The part I chose for my text analysis was the beginning of the textbook where it talks

about the beginning of human civilization from pages 2-26. Other texts found in this textbook are

well-documented sources written in Chicago style, which is the normal writing style for

historians. The textbook uses good evidence for background and uses professionally written

books based off the topic of early human history. The textbook is in a timeline-based writing

style where it first touches upon every human civilization in various parts of the world and then

it moves to the start of early agriculture and how that formed new civilizations. Lastly it ends

with the introduction of early civilizations like Mesopotamia and Egypt on pages 22-23. I would

say the organization is good in how it first touches various parts of the world and then it brings it

back to a timeline style starting with early agriculture and early civilizations. This text is

appropriate for sophomores in high school because it gives an incredibly detailed description of

timely events that take place around the world in an easy-to-understand way. My observation

teacher takes parts of this text and has her students read from those specific parts so she can

reinforce them with more up to date information.

The strength of this text is its use of easy-to-read descriptions and vocabulary help on the

side of each page when there is a word that needs further explanation. An example of this would

be on page 23, where it gives vocabulary help for the word Jerich, one of the first settlements in

early human history. Another strength is its use of imagery that goes along with the text showing

different artifacts during that time to give kids a better understanding of the text with visual

support. A textual aid that helps with reading comprehension is this paragraph usually at the

beginning of the text called Context & Connections where it gives more background on what is

happening and why these people did these things. This really helps kids understand the text

better by giving them more background knowledge about the subject. Context & Connections
also help with student understanding or getting further knowledge about what is happening

visually and what's being said in the text.

The weakness of this text really shows in some of the organizations. Like I said before, I

really like how it's laid out, but I feel like it doesn't touch on some aspects of humans in various

places. It goes over them yes, but I don't give enough to where the reader feels comfortable

enough to move on to the next civilization. For adolescent readers, this textbook will pose a

problem because they may not understand some of the bigger vocabulary in the book and

sometimes the definitions aren't enough because there would be bigger words that an 8th grader

will not understand, but it's different for a high schooler who is more familiar with that kind of

vocabulary. An aspect of the text that might pose a problem to the reader when reading this part

of the textbook would be the Vocabulary again because looking closer, I can see some words I

don't even know so having a kid read this without knowing most of the vocabulary would make

the assignment harder than it looks.

The cultural and identity in this text is very prominent especially how in the first text on

pages 4, 7, and 15 it talks about diverse cultures in each part of the world in early history. It also

points out differences between the locations and how people were able to adapt to those climates

differently than other cultures. There's not really any prior knowledge that the author expects of

the reader except knowledge of locations on where these early civilizations lived. Like when

they start each chapter off with "How modern Humans Populated Asia" (Hansen, V., & Curtis,

K. R. pg.7) this shows that the author expects the reader to know a little about where they are

traveling in the first place. With this text readers might get a sense of cultural pride when finding

where their ancestors really came to be, and the text might even touch on traditions that early

civilizations did that carried on to our modern society. This might begin a discussion on how
everyone is from the same place really and how it's not okay to be mean to one another since we

all started from one place or another. An example of a cultural finding would be on page 9 where

they talk about artifacts used by early Africans in South Africa. This might give a kid who has a

lot of African background pride and interest in the subject of early human civilizations.

Some considerations I'd make when teaching this textbook is that some of its resources

are out of date so maybe I could fill in some holes to make it fully up to date and ready for kids

to dive into. I could also make kids read just a certain paragraph so that they can focus on the

more accurate parts of the text rather than the older ones. While reading this text, I'd support my

kids by giving them answers for questions they have about the text, any vocabulary that they

don't understand or need help on finding out what it means, and adding on to texts that don't fully

grasp what the main goal of the lesson is. A strategy I used from chapter 6 of "Subjects Matter"

would be the Vocabulary wall. This would fit best with my lessons by showing important

Vocabulary throughout the lesson and then incorporating those words into tests and quizzes, so

kids know that they are important. This strategy will not only help kids learn unfamiliar words

but also help me learn unfamiliar words that I still don't understand. This will make the class

interactive and give students a reason to pay attention naturally.

In conclusion, doing this text analysis really showed how hard it can be to pick an

appropriate text for your kids to fully understand reading comprehension. It cannot even be your

choice to use that textbook. My observation teacher was saying how she personally didn't like

the book, but she said it was better than the other options that were available which makes a lot

of sense. She only really liked this book because it was in a timeline-based structure, so it made

it a lot easier for her to understand it. But after my analysis, this is an okay book for kids to read
on their own if they were given chapter assignments, but I'd still reinforce it so the book could be

up to date and understandable for kids to read.

Sources:

- Hansen, V., & Curtis, K. R. (2023). Voyages in world history (Third). Cengage. Pg. 2-22

- Daniels, H. (2014). Subjects matter: Exceeding standards through powerful content-area

reading. Heinemann.