®
GUIDED
READING
EXPLANATION
“What Is
Precipitation?”
Written by Arianne J. Pinchuk
KEY IDEA Precipitation comes from clouds and is made up
of tiny droplets of water. Precipitation can come in several
different forms including rain, snow, sleet, and hail.
STUDENTS
Session 1 “What Is Precipitation?”
Session Learning Focus/Standards
RI.1.1* Ask and answer questions about key details in a text, referring to
what is explicitly stated, and use the details to support basic inferences.
*standard adapted from another grade
RI.1.8 Identify the reasons an author gives to support points in a text.
SL.1.1b Build on others’ talk in conversations by responding to the
comments of others through multiple exchanges.
Comments for future instruction:
X = not demonstrated/not articulated
✓= demonstrated/articulated
PREVIEWING THE TEXT 5 minutes
oday we are going to read an article called “What Is Precipitation?” Let’s look at the pictures
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on the first two pages of the article. What do you see?
Now let’s look at the next two pages of the article. What do you see?
Let’s read to find out more about these pictures.
READING THE TEXT CLOSELY 10 minutes
he author wants us to answer the question, “What will happen next?” What is the answer to
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this question?
What details make you think that this is the answer?
Why does the author use these details to show it is going to rain?
MONDO BOOKSHOP GRADE 1 1
hen reading, it is important that we think about the details. By doing so, we were able to
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figure out the answer to an important question and see why the author gave us those details.
We will practice doing this throughout the rest of this article.
ur work today is to find answers to our questions about precipitation and explain the
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different types of precipitation.
DISCUSSING THE TEXT 10 minutes
isten to your classmates share ideas and wait for them to finish speaking before you begin
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talking. Who would like to begin by sharing a question they had or something they learned
while reading the article?
That is a great question. Did anyone find the answer to this question when they read?
That’s exactly right. Would anyone else like to add to that idea?
es, now we have answered the title of our article, “What Is Precipitation?” If these things are
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all forms of water that fall from the sky, why are they given different names?
hink about the things the author told you in the article. What did she say or show about how
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these kinds of precipitation are different from one another?
Great job. These are key details from the article. Now, let’s talk more about these words.
e have just been talking about some of the words we read about today. What are rain,
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snow, sleet, and hail?
hat’s right. We can define these words as things that fall from the sky. Now, let’s see if we
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can say more about them using some of the other details from the article. Read page 29 with
me. . . . Now, what else can we say about rain, snow, sleet, and hail?
What more can you tell me about them?
ometimes when we read new words, we can think of them in terms of categories, like
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plants, animals, or colors. In this case, we can think of rain, sleet, snow, and hail as a category.
They are things that fall from the sky. They are all things that come from clouds. They are all
things that are made up of water. They are all kinds of precipitation. When we categorize
things, it helps us better understand new words.
oday you read an article for information. You thought about the details and how they can
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help you ask and answer questions. You also thought about how the author gives reasons to
support the details. Remember to do this whenever you read for information.
2 “What Is Precipitation?”
®
GUIDED
READING
EXPLANATION
“What Is
Precipitation?”
Written by Arianne J. Pinchuk
KEY IDEA Precipitation comes from clouds and is made up
of tiny droplets of water. Precipitation can come in several
different forms including rain, snow, sleet, and hail.
STUDENTS
Session 2 “What Is Precipitation?”
Session Learning Focus/Standards
RI.1.1* Ask and answer questions about key details in a text, referring to
what is explicitly stated, and use the details to support basic inferences.
*standard adapted from another grade
RI.1.5* Describe the overall structure to establish what/why (cause/
effect) and how the order of events (chronology) contributes to the
understanding of key concepts in a text.
*standard adapted from another grade
RI.1.8 Identify the reasons an author gives to support points in a text.
SL.1.1b Build on others’ talk in conversations by responding to the
comments of others through multiple exchanges.
Comments for future instruction:
X = not demonstrated/not articulated
✓= demonstrated/articulated
RETURNING TO THE TEXT 5 minutes
Let’s quickly review what we talked about last time.
READING THE TEXT CLOSELY 10 minutes
oday we are going to use text features in the article to help us find important details about
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the topic of precipitation. Let’s start by looking at the subheadings. Who can show me one of
the subheadings in the article?
How do we know this is a subheading?
MONDO BOOKSHOP GRADE 1 1
hat is exactly right. So, who can tell me how subheadings can help us when we read?
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Great! So, in this section with the subheading, “Rain,” would we find anything in there about hail?
So, if you wanted to find out information quickly about hail, what would you do?
Well done! Class, you need to remember that when you read for information, you can find
information quickly if you use subheadings, titles, and bolded words. These text features
help you see how the text is sorted and will give you clues about where you can go to find
answers to questions about a topic.
