Candidate’s Name: Gitel Itzkowitz
Grade Level: 3-6
Title of the lesson: Character Traits- “The Short and Incredibly Happy Life of Riley”
Length of the lesson: 2 class periods
Central focus of the lesson
This comprehension lesson focuses
on character traits and understating and comprehension of characters through reading and be able to use context and picture
clues to assist with comprehension.
Key questions:
●
Do students understand the main idea and can they
differentiate between diverse character traits in story?
●
Do students understand the role the illustrations play
in this book and how they help elaborate the main idea?
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Knowledge of students to inform teaching:
●
Students should be fluent readers and read at level
or above the level of the story.
●
Students should know what a main idea is and how to
use context and picture clues to comprehend a story.
●
Students should have prior knowledge of structure of
short story and should be able to writing and illustrate a short story at
appropriate grade level
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Common Core State Standards:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.1
Ask and answer questions to
demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the
basis for the answers.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.2
Determine the main idea of a
text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.3
Describe characters in a story
(e.g., their traits, motivations, or feelings) and explain how their actions
contribute to the sequence of events
Responding to Literature
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.WS.3.11
Create and present a poem, narrative, play,
art work, or personal response to a particular author or theme studied in
class.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.1.A
Come to discussions prepared,
having read or studied required material; explicitly draw on that preparation
and other information known about the topic to explore ideas under
discussion.
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Support literacy development through language
●
Students will work on literacy development through
implementation of elaboration strategies, which includes making inferences,
generating questions throughout the reading, and evaluating the text.
●
Students will use language as they write short
stories and describe character traits to promote comprehension
Vocabulary
●
Satire, happy, sad, silly, depressed, emotions,
●
Character traits, picture clues and illustrations,
context clues, analyze, elaborate, critical thinking, inferences
Discourse
●
Text structure, conversation, discussion,
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Learning objectives
1.
Will read the book “The Short and Incredibly
Happy Life of Riley”
2.
Will analyze and interpret the book while reading
and compare Riley’s experience to their own life experiences during
small-group discussion
3.
Will write and illustrate a short story “A Day in
the Life of Riley” and present to class
4.
Will develop
a character trait chart for Riley and one for Human
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Formal and informal assessment
Students will
be assessed on their comprehension of the book” A Day in the Life of Riley”
by:
·
Completing character traits charts and
comparing and contrasting humans and Riley accordingly. They will be
discussed, reviewed, and handed for further evaluation.
·
Writing a short story with illustrations
titled “A Day in the Life of Riley” and will be assessed on presentation,
structure of story, writing, and creative illustrations used to depict the
text.
·
Actively participating in oral group discussions
and answering questions like: Why is Riley so happy? According to the book,
why do people get depressed? What is the tone of the story? And so on.
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Instructional procedure:
●
Before introducing book, review vocabulary words on
board so students will have preview of the book.
●
Hand out Post
its and have students silently read to themselves and using post-its as they
read the story, if they don’t understand a word or find something amusing,
etc.
●
Once reading is done, split class for small-group discussions
activity and have them share feedback of group by beginning to fill out character
trait charts.
●
As students
share thoughts, questions and opinions, move between groups to helps
facilitate discussion. Ask questions and guide answers and observe to see who
is participating and who may need further assistance.
●
Once discussions move along and charts are being
filled, have students go back to own their own seats and work on creating
their own short stories titled” A Day in the Life of Riley”. It should have
the title, author, and illustrations throughout..
●
Once initial planning is done, students will head to
computer lab to create short stories online. They can create the short story
through Book Builder or StoryBird and present it to the class on SMARTBoard.
●
Provide class time to complete their short stories.
Student will present stories next lesson.
●
Accommodations and modifications: ELLs/struggling readers:
Visual aids in the book and extra assistance and interpreters can be available to help clarify and comprehend the book. The chart can be modified for ESL
and struggling readers. The groups should be modified and spilt accordingly
so cooperative learning can successfully take place. Book Building programs
for ESl students can be made available to assist with writing short story.
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Instructional resources and materials
·
http://ebookbrowsee.net/the-short-but-incredibly-happy-life-of-riley-pptx-d259651837
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Character Trait charts
·
Multiple copies of “The Short but Incredible
life of Riley” by Colin Thompson and Amy Lissiat
·
Post it notes and writing utensils to jot down
thoughts and observations/ questions while reading
·
Computers with Internet access for creating
short story.
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Reflection
What i really think students will appreciate is the thought-provoking and fun context of the book "The Short but Incredibly Happy life of Riley" by Colin Thomson. Its the type of book that with comprehension of the main idea, comes along the funny and engaging satire of human life that students of all ages will appreciate. Therefore, this lesson completely revolves around how much students can understand and the more engaging the text, the more they will be motivated to comprehend. The book can be appreciated by all types of ESL students as the illustrations are very vivid and descriptive and play a big role in comprehension of the book. Writing up the character trait chart helped organize the information in the book and points out the stark differences between Riley and the human, helping the students understand more of what the author is trying to say. Working in small groups discussion allows for more students to voice thoughts and opinions in a less overwhelming environment and will allow the teacher the opportunity to just observe students in action, facilitate discussion, and help when necessary. The creation of the short story is a fun way for students to apply what they learned and incorporate their writing skills towards a literature response to the book. The technology aspect only ups the value of the short-story Book Building and allows for more authentic opportunities to evaluate and asses students. The books can be scaffolded according to students' abilities and their presentations skills will be on display as well. |
Questions for small group discussion/review
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