Title of Text: Earth’s Water Cycle
Author/Illustrator: Robin Nelson GRL: D Series: First Step Nonfiction Genre: Nonfiction, Science Standard: Describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text.
Lesson Objectives: to describe connections between processes in science, to use the strategy of inferring to better understand the concepts in a text, to use cause and effect as a reading skill. Comprehension Strategy: Inferring Skill: Cause and Effect Fluency: Immediate letter/cluster/word recognition ‐ CYCLE Academic Vocabulary: explain or research the meanings of the words below. Discuss the morphology of the words: suffixes, taking a root word and adding to it to change the meaning of the word. Have students talk about the meaning of each word, using antonyms, synonyms and situations where each word can be used correctly. a. condensation b. Earth c. evaporation d. gas e. form f. evaporate g. vapor PHONICS/FOUNDATIONAL SKILLS: Soft and hard c – talk to students about how the letter C has two sounds. Write the word CYCLE on the board – underline the c’s and help students hear them by saying the word slowly. Write the words CLOUD, COOL, CALLED, CENTER, CITY, CERTAIN. Say them all aloud and discuss the sounds of the c’s. Before Reading: ENGAGE! THINK! 1. Build Background Knowledge a. Let’s look at the front and back cover. What do you know about? b. What would you like to learn? c. Discuss the meaning of the word cycle – something that happens over and over. What are other cycles you can think of? d. What happens when it rains? What does rain do? How does it happen? 2. Skill Introduction: a. Cause and Effect – if I had a pair of good leather shoes outside, and it started to rain, what could happen to the shoes? This is cause and effect – shoes getting ruined is the effect of the cause – rain. 3. Strategy Introduction: a. Inferring – you inferred that the shoes could be ruined if you left them out and it rained. What else can you infer about rain? 4.
Fluency: Immediate letter/cluster/word recognition – CYCLE – work on understanding the word – syllable, soft and hard c and meaning of the word. Use the glossary and index in the book to help. Standard ‐ Describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text. Before reading, talk about how rain helps the environment – plants need rain – this is a connection. Copyright © 2012 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc. Lerner Digital™ and Lerner eSource™ are trademarks of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc. All rights reserved. www.lernerbooks.com During Reading: Don’t Wait Until It’s Too Late! Check for Understanding (Stop after page 11) 1.
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Tell me about a part you didn’t understand? Turn and Talk: how is using the strategy of making connections helpful in your reading? How does it feel to sit in the sun? Do you become warm? This happens to water on the earth – what kinds of water is on the Earth? Tell me what evaporation and condensation is….how do they work? Standard: Describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text. What is the connection between the water getting warmer and it turning into gas? After Reading: 1. What did you learn? What surprised you? 2. What more do you want to learn about this topic? 3. Use the illustration on page 18 to tell me the process of the water cycle. Infer what would happen if one part of the water cycle did not happen. 4.
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Standard: What is the most important thing to remember from this book? What are the details that can help you remember this? What is vapor? How does it occur? What is the cause of vapor? What is it’s effect? Standard: Describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text. How does a dark cloud have more water than a light cloud? Academic Vocabulary: Condense – what does it mean to condense? Show me with your body how you can be condensed. Writing Standard: Write informative/explanatory texts in which they name a topic, supply some facts about the topic, and provide some sense of closure. Task: Write about the water cycle. You can draw an illustration if it helps you get started. Write about how it begins, what happens during the water cycle and how it affects the environment. IF/THEN: Cause and Effect – show students who need extra support, a picture of a sun and a picture of an ice cream cone. Talk about what would happen if the ice cream cone would sit in the sun. Discuss what cause and effect means. Ask students to give more examples. Copyright © 2012 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc. Lerner Digital™ and Lerner eSource™ are trademarks of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc. All rights reserved. www.lernerbooks.com