Using Multimodal Text Sets to Support Conceptual Understanding

Differentiated collections of print, non-print, and multimodal texts focused on a common topic, theme, concept, essential question, or anchor text
Use multiple texts to guide instruction.
Types of texts not limited to Photograph, Infographic, Video, Chart, Map, Website, Graph, Book, Web Cam, Comic Strip/Cartoon, Concept Map, and more
Materials for text sets are purposefully chosen to:
- 1. Support and deepen students understanding of concepts
- 2. Scaffold reading of increasingly complex texts,
- 3. Teach strategies for reading multiple texts, and
- 4. Provide different perspectives on a concept.

To develop conceptual knowledge, the necessary conditions for teachers to consider when creating text sets include:

Activate students’ existing knowledge, and
Relevant, engaging and interesting to students
Provide new information and experiences that allow students to make connections to further develop a concept.

When engaging with text sets to build conceptual knowledge, students need to:

Discover patterns and connections among ideas,
Think critically i.e. evaluate the truth of these understandings based on the supporting evidence provided in the texts, and
Transfer the new understandings across time or situations.

Concept Oriented Reading Instruction CORI

Engaging students and creating interest, and
Teaching students:
- Strategies for accessing information from different types of texts,
- How to synthesize information from a range of sources to construct meaning and conceptual understanding,
- How to communicate with a range of different audiences.

First, what is scaffolding?
Discuss and explain the following (Jigsaw in small groups).
- Hierarchical Scaffolding
- Quad text sets
- Linked text sets
- Anchor text sets

Resources for Primary Sources p. 87