting close to? Sped...? Let me see. Bin?
Student Towards the city?
Teacher Fantastic, towards the city.
[check weaker student] Got it Matt? Good.
So they sped towards the city.
Teacher It goes on to tell us what’s happening now with the ground. It talked about the
sound, now it’s talking about the ground. So it started to shake. It tells us where
this ground is, that was shaking. Where was the ground Eric?
Student Beneath their feet?
Teacher Fantastic, beneath their feet.
So let’s highlight beneath their feet.

Reading and writing stories
For Detailed Reading of stories, a short passage is
selected from the story, such as an exciting action
sequence, or a rich description. The passage
should include well written language patterns that
are used to build tension in an action sequence,
create images in a description, or carry a key
message in the story. These are literary language
patterns that readers must recognise, to get the
full meaning and value of the story, and which
the students will learn to use themselves in their
writing.
Very importantly the passage must be interesting

and challenging for the students, as you will spend
at least two lessons working with it. (Interesting
does not mean easy to read, as you will support
them to engage with challenging language.)
Enlarge the passage on A4 copies for all students, so that it is easy to read and highlight.
If it breaks across pages of the book, cut and paste it on one page, or type it out. To make
Detailed Reading easier, the passage can be copied on an overhead, and students take turns
to come out and mark it. However this strategy should not be used once the class is familiar
with the strategies, as Detailed Reading is more effective if all students find the wordings to
mark on their own copies, rather than copying from an overhead.
Here is the passage used for Detailed Reading in the DVD Stories lesson.
At 2am that morning when most people were asleep the

earthquake struck. It started with a long low roar that seemed to be
approaching from the north of the city. Those people who were awake
heard a sound like distant thunder, and as the first ripples of the
earthquake sped towards the city the ground beneath their feet started
to shake. Glasses in cupboards started to tinkle, plates started to rattle.
Within seconds the roar grew louder and the ground wobbled like a
huge bowl of jelly.
“The ground will stop shaking soon,” he said, trying to reassure
himself. “It’s only a small earthquake. Just a light tremor.”
But he couldn’t have been more wrong. This earthquake was big.
And it was about to get bigger.
Language focus for Detailed Reading
This is an action sequence which starts with a long low roar, then builds up with first ripples,
shake, tinkle, rattle, then grew louder and the ground wobbled. This building problem is
followed by the character’s reaction, trying to reassure himself, and then a comment by the
author telling the reader what to expect it was about to get bigger.

In the lesson, there are lots of literary language patterns that the teacher draws students’
attention to and explains. These include:
• starting low and uncertain: long low roar, seemed to be approaching
• metaphors, similes and idioms: like distant thunder, first ripples, like a huge bowl of jelly,
the ground beneath their feet, couldn’t have been more wrong
• movements and sounds: sped, shake, tinkle, rattle, wobbled
• unfamiliar words: light tremor
• setting in time: At 2am that morning..., as the first ripples sped..., Within seconds...
time At 2am that morning when most people were asleep

themes
the earthquake struck. bridging
metaphor
It started with a long low roar uncertain reference
that seemed to be approaching from the north of the city.

Those people who were awake
conjunction heard a sound like distant thunder,
(simultaneous)
and as the first ripples of the earthquake sped towards the city
idiom
the ground beneath their feet started to shake.
Glasses in cupboards started to tinkle,
movement
plates started to rattle. & sounds
time
theme Within seconds the roar grew louder
and the ground wobbled like a huge bowl of jelly. metaphor
“The ground will stop shaking soon,” he said,

reacting trying to reassure himself. unfamiliar
“It’s only a small earthquake. Just a light tremor.” words
But he couldn’t have been more wrong.

