Unifying Concept: Journeys and Explorations
Overview:
Students will learn the history and importance of migration within the United States. Students will evaluate how and why people made journeys; learn how people overcame certain obstacles through migration, and building a community with multiple perspectives. Students will discover authors’ motives while reading literature and informational texts, and interpreting their characters. Students will apply this learning to their own practices as readers and writers.
Purpose:
To read, write and communicate using grade level texts.
To interact with complex, paired informational texts and practice narrative and persuasive writing in a variety of ways (whole class, small groups, and independently) focusing on essays and summarizing.
Enduring Understandings:
- The journey is not the destination but the knowledge,exploration, and connections people make along the way.
- What challenges do people face when settling in a new land?
- What factors might people think about before deciding to start new lives?
- What factors might people think about before deciding to start a journey?
- Migration is moving from one place to another.
- People migrate for many reasons: job opportunity, escaping, family, health, acts of nature.
Target Standards are emphasized during the quarter and used in a formal assessment to evaluate student mastery.
Highly-Leveraged1 arethe most essential for students to learn because they have endurance (knowledge and skills are relevant throughout a student's lifetime); leverage (knowledge and skills are used across multiple content areas); and essentiality (knowledge and skills are necessary for success in future courses or grade levels).
4.RL.6 Compare and contrast the point of view from which different stories are narrated, including the difference between first- and third- person narration.
4.RI.5 Describe the overall structure (e.g., chronology, comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in a text or part of a text.
4.RI.6 Compare and contrast a firsthand and secondhand account of the same event or topic; describe the differences in focus and the information provided.
4.W.1a-dWrite opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons and information.
a. Introduce a topic or text clearly, state an opinion, and create an organizational structure in which related ideas are grouped to support the writer’s purpose.
b. Provide reasons that are supported by facts and details.
c. Link opinion and reasons using words and phrases (e.g., for instance, in order to, in addition).
d. Provide a concluding statement or section related to the opinion presented.
Supportingare related standards that support the highly-leveraged standards in and across grade levels.
4.RI.2 Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize the text.
4.RI.9 Integrate information from two texts on the same topic in order to write or speak about the subject knowledgeable.
4.W.9 Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
b. Apply grade 4 Reading standards to informational texts (e.g., “Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in a text”).
4.SL.2Paraphrase portions of a text read aloud or information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally.
4.SL.3Identify the reasons and evidence a speaker provides to support particular points.
Constant Standards are addressed routinely every quarter.
4.RL.2, 3
4.RI.7, 9
4.W.2a-e, 7, 8
4.SL1a-d, 4
Selected Readings of Complex Texts
Extended/Short Texts:
Color Me Dark, Patricia McKissack
Hip Hop Speaks to Children, Nikki Giovanni
I Have Heard of a Land, Joyce Carol Thomas
Harcourt Books for All Learners:
Days of the Exodusters (Below)
Prairie Neighbors (Advanced) / Multicultural Adoptions:
Blacker the Berry, The,Joyce Carol Thomas
If the World Were a Village, David J. Smith
This is the Rope, Jacqueline Woodson / Scholastic Leveled Bookroom Adoptions:
Level P:
La Mariposa,Francisco Jimenez
Tar Beach,Faith Ringgold
Level Q:
La Rue: Across America Postcard from the Vacation,Barb Rosenstock
Level R:
Brian’s Winter,Gary Paulsen
Freedom Crossing,Margaret Goff Clark
More Than Anything Else, Marie Bradby
Pocahontas Princess of the New World,Kathleen Krull
Pocahontas and the Strangers,Clyde Robert Bulla
Level S:
Salsa Stories,Lula Delacre
Additional Instructional Resources
Electronic Resources and Alternative Media:
Performance Assessments
Formative Assessments:
This includes quick writes, interviews, note-taking, graphic organizers, classroom discussions and writing (summaries and essays). / Summative Assessments:
This includes an inquiry project, a paragraph summary, interpretation of data from readings, a graffiti board and an opinion essay.
School City – ELA.4.ArtMigration
ELA, Office of Curriculum Development© Page 1 of 3
These modules are not an exhaustive list of resources and may be used by teachers to implement the quarterly standards and to meet the needs of students.
1This definition for highly-leveraged standards was adapted from the “power standard” definition on the website of Millis Public Schools, K-12, in Massachusetts, USA.
ELA, Office of Curriculum Development© Page 1 of 3
These modules are not an exhaustive list of resources and may be used by teachers to implement the quarterly standards and to meet the needs of students.