CCR Anchor Standards in Speaking and Listening: An Overview

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Once you page through the writing strand of anchor standards, you’ll find the anchor standards in speaking in listening. In the Common Core State Standards” (CCSS) ELA document, these are first found on page 22. The question these anchor standards seek to answer is, “What should a college and career-ready (CCR) person be able to do as a speaker and listener?”

How are the Anchor Standards for Speaking and Listening Organized?

Unlike the anchor standards in reading and writing, there are 6 speaking and listening standards and they are broken up into 2 groups:

1. Comprehension and Collaboration (SL.CCR.1-3*)
2. Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas (SL.CCR.4-6)

Or, in everyday human terms, these anchor standards are dedicated to answering these questions:

1. How do you prepare for and effectively participate in a range of conversations and collaborations with diverse partners? How do you build on others’ ideas and express your own clearly and persuasively? Can you integrate and evaluate information from a variety of sources? Can you evaluate a speaker’s point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric?
2. Are you able to present information, findings, and supporting evidence in a way that allows your listeners to follow your line of reasoning? Are you strategic when you make visual displays to complement your speaking? Can you use formal English when appropriate?

All in all, the speaking and listening standards usually get ignored, but they are critical. Students need and love ample opportunity to take part in a variety of rich, structured conversations. They need practice doing this in pairs, in small groups, and as a whole class. We need to find ways to ensure that they are productive members of the conversations we ask them to take part in, and methods holding them accountable and giving descriptive feedback range from wandering around the classroom during small group discussions to using a rubric to assess student speaking skills in a whole class debate.

*The CCSS use the following format for notating anchor standards: [Strand, i.e., Reading or Writing or Speaking and Listening or Language].[College and Career Ready, i.e., this is what kids should be able to do when they graduate; see my post on anchor standards].[Number of the standard]. So, the fifth anchor standard in the Speaking and Listening strand would be SL.CCR.5, and the ninth anchor standard in the Writing strand would be W.CCR.9.

What are the CCSS CCR Anchor Standards?

When I started making this website, I had a hard time envisioning how it would be set up. After all, how do you turn a 66-page document with an 18-word title* into something manageable, searchable, teachable, embraceable? I think one key tool in the task of comprehending the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are their use of what they call College and Career Readiness (CCR) “anchor standards.”

A CCR anchor standard is a skill that high school graduates should have in order to be ready for entry into the world of work or postsecondary education. Basically, an anchor standard is an answer to the question, “What should a 21st century diploma holder be able to do in order to flourish?” Whether you teach kindergarten or 12th grade, an anchor standard is the target.

A particularly lovely anchor. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Because literacy tasks involve various modes of operation, there are several sets of anchor standards. They are: Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening, and Language.

Now, because K-12 schooling is complex, the CCSS document gets increasingly complicated once you dive deeper than the anchor standards. For example, from K-5, the anchor standards in reading are broken into the categories of literature, informational texts, and foundational skills. However, from 6-12, those same reading anchor standards are broken into the categories of “English Language Arts” (ELA) and “Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects.” All of this complexity is simply for the purpose of translating the broad anchor standards into grade-appropriate end-of-year expectations.

Okay, so let’s not go there yet. Let’s just focus on the anchor standards.Think of them like… an anchor. (Wow.) But seriously: the anchor standards are the fundamental skills that we want students to have when they graduate from our public schools. They are general enough to allow for the entrepreneurial aspects of being a teaching professional (i.e., they give us room to play), but they are also rigorous (which, I would argue, kids will appreciate), and they are also aligned with what colleges and workplaces expect students to be able to do. These anchors or what can keep our kids from floating away sometime between their entry into kindergarten and the fateful flipping of their tassles.

*Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects = 18 words

Related articles

• CCSS = Cargo Cult State Standards (jaypgreene.com)
• Common Core – Implications for Literacy and Language (ssppreads.wordpress.com)