information-dense sentences. Learning to craft rich and effective sentences in writing that are
appropriate to task, purpose, and audience is a long-term enterprise—one that should continue
throughout students’ schooling and careers.
In addition, students can learn to analyze sentences, paragraphs, and whole texts using a
metalanguage for discussing how writers make language choices to convey particular meanings
(Schleppegrell 2013; Fang, Schleppegrell, and Moore 2013). For example, teachers can facilitate
conversations with students in which they unpack lexically dense sentences to uncover the various
meanings in the sentences. Teachers can also help students see how different text types are
structured and how they employ various linguistic resources, such as different types of verbs or
connecting phrases to create cohesion, depending on the purpose of the text type (e.g., to argue,
entertain, describe, explain, recount events). These understandings about how language works
to make meaning support students’ reading comprehension, and they also provide students with
models for their own writing. This language learning is contextualized in the rich content students
are learning, and teachers facilitate active dialogue about how language works, rather than teaching
language in an isolated way (e.g., students silently complete grammar worksheets).
Effective Expression
The development of effective communication skills is one of
the hallmarks of the CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy and the CA ELD
Standards. This section provides a brief overview of writing,
discussing, presenting, and language conventions for the grade
span.
Writing
By the end of grade eight, students demonstrated their
growing writing skills by writing arguments to support claims
with relevant evidence, acknowledging and addressing opposing
claims, supporting counterarguments, and using credible sources
(W/WHST.6–8.1). Students also wrote informative/explanatory
texts by introducing a thesis statement, using relevant,
well-chosen facts in the content areas, using appropriate
organization and varied transitions for clarity and cohesion, and establishing and maintaining a
formal style and objective tone (W/WHST.6–8.2). Students wrote narratives that engaged the reader,
established context and point of view, used language to signal shifts in time frame or setting, and
showed relationships among experiences and ideas (W.6–8.3). Students considered how well purpose
and audience had been addressed in their writing (W/WHST.6–8.5) and used technology to type a
minimum of three pages in a single setting, linking and citing sources and presenting relationships
between ideas and information clearly and efficiently (W/WHST.6–8.6). Students wrote a balance of
texts to parallel National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) expectations at grade eight: 35
percent to persuade, 35 percent to explain, and 30 percent to convey experience.
As students advance through high school, they become increasingly effective at expressing
themselves through different genres of writing.
New to the grades nine through twelve span are the following:- In ELA, writing arguments in an analysis of substantive topics or texts using valid reasoning
(W.9–12.1); introducing precise (W.9–10.1a) and knowledgeable claims (W.11–12.1a);
establishing the significance of claims (W.11–12.1a); organizing writing to establish clear
relationships (W.9–10.1a) and logical sequence (W.11–12.1a) among claim(s), counterclaims,
reasons, and evidence; pointing out strengths and limitations of claim(s) and counterclaims
Grades 9 to 12 Chapter 7 | 685