This engaging workshop will take teachers and literacy leaders on an excursion through complex texts. Participants will come away with proven strategies to help all students value navigate rich literary and informational texts. When readers have a sense of agency around the following text and reading dynamics they can access complex texts: • Purpose: “If I know my purpose as a reader, and the author’s purpose for writing, then I can acccess more complex texts.” • Organization: “If I am aware of how the text is organized, then I can access more complex content and texts.” • Sentence Structure: “If I am aware of the sentence structure in a complex selection, it is more accessible.” • Genre: “If I am aware of the traits of a specific genre, then complex text within that genre is made more accessible.” • Connection of Ideas: “If I know that I must carry information or content from what part of the read to another, or between texts, then I am more apt to be able to comprehend complex text.” • Prior Knowledge: “I must have prior knowledge that can be connected to the content of a complex text, if I am to be able to fully access it.” • Specific Vocabulary: “I must have knowledge of domain specific and high-utility academic language which is important to the meaning of a piece of complex text, if I am to fully understand it.”
