Grade 8 ELA GSE Standards

The student develops oral language through listening, speaking, and discussion.

listen actively to interpret a message by summarizing, asking questions, and making comments;

follow and give complex oral instructions to perform specific tasks, answer questions, or solve problems;

advocate a position using anecdotes, analogies, and/or illustrations employing eye contact, speaking rate, volume, enunciation, a variety of natural gestures, and conventions of language to communicate ideas effectively; and

participate collaboratively in discussions, plan agendas with clear goals and deadlines, set time limits for speakers, take notes, and vote on key issues.

The student uses the writing process recursively to compose multiple texts that are legible and uses appropriate conventions.

plan a first draft by selecting a genre appropriate for a particular topic, purpose, and audience using a range of strategies such as discussion, background reading, and personal interests;

develop drafts into a focused, structured, and coherent piece of writing by:

organizing with purposeful structure, including an introduction, transitions, coherence within and across paragraphs, and a conclusion; and

developing an engaging idea reflecting depth of thought with specific facts, details, and examples;

revise drafts for clarity, development, organization, style, word choice, and sentence variety;

edit drafts using standard English conventions, including:

complete complex sentences with subject-verb agreement and avoidance of splices, run-ons, and fragments;

consistent, appropriate use of verb tenses and active and passive voice;

prepositions and prepositional phrases and their influence on subject-verb agreement;

pronoun-antecedent agreement;

correct capitalization;

punctuation, including commas in non-restrictive phrases and clauses, semicolons, colons, and parentheses; and

correct spelling, including commonly confused terms such as its/it's, affect/effect, there/their/they're, and to/two/too; and

publish written work for appropriate audiences.

The student uses genre characteristics and craft to compose multiple texts that are meaningful.

compose literary texts such as personal narratives, fiction, and poetry using genre characteristics and craft;

compose informational texts, including multi-paragraph essays that convey information about a topic, using a clear controlling idea or thesis statement and genre characteristics and craft;

compose multi-paragraph argumentative texts using genre characteristics and craft; and

compose correspondence that reflects an opinion, registers a complaint, or requests information in a business or friendly structure.

The student engages in both short-term and sustained recursive inquiry processes for a variety of purposes.

generate student-selected and teacher-guided questions for formal and informal inquiry;

develop and revise a plan;

refine the major research question, if necessary, guided by the answers to a secondary set of questions;

identify and gather relevant information from a variety of sources;

differentiate between primary and secondary sources;

synthesize information from a variety of sources;

differentiate between paraphrasing and plagiarism when using source materials;

examine sources for:

reliability, credibility, and bias, including omission; and

faulty reasoning such as bandwagon appeals, repetition, and loaded language;

display academic citations and use source materials ethically; and

use an appropriate mode of delivery, whether written, oral, or multimodal, to present results.

The student uses newly acquired vocabulary expressively.

use print or digital resources to determine the meaning, syllabication, pronunciation, word origin, and part of speech;

use context within or beyond a paragraph to clarify the meaning of unfamiliar or ambiguous words; and

determine the meaning and usage of grade-level academic English words derived from Greek and Latin roots such as ast, qui, path, mand/mend, and duc.

The student reads grade-level text with fluency and comprehension. The student is expected to adjust fluency when reading grade-level text based on the reading purpose.

The student reads grade-appropriate texts independently. The student is expected to self-select text and read independently for a sustained period of time.

The student uses metacognitive skills to both develop and deepen comprehension of increasingly complex texts.

establish purpose for reading assigned and self-selected texts;

generate questions about text before, during, and after reading to deepen understanding and gain information;

make, correct, or confirm predictions using text features, characteristics of genre, and structures;

create mental images to deepen understanding;

make connections to personal experiences, ideas in other texts, and society;

make inferences and use evidence to support understanding;

evaluate details read to determine key ideas;

synthesize information to create new understanding; and

monitor comprehension and make adjustments such as re-reading, using background knowledge, asking questions, and annotating when understanding breaks down.

The student responds to an increasingly challenging variety of sources that are read, heard, or viewed.

describe personal connections to a variety of sources, including self-selected texts;

write responses that demonstrate understanding of texts, including comparing sources within and across genres;

use text evidence to support an appropriate response;

paraphrase and summarize texts in ways that maintain meaning and logical order;

interact with sources in meaningful ways such as notetaking, annotating, freewriting, or illustrating;

respond using newly acquired vocabulary as appropriate;

discuss and write about the explicit or implicit meanings of text;

respond orally or in writing with appropriate register, vocabulary, tone, and voice;

reflect on and adjust responses as new evidence is presented; and

defend or challenge the authors' claims using relevant text evidence.

The student recognizes and analyzes literary elements within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse literary texts.

analyze how themes are developed through the interaction of characters and events;

analyze how characters' motivations and behaviors influence events and resolution of the conflict;

analyze non-linear plot development such as flashbacks, foreshadowing, subplots, and parallel plot structures and compare it to linear plot development; and

explain how the setting influences the values and beliefs of characters.

The student recognizes and analyzes genre-specific characteristics, structures, and purposes within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse texts.

demonstrate knowledge of literary genres such as realistic fiction, adventure stories, historical fiction, mysteries, humor, fantasy, science fiction, and short stories;

analyze the effect of graphical elements such as punctuation and line length in poems across a variety of poetic forms such as epic, lyric, and humorous poetry;

analyze how playwrights develop dramatic action through the use of acts and scenes;

analyze characteristics and structural elements of informational text, including:

the controlling idea or thesis with supporting evidence;

features such as footnotes, endnotes, and citations; and

multiple organizational patterns within a text to develop the thesis;

analyze characteristics and structures of argumentative text by:

identifying the claim and analyzing the argument;

identifying and explaining the counter argument; and

identifying the intended audience or reader; and

analyze characteristics of multimodal and digital texts.

The student uses critical inquiry to analyze the authors' choices and how they influence and communicate meaning within a variety of texts. The student analyzes and applies author's craft purposefully in order to develop his or her own products and performances.

explain the author's purpose and message within a text;

analyze how the use of text structure contributes to the author's purpose;

analyze the author's use of print and graphic features to achieve specific purposes;

describe how the author's use of figurative language such as extended metaphor achieves specific purposes;

identify and analyze the use of literary devices, including multiple points of view and irony;

analyze how the author's use of language contributes to the mood, voice, and tone; and

explain the purpose of rhetorical devices such as analogy and juxtaposition and of logical fallacies such as bandwagon appeals and circular reasoning.