Why Mirrors & Windows?

• The quality of the supplemental materials—a good range of complexity and types of activities.

• The inclusion of companion pieces for main selections—Common Core will require comparison and contrast of these.

• The scope of the questions at the end of each unit.

• The covers and actual text are very appealing—I had students look at several preview texts and all chose EMC!

--Arkansas teacher using Mirrors & Windows, Natalie Lancaster

Request a complimentary copy today and find out for yourself!

STAAR to replace TAKS

The Texas Education Association recently announced that a new generation of student tests called the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) will replace the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS), a criterion-based test which been in use since 2003.

According to TEA, the new tests will be significantly more rigorous than previous tests and will measure a child’s performance, as well as academic growth. By law, the grade 3-8 STAAR tests in reading and mathematics must be linked from grade to grade to performance expectations for the English III and Algebra II end-of-course assessments.

The new tests will be used beginning in the 2011-2012 school year. A new state accountability rating system will debut in 2013.

EMC’s Mirrors & Windows: Connecting with Literature responds to this call for educational rigor by offering full-length formative surveys, developed and validated by the Educational Testing Service, that measure student performance against other students nationwide.

For more information on the new STAAR tests, visit TEA’s website at http://www.tea.state.tx.us/index4.aspx?id=7874

Literature as Mirrors and Windows

Journalist Sydney J. Harris wrote, “The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.” Education provides the opportunities, or windows, for students to expand their understanding of themselves and the world around them. Reading good literature can help with this transformation and initiate a journey of lifelong discoveries.
Think about when you were young and about to start school for the first time. When you stood in front of the mirror, your view was focused on your own reflection and limited by your own experience. Then the windows of learning began to open your mind to new ideas and new experiences, broadening both your awareness and your curiosity.
As you discovered reading and the power of words, you learned to connect to what you read and to examine your own ideas and experiences. And the more you read, the more you learned to connect to the ideas and experiences of other people from other times and other places. Great literature provides mirrors that help you reflect on your own world and windows that lead you into new worlds.
EMC’s literature program, Mirrors and Windows: Connecting with Literature, does just that. We hope that as you read the selections in this book, you will see yourself in the characters, stories, and themes—and that you will discover that we are all citizens of the world and part of the collective human experience.