Look at the title of this article. What type of sentence is this?
Are there other places in the article that have this kind of sentence?
What do these sentences make you do when you read them?
Just like the author uses questions, so can you. When you finish reading something, you can
ask yourself a question about what you just read. When you look at a picture, you can ask a
question about it. This will help you better understand what you read.
Let’s read the second paragraph on page 31. Sometimes snow turns into sleet. Why does the
author say this happens?
See how important it is that the author told us that. She could have just said “Snow sometimes
turns into sleet,” but that wouldn’t have helped us know how it happens. Authors use “reasons” in
their writing to explain things to the readers.
DISCUSSING THE TEXT 10 minutes
et’s talk about other text features that we can use to help find details about precipitation.
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What kinds of other text features do you see in this article?
Yes, those are one example of a text feature. They are called captions. Captions can give us
more information about the topic that is not in the article. Let’s look at the captions in this
article. Can anyone find a new fact in a caption that they didn’t learn about in the text?
You’re right. This information was not in the text. Can anyone build on this idea?
That is right. Sleet is slippery, but it doesn’t say that in the text. This information can help us
draw a conclusion about the picture. If the road in the picture has sleet on it, how would that
affect the drivers of these cars?
We can use information in the captions and photos to make conclusions about what we read
and the pictures we have seen. The text features can help us by giving even more information
than what was found in the author’s words in the text.
Let’s look at the word noisy on page 30. In that sentence noisy describes the storm. What are
some other words that mean the same thing as noisy?
What do people want to do when things are too noisy?
Now, let’s think of other things that are noisy. What kinds of things are noisy outside our school?
What kinds of things are noisy in our classroom?
What kinds of things are noisy at your home?
So, based on our knowledge of noisy things, what is this storm like in the article?
What would you do during a noisy storm?
You really built off one another’s ideas during our discussion. We’ve identified some of the
text features that readers can use to find important details about the topic of a text. Which
text features helped us find details about precipitation?
Remember to use text features along with the author’s words whenever you are looking for
or retelling important details about a topic.
2 “What Is Precipitation?”
®
GUIDED
READING
EXPLANATION
“What Is
Precipitation?”
Written by Arianne J. Pinchuk
KEY IDEA Precipitation comes from clouds and is made up
of tiny droplets of water. Precipitation can come in several
different forms including rain, snow, sleet, and hail.
Session 3 “What Is Precipitation?” and “Extreme Storms”
STUDENTS
KEY IDEA Precipitation generally comes from clouds that have brought forth storms. Some storms are
gentle while others are extreme.
Session Learning Focus/Standards
RI.1.1* Ask and answer questions about key details in a text, referring to
what is explicitly stated, and use the details to support basic inferences.
*standard adapted from another grade
RI.1.5* Describe the overall structure to establish what/why (cause/
effect) and how the order of events (chronology) contributes to the
understanding of key concepts in a text.
*standard adapted from another grade
RI.1.8 Identify the reasons an author gives to support points in a text.
RI.1.9 Identify basic similarities in and differences between two texts on
the same topic (e.g., in illustrations, descriptions, or procedures).
SL.1.1b Build on others’ talk in conversations by responding to the
comments of others through multiple exchanges.
Comments for future instruction:
✓= demonstrated/articulated
X = not demonstrated/not articulated
MONDO BOOKSHOP GRADE 1 1
REFLECTING ON THE TEXTS 5 minutes
We have learned a lot about precipitation in the last two days. What is precipitation?
Where does precipitation come from?
How do we know that precipitation will likely fall?
et’s look back at page 30 of “What Is Precipitation?” Let’s read this page together again.
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What kinds of storms can clouds form?
What kind of storm is shown in the picture? Do you think it is a gentle storm or a loud storm?
CROSS-TEXT ANALYSIS 10 minutes
ow let’s talk about the article, “Extreme Storms.” What kind of storm was described in this
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article?
ow does this storm compare to the storms described on page 30? Is it a gentle storm or a
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loud storm? How do you know?
hat is exactly right. How do you think this storm compares to a hailstorm? Why do you think
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this?
et’s think about discussing the two stories together to help you understand both more
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deeply. Work with your partner. What is a question that could be answered by reading both
articles?
Who wants to build on that idea? What idea from the first article answers this question?
What idea from the second article answers this question?
INTEGRATING THE LEARNING 10 minutes
ften when we read, we try to say what an article was mostly about—the big idea—in one
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sentence. Now we’re going to think through key parts of these two articles to find a common
idea for both of them in one or two sentences. Turn and talk with a partner. Think about how
we can state a topic that would go with both articles. . . . Who would like to start?
Let’s recap what strategies we used to deepen our understanding of both articles.
2 “What Is Precipitation?”