Overview

Lesson Procedure

60-75 minutes of class time across 5 phases.

1. Warm-Up5-10 minutes
2. Direct Instruction20 minutes
3. Guided Practice15 minutes
4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes
5. Closure5-10 minutes

1. Warm-Up5-10 minutes

   Put two versions of the same three facts on the board.

   Warm-Up Prompt

   "Version 1: 'The bridge was closed for repairs. Traffic backed up for miles. The mayor apologized.' Version 2: 'The mayor apologized. Traffic had backed up for miles because the bridge was closed for repairs.' The facts are the same. Which version makes the apology the main point? Which one reads as an explanation of why traffic backed up? What changed besides the order?"

   Collect answers. Students usually notice that the first sentence of Version 2 gets the attention and that "because" turns the list of events into an explanation. Name the skill: the structure of a text is the order and grouping of its parts and the signals that join them, and a writer uses it to decide what readers notice first, what they remember last and how one idea leads to the next. RH.9-10.5 asks students to analyze how a history text uses structure in this way.

2. Direct Instruction20 minutes

   Part 1: Structures and signals. Show the table and have students copy the three questions of the routine into their notebooks: What are the parts, and what job does each do? What signals join them? What does this order make the reader notice or accept?

   Structures a history text can use, the signals that show them, and what each one can emphasize

   Structure	Signals to look for	What it can emphasize or advance
   List or program	Numbers, "first," one item per paragraph, the same grammar in every item	Each item as a separate commitment; the first and last items
   Cause and effect	because, therefore, as a result, the reason was, had three effects	An explanation of why something happened
   Chronological	Dates, then, next, after that, in the years that followed	What happened in what order; the last event
   Claim and refutation	some say ... but, critics claim, this ignores, in fact	An analysis: the author's view wins by beating rival views
   Question and answer	A question, then its answer in the next sentence or paragraph	The next step of the argument
   General to specific	Rules for all first, named cases after	The rule that the cases apply

   Part 2: Model with Wilson. Give the context in two sentences: on January 8, 1918, President Wilson spoke to a joint session of Congress about the aims the United States would pursue at the peace. The four paragraphs before T1 describe the peace talks between Russia and the Central Powers at Brest-Litovsk, ask whom the German and Austrian negotiators really spoke for, and praise the Russian people's refusal to accept a peace of conquest. Read T1 aloud. Students number the paragraphs and circle every signal word. Show Diagram 1 and work the three examples.

   1It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind. The day of conquest and aggrandizement is gone by; so is also the day of secret covenants entered into in the interest of particular governments and likely at some unlooked-for moment to upset the peace of the world. It is this happy fact, now clear to the view of every public man whose thoughts do not still linger in an age that is dead and gone, which makes it possible for every nation whose purposes are consistent with justice and the peace of the world to avow now or at any other time the objects it has in view.

   2We entered this war because violations of right had occurred which touched us to the quick and made the life of our own people impossible unless they were corrected and the world secured once for all against their recurrence. What we demand in this war, therefore, is nothing peculiar to ourselves. It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in; and particularly that it be made safe for every peace-loving nation which, like our own, wishes to live its own life, determine its own institutions, be assured of justice and fair dealing by the other peoples of the world as against force and selfish aggression. All the peoples of the world are in effect partners in this interest, and for our own part we see very clearly that unless justice be done to others it will not be done to us. The program of the world's peace, therefore, is our program; and that program, the only possible program, as we see it, is this:

   3I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind, but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

   4II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants.

   5III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance.

   6IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

   7V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.

   • A chain of reasons that leads into the list (T1, paragraph 2)

     "We entered this war because violations of right had occurred ... What we demand in this war, therefore, is nothing peculiar to ourselves. ... The program of the world's peace, therefore, is our program; and that program, the only possible program, as we see it, is this:"

     Result: The paragraph has three steps joined by signal words: a cause ("because"), a demand that follows from it ("therefore"), and a program that follows from the demand (a second "therefore"). The colon at the end hands the reader straight to Point I. The structure advances an explanation: the fourteen points arrive as the logical result of why the United States went to war, not as a list of American wishes. The phrase "nothing peculiar to ourselves" sits in the middle step to block the reading that the list serves only the United States.

