Page 135 - The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 11 and 12: English, 2007 (Revised)

Grade 12, Workplace Preparation
3. Reading With Fluency
4. Reflecting on Skills and Strategies
THE ONTARIO CURRICULUM, GRADES 11 AND 12 | English
Elements of Style
2.3 identify a variety of elements of style in texts, including increasingly complex texts, and explain how they help communicate meaning and enhance the effectiveness of the texts (e.g., variety in sentence and paragraph lengths can affect readability and reader interest; the use of a symbol in an advertisement can create a particu- lar impression about the product; the use of evocative words can help the reader visualize the characters in a short story; dialect, regional accents, or non-standard English can be used to reveal information about characters)
Teacher prompts: “How do short, choppy sen- tences affect your interest in the text?” “What kinds of symbols would make you associate a product with youth culture?” “Which words in the short story help the reader to visualize its main character?”
By the end of this course, students will:
Reading Familiar Words
3.1 automatically understand most words in
a variety of reading contexts (e.g., words in grade-level texts; words found in texts on their favourite websites; terminology in technical and workplace texts)
Teacher prompt: “These terms are used so frequently in the construction industry that most people use the acronyms for them. What does this acronym stand for?”
Reading Unfamiliar Words
3.2 use appropriate decoding strategies to read and understand unfamiliar words (e.g., discuss possible meanings of unfamiliar words with peers when participating in small-group, guided reading experiences; reread the sentence aloud to hear the unfamiliar word spoken in context; use print and electronic dictionaries to find the meanings of unfamiliar words)
Teacher prompts: “What other word could you use here that would make sense in the sentence?” “Does this word look or sound like any other word you know?”
Developing Vocabulary
3.3 identify and use a variety of strategies to expand vocabulary, with a focus on vocabulary needed to function effectively as responsible citizens, pursue careers, and participate actively in the
community (e.g., create a list of words used in transactions such as renting an apartment or buying a car; report on vocabulary learned in a co-op placement, a part-time job, or a volunteer placement; create a visual/verbal collage using the new vocabulary in a text)
Teacher prompts: “Read to the class your list of the words that appeared most often in the employment ads you researched in your cho- sen field.” “Which words are commonly used at your part-time job? What strategies have you used to help you remember them?
By the end of this course, students will:
Metacognition
4.1 describe a variety of strategies they used before, during, and after reading; explain which ones they found most helpful; and identify appro- priate steps they can take to improve as readers (e.g., list the five reading strategies they found most helpful, and explain their choices; describe the benefits of reflecting on their reading practices and their progress as readers)
Teacher prompts: “What questions did you ask yourself as you scanned the website for specific information? Which questions were most helpful?” “How did using sticky notes during reading help you to prepare your summary of the article?” ”Which strategies do you think would help you most when you are reading longer texts? Why?”
Interconnected Skills
4.2 identify a variety of their skills in listening, speaking, writing, viewing, and representing and explain how the skills help in their devel- opment as readers (e.g., write a blog entry or an editorial for a student newsletter to explain the importance of this combination of skills in the complex world of work; record in your reading journal the insights into the novel that you gained from participating in a literature circle)
Teacher prompts: “What did you learn by writing and illustrating this procedure that will help you to read procedural texts more effectively?” “How does talking to a partner after reading a section of a challenging tech- nical text help you to understand the text?”
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