1. Topic-
Non-fiction Writing
 
2. Content-
Creating a non-fiction story using research facts.
 
3. Goals: Aims/Outcomes-
After researching using book and web sources, students will create a non-fiction digital story that visually displays at least 8 facts about an animal of their choosing.
 
4. Objectives-
1. Students will research an animal of their choosing using at least one book and one website.
2.Students will use written English to communicate what they learned about their animal.
3. Students will create a digital pop up book using the Zooburst website.
 
5. Materials and Aids-
Library books about their chosen animals (chickens and cats); laptops; storyboard planners; website: www.zooburst.com
 
6. Procedures/Methods-

A. Introduction-

*These procedures are for one lesson in the middle of this unit.*

1.Remind students of what they have already accomplished in their writing project (they have researched their animal using books and Internet; they have organized their facts into 8 storyboards with pictures and words).
2. Login to the Zooburst website and bring up the teacher-model book "Owls."
3. Allow students to read the book about Owls that you created. Students should see that there are both page and character narrations.
4. Show your storyboard planner for each page and ask students to compare: How did I use my storyboard to create this page? What did I have to change? (Pictures won't exactly match up, etc).
 

B. Development-

1. Click to begin a new book. Explain to students that this will not be an actual book, but just one that we will use to learn more about the features and practice with them.
2. Show students how to change the page colors and the background. Allow students to play around with this.
3. Show students the picture adding tool. This includes demonstrating picture searching, selecting, resizing, rotation, and angles. Allow students time to play around with these features and ask questions.
4. Show students the page narration options. Explain the difference between page narration and character narration (dialogue). Allow students time to play around with these features and ask questions.
5. Show students how to create a new page of their book and how to save.
 

C. Practice-

1. Give each student a laptop and login to the Zooburst website to the "create new book" page.
2. Have students take out their storyboard planners. Ask: What should they put on the first page? Have them orally explain what pictures they will search for and how to find them. Ask: What words will go on your first page? They should be able to show the text on their storyboard that they will type onto their book page.
3. Allow students to begin, carefully monitoring and aiding as they learn the program.
 

D. Independent Practice-

Allow students to continue using the program on their own to create their pop up book.
 

E. Accommodations (Differentiated Instruction)-

There are only two ELL students in this group who are at the same WIDA language level. No added differentiation should be needed.
 

F. Checking for understanding-

Check in by having students show you how each storyboard planner page matches up to each page of their pop up book. Note where items are missing and have students go back to edit those pages.
 

G. Closure-

Have students wind down with a discussion: What was easy about making this pop up book? What parts were hard? What do you still have left to do?
 
7. Evaluation-
When the project is complete, students will be assessed on their writing using the WIDA writing rubric. It grades students on a scale of 1-6 in three areas: linguistic complexity (sentence lengths, cohesion, details), vocabulary usage (technical vs general language), and language control (grammar, comprehensibility).
 

This Lesson Plan is available at (www.teacherjet.com)