This earthquake was big. idiom
expecting
And it was about to get bigger.
In the lesson shown on the DVD, the teacher discusses many of these language patterns
after students have identified them. Issues that could be discussed include:
• Starting a sentence with a time or place tells readers that a new phase in a story is
beginning. (The start of a sentence is called its Theme.)
• In the beginning of the passage, two sets of people are distinguished, asleep and awake.
But the author distinguishes them only indirectly by reference - those who were awake.
This is important because only those awake would have heard the low roar.
• Uncertainty is also important because it is used to begin building the tension in the
passage.
• Images and feelings are enriched by the variety of movements and sounds, and by the
metaphors and idioms. (Similes are a kind of metaphor, idioms are phrases used by
some people, but other people may not understand their meaning).
• Characters’ reactions are used to engage the reader in the story, by expressing feelings.
But here we only indirectly know that he was scared, as he was trying to reassure himself.

Reading and writing factual texts
The lesson shown in the DVD chapter

Factual Texts was filmed in a South
African high school, with a Year 9 society
& environment class. The students in
this class all spoke English as a second
language, their academic literacy levels
were generally very low for their grade
level, and some students even had trouble
with decoding simple words. The topic
was modern South African history, and the
text chosen was from the textbook From
Apartheid to Democracy: South Africa
1948-1994.7
Detailed Reading passage
The passage chosen for Detailed Reading was about the events of the mid-1980s.
Revolutionary days: The 1984 to 1986 uprising

In the mid-1980s South African politics erupted in a rebellion in black
townships throughout the country. The government’s policies of repression
had bred anger and fear. Its policies of reform had given rise to expectations
amongst black people of changes which the government had been unable
to meet. The various forces of resistance, which we outlined in the previous
section, now combined to create a major challenge for the government.
The townships became war zones, and in 1985 the ANC called on its
supporters among the youth to make these areas ‘ungovernable’. The army
occupied militant township areas. The conflict was highly complex and
violent; it involved not only clashes between the security forces and the
resisters, but violence between competing political organizations, between
elders and youth, and between people who lived in shantytowns and those
who lived in formal townships.
7
Nuttall T, Wright J, Hoffman J, Sishi N, Khandlhela S 1998 From Apartheid to Democracy: South Africa
1948-1994. Pietermaritzburg: Shuter & Shooter.

Language focus for Detailed Reading
metaphors
Revolutionary days: The 1984 to 1986 uprising
time
themes In the mid-1980s South African politics erupted in a rebellion in black
townships throughout the country. The government’s policies of repression abstract
things
had bred anger and fear. Its policies of reform had given rise to expectations
causal
metaphors amongst black people of changes which the government had been unable
to meet. The various forces of resistance, which we outlined in the previous abstract
things
section, now combined to create a major challenge for the government.
The townships became war zones, and in 1985 the ANC called on its
unfamiliar supporters among the youth to make these areas ‘ungovernable’. The army
words
occupied militant township areas. The conflict was highly complex and
abstract
violent; it involved not only clashes between the security forces and the qualities
resisters, but violence between competing political organizations, between

elders and youth, and between people who lived in shantytowns and those
who lived in formal townships.
implicit logic
(three reasons for rebellion)
The passage contains many language features that we would expect to find in highly written
texts in the social sciences. This is one of the reasons it is a good text for Detailed Reading,
as it gives the students lots of practice in reading this kind of language and using it in their
writing. These language features include:
• metaphors: Revolutionary days, politics erupted.
• words that may be unfamiliar: militant, resisters, ungovernable
• abstract things: uprising, rebellion, policies of repression, policies of reform,

expectations of changes, various forces of resistance, a major challenge
These abstractions stand for activities that involve people, such as people rising up, rebelling
against the government, repressing the people, making things better, resisting against
the government, challenging the government. But in the abstractions, these activities are
expressed as nouns instead of verbs, and the people are left out. This is done in writing
to compress and organise information, but this way of speaking can be very strange for
many students, and is the biggest single problem that many have with academic reading and
writing, in both secondary and upper primary school.

