Choosing and Using Complex Text

Every Student, Every Day

All students should engage with complex text regularly by reading or listening. All students, regardless of grade or current reading ability, deserve access to rich, engaging, inclusive, and authentic literature every day in school. In the younger grades, this happens primarily through read-alouds. As children progress through the grades, they increasingly read grade-level complex text on their own, although read-aloud remains beneficial. Engagement with this type of text is critical to reading development and identity development as it provides access to complex language, ideas, and a range of perspectives. Importantly, engaging with complex text is not leveled instruction. During a complex text lesson, instruction may be scaffolded while the text at the center of instruction is at or above grade level.

What is Complex Text?

Text complexity is defined by a range of qualitative and quantitative features, and depends on the reader and task for which it is selected (see DESE Quick Reference Guide: Text Complexity and the Growth of Reading Comprehension ). Complex text offers opportunities to develop academic language and acquire knowledge about the world, both of which contribute to development of reading comprehension (Shanahan et al., 2010 ). The Massachusetts 2017 English Language Arts and Literacy Framework places "equal emphasis on the sophistication of what students read and the skill with which they read. Standard 10 defines a grade-by-grade 'staircase' of increasing text complexity that rises from beginning reading to the college and career readiness level" (page 12).

Not every text selected for instruction needs to be complex, but easier texts should be purposefully selected with the goal of scaffolding students' access to increasingly complex related texts.

When working with a complex text, the ultimate teaching goal is for students to understand the text, not to "practice" a particular strategy or a standard. Thus, the choice of text is not incidental but the center of the lesson.

Culturally Responsive Practice and Complex Text

Selecting texts to read and topics to study in early literacy is a particularly salient opportunity to be culturally responsive, Texts should provide "mirrors and windows" for children; allowing students both to see themselves (characters and communities that are familiar) and to see and learn about others in the texts they read (Bishop, 1990). Characters, settings, and authors should be diverse as well as reflective of students' community (Kelly et al., 2021). In selecting texts, it is important to go beyond superficial representation and to carefully avoid common biases in curricular materials, such as stereotypes (Zittleman & Sadker, 2002).

In contrast to biased curricular materials, Tatum (2009) describes qualities of "enabling texts" that positively support students' development of identity and capacity. For instance, these texts:

• Provide a modern awareness of the real world
• Serve as a road map for being, doing, thinking, and acting
• Demonstrate resiliency
• Avoid caricatures
• Recognize, honor & nurture multiple identities (Tatum, 2009).

With such "enabling texts" in place, teachers can select or adapt text-based questions to open up conversations about socio-political awareness. These conversations can serve to challenge existing narratives and support students to discuss their thoughts on injustices surfaced from text. Critical wonderings about whose voice is included in the text, whose is not, the perspective of the author, and the way and the context in which the text is written can help students examine and interpret the text, and its underlying messages, more deeply and meaningfully.

To provide coherent sets of texts and tasks that meet the demands of the standards, and to meet the unique needs of all students, teachers must have access to high-quality curriculum materials from which to plan. The CURATE project provides information about published curricular materials and resources for high-quality curricular materials.

For More Information

• Tatum, Alfred. (2009). Reading for Their Life: (re)building the Textual Lineages of African American Adolescent Males. Heinemann.
• Assessing Bias in Standards and Curricular Materials (Coomer et al., 2017)
• Massachusetts CURATE rubric for evaluating ELA/Literacy curricular materials . This rubric includes indicators for diverse representation in texts.
• Seven Forms of Bias in Curricular Materials
• Text Analysis Toolkit from Achieve the Core
• Reading for Diversity Toolkit from Learning for Justice
• Windows, Mirrors, Sliding Glass Doors (video) Reading Rockets video interview with Rudine Sims Bishop, Ph.D.
• Using Text Sets to Support Culturally Relevant Pedagogy from Achieve the Core

Building Vocabulary and Knowledge

Engaging with complex text is an important classroom activity to build vocabulary and knowledge, both of which are essential for development of reading comprehension. Development of vocabulary and knowledge begins at birth and must be supported from the earliest days of formal schooling. Vocabulary knowledge is intimately linked to conceptual knowledge. "Big ideas and complex questions cannot be separated from the language used to represent them…A reader's comprehension of a story depends greatly upon the knowledge and language she brings to the experience" (Lesaux & Russ Harris, 2015). All students bring their own "funds of knowledge" (Moll & González, 1994) to the classroom, impacting how and what they take away from a word, text, or discussion.

Using texts in related sets is a widely recognized strategy to build students' topical and conceptual knowledge. Not every text selected for instruction needs to be complex, but easier texts should be purposefully selected with the goal of scaffolding students' access to increasingly complex related texts. As Adams (2010) explained, students should read a sequence of increasingly complex texts "so that each text bootstraps the language and knowledge needed for the next. Gradually, students will be ready for texts of greater complexity" (Adams, 2010). Teachers select key concepts and vocabulary from text sets and provide explicit instruction on those words, along with authentic practice through discussion and writing. Activating background knowledge related to the text topics and building upon that knowledge to increase it through daily instruction are practices that enhance reading comprehension over time (Cabell & Hwang, 2020). Connecting topics from the school curriculum to student's everyday lives also supports deeper engagement and relevance for students (Institute for Education Science, Regional Education Laboratory Program, 2017).

