Common Core Standard For English Language Arts (Page 5 of 43) in pdf

Common Core State StandardS for engliSh language artS & literaCy in hiStory/SoCial StudieS, SCienCe, and teChniCal SubjeCtS

The Standards presume that all three elements will come into play when text complexity and appropriateness are

determined. The following pages begin with a brief overview of just some of the currently available tools, both quali-

tative and quantitative, for measuring text complexity, continue with some important considerations for using text

complexity with students, and conclude with a series of examples showing how text complexity measures, balanced

with reader and task considerations, might be used with a number of different texts.

Qualitative and Quantitative Measures of Text Complexity

The qualitative and quantitative measures of text complexity described below are representative of the best tools

presently available. However, each should be considered only provisional; more precise, more accurate, and easier-

to-use tools are urgently needed to help make text complexity a vital, everyday part of classroom instruction and

curriculum planning.

Qualitative Measures of Text Complexity

Using qualitative measures of text complexity involves making an informed decision about the difficulty of a text in

terms of one or more factors discernible to a human reader applying trained judgment to the task. In the Standards,

qualitative measures, along with professional judgment in matching a text to reader and task, serve as a necessary

complement and sometimes as a corrective to quantitative measures, which, as discussed below, cannot (at least at

present) capture all of the elements that make a text easy or challenging to read and are not equally successful in rat-

ing the complexity of all categories of text.

Built on prior research, the four qualitative factors described below are offered here as a first step in the development

of robust tools for the qualitative analysis of text complexity. These factors are presented as continua of difficulty

rather than as a succession of discrete “stages” in text complexity. Additional development and validation would be

needed to translate these or other dimensions into, for example, grade-level- or grade-band-specific rubrics. The

qualitative factors run from easy (left-hand side) to difficult (right-hand side). Few, if any, authentic texts will be low

or high on all of these measures, and some elements of the dimensions are better suited to literary or to informational

texts.

(1) Levels of Meaning (literary texts) or Purpose (informational texts). Literary texts with a single level of meaning tend

to be easier to read than literary texts with multiple levels of meaning (such as satires, in which the author’s literal mes-

sage is intentionally at odds with his or her underlying message). Similarily, informational texts with an explicitly stated

purpose are generally easier to comprehend than informational texts with an implicit, hidden, or obscure purpose.

(2) Structure. Texts of low complexity tend to have simple, well-marked, and conventional structures, whereas texts

of high complexity tend to have complex, implicit, and (particularly in literary texts) unconventional structures. Simple

literary texts tend to relate events in chronological order, while complex literary texts make more frequent use of

flashbacks, flash-forwards, and other manipulations of time and sequence. Simple informational texts are likely not to

deviate from the conventions of common genres and subgenres, while complex informational texts are more likely to

conform to the norms and conventions of a specific discipline. Graphics tend to be simple and either unnecessary or

merely supplementary to the meaning of texts of low complexity, whereas texts of high complexity tend to have simi-

larly complex graphics, graphics whose interpretation is essential to understanding the text, and graphics that provide

an independent source of information within a text. (Note that many books for the youngest students rely heavily on

graphics to convey meaning and are an exception to the above generalization.)

(3) Language Conventionality and Clarity. Texts that rely on literal, clear, contemporary, and conversational language tend

to be easier to read than texts that rely on figurative, ironic, ambiguous, purposefully misleading, archaic or otherwise unfa-

miliar language or on general academic and domain-specific vocabulary.

(4) Knowledge Demands. Texts that make few assumptions about the extent of readers’ life experiences and the

depth of their cultural/literary and content/discipline knowledge are generally less complex than are texts that make

many assumptions in one or more of those areas.

Common Core Standard For English Language Arts Page 5

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