READING TO LEARN
5
Detailed Lesson Plans
Planning Detailed Reading lessons
Lesson plans for Detailed Reading are written as brief notes. They include five elements:
1. The passage selected for Detailed Reading
2. Wordings marked that students will identify and highlight
3. A note above each wording, for preparing students to identify it
4. Notes to prepare each sentence, written above the sentence
5. Things to elaborate, written as dot points under each sentence
For example, here is the note for the first sentence in the Mum Shirl biography.
Sentence prep Orientation of the biography - why Mum Shirl is famous

Prepare cues nick name proper name what she was who she helped
Sentence Mum Shirl (Shirley Smith) was a community leader who helped thousands of Aboriginal
people in need
Elaborate • discuss community leaders & people in need
This format for lesson plans has been developed as the simplest and easiest way to plan
Detailed Reading lessons. The easiest way is to enlarge a photocopy of the passage, and
hand write your notes, following the six steps below.
When you use this plan in teaching, it will come out like this:
Prepare This is the Orientation of the biography, that tells us about why Mum
sentence Shirl is famous, and her early life, and the background to her work.
The first sentence tells us why Mum Shirl is famous. Look at the sentence
as I read it. Mum Shirl (Shirley Smith) was a community leader who
helped thousands of Aboriginal people in need.
Prepare wording First it tells us her nickname, then her proper name in brackets. Can you
see her proper name?
Identify - Shirley Smith
Affirm Exactly right. Let’s all highlight Shirley Smith.
Prepare wording Then it tells us what kind of person she was. Can you see what kind of
person she was?
Identify - a community leader
Affirm Yes, highlight community leader. Community leaders are people that
Elaborate help organise the community, and others look up to. What other kinds of
community leaders can you think of?
Propose - school principal, mayor, footy coach, priest (etc)
Affirm That’s right. They all help organise the community, and others look up
to them.
Prepare wording Then it tells us who she helped
Identify - thousands of Aboriginal people
Affirm Exactly. Highlight thousands of Aboriginal people in need
Elaborate Why do you think they were in need? What are the things we need most?
Propose - no money, no houses, not enough food, lonely (etc)
2 Reading to Learn - Book 5 - Detailed Lesson Plans

Using lesson notes
We can’t write lesson plans exactly as we would say them (like a script for play), or it would
take forever. Using the note method should take about 30-40 minutes to plan a Detailed
Reading lesson. The lesson notes just contain the bare minimum of information. What’s
missing? The things that you repeat each time:
1 Sentence preparations – in simple words

The first sentence tells us… The next sentence tells us…
2 Reading the sentence aloud

Look at the sentence as I read it. (read sentence)
3 The position of each wording, followed by the preparation

First it tells us… Then it tells us… At the end of the sentence it says…
4 The focus question for students to find the wording

Can you see the words that say... ?
5 Your affirmations
Exactly right… Yes… Exactly… That’s right… Fantastic… Perfect…
6 Instructions to highlight the exact words

Let’s all highlight ...
7 Discussions to elaborate after highlighting

Because these words are repeated each time, it gets easy after a little practice. And
students find it easy too! This means you can concentrate on identifying and discussing
complex meanings, because the interaction becomes second nature for you and your
students.
Steps in planning lessons

The following six steps are the most efficient way to plan Detailed Reading lessons.
(Note that these are not the same as the steps in delivering a lesson.)
1 Select the text
2 Choose a passage for Detailed Reading
3 Highlight the wordings that students will identify
4 Write Prepare cues above the highlighted wordings
5 Write notes for Preparing sentences and Elaborating
6 Write notes for Preparing before reading the text (if necessary).
Reading to Learn - Book 5 - Detailed Lesson Plans 3