Explicit vocabulary instruction often occurs at the beginning of a lesson, before reading the text. Selecting high-value words to teach that recur throughout a topic or text set is an effective approach for vocabulary development (Lesaux & Russ Harris, 2015).

Resources for Developing Knowledge and Vocabulary Using Text Sets

• Text Set Project, from Achieve the Core (Resource)
• Sample Text Set for the Elementary Grades: Water , from Massachusetts English Language Arts and Literacy Framework, page 83
• Teaching with Text Sets, from Teaching With Tradebooks.com (Resource)
• Text Project informational texts (Resource)
• Grade 2 Building knowledge through close reading, from Achieve the Core (video)
• Selecting and Using Academic Vocabulary in Instruction , from Achieve the Core (Resource)
• Six-step process for teaching vocabulary (Marzano & Simms, 2013)
• Seven-step process from Massachusetts SEI course
• Knowledge and Vocabulary K-2, from Achieve the Core (Resource)

In addition to explicit vocabulary teaching, implicit vocabulary learning occurs when children hear, use, and interact with words in their reading and discussion of texts and topics. Extensive opportunities for discussion of complex text are critical to language development and are particularly supportive of multilingual learners (Baker et al., 2014).

Leveraging Linguistic Assets for Multilingual Learners

English learners must have equal opportunity to meaningfully participate in all literacy instruction. The WIDA Can Do Descriptors and 2020 ELD Standards Framework highlight what language learners can do at various stages of language development and help educators plan for instruction that fosters high expectations and equity of access for ELs. For additional information, see this set of Five Instructional Practices and Instructional Strategies for Centering MLLs in Early Literacy Instruction (Instruction Partners).

When building vocabulary and knowledge as part of engaging with complex text, English Learners may need instruction in what are often referred to as Tier 1 words (words that native speakers tend to pick up from oral language experience alone). Also, if a student understands a concept and has a word for that concept in their native language, then the student only needs to learn the English word and recognize it as a synonym. However, if the student doesn't yet have the concept in question, then vocabulary instruction needs to be more thorough (Carlo et. al., 2004).

Supports for English Learners

• Incorporate reading selections that have topics, settings, concepts, references, and cultural contexts that are familiar and relevant (Lesaux et al., 2010)
• Help students activate and build knowledge (Baker et al., 2014 ).
• Survey or preview the text before reading it (Brown et al.,1995)
• Teach word meanings through explicit instruction in combination with rich opportunities to listen, observe, participate, and interact in meaningful contexts (Carlo et al., 2004); Lesaux et al., 2010)
• Teach relationships between words (Lesaux et al., 2010)
• Offer multiple exposures to new words in different contexts; for instance, have students choose which of two newly learned words best applies to a given situation or ranking words according to meaningful criteria (August et al., 2009; Carlo et al., 2004; Lesaux et al., 2010)
• Provide explicit instruction and practice in morphology; reinforce understanding of word roots and the meanings of common prefixes and suffixes (Carlo et al., 2004; Lesaux et al., 2010)
• Teach students to recognize cognates and how to use them to create meaning whenever words in their home language have similar meaning and form as English (Carlo et al., 2004)

Learn More

• Vocabulary Development, from Colorín Colorado
• Vocabulary and English language learners, from Colorín Colorado
• Do Leveled Readers Hurt or Help My ELs?, from English Learner Success Forum
• Translanguaging Strategies, from English Learner Success Forum

Comprehension Strategies with Complex Text

Comprehension strategies are "intentional mental actions during reading that improve reading comprehension" (Shanahan et al., 2010 , page 11). Some of the most commonly taught reading comprehension strategies include self-monitoring, questioning, inferring, and visualizing. Research has shown that readers with good comprehension do use these strategies, especially self-monitoring and inferring (Willingham, 2006 ; Oakhill, Cain, & Elbro, 2015).

Supporting Development of Reading Comprehension Strategies

Reading strategies are not the same as reading comprehension. "Rather," writes cognitive psychologist Dan Willingham, they are "a bag of tricks that can indirectly improve comprehension. These tricks are easy to learn and require little practice, but students must be able to decode fluently before these strategies can be effective" (Willingham, 2006 ).

Comprehension strategies should be understood as a means to an end. They are not the purpose of reading, but rather a tool to understand the meaning of the text. A recent meta-study (Elleman, 2017) found that most studies of comprehension strategy teaching showed positive results in relatively short periods of time (i.e., less than 10 hours of instruction). Students can learn these strategies through relatively brief instruction and then proceed to apply these strategies when working with complex text.

Evidence from classroom studies suggests that students benefit most from strategy instruction when they are able to read meaningful texts independently and fluently. For many children, this stage is achieved around second grade. Evidence does not strongly indicate that explicit comprehension strategy instruction aids comprehension below second grade (Elleman, 2017, Willingham, 2006 ).

Some helpful questions to consider when planning complex text instruction

• Does the lesson use high-quality, culturally relevant, complex texts and text sets that are rich in academic language and promote critical thinking?
• Does instruction give all students equitable access to grade-level texts, tasks, and experiences as well as the supports they need to meet high expectations?
• How are students encouraged to notice, discuss, and critique texts and topics through a sociopolitical lens to help advance student thinking and actions about issues of identity, equity, power, or oppression?
• How does student discussion in whole-group and small groups using text-based questions move from literal to deeper and more inferential concepts, based on grade-level standards?
• How are students provided explicit vocabulary instruction and opportunities to hear and use new words?

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Last Updated: September 12, 2022