Notice & Note: Strategies for Close Reading
Imprint
Heinemann
Author(s)
Kylene Beers, Robert E. Probst
"Just as rigor does not reside in the barbell but in the act of lifting it, rigor in reading is not an attribute of a text but rather of a reader’s behavior—engaged, observant, responsive, questioning, analytical. The close reading strategies in Notice and Note will help you cultivate those critical reading habits that will make your students more attentive, thoughtful, independent readers."
—Kylene Beers and Robert E. Probst
In Notice and Note Kylene Beers and Bob Probst introduce 6 “signposts” that alert readers to significant moments in a work of literature and encourage students to read closely. Learning first to spot these signposts and then to question them, enables readers to explore the text, any text, finding evidence to support their interpretations. In short, these close reading strategies will help your students to notice and note.
In this timely and practical guide Kylene and Bob:
- examine the new emphasis on text-dependent questions, rigor, text complexity, and what it means to be literate in the 21st century
- identify 6 signposts that help readers understand and respond to character development, conflict, point of view, and theme
- provide 6 text-dependent anchor questions that help readers take note and read more closely
- offer 6 Notice and Note model lessons, including text selections and teaching tools, that help you introduce each signpost to your students.
Notice and Note will help create attentive readers who look closely at a text, interpret it responsibly, and reflect on what it means in their lives. It should help them become the responsive, rigorous, independent readers we not only want students to be but know our democracy demands.
Authors
Kylene Beers
Kylene Beers, Ed.D., is a former middle school teacher who has turned her commitment to adolescent literacy and struggling readers into the major focus of her research, writing, speaking, and teaching. She author of the best-selling When Kids Can’t Read/What Teachers Can Do, co-editor (with Bob Probst and Linda Rief) of Adolescent Literacy: Turning Promise into Practice, and co-author (with Bob Probst) of Notice and Note: Strategies for Close Reading, all published by Heinemann. She taught in the College of Education at the University of Houston, served as Senior Reading Researcher at the Comer School Development Program at Yale University, and most recently acted as the Senior Reading Advisor to Secondary Schools for the Reading and Writing Project at Teachers College.
Kylene has published numerous articles in state and national journals, served as editor of the national literacy journal, Voices from the Middle, and was the 2008-2009 President of the National Council of Teachers of English. She is an invited speaker at state, national, and international conferences and works with teachers in elementary, middle, and high schools across the US. Kylene has served as a consultant to the National Governor’s Association and was the 2011 recipient of the Conference on English Leadership outstanding leader award.
Robert E. Probst
Robert E. Probst, author of Response and Analysis, (Heinemann, 2004) is a respected authority on the teaching of literature. Bob’s focus on engagement and literary analysis helps teachers learn the strategies to help readers approach a text with more confidence and greater skill.
Professor Emeritus of English Education at Georgia State University, Bob’s publications include numerous articles in English Journal, Voices from the Middle, and professional texts including Adolescent Literacy: Turning Promise into Practice (Heinemann, 2007), and the forthcoming Heinemann book Notice and Note: Strategies for Close Reading (with Kylene Beers).
He presents at national conventions including the International Reading Association (IRA), the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), the Association of Supervisors and Curriculum Developers (ASCD), and the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP). He has served NCTE in various leadership roles including the Conference on English Leadership Board of Directors, the Commission on Reading, column editor of the NCTE journal Voices from the Middle, and is the 2007 recipient of the CEL Outstanding Leadership Award.
Table of Contents
Overview
Part I, The Questions We Pondered, shares our thinking about some critical topics of today. Because our thinking about these topics mostly took the form of questions we asked of one another, we decided to present this section as a series of questions and our answers. Our answers, tentative as they are, may help you understand the thinking that guided our development of the Notice and Note Signposts. Also in Part I you’ll see sections labeled “What you might wonder about.” These are additional questions we thought you and others in your own learning community might want to discuss. See these questions as starting points for rich conversations about literacy education in your own classroom and your own school.
Part II, The Signposts We Found, explains the Notice and Note Signposts, the role of generalizable language, and the anchor question that accompanies each signpost.
Part III, The Lessons We Teach, provides model lessons for teaching the Signposts. This is our language and we don’t expect it to work for you or your students until you’ve put it in your own words, but it will give you a start, a place to begin.
We hope that Notice and Note: Strategies for Close Reading will help students come to enjoy the pleasures of reading attentively and responsively. They will need you to put the right books in their hands, books in which they can get lost and books in which they can find themselves. And they’ll need you, and other teachers like you, to invite them into the conversations that will transform them into the close and thoughtful readers whose entire lives will be enriched by books.
Table of Contents
Part I: The Questions We Pondered
1. Is reading still reading?
2. And what is the role of fiction?
3. Where does rigor fit in with this discussion of reading?
4. What do we mean by intellectual communities?
5. What is the role of talk in creating intellectual communities?
6. Do text-dependent questions foster engagement?
7. What is “Close Reading?”
8. To talk about novels do we all need to be reading the same book?
9. As I’m choosing novels, don’t the CCSS say novels must be harder, be more complex?
10. And one final question: Are we creating lifetime learners?
Part II: The Signposts We Found
1. The Notice and Note Signposts
2. Defining the Notice and Note Signposts
3. The Anchor Question for each Signpost
4. The Role of Generalizable Language in Teaching these Lessons
5. The Generalizable Language We Use for Each Signpost
6. Explaining the Signposts to Students
7. Assessment and the Notice and Note Signposts
8. Some Questions You Might Have
Part III The Lessons We Teach
1. Contrasts and Contradictions
2. The Aha Moment
3. Tough Questions
4. Words of the Wiser
5. Again and Again
6. Memory Moment
Appendix
1. Student Survey on Discussions
2. Rigor and Talk Checklist
3. Huswifery
4. Text complexity worksheet
5. Notice and Note Bookmark
6. Texts for teaching the Notice and Note Lessons
Virtual Samples