BIG QUESTIONS:       Why do scientists study the rainforest?     What can we do to help the rainforest?

In this unit, students build background knowledge about the rainforest, including rainforest destruction, to understand why scientists study the rainforest. In the first half of the unit, they read excerpts from The Most Beautiful Roof in the World by Kathryn Lasky and other informational texts to analyze and compare text structure and write summaries. For the mid-unit assessment, students read, summarize, and compare the structure of two new informational text about the rainforest.

In the second half of the unit, students transition to conducting web research in the second half of the unit to answer the question: What can I do to help the rainforest? They prepare for a Science Talk in which they discuss the things they can do to help and also the realistic challenges of implementing some of those things. For the first part of the end of unit assessment, students complete research independently using new sources to participate in a Science Talk in the second half of the assessment.

In Unit 2, students read and analyze literary texts, focusing on how the point of view influences how the events in the text are described and how concrete and descriptive language help a reader to understand a text. Students read several literary texts about the rainforest, including “The Dreaming Tree,” a folk tale from Brazil; The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest by Lynne Cherry; and excerpts from The Most Beautiful Roof in the World by Kathryn Lasky. In the first half of the unit, they compare the point of view and figurative language used in these texts. On the mid-unit assessment, students read and analyze a new literary text for author’s craft.

In the second half of the unit, students analyze the use of concrete and sensory language in an excerpt of The Most Beautiful Roof in the World and what it helps the reader understand. They work in pairs to write a literary analysis essay to answer the question: “What does the use of concrete language and sensory detail help you understand about the rainforest?” They also practice reading aloud various excerpts from The Most Beautiful Roof in the World. In the end of unit assessment, students read aloud a new excerpt from The Most Beautiful Roof in the World to complete a fluency assessment and another excerpt to independently write a literary analysis essay to answer the question: “What does the use of concrete language and sensory detail help you understand about the rainforest?”

In this unit, students apply what they have learned about point of view and narrative techniques in Unit 2 to plan and draft a first person narrative that builds out a scenario from The Most Beautiful Roof of the World by Kathryn Lasky. Students work in pairs to plan and draft a partner narrative in the first half of the unit. For the mid-unit assessment, students plan and draft a new first person narrative building out a new scenario from the text.

In the second half of the unit, students revise their partner narrative with a focus on pacing: speeding up parts of the narrative that are irrelevant to the plot and slowing down important action. For the end of unit assessment, students apply teacher feedback and the skills they have learned throughout the second half of the unit to revise the narrative they wrote independently for the mid-unit assessment. They also complete a task identifying the function of conjunctions, interjections, and prepositions—a focus of mini lessons throughout the unit. The unit ends with students working with their partner to compile their narrative writing from across the unit to create the final performance task, a Rainforest Adventures ebook.  We will also work on creating a four story 3-D rainforest with labels and explanations. Students will also work on an Information Cereal Box display focused on everything they learned about the rain forest!