Unit 1

Launching

The Reading Fundamentals Launching Unit of Study provides models for many reading behaviors, rituals, and routines. Active listening, thinking, engagement, and participation are fundamental expectations for reading workshop. Establishing a community that fosters these behaviors is vital and will help your students develop and grow.

Students will:

• Develop an understanding of themselves as readers;
• Learn to self-select appropriate texts;
• Set goals for themselves as readers;
• Learn the expectations and routines for actively participating in a reading community;
• Learn how to participate in a range of collaborative conversations about texts;
• Learn how to follow agreed-upon rules and protocol for conversations;
• Learn how to prepare for conversations;
• Learn to identify the theme of a text from details in the text;
• Learn to cite textual evidence to support analysis of a text;
• Learn to determine the central idea of a text and how it is conveyed;
• Recognize the differences among books that entertain, inform, and persuade, drawing on a wide reading of a range of text types, including fiction, poetry, and nonfiction;
• Develop habits of mind for engaging with a variety of texts;
• Learn how to apply self-monitoring skills;
• Learn how to determine the meaning of challenging vocabulary words and phrases in a text.

Unit 2

Fiction

By reading and studying different types of fiction (fantasy, traditional, and realistic), students will develop an understanding of various forms, features, and purposes of fiction. Their reading of fiction texts will be enhanced by an understanding of the narrative structure, story elements, and themes associated with each particular type of fiction writing. Students will also learn and apply specific reading skills and strategies that will enable them to visualize magical lands, infer characters’ feelings and traits, identify the author’s message, and actively engage with the texts they read.

Students will:

• Recognize different types and structures of fiction (fantasy, traditional tales, and realistic);
• Identify common story elements and key details in fiction texts (characters, setting, plot, conflict, and resolution);
• Understand the narrative, chronological structure of fiction (beginning, middle, and end);
• Understand how to read a dramatic play differently from a narrative fiction text;
• Understand how the plot structure in a fiction text and how a particular sentence, chapter, or scene fits into the larger structure of a story;
• Explain how writers develop the point of view of the narrator or speaker;
• Ask questions to help clarify thinking and deepen understanding;
• Use strategies before, during, and after reading to enhance comprehension of texts;
• Apply self-monitoring skills and strategies to determine the meaning of important vocabulary;
• Identify a writer’s tone and how it affects readers’ emotional responses to a text;
• Determine the themes of fiction stories;
• Identify big ideas and supporting details within texts;
• Synthesize information presented within and across fiction texts;
• Compare texts in different forms that share similar themes and topics; and
• Deepen their understanding of author’s purpose as it relates to the fiction genre.

Unit 3

Nonfiction

Nonfiction texts encourage students to closely observe and learn about all that is around them. Students will develop passions for locating information, finding answers, and deepening their understanding about the nonfiction topics they are reading and learning about. This unit will help students learn and apply specific reading skills and strategies that will enable them to discover facts, identify big ideas, and learn new information about the topics they are reading about. It will also address the challenges of reading nonfiction, as well as ways to work through difficult text—essential skills for any reader.

Students will:

• Read a variety of types of nonfiction, including reference, literary nonfiction, and biography;
• Use knowledge of genre, text structure, and text features to support understanding;
• Use comprehension strategies before, during, and after reading to monitor and deepen comprehension;
• Employ a repertoire of strategies and self-monitoring skills to figure out unfamiliar vocabulary while reading;
• Use textual evidence to support thinking about nonfiction reading in both conversation and writing;
• Infer an author’s purpose or viewpoint;
• Summarize and synthesize information to determine important ideas;
• Analyze the impact of the author’s language choices on the meaning and tone of the text;
• Analyze and evaluate arguments presented in nonfiction texts;
• Synthesize and compare information across texts and in various formats (e.g., print, visual);
• Determine and pursue meaningful goals for enhancing the reading of nonfiction.

Unit 4

Poetry

Poems are the perfect vehicle for young children to make connections, think deeply, and analyze literature for purpose and message. This unit will help readers learn and apply specific reading skills and strategies that will help unlock the meaning of poems while building their understanding of poetry as a genre. It will also address strategies that readers use when reading poetry, as well as ways to work through unfamiliar text, infer meaning, and build a deeper understanding of the messages, moods, images, and feelings that are shared in poems.

Students will:

• Discover the richness of the genre of poetry;
• Interpret a variety of poems;
• Use personal schema and textual evidence to make predictions and connections;
• Ask questions to help clarify thinking and deepen understanding;
• Use strategies before, during, and after reading to enhance comprehension of poetry;
• Apply self-monitoring skills and strategies to determine the meaning of important vocabulary and central ideas;
• Analyze poems for a variety of literary elements, including elements of structure, figurative language, use of imagery, repetition, and other crafting techniques;
• Analyze how structural elements including line breaks, white space, and stanzas affect meaning;
• Identify how structural elements fit together to build the overall meaning of a poem;
• Deepen understanding of author’s purpose as it relates to the genre;
• Interpret words and phrases in order to notice and/or discuss how these words and phrases shape meaning, mood, and tone; n Identify central ideas and cite evidence to support interpretations;
• Analyze themes within poems;
• Use writing to notate and develop ideas and interpretations of poetry;
• Compare the reading and performance of poetry