Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
Stage 1 - Desired Results
0B
Unit Summary
3B
In this unit, students will become journalists and create their own classroom newspaper by studying
examples of news articles from the local to the global. Students will identify and differentiate between
fact and opinion and summarize by identifying the main idea and details of non-fiction text.
Transfer goal: Students will leave the class able to read and write news articles to help them
understand the difference between fact verses opinion and to know the importance of selfrepresentation in the media.
Content Standards and Learning Expectations
4B
Listening and Speaking
L/S.3.3 Listens and responds to, gives commands, provides both instructions and directions; shares
answers and formulates the 5-W Questions (who, what, when, where, and why).
L/S.3.4 Uses and applies appropriate language structure with formal and informal expressions to
identify, describe, and classify familiar concepts in relation to personal experiences, preferences,
interests, and environment.
15B
Reading
R.3.2 Applies phonemic awareness strategies to identify syllables and word family patterns.
R.3.6 Recognizes differences between fiction and nonfiction; identifies fact and opinion; recognizes
main idea in simple informational text.
16B
Writing
W.3.2 Applies phonemic awareness and phonics strategies to correctly spell words that have two letter
clusters, common spelling patterns, and uncommon consonant patterns.
W.3.3 Applies basic grammar and mechanics to write complete declarative and interrogative sentences
of three to five words in length; identifies declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, and imperative types
of sentences; identifies the parts of speech.
17B
Big Ideas/Enduring Understandings:
5B
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News helps us know what is happening in our
community or world.
News we receive is edited for a variety of
purposes and does not always include a
variety of perspectives.
Good questions are open and give the
interviewee space to share his/her
experience.
Written language is more formal than oral
language and reflects our ability to
communicate in print.
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Essential Questions:
6B
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What roles does the news play in our lives-past and present?
How is spoken language different from
written language?
What news is newsworthy and why?
What does it mean to ask a good question?
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
Content (Students will know…)
7B
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How to organize an article (main idea (5W’s in
the first paragraph, then details and quotes in
later paragraphs)
Difference between local, national, and
international news
Difference between sensational news and
news that is newsworthy
Sentence types (declarative, interrogative,
exclamatory, and imperative)
Difference between fact and opinion, fiction
and nonfiction
The role of editing in the news
Declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, and
imperative types of sentences
Journalism vocabulary (see below)
Skills (Students will be able to…)
8B
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Content Vocabulary
18B
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Article, News
Media (newspaper, magazines, television,
internet, journal, website)
(Parts of an article and newspaper) Headline,
caption, title, subtitle, editorial, op ed,
feature)
Sensational
Advertisements
Investigate
Observe
Journalist, reporter
International, national, local
Topics (crime, human interest, government,
investigative, celebrities, sports, business)
Newsworthy (e.g. If I were a journalist, I
would write about _____. I think newspapers
today write too much about ____ and need to
include more about ______. For example, __)
Fact, opinion
Media bias (favoring the opinion and beliefs
of one group over another’s in the news)
Stereotypes
Main idea and Details
Spoken language, Written language
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Shares answers and formulates the 5-W
Questions (who, what, when, where, and
why).
Use and apply appropriate language structure
with formal and informal expressions to
identify, describe, and classify familiar
concepts in relation to personal experiences,
preferences, interests, and environment.
Apply phonemic awareness strategies to
identify syllables and word family patterns.
Identify fact and opinion.
Recognize main idea in simple informational
text.
Apply phonemic awareness and phonics
strategies to correctly spell words that have
two letter clusters, common spelling patterns,
and uncommon consonant patterns.
Apply basic grammar and mechanics to write
complete declarative and interrogative
sentences of three to five words in length.
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
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Organization
Paragraph
Sentence types (declarative, interrogative,
exclamatory, and imperative)
Punctuation marks (period, question mark,
exclamation point)
Stage 2 - Assessment Evidence
1B
Performance Tasks
9B
Class Newspaper
19B
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Students will brainstorm and investigate
topics that are newsworthy in their lives and
at the school to create their own class
newspaper.
Ask students, “What is newsworthy in our
lives?” Have students come up with a list of
topics they want to discuss (community
issues, needs at the school, important events
or celebrations, problems that need to be
addressed).
Ask, “What is news?” Discuss the importance
of writing your own news and about the
importance of self-representation.
Out of all of the suggestions, have students
select a topic work in pairs to come up with a
plan (who they will interview, what questions
they will ask, what research needs to be
done).
Students in pairs interview a person about the
topic and write down their answers in a
reporter notebook. They can also visit a site
and write down their observations.
Students draft out their stories using
attachment 3.4 Performance Task – Inverted
Pyramid Graphic Organizer to write their
article with the 5W’s in the beginning and to
have details and a quote from their interview.
Have pairs share their draft with other groups
to make comments on sticky notes (what can
improve? What information is missing? Is this
a fact or an opinion?).
