This website is the “Multimodal Text Set” product of our RE 5140 and RE 5730 classes for the fall 2018 semester. The purpose of this website is to house the entirety of the novel study resources that we have curated for The Parker Inheritance by Varian Johnson. It is our hope that both we and our peers in the graduate program will be able to utilize this novel study, including all of its resources, in our own classrooms. For more information on how we suggest navigating this site, see below.

You’re probably wondering exactly how to best navigate this resource to make it a part of your own classroom curriculum.

We suggest beginning by looking at the Introduction page of our website to learn more about The Parker Inheritance as an anchor text. This page will provide you with a book summary, an introduction to Varian Johnson as an author, and even a few activities that we believe could provide meaningful initiating experiences for the students in your classroom. Following this, we invite you to check out the Comprehension page of our website. Here you will find the four-week pacing guide that we created for the novel study in a 5th grade classroom. This pacing guide includes suggested dialogic discussion questions for each section of daily reading, pre-planned activities/mini-lessons, and suggested companion texts. To learn more about the companion texts that we selected, and other connecting texts that we feel would be useful in building your students’ background knowledge, visit the Text Set page of our website. Finally, you can find resources for teaching Tier II vocabulary from the book on the Vocabulary page. The Google slides resource on this page offers student friendly definitions of words as well as appropriate and engaging activities for readers.

North Carolina ELA State Standards:

• RL.5.2 Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text, including how characters in a story or drama respond to challenges or how the speaker in a poem reflects upon a topic; summarize the text.
• RL.5.3 Compare and contrast two or more characters, settings, or events in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text.
• RL.5.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, recognizing specific word choices that contribute to meaning and tone.
• RL.5.9 Compare and contrast stories in the same genre on their approaches to similar themes and topics

North Carolina Social Studies Essential Standards:

• 5.H.1 Analyze the chronology of key events in the United States.
• 5.H.2 Understand the role of prominent figures in shaping the United States.
• 5.C&G.2 Analyze life in a democratic republic through the rights and responsibilities of citizens.

Critical Issue: Racial Injustice and Inequality

People around the world experience racial injustice and inequality every day. This issue is not contingent on age, gender, or location. As educators, we are aware that our own students will face this in their own lives. Talking about race is important, but talking about race in a way that students understand is essential to developing citizens who not only “know better” but also “do better”. We believe that in order to do this we need to equip students with both a brave space to discuss race as well as the language to do so meaningfully. For more information about brave spaces, we suggest visiting this site. To learn more about approaching inclusive language with students in your classroom, we’ve included a Google Slides resource below.