Instructional Playbook

Engineer the Text

Click here for the Implementation Slides

Overview There are two ways to do this strategy.

The teacher strategically amplifies the language of a text. Examples are things like the learning intentions and success criteria, bell activities, notes, math problems, passages from a lengthy or challlenging chapter/article/story, etc. The teacher models how to strategically amplify the language of text, then has students work in cooperative groups of 3 or 4 to engineer it. Students can jigsaw any text and follow the same steps the teacher provides to engineer it. Instructional Purpose To engage with peers using a complex texts which is crucial for learning a language. To familiarize learners with grammatical structures, text features, and big ideas necessary to access grade level content and text. Materials/Set-Up Grade-level text (paragraph, passage, problem set, or task) Copies of the text for each student or group on a shared digital space Pre-determined groups of 3–4 students Clearly defined student roles (A, B, C, D) Instructional Steps 1.Explain that we can make complex text more clear by strategically adding supports. 2.Display a short text and model how to: a.Chunk the text b.Add guiding questions or headings c.Add visuals or thinking maps d.Add a glossary or translations 3.Place students in groups and assign roles - chunk text, add questions/ headings, add visuals, add glossary/translations 4.Students work together to engineer the text and agree on supports. 5.Circulate, prompt thinking, and reinforce clarity. 6.OPTIONAL: Groups briefly share their work.

Access by Language Proficiency Level Entering (1) Emerging (2)

Developing (3)

Expanding (4)

Students follow along highlighting words, listening in on a group of 3. Convey purpose of the activity through gestures or prompts provided in home language or visuals.

Students at this level may need clarification in home language or with visuals. They can read along and engineer text with their peers.

Students at this level can read along and engineer text with their peers. They might need clarification of some texts that are heavy in academic language.

Students at this level can read along and engineer text with their peers.

Sentence Stem Examples

I see ___. This means ___. I added a picture for ___.

We added ... This helps because ... The heading tells us ...

We highlighted ___ because it is important. We selected this support because ___..

This change improves comprehension by ...