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Other Evidence
10B
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Word Family Check Select a word family with
two or three letter clusters to focus on every
week during the morning meeting. Have a
short lesson of how to pronounce the cluster
and give examples of words (see website
http://www.carlscorner.us.com/Sorts.htm for
word families picture cards and sorting ideas).
Use attachment, 3.1 Other Evidence – Word
Family Assessment to check student’s ability
to identify and read letter clusters. Students
can also create word family notebook to keep
track and add new words to their notebooks
throughout the year (see attachment: 3.1
Other Evidence – Word Family Book).
Oral Assessment of Word Wall Vocabulary
and Individual Vocabulary (see attachment:
Resource 1 – Oral Assessment for Vocabulary
Acquisition). Based on words you select for
the whole class and on the individual words
students want to know in English for their
individual word list, have a conference for
each student to check if the student
understands the vocabulary words when
listening and speaking (say it by itself, with a
sentence starter, or independently).
Fluency Check Have a student read aloud to
check for fluency: any words that students
have difficulty in, for intonation, skipped
words, and missed endings (see attachment:
Resource 8 – Paired Reading Fluency Check as
an evaluation).
Fact or Opinion? Have students read a nonfiction text and use a T-Chart to find examples
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
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Pairs will use comments to rewrite their
article and then look for spelling and grammar
errors.
Have students put together their writing in a
class newspaper, take pictures or make
illustrations for their article and include a
caption describing the photo. Have students
work together (or select a group of editors) to
work on layout and decide the top stories to
have on the cover.
Share their newspaper with other classes, in
the library and in the community (make sure
to share with the people interviewed)
Use attachment 3.1 Performance Task –
Descriptive Writing Rubric to assess writing.
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of a facts and opinions. Then have them
create a Fact or opinion Foldable (see
attachment: 3.3 Other Evidence – Shutter
Fold) book illustrating on the inside examples
of facts and opinions, with a list of three facts
and two opinions found.
Sentence types Comic Strip Have students
create a comic strip that uses the four types of
sentences in the dialogue between the
characters. Students can include the best
comics in their classroom newspaper (see
attachment: 3.3 Learning Activity – Comic
Strip).
Newspaper Critique and Reflection
20B
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Have students pick up a local newspaper (in
Spanish) and have students look through it
and make an inventory of types of stories
(local, Puerto Rican, national, international)
and topics (crime, human interest,
government, investigative, celebrities, sports,
business).
Ask the question, “What is newsworthy?” is
there anything you think is missing from the
newspaper? Discuss how newspapers need to
make money so many times the news is
sensational and tries to capture the reader’s
attention. Notice if the news is negative
(crime, disasters, gossip) or positive (human
achievement, discoveries, investigative
(uncovering and questioning problems)).
Have students go through the newspaper
again with these questions “Is this negative
news or positive news?” and create a tally
Have students write a reflection based on
“What is newsworthy?” (e.g. If I were a
journalist, I would write about _____
because____. I think newspapers today write
too much about ____ and need to include
more about ______. For example, ____.)
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
Stage 3 - Learning Plan
2B
Learning Activities
1B
What’s in the News?
21B
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Ask the question, “What is news?” and have students brainstorm reasons why it is important to
know about what is going on. Ask, “What is newsworthy?” and create a list with the class. See how
this will change throughout the unit, as students will begin to critique newspapers and magazines
for their focus on sensational news.
Bring in examples of different types of media (it can be in Spanish or English). Define media as ways
of sharing information to many people. Bring in examples of magazines (Bring various: e.g.
Children’s Newspaper in Nuevo Dia, Vanidades, National Geographic, News magazines)
newspapers, printed websites, or names of television news shows that are media. Have them look
through and create a list of examples of news or information that is found in the media types.
Share how news can have the ability to change things because it brings an issue into question and
asks for change. Ask, “What makes a good question?” to have students brainstorm problems that
need to be investigated in their community. Search local newspapers to see if they are addressing
these issues. Ask “What is newsworthy?” to find out whether or not these topics are being
covered.
Model the format of what is in a newspaper by doing a newspaper scavenger hunt for features in
the newspaper: http://www.newspapersineducation.ca/eng/level_7to9/lesson2/lesson2_eng.html
Describe the different parts of the newspaper (heading, article, feature, captions, photos, editorial,
op-ed opinion page, comics) Show each part and have students in pairs do a scavenger hunt in a
newspaper to find, cut out, and label the parts of a newspaper to make a poster of “Parts of a
Newspaper.”
Share how the first paragraph of a newspaper always has the 5Ws in the first paragraph to give the
important information first. Have students use graphic organizer, 3.4 Graphic Organizer - 5Ws and
1H, to find the 5Ws in the first paragraph of a newspaper article.
Have students create a newsletter for the classroom of important events in the school (as an
exercise to prepare for the larger newspaper performance task) (see attachment: 3.4 Learning
Activity – Classroom News Organizer).
