A Trip to the Aquarium

Lesson Title & Subject(s): Determining the Importance of Text, Language Arts

Topic or Unit of Study: Native Americans

Grade/Level: 9^th grade

Instructional Setting:

This lesson is for a class located in Montana and offered to a room of general and special education mixed. The classroom has a computer for each student to do their own word processing and research.  There is also an IPad available for any accommodations needed.

Your State Core Curriculum/Student Achievement Standard(s):

Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text.

Lesson Objective(s):

After reading a text of 20 phrases, students will be able to provide a summary of the theme with 3 connections to textual evidence with at least 80% accuracy.

After independently reading a grade level narrative text, students will explain how the author develops the narrator or main character’s point of view (e.g., choice of words, character interaction, dialogue) by using metacognitive notetaking to identify (3) key phrases or pieces of dialogue that reflect that point of view and acting out (1) scene that incorporates key dialogue in (4 out of 5) passages.   

Instructional Materials:

Student copies of the story, PowerPoint on themes, video of story for accommodation

Resources:

English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects Grade-Level (pp. 17-20, Publication). (2011). Helena, MT: Montana Office of Public Instruction.

Feichter, K. (2015, November 09). The Rough Faced Girl. Retrieved August 25, 2017, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Tc76sSelXY

Morton. (n.d.). Theme or Author's Message Worksheets. Retrieved August 25, 2017, from https://www.ereadingworksheets.com/free-reading-worksheets/theme-worksheets/

Sequence of Instructional Procedures/Activities/Events (provide description and indicate approximate time for each):

1. Student Prerequisite Skills/Connections to Previous Learning:

Theme is the central idea or message in a literary work. It is not the subject of the work (students often get the two definitions of theme confused). It is a perception about human life.

Themes are seldom explained directly. They usually must be inferred by the reader.

The theme is exposed in the way characters change in a story, conflicts in the story, and statements made by the narrator or characters.

Understanding the theme involves students understanding the plot, the characters, and the setting.

2. Presentation Procedures for New Information or Modeling:
   
   

There is an attached power point to go over what a theme is and how it can be found within a text. The teacher should go through the power point with the class, answering any questions that may arise.
 

3. Guided Practice:
   
   
   1. Students will work as a class with the teacher to determine the theme of the text in the “Rough Faced Girl” by Rafe Martin. 
   2. He students will follow along the text as the teacher reads aloud or plays the included video of the text.
   3. Afterwards, the teacher will facilitate a class discussion, determining the theme of “The Rough Faced Girl”.
      1. This book has several themes. One theme is that people will get what they deserve, whether it be good or bad. Another theme is that what’s on the outside doesn’t represent what is on the inside.
4. Independent Student Practice:

The worksheet included presents three excerpts of text with an overall theme. Students will independently complete the worksheet to demonstrate their knowledge in extrapolating a theme from within a text.

5. Culminating or Closing Procedure/Activity/Event:

For the closing of the lesson, the students will participate in a snowball check. Students are to write down one thing they learned on a piece of scratch paper and wad it up. On the teacher’s signal, they throw their paper “snowballs” in the air. Then each learner picks up a nearby response and reads it aloud.

Accommodation: If a student has anxiety of reading their piece of paper aloud, the student can present their piece of paper to the teacher directly, and say pass during the activity.

Instructional Strategy (or Strategies):

 The instructional strategies are mixed in this lesson. The teacher used direct instruction when reading the text aloud with the class and guiding the students, asking them questions that focus students' attention on what they are to learn, help students to think actively as they read, encourage students to monitor their comprehension, help students to review content and relate what they have learned to what they already know.  There is direct instruction with delivering information about what a theme is and how to find it within a text.

Differentiated Instruction Accommodations:

Accommodations for this lesson include a recording of the text and the option to verbalize the theme of the text instead of writing out. 

Students can present their thoughts directly to the teacher, rather than reading in front of the class.

For the worksheet, there is an alternative worksheet for a student that is working on the same skill, just with an easier text and vocabulary.

Use of Technology:

Teacher and students will use technology in this lesson. The Smart Board is used by both the teacher and the student while the teacher presents a PowerPoint lesson. Also, technology is utilized in the accommodations with a voice recording of the accommodated text. This can be accessed on the classroom iPad.

Student Assessment/Rubrics:

The teacher will assess whether the student has gotten a firm grasp on inferring the theme of the text, while grading the independent practice. The rubric for the Independent practice is: