Unit Overview: Read more about the unit and find all unit materials here on the Fishtank website

Natural disasters such as volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, and wildfires happen all over the world. Understanding how natural disasters happen and why helps children feel less anxious and more prepared. Therefore, this unit focuses on teaching students the science behind each natural disaster while also explaining what to do if they live in an area prone to a particular natural disaster. Over the course of the unit, students hear about many famous natural disasters, but the unit places more of an emphasis on how the disasters happen rather than exploring the devastation or destruction caused by previous natural disasters. The unit provides many opportunities for students to learn more about recent natural disasters, including a culminating research project. 

The texts in this unit were chosen because of their wide variety of text features, content, and accessibility. Over the course of the unit, students will read texts that are very technical and rely heavily on text features, diagrams, and illustrations, as well as texts that are written as informational narratives. Students will be challenged to think about the structures the authors use to help the reader interact with and learn the content, noticing the author's use of cause-and-effect and chronology. Additionally, students will learn the importance of referring to specific details from the text and using those details to explain and teach back the newly learned material. 

Students build their writing fluency by writing daily in response to the Target Task question. Throughout the unit, students also learn to craft strong informational paragraphs, focusing on introducing a topic, providing details and reasons, and elaborating on details. Students also have an opportunity to write a short narrative, using what they learned about a particular natural disaster and the features of a narrative to retell an experience. The unit culminates with students conducting research and writing a report on a recent natural disaster.

Unit Calendar:

Unit 2 is 38 instructional days. It is recommended to run from October 27th - January 23rd.