ABSTRACT
One of the major shifts in the Common Core State Standards for secondary English language arts teachers is an increased focus on nonfiction, informational texts-essays, reports, articles, historical and cultural documents, blog posts, reviews, etc. In this chapter we provide strategies to teach your students the kind of close and careful reading of language, ideas, and arguments that are required by the Common Core State Standards. We will show you why knowledge of literacy practices is essential to teaching reading at a high level of complexity and we will explain and illustrate how to effectively integrate nonfiction and informational texts into a meaningful language arts curriculum.