   • Placement first: Point I repeats the key idea of paragraph 1 (T1, paragraphs 1 and 3)

     Paragraph 1: the processes of peace "shall be absolutely open" and permit "no secret understandings of any kind"; "so is also the day of secret covenants" gone by. Point I: "Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind."

     Result: Wilson puts openness in the paragraph just before the program and then makes it the first point, in nearly the same words ("of any kind" appears in both). The repetition inside Point I ("Open covenants ... openly arrived at") doubles it. Position first plus repetition tells the reader that open diplomacy is the base the other points stand on. A reader who asks "why is this first?" finds the answer one paragraph earlier.

   • Grouping: Points I-V apply to all nations (T1, paragraphs 3-7)

     Point I names diplomacy, II the seas, III trade ("economic barriers"), IV armaments and V "colonial claims." Each begins with a phrase that names a principle: "Open covenants," "Absolute freedom," "The removal," "Adequate guarantees," "A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment."

     Result: None of the first five points names a country; they are rules for every nation, written in the same grammatical form. Grouping them at the head of the list makes the program read from general to specific: the rules come first, and the territorial points that follow (VI-XIII) read as applications of them. Diagram 1 shows the grouping to scale: Points I-V take 174 words, Points VI-XIII take 481.

3. Guided Practice15 minutes

   Read T2, the rest of the program. Pairs answer three questions before the class works the example: Which points name a place? How many sentences does each point have? Which verb carries each point (must, should, or none)?

   1VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest coöperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

   2VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is forever impaired.

   3VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of all.

   4IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

   5X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development.

   6XI. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea; and the relations of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; and international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into.

   7XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

   8XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.

   9XIV. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.

   • Emphasis by elaboration and by verbs (T2, Points VI-XIV)

     Points VI and VII are the only points in T2 with more than one sentence: VI adds that Russia's treatment "will be the acid test" of the other nations' good will, and VII adds "No other single act will serve as this will serve" and a third sentence on what is lost without it. VII says Belgium "must be evacuated"; VIII-XIII say "should"; XIV says an association of nations "must be formed."

     Result: Two structural signals mark the strongest points. Elaboration: only Russia (VI) and Belgium (VII) get extra sentences that explain why they matter. Verb strength: among the territorial points, only VII uses "must"; the next six use the softer "should." The list then ends with the one other "must" in T2, Point XIV, placed last. Its words "political independence and territorial integrity" repeat phrases from Points XI and XIII, so the last point reads as the guarantee for the ones before it.

   Teacher model for the pair work: Point XIV is a single short sentence, yet it is the point history remembers, because the association of nations it calls for became the League of Nations, set up in 1920 by the peace treaties. Placement last gives a short point weight. Ask pairs whether the program would read differently if XIV came first, and have them write one sentence of answer.

   Passage for Activity 2. The two versions below were written for this page. They use the same facts in two structures. Show Diagram 2 after pairs finish the activity.

   1Version A. Work on the Erie Canal began in 1817, when crews broke ground near Rome, New York. Governor DeWitt Clinton had pushed the plan through the state legislature, and critics mocked the project as "Clinton's Ditch." For eight years workers dug, largely by hand and with the help of horses and mules, across about 363 miles of the state.

   2In October 1825 the canal opened along its full length, from Buffalo on Lake Erie to Albany on the Hudson River, and Clinton rode a canal boat from Buffalo all the way to New York City to celebrate. In the years that followed, grain and lumber moved east on canal boats and manufactured goods moved west. New York City's population grew from about 124,000 in 1820 to about 313,000 in 1840.

   3Version B. The Erie Canal, opened in 1825, made New York City the gateway to the American interior. The reason was cost. Before the canal, goods from the Great Lakes region went east over rough roads by wagon, or far south by river to New Orleans, and both routes were slow and costly. After it, a canal boat could carry them from Buffalo to Albany, and from there they went down the Hudson River to the city.

