As the basis for design of those assignments that integrate reading with listening (in the case of video and film), speaking, and writing skills, different Standards suggest different ways to read how a text presents people, events, institutions, or ideas.

     Depending on the learning strategy suggested by the Standards, the emphasis a teacher decides to choose as the basis for rereading assignments (Phases 3, 4, and 5) will depend on the cognitive and linguistic level of his or her students.  Note, however, that extensive reading is probably not feasible for Grade 4 (nor probably even desirable), and hence the sample exercises below include examples only for the upper grades. Those Standards will, nonetheless, provide students with a framework of meaning, a pattern of relationships with which to read for meaning.  That is, each Standard proposes a particular logic with which a text can be read to identify patterns of information from which students can draw inferences and significance.  While the choice of logical relationships to read for will depend on the content of the text, the choice of assignment types will depend on the Standards the teacher wishes to apply.

     To read for meaning (that is, to read information for its implications and significance), there are three logical patterns to choose from: 1) relational (as characteristics of people, events, institutions, or ideas and their implications), 2) causal (how circumstances in which people find themselves, events, institutions, or ideas affect other circumstances, events, institutions, or ideas), or 3) comparative (between people, events, institutions, or ideas).  The Standards guide the teacher in designing assignments in the following ways that generalize to almost any kind of reading (viewing, listening) text:

communication standards: Ask students to find language in the text that enables them to reenact the ideas, events, people, or institutions depicted in the text and their relationship to one another (primarily in the first person).

connections standards: Ask students to find language in the text that enables them to express the ideas, events, people, or institutions depicted and describe their relationship to one another (primarily in the third person).

culture standards: Ask students to use the speech, actions, and attitudes expressed by people, events, institutions, or ideas in the text and express the values that can be inferred from them.

comparisons standards: Ask students to find language in the text that characterizes the people, events, institutions, or ideas depicted in the text and contrast or compare those people, events, institutions, or ideas with those found in their culture.

communities standards: Ask students to find language in the text that reflects how people, events, institutions, or ideas function in that text and what is implied discursively and behaviorally about the way they, as visitors to Germany, might function successfully in a similar situation.

As in the preceding examples, in the exercise pairs that follow, our aim is to illustrate how different exercises achieve different learning goals rather than to designate one approach necessarily inferior to another.

     Ultimately, the decision about "what is right" for your students will depend on the curricular objectives of your school's program and the learning objectives of your students.  Again, after you read the exercise pairs that follow, you have the option of Brainstorming or to go directly to Hints about the pairs of assignments you read.

 GRADE 8 EXERCISES
 GRADE 12 EXERCISES