Lesson planning steps in detail
1 Select the text
There are four criteria for selecting texts for Detailed Reading.
1. Curriculum
Whatever texts you ask your students to read should be selected to meet the goals of
your curriculum. It is essential to use your syllabus documents as a guide for selecting
appropriate reading texts. Curriculum goals include the topics to be covered (field), the
level of language appropriate to the school stage (mode), and the type of texts that students
need to write (genre).
2. Field
As you will spend some time on it, the passage you select for Detailed Reading must
address a key area in the topic you are studying. For factual texts, this may be a short
passage from a textbook or other source (such as All wrapped up in Book 1). For stories,
this may be key passage in a novel, short story or play, that is great action sequence,
description, or carries the message of the story.
3. Mode
The passage you choose should be at the right level of difficulty for the grade. It should
not be too easy or it is not worth Detailed Reading. This is often a problem if we think our
students can’t handle hard texts. The passage should be challenging for the top students
in your class. But you will support all your students to read and understand it.
4. Genre
The passage you choose should provide a model for the text you want students to write
for Independent Writing, at the end of the Reading to Learn cycle. Again this writing task
should match with your curriculum goals. So you need to be thinking about the genre you
want students to write, when you are looking for a good text.
2 Identify phases
There are two main reasons for identifying the phases in a text:
• Phases provide an overall structure for summarising the text before you read it to the
class, in Preparing before Reading
• The phases of the Detailed Reading passage provide an overall structure for Rewriting.
Use your common sense to work out what is happening in each paragraph, and write a note
of one or a few words beside it, summarising what it is about. This commonsense analysis
will give you a clear idea of what is happening in the text.
Each genre also has certain types of phases. These are set out in Book 5, and will be
discussed in Workshop 2.

3 Highlight key wordings in each sentence
These are the wordings that you want students to identify. In factual texts this is the key
information in each sentence. In stories it includes literary language patterns. In arguments
and text responses it includes wordings that are used evaluate an issue or a text.
Importantly, it is more often groups of words that need to be highlighted, rather than just
single words, which is one reason we say ‘wordings’. It is also important to be as minimal as
possible with wordings to identify, or too much of the text will be highlighted. There is often no
need to highlight wordings that are easy to read, or that do not carry key information.
There also need to be spaces between the highlighted wordings. So only content words are
highlighted, that express specific meanings, leaving the grammatical words and connecting
words between them.
If you are handwriting lesson plan notes on the text, you can use a highlighter to mark the
wordings. If you are typing, underline them.
4 Write preparation cues above highlighted wordings
Above the highlighted wordings in the text, short notes are written to remind us how to
prepare students to identify each wording.
There are two kinds of preparation cues. One kind are ‘wh’ cues, such as who, what, what
doing, where, when, how, why. These cues give the general kind of meaning of the words to
identify - a person, thing, process, place, time or reason. The other kind of cue is a paraphrase
or synonym of the words to identify, in words that students can understand.
‘Wh’ cues are used when the wording is easier for students to read and understand. Identifying
the wording from ‘wh’ cues tunes students into patterns that are found in all sentences. (All
sentences consist of groups of words that denote people, things, processes, places, times
and qualities – see Book 8 for more detail).But when the words could be hard for students to
understand, we must tell them what they mean, using a paraphrase that all our students can
understand. Identifying the words from paraphrase cues gives students skills in recognising
the meanings of less familiar words, and their functions in sentences.
The notes we write on the text are just the ‘wh’ words or the paraphrase for the wording. If
a sentence has two or more wordings of the same type, we can write cues such as ‘where
x2’, or ‘how x3’.
The preparation notes do not include all the words we will say in the classroom. For example,
we might say ‘At the beginning of this sentence it tells us who it is about. Can you see the
words that say who it is about?’, or ‘Next it tells us two places it happened. Can you see the
first place?’… ‘Can you see the second place?’ The notes are just the bare minimum we
need to remind us what to say.
These preparation notes can be handwritten written above the highlighted wordings. If they
are typed, insert a line between each line of text. Then tab along until the cursor is above the
underlined wording and type your preparation note.
Reading to Learn - Book 5 - Detailed Lesson Plans 5

