ELA

Read to Answer Questions (tips from our class):

Look at the title and text features. Is it fiction or nonfiction? What is your background knowledge?
Decide on the topic and think about the text structure.
Read the questions! This will help your brain be on alert.
As you read, take notes about the important stuff.
Time to answer questions! Remember to read ALL of the answer choices. Slash the trash!
Go back and prove it! Underline your evidence.

Reading/ELA Updates:

We studied people who made history, and heard the story of Audrey Faye Hendricks. She was the youngest marcher to be jailed for peacefully protesting during the civil rights movement. We also found inspiration in Madam CJ Walker, the first african american woman to become a millionaire. We loved that she saw a problem that needed a solution, and she made an opportunity for herself!
We laughed and we cried together as we finished reading The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Students thought deeply about the book and worked on cross curricular activities like mapping, research, writing postcards from a character’s point of view, and more. We also watched The Velveteen Rabbit and compared the two stories. They are very excited about creating a theatrical performance of the book. This story will stick with us!
In writing, students continued working on their fantasy adaptations. We are brainstorming about how we want to share them with our friends and family. Hopefully we will have final products by the end of the week. Stay tuned for more details!

Finding the main idea (tips from our class):

Think about the most important thing the author wants you to learn about the topic.
Pay careful attention to the first and last paragraphs!
Think about text structure (cause and effect, sequencing, problem and solution, compare and contrast, descriptive).
Search for supporting details.
Use a main idea house to organize your thinking.

How to be persuasive (tips from our class) :

We are building our reading lives by...

We started out the year with an oldie-but-a-goodie, Stone Fox. We laughed and we cried! The story was full of "cliff-hangers" and unexpected moments. We practiced summarizing and making predictions. Now we are watching the movie and noticing similarities and differences. So far we all agree, the book is WAY better, but isn't that always the case? ;)
We are currently reading The Best School Year Ever. We LOVE laughing together while we read about the crazy Herdman kids. We never know what they will do next! This book is giving us lots of opportunities to discuss vocabulary, figurative language, and dialog.
Come on, Rain! We studied what the author did to make her storytelling voice so strong.
Thank you, Sarah! Have you ever wondered how Thanksgiving evolved into the national holiday it is today? You will find the answer in this book.
I Wanna Iguana- The perfect book for studying the art of persuasive writing.
The Greedy Triangle- This book is a fantastic way to introduce geometry vocabulary, and lots of fun, too!
Folk Tales, Folk Tales, and MORE Folk Tales! We have been researching folk tale adaptations.
28 Days-This book teaches us about 28 fascinating people in American history.
The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane-This book gave us the perfect opportunity to closely study character development.

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