Subject: Communication Arts
1. Topic-
Hero: A Study of Comprehension Skills
 
2. Content-
CA-R1C-4
CA-W2A-4
 
3. Goals: Aims/Outcomes-
1. Students will variety of technological and information resources to gather and synthesize information and to create and communicate knowledge.
2. Students will apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. They draw on their prior experience, their interactions with other readers and writers, their knowledge of word meaning and of other texts, their word identification strategies, and their understanding of textual features.
3.Students read a wide range of literature from many periods in many genres to build an understanding of the many dimensions of human experience.
 
4. Objectives-
Students will be able to:
1.Learn and apply the comprehension strategy of making connections.
2. Define and understand the three types of connections (i.e., text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world).
3. Make connections and react to various texts using a double-entry journal.
 
5. Materials and Aids-
Book: Krull, Kathleen. (2003). Harvesting Hope: The Story of Caesar Chavez. New York: Harcourt Children's Books.
Computer with Internet access.
 
6. Procedures/Methods-

A. Introduction-

Explain the strategy. Explain to students that there are three main types of connections that we make while reading texts. Use the making connections posters while discussing each type with students.
 

B. Development-

1.Demonstrate the strategy. Display a blank copy of the Double-Entry Journal and demonstrate how to use this technique. Explain to students that, in the first column, they should choose a quote or situation from the text that they can react to. Then, in the second column, they should record their reaction.
2.Reinforce the fact that these reactions should make a connection between the text and themselves, another text, or the world. (Refer back to the making connections posters during this demonstration and discussion.)
 

C. Practice-

1.Read aloud the first few pages of Harvesting Hope and model the process of completing the double-entry journal.
2.Guide students to apply the strategy. After reading several pages of Harvesting Hope and modeling the process, have students begin offering their reactions to the text as a way to practice the technique together as a class. Have students take part in completing the double-entry journal together.
 

D. Independent Practice-

1.Practice individually or in small groups. Divide students into groups of three. As you continue reading the story, stop every few pages and ask students to record their reactions to the text on their own copies of the double-entry journal and then share their reactions with their group. Continue reading and stopping periodically for reactions until the story is finished.
 

E. Accommodations (Differentiated Instruction)-

Adapt this lesson and have students practice the making connections strategy with other texts. With continued practice using the double-entry journal, students should be able to apply the technique independently.

Access and use other lessons based on the Guided Comprehension Model to teach additional comprehension strategies.To extend the activities in this lesson, students may want to do further research on the life of Caesar Chavez or the Migrant Farm Workers of America.

Ask students to use the Venn Diagram: 2 Circles to compare and contrast the life of Caesar Chavez with another civil rights leader, such as Martin Luther King, Jr.
 

F. Checking for understanding-

1. The assessment for this lesson can be done informally by asking students to respond to journal prompts.
2.You can also assess students' understanding of the making connections strategy using the double-entry journals that they completed during the lesson. Assess the double-entry journals for completeness of connections; be sure that students are making authentic, rich connections and that they are using all three types of connections to build their comprehension.
3. Ask students to share with a partner examples of each of the three types of connections they made to a text. Have them also record these connections for assessment of their understanding of each type.
 

G. Closure-

Reflect. Gather students as a whole class to discuss the process of making connections. Ask students which types of connections were the easiest and the hardest to make?
 
7. Evaluation-
1. Writing progresses over time with the addition of new comprehension connection strategies.
2.Double-Entry journals can be kept from story to story to monitor student progress and implementation of strategy.
 

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