Integrating Standards: Considerations for Writing and Language

How to integrate Common Core State Standards for Language into language and writing instruction is a critical question facing teachers today. From the perspective of a linguist and writing methods instructor who prepare teachers, this paper explores why the CCSS for Language can seem daunting for teachers and ways to incorporate them into inquiry-based units of study and writing workshop minilessons. The CCSS for Language hold particular opportunities for raising issues of language variation among teachers and with students, so special consideration is paid to how to foster respect for and awareness of dialect diversity through code-switching lessons and contrastive analysis. Highlighting the elements of the CCSS that respond to diverse learners could draw test-makers’ attention to the issue so that they interpret the standards in ways that promote equity in the assessment process.