Grade 3
Reading and Writing in American History
PCS Theme 2: BUILDING COMMUNITIES
Radio Reading for Fluency
Looping to Develop a Topic
Lesson Focus:
Students will come to learn about American historical heroes.
Increase reading fluency through oral reading activities.
Recognize that a single topic can be developed by using the “looping” strategy.
North Carolina Social Studies Standards:
· 4.04 Compare how people in different communities adapt to or modify the environment.
North Carolina English Language Arts Standards:
· 4.01 Read aloud grade-appropriate text with fluency, comprehension, expression.
Resources:
· McMillan McGraw-Hill Our Communities pages 97-102
· The Bison are Back by Stanford Makishi
· Orphan Train Journey by Janine Rancourt
· Prairie Danger by Ann Rossi
Explanation of Reading Strategy Emphasized in the Lesson:
· Repeated reading is a powerful tool and beneficial for students lagging in reading skills, but can be boring to proficient readers. We make repeated reading beneficial to both kinds of students when we give students reading tasks that demand practice, such as performance reading, or reading for an audience. It takes time, but the results—students reading with expression, fluency, and meaning—will show that it is time well spent.
Lesson Description:
· The day before the performance activity, read aloud a selection from the textbook to model reading with expression and phrasing. Tell them you are reading like a radio or television announcer and talk about how important it is for them to read with expression. Ask students to follow along with you and to observe how you emphasize certain words and how you “chunk” text into meaningful phrases, not reading “word by word.” Ask them to visualize a snowball rolling downhill, pausing when it hits bumps (punctuation), and speeding up at certain parts until it hits the period at the end. Read aloud a passage to model.
· Assign parts of the passage to students. Assignments do not need to be equal in length. You might give more challenging passages to more able students. Have students practice reading their parts orally, alone or with others.
· Have each student develop two questions about his/her part: a literal question and an inferential question.
· On performance day remind students of the need to read with expression and meaning. Five students at a time go up to read. Provide mock microphones and lecterns, if desired. Tell students to read their assigned parts orally in the proper order. After the selection is completed, discuss the entire passage using the questions the students prepared. Summarize the passage as a class.
Student-Centered Activity:
· Extend the activity by dividing the class into groups. Assign each group one of the trade book resources. Assign each individual in the group a part of that trade book. Allow them time to practice and develop questions in their groups. After allowing time for practice, ask them to “perform” their book within their group by doing a “radio reading.” Then, if you wish, they can perform their radio reading before the whole class. You might want to spread these performances out over a period of weeks. If possible, invite parents to be the audience.
(Adapted from The Fluent Reader by Timothy V. Rasinski)
Writing Activity: Narrative
· In a mini-lesson, hold up one of the trade books. Talk about how the author focused on one main idea. Ask them to brainstorm in their notebooks about a story they would like to write about pioneer days (or other periods in American history).
· Point out how important it is for writers to develop one main idea in a short piece of writing. Demonstrate how to develop an essay by modeling “looping” as a planning devise on the overhead.
o Write a sentence on the overhead giving the first lines of a possible story that you want to develop. For example: “The Pathfinder made his way quietly through the forest.”
o Circle, or loop, the words in this sentence you want to develop further – “the forest.”
o Write a new sentence developing this idea: “The forest was quiet. Not a breath was stirring. Not a tree leaf was moving. Not a sound could be heard.”
o Circle, or loop, the words in this sentence group you want to develop further – “not a sound.”
o Write a new sentence developing this idea: “Pathfinder knew not hearing a sound in the forest was very strange. He wondered what could possibly be wrong.”
o Continue this sequence until a story is developed.
· After you have modeled the “looping” activity, ask students to write a story about pioneers (or other heroes) using the looping strategy to develop the story.
Reading and Writing in American History Grade 3
Pitt County Schools May 2005