   4Cheaper shipping had three effects. Farmers in the Great Lakes region could sell their grain in eastern markets. Merchants in New York City pulled further ahead of their rivals in Boston, Philadelphia and Baltimore. And the city itself grew: its population rose from about 124,000 in 1820 to about 313,000 in 1840.

4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes

   Students read T3, from the introduction to The Shame of the Cities (1904), in which the journalist Lincoln Steffens collected his magazine reports on corruption in American city governments. The paragraph just before the excerpt ends with a question: why not admit that corrupt officials represent Americans as truly as the heroes do? Paragraph 1 begins with the answer. "Boodlers" and "grafters" are officials who take bribes. Students use the three-question routine and then take the quiz, which uses T3.

   1Because, I heard, the American people won’t “stand for” it. You may blame the politicians, or, indeed, any one class, but not all classes, not the people. Or you may put it on the ignorant foreign immigrant, or any one nationality, but not on all nationalities, not on the American people. But no one class is at fault, nor any one breed, nor any particular interest or group of interests. The misgovernment of the American people is misgovernment by the American people.

   2When I set out on my travels, an honest New Yorker told me honestly that I would find that the Irish, the Catholic Irish, were at the bottom of it all everywhere. The first city I went to was St. Louis, a German city. The next was Minneapolis, a Scandinavian city, with a leadership of New Englanders. Then came Pittsburg, Scotch Presbyterian, and that was what my New York friend was. “Ah, but they are all foreign populations,” I heard. The next city was Philadelphia, the purest American community of all, and the most hopeless. And after that came Chicago and New York, [...] the one a triumph of reform, the other the best example of good government that I had seen. The “foreign element” excuse is one of the hypocritical lies that save us from the clear sight of ourselves.

   3Another such conceit of our egotism is that which deplores our politics and lauds our business. This is the wail of the typical American citizen. Now, the typical American citizen is the business man. The typical business man is a bad citizen; he is busy. If he is a “big business man” and very busy, he does not neglect, he is busy with politics, oh, very busy and very businesslike. I found him buying boodlers in St. Louis, defending grafters in Minneapolis, originating corruption in Pittsburg, sharing with bosses in Philadelphia, deploring reform in Chicago, and beating good government with corruption funds in New York. He is a self-righteous fraud, this business man. He is the chief source of corruption, and it were a boon if he would neglect politics. But he is not the business man that neglects politics; that worthy is the good citizen, the typical business man. He too is busy, he is the one that has no use and therefore no time for politics. When his neglect has permitted bad government to go so far that he can be stirred to action, he is unhappy, and he looks around for a cure that shall be quick, so that he may hurry back to the shop. Naturally, too, when he talks politics, he talks shop. His patent remedy is quack; it is business.

   4“Give us a business man,” he says (“like me,” he means). “Let him introduce business methods into politics and government; then I shall be left alone to attend to my business.”

   5There is hardly an office from United States Senator down to Alderman in any part of the country to which the business man has not been elected; yet politics remains corrupt, government pretty bad, and the selfish citizen has to hold himself in readiness like the old volunteer firemen to rush forth at any hour, in any weather, to prevent the fire; and he goes out sometimes and he puts out the fire (after the damage is done) and he goes back to the shop sighing for the business man in politics. The business man has failed in politics as he has in citizenship. Why?

5. Closure5-10 minutes

   Exit ticket: On an index card, name one structural choice in T1 or T2 (an order, a grouping, a repeated phrase or a verb) and the key point it emphasizes. Give the paragraph number.

   Teacher note on the sources and their language: The passages are quoted exactly as printed, including "Pittsburg," the city's spelling in 1904. T3 omits a derogatory term for people of mixed ancestry that appears in the original, marked [...]. Steffens also reports prejudices he sets out to reject: a New Yorker's claim that "the Irish, the Catholic Irish" were to blame, and the phrase "the ignorant foreign immigrant"; "breed" is his period word for an ethnic group. Discuss these as the views his structure is built to knock down. Wilson's call for "justice to all peoples and nationalities" can be set beside his own record, for example the segregation of federal offices under his administration, and beside the peace treaties, which did not apply the principle to colonies outside Europe. The excerpts from Wilson contain no slurs.