5 Write notes for sentence meanings and elaborations
Writing the preparation cues for each wording gives us a detailed idea of what each sentence
is about, and how to explain the sentence to students in simple terms before reading it. It
also gives us a clear idea of how each wording needs to be elaborated, after students have
identified it.
So now we can write a note about the meaning of each sentence. This will often be a
summary of the preparation cues for the sentence. And we can write notes for elaborating
each wording in the sentence.
These sentence meaning notes and elaboration notes must be written separately from the
text (as there is no room within the text). The simplest way is to number each sentence in
the text. Then write the sentence meaning notes below the text, with the sentence number,
or on a separate page.
Below each sentence meaning note, we can write notes for elaborating the wordings in that
sentence. These can be dot points. So for each numbered sentence, there is a note on the
sentence meaning, followed by several dot points for elaborating.
To use these notes, the teacher looks first at the sentence meaning note, and says this to the
class, then reads the sentence. Then we look at the first preparation note in the text, and say
this to the students, who identify the wording. Then we look at the corresponding elaboration
note and say this to the class. Then we go on to the next preparation note, and so on.
6 Write notes for preparing before reading
Closely analysing the text for lesson planning gives us a clear idea of what to tell students
before reading it to them. So now notes can be written for preparing before reading. These
can include notes about the background knowledge that we will need to include in the lesson.
For longer texts, we can then make notes to summarise what happens in the whole text. For
the Detailed Reading passage, the notes will summarise what each phase of the passage is
about.Lesson plan notes.

Detailed Reading Lesson Plan - copy and use for each text
Sentence Prep
Cues
Sentence
Elaborations
Sentence Prep
Cues
Sentence
Elaborations
Reading to Learn - Book 5 - Detailed Lesson Plans

Sentence Prep
Cues
Sentence
Elaborations
Sentence Prep
Cues
Sentence
Elaborations

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READING TO LEARN

Accelerating learning and closing the gap

David Rose 2014

The Reading to Learn teacher resource books are copyright

Please do not copy or distribute without permission

Enquiries about the Reading to Learn program can also be made to

Book design by Andrew Rose

To do a learning task successfully, it needs to be

Doing a task successfully opens up learners’

We can apply the learning cycle to

4 Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing

Level 1: Preparing for Reading, Joint Construction and Independent Writing

8 Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing

The second level enables all students to read a

The teacher guides students through the passage,

Level 3: Sentence Making, Spelling and Sentence Writing

Words are then selected from these

Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 9

14 Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing

Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 15

• cells - same basic structure

16 Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing

The Structure of Cells

Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 17

Beyond the text is its context, including:

• Interpretive comprehension means interpreting

Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 27

Likewise a sentence only makes sense in relation

Reading to Learn - Book 1 - Preparing for reading and writing 29

2 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

chronicles! stages in a life (set in time) – biographical recount!

sequence of cause & effect - sequential!

Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

genre purpose stages

recount recounting events Orientation

classifying & describing types of Classification

exposition arguing for a point of view Arguments

setting presenting people, activities, places, times

6 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

Butterfly Song by Terri Jaenke

Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts 7

A Good Tip for Ghosts by Paul Jennings

8 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

classifying classifies different types of things types

compositional describes parts of wholes parts

Label these types of reports, and their stages and phases.

Australia is home to 25 of the world’s 30 monitor lizard species. In Australia,

18 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

Transport in the body

Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts 19

argument type purpose stages

Phases in expositions include supporting arguments, that can be labelled argument1,

22 Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts

Reading to Learn - Book 2 - Selecting and Analysing Texts 23

Student It. Identify

Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting 8

9 Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting

How you prepare depends on the needs of your students.

Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting 10

11 Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting

Reading to Learn - Book 4 - Detailed Reading and Rewriting 12

Very importantly the passage must be interesting

At 2am that morning when most people were asleep the