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Fact versus Opinion
2B
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Use Fact and Opinion web (see attachment: 3.4 Learning Activity – Fact and Opinion Web) to
define and give examples of how to find facts and opinions. Facts are based on information that
can be proven (person, places, events) and an opinion is what someone things or feels. They can
have adjectives as a way of showing it is someone’s thought on a topic.
Give examples of how fact and opinion can be found in texts and what type of texts should have
opinions (letters to the editor, advertisements) and what type of texts should have facts (articles,
non-fiction books). Provide examples of these texts and have students look through them to find
facts and opinions. See how advertisements use opinions to make you buy the product.
Create sentence strips of sentences that are facts and opinions and have students sort and classify
them.
Have students find examples of facts and opinion in a non-fiction text and sort them into a T-chart.
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
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Give facts and have students create an opinion based on the fact.
Connect to how an opinion can enter into media because of bias, or stereotypes. Use attachment
3.4 Learning Activity – Bias in the Media, to have students analyze how different ethnic groups and
racial groups are represented in Puerto Rican newspapers.
Main Idea and Details
23B
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Share how in non-fiction writing each paragraph has a big idea, or main idea. On a chart paper,
have a paragraph from a non-fiction grade level text. Scaffold learning by Color coding main idea
and details in different colors to visually show the main idea and details. Gradually release
responsibility to the students by having them color code by underlining main idea and details in
paragraphs on chart paper and then using attachment, 3.4 Learning Activity – Main Idea and
Details organizer to map out the main idea and details.
Have students read non-fiction texts and write the main idea for each paragraph on a post it note
and at the end of the lesson, students share what main ideas they found.
In partners use sentence starters to give supporting details. As students are reading in pairs,
Partner A asks, “What’s the main idea?” and the Partner B says the main idea. Then partner A says,
“Prove it!” and Partner B gives supporting details. They then switch roles when reading another
paragraph.
Sentence Types
24B
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Model in a teacher chart one of the four types of sentences (declarative, interrogative,
exclamatory, and imperative) a day during morning message. Give an example of each type of
sentence and have the punctuation part blank. Have students volunteer to say what punctuation
mark goes with it and why.
Students can search for sentence types in books they read in pairs, create a chart in their
notebooks.
Have students act out and create skits where they use the four sentence types.
Create a four tab book with examples of sentences for each type (see attachment: 3.4 Learning
Activity – Four Door Foldable).
Sample Lessons
12B
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Summarizing Fact and Opinion http://www.readworks.org/lessons/grade2/fact-and-opinion
See attachment: 3.4 Sample Lesson – Finding Facts
See attachment: 3.4 Learning Activity – Bias in the Media (adjust activity for Puerto Rican context
by using Puerto Rican newspapers)
Organizing a news story
http://www.newspapersineducation.ca/eng/level_7to9/lesson5/lesson5_eng.html
Creating a class newspaper http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lessonplans/creating-classroom-newspaper-249.html
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Additional Resources
13B
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On determining importance in Non-Fiction http://liketoread.com/read_strats_importance.php
Explaining the Inverted Pyramid Organizational strategy in articles
http://fcit.usf.edu/fcat/tests/newspaper/default.htm
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Unit 3.4: News
English as a Second Language
5 weeks
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List of websites of news for kids http://www.eduplace.com/ss/current/
Explaining the Inverted Pyramid Organizational strategy in articles
http://fcit.usf.edu/fcat/tests/newspaper/default.htm
List of websites of news for kids http://www.eduplace.com/ss/current/
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Literature Connections
14B
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The Mini Pages newspaper for kids http://www.lib.unc.edu/dc/minipage/
Time for Kids http://www.timeforkids.com/
National Geographic for Kids http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/kids/
Modeling Fact and Opinion:
o Penguins by Lynn M. Stone
o The Honest to Goodness Truth by Patricia McKissack
o Little Red Hen by Lucinda McQueen
o Day of the Blizzard by Marietta D. Moskin
o The Memory Coat by Elvira Woodruff
o Let’s Drive, Henry Ford! ( Before I Made History) by Peter and Connie Roop
• Books about changing or questioning problems around you
o Something Beautiful by Sharon Dennis Wyeth
o The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson
o That’s Not Fair/No es justo! Emma Tenayuca’s Struggle for Justice by Carmen Tafolia
o The Composition by Antonio Skarmeta
o Martin’s Big Words: The Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. by Doreen Rappaport
o Harvesting Hope: The Story of Cesar Chavez by Kathleen Krull
o A Picture Book of Rosa Parks by David A. Adler
o Helen Keller by Margaret Davidson
o Mother Teresa by Demi
o Gandhi by Demi
o A Picture Book of Benjamin Franklin by David A. Adler
o Barack Obama : Son of Promise, Child of Hope by Nikki Grimes
o Who was Anne Frank? by Ann Abramson
• Scott Foresman Reading – Collection 2. 1
o New Beginnings Book and Practice Book
o Tools by Ann Morris page 70 ( Photo Essay/ Social Studies Connection)
o The Green Leaf Club News by G. Brian Karas page 88 (Newsletter)
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Adapted from Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe
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