   Homework passage. The four paragraphs that follow Point XIV and end the address, used for the homework problems.

   1In regard to these essential rectifications of wrong and assertions of right we feel ourselves to be intimate partners of all the governments and peoples associated together against the Imperialists. We cannot be separated in interest or divided in purpose. We stand together until the end.

   2For such arrangements and covenants we are willing to fight and to continue to fight until they are achieved; but only because we wish the right to prevail and desire a just and stable peace such as can be secured only by removing the chief provocations to war, which this program does remove. We have no jealousy of German greatness, and there is nothing in this program that impairs it. We grudge her no achievement or distinction of learning or of pacific enterprise such as have made her record very bright and very enviable. We do not wish to injure her or to block in any way her legitimate influence or power. We do not wish to fight her either with arms or with hostile arrangements of trade if she is willing to associate herself with us and the other peace-loving nations of the world in covenants of justice and law and fair dealing. We wish her only to accept a place of equality among the peoples of the world,—the new world in which we now live,—instead of a place of mastery.

   3Neither do we presume to suggest to her any alteration or modification of her institutions. But it is necessary, we must frankly say, and necessary as a preliminary to any intelligent dealings with her on our part, that we should know whom her spokesmen speak for when they speak to us, whether for the Reichstag majority or for the military party and the men whose creed is imperial domination.

   4We have spoken now, surely, in terms too concrete to admit of any further doubt or question. An evident principle runs through the whole program I have outlined. It is the principle of justice to all peoples and nationalities, and their right to live on equal terms of liberty and safety with one another, whether they be strong or weak. Unless this principle be made its foundation no part of the structure of international justice can stand. The people of the United States could act upon no other principle; and to the vindication of this principle they are ready to devote their lives, their honor, and everything that they possess. The moral climax of this the culminating and final war for human liberty has come, and they are ready to put their own strength, their own highest purpose, their own integrity and devotion to the test.

Differentiation Strategies

Assessment Guidance

1. Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which sentence in T3 paragraph 1 states the key point that the rest of the passage supports?

   A"Because, I heard, the American people won't 'stand for' it." B"You may blame the politicians, or, indeed, any one class, but not all classes." C"The misgovernment of the American people is misgovernment by the American people." D"Or you may put it on ... any one nationality, but not on all nationalities, not on the American people."

2. Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Why does Steffens put his key point at the end of paragraph 1, after the two sentences that begin "You may blame the politicians" and "Or you may put it on"?

   AHe is listing the events of his travels in the order in which they happened BHe agrees with those explanations and adds his own claim as one more CHe wants readers to reach paragraph 2 before they learn what he thinks DHe sets out the usual excuses first so that his claim reads as a rejection of them

3. Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   In what order does paragraph 2 present the cities?

   AAlphabetical order, from Chicago to St. Louis BThe order in which Steffens visited them CFrom the largest city to the smallest DFrom the most corrupt city to the least corrupt

4. Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which city does Steffens place directly after the objection "Ah, but they are all foreign populations" to answer it?

   ASt. Louis, "a German city," the first city he visited BMinneapolis, "a Scandinavian city, with a leadership of New Englanders" CPhiladelphia, "the purest American community of all" DPittsburg, "Scotch Presbyterian, and that was what my New York friend was"

5. Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   What job does the last sentence of paragraph 2 do in the structure of the paragraph?

   AIt begins a new topic, the business man, which paragraph 3 develops BIt reports the honest New Yorker's opinion about who is to blame CIt adds one more city to the list of places Steffens visited DIt states the conclusion that the list of cities was built to reach

6. Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Paragraph 3 begins "Another such conceit of our egotism." How does this opening connect paragraph 3 to paragraph 2?

   AIt marks the praise of business as a second excuse of the same kind as the "foreign element" excuse BIt signals that paragraph 3 will show the "foreign element" excuse was true after all CIt signals a jump forward in time to the later part of Steffens's travels DIt admits that paragraph 2 went too far and that its claim needs to be softened

7. Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Paragraph 3 divides "the business man" into two kinds. Which two?

   AThe honest merchant and the dishonest merchant who takes bribes BThe business man of St. Louis and the business man of New York CThe "big business man" in politics and the typical one too busy for it DThe business man who runs for office and the business man who only votes

8. Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   "I found him buying boodlers in St. Louis, defending grafters in Minneapolis, originating corruption in Pittsburg, sharing with bosses in Philadelphia, deploring reform in Chicago, and beating good government with corruption funds in New York" (paragraph 3). What does the structure of this sentence emphasize?

   AThat each of the six cities had its own separate and different kind of business BThe dates on which Steffens visited each of the cities on his tour CThat the business man was the helpless victim of the city bosses DThat the big business man joined in corruption in every city he visited

9. Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Why does Steffens make paragraph 4 a quotation in the business man's own voice?

   ATo state the business man's remedy in his own words so that paragraph 5 can test it BTo show that Steffens himself had worked as a business man before he became a reporter CTo give the key point of the whole passage in the most memorable words DTo introduce a new excuse about the foreign population of the cities

10. Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    How does paragraph 5 respond to the remedy in paragraph 4?

    AIt agrees that electing more business men would clean up city government BIt shows the remedy was tried and failed: politics "remains corrupt" CIt proposes that the old volunteer fire companies take over city government DIt returns to the tour of cities to add Chicago and New York to the list

11. Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    The comparison to "the old volunteer firemen" in paragraph 5 supports which point?

    ACities of the time needed larger, better-trained and better-paid fire departments BBusiness men made the best volunteer firemen in American cities CThe citizen acts only after the damage is done, then returns to business DVolunteer firemen were among the most corrupt workers in the cities

12. Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    T3 ends with a one-word question: "Why?" What does this ending do in the structure of the introduction?

    AIt shows that Steffens does not know why the remedy failed BIt repeats the question that paragraph 1 was written to answer CIt invites readers to stop and write their own ending to the essay DIt signals that the next part will explain the failure just described

13. Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Which best describes the structure of T3 as a whole?

    AA chronological story of a single city election, told from start to finish BA claim, then two popular excuses tested and rejected, then a question that leads on CA problem and its solution, with the solution given in the final paragraph DA point-by-point comparison of two cities and their city governments

14. Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    "The business man has failed in politics as he has in citizenship" (paragraph 5). Which earlier sentence does "in citizenship" point back to?

    A"The typical business man is a bad citizen; he is busy." (paragraph 3) B"Give us a business man," he says (paragraph 4) C"The first city I went to was St. Louis, a German city." (paragraph 2) D"You may blame the politicians, or, indeed, any one class" (paragraph 1)

15. Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer

    Why does Steffens open paragraph 2 with the honest New Yorker's claim that "the Irish, the Catholic Irish, were at the bottom of it all everywhere," instead of with the first city? What does the sentence "Then came Pittsburg, Scotch Presbyterian, and that was what my New York friend was" add to the test of that claim?

    Show model answer

16. Question 16 of 20 · Short Answer

    Paragraph 3 ends: "Naturally, too, when he talks politics, he talks shop. His patent remedy is quack; it is business." Explain how these two sentences prepare for paragraph 4, and why it matters that Steffens gives his judgment before the business man speaks.

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17. Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer

    Paragraph 3 moves from "the typical American citizen" to "the business man" in its first three sentences. Explain why the sentence "Now, the typical American citizen is the business man" is a key sentence for the analysis of the whole passage.

    Show model answer

18. Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer

    Explain how Steffens uses the list of cities in paragraph 2 inside a passage built as an analysis, and why the list ends with Chicago and New York.

    Show model answer

19. Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer

    Suppose Steffens had moved paragraph 2 so that it came after paragraph 5. What would be lost? Give two effects and support each with words from the passage.

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20. Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer

    Paragraph 4 is by far the shortest paragraph in T3: two sentences, set between two long paragraphs. Explain what Steffens gains by giving the business man's words a paragraph of their own at this point in the passage.

    Show model answer

These standards connect to RH.9-10.5: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.

Standard text: Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy. © Copyright 2010. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers. All rights reserved.