Reading Informational Texts: Reading Closely about Expert Group Animals on a Web Page | EL Education Curriculum

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ELA G4:M2:U2:L4

Reading Informational Texts: Reading Closely about Expert Group Animals on a Web Page

In this Lesson

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These are the CCS Standards addressed in this lesson:

  • RI.4.1: Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.
  • W.4.7: Conduct short research projects that build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic.
  • W.4.8: Recall relevant information from experiences or gather relevant information from print and digital sources; take notes and categorize information, and provide a list of sources.
  • W.4.9: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
  • L.4.6: Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, including those that signal precise actions, emotions, or states of being (e.g., quizzed, whined, stammered) and that are basic to a particular topic (e.g., wildlife, conservation, and endangered when discussing animal preservation).
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Daily Learning Targets

  • I can read a web page closely in order to answer research questions. (RI.4.1, W.4.7, W.4.8)
  • I can cite evidence from the text to support my answers to questions. (RI.4.1, W.4.7, W.4.8)

Ongoing Assessment

  • Web Page Research Guides in Expert Group Animal research notebooks (RI.4.1, W.4.7, W.4.8)

Agenda

AgendaTeaching Notes

1. Opening

A. Reviewing Learning Targets (5 minutes)

2. Work Time 

A. Guided Practice: Using the Web Page Research Guide to Research the Millipede (15 minutes)

B. Expert Group Work: Researching the Expert Group Animal (30 minutes)

3. Closing and Assessment 

A. Sketching (10 minutes)

4. Homework 

A. Accountable Research Reading. Select a prompt and respond in the front of your independent reading journal.

Purpose of lesson and alignment to standards:

  • In this lesson, students read their expert group animal web page to learn more about their animal. They answer questions in their Expert Group Animal research notebooks, which have been written to guide students to build knowledge and collect the evidence that they need to write an informative piece about their animal at the end of the unit (RI.4.1, W.4.7, W.4.8). 
  • The research reading that students complete for homework will help build both their vocabulary and knowledge pertaining to animals and specifically animal defenses. By participating in this volume of reading over a span of time, students will develop a wide base of knowledge about the world and the words that help describe and make sense of it.
  • Students who finish answering the research questions quickly can continue to devise their own research questions and find the answers in the text or in a safe internet search engine.
  • Lessons 1-3 featured built-out instruction for Goal 3 Conversation Cues. Moving forward, this will only appear as reminders after select questions. Continue using Goals 1-3 Conversation Cues to promote productive and equitable conversation. See the Tools page for additional information on Conversation Cues.
  • In this module, the habit of character focus is working to contribute to a better world. They are reminded of all of the characteristics for this habit in this lesson: applying my learning through reviewing the performance task, use my strengths when working in expert groups, and taking care of shared spaces when working on shared computers.

How it builds on previous work:

  • In the previous lesson, students read their expert group animal web page for the gist and identified unfamiliar vocabulary to prepare them to read the web pages more closely in this lesson.

Areas where students may need additional support:

  • Some students may need additional support reading the web page. Consider sending home a printout of the web page for students to spend additional time reading in advance of the lesson. 
  • Some students may need additional support writing answers to the questions. Consider inviting those students to write key words to answer the questions rather than complete sentences. 
  • Some of the questions about predators cannot be found on the web page that students are directed to view. When students get to this question, encourage them to use a safe search engine to find the answer to this question themselves. This may require teacher modeling, but give them the opportunity to problem-solve in their group first, as they may come to that conclusion without support.

Assessment guidance:

  • Check student learning by reading their answers to the questions, as incorrect answers will affect the factual accuracy of their informative writing at the end of Unit 2 and their narrative writing in Unit 3.
  • Consider using the Reading: Foundational Skills Informal Assessment: Reading Fluency Checklist when students reread their expert group animal web page in Work Time B. See the Tools page.
  • Consider using the Reading: Foundational Skills Informal Assessment: Phonics and Word Recognition Checklist (Grade 4) to informally assess students as they reread their expert group animal web page in Work Time B. See the Tools page.
  • Consider using the Speaking and Listening Informal Assessment: Collaborative Discussion Checklist during students' small group discussions in Work Time B. See the Tools page.

Down the road:

  • In the next lesson, students will organize and categorize their research.

In Advance

  • Post: Performance Task anchor chart, Close Readers Do These Things anchor chart, and learning targets.

Tech and Multimedia

  • Work Time A and B: Students complete their note-catchers in a word processing document, for example a Google Doc using Speech to Text facilities activated on devices, or using an app or software like Dictation.io.
  • Work Time B: Consider inviting students to use a text-to-speech tool such as SpeakIt! so they can hear the text read aloud multiple times in order to find the answers to the questions in the research notebook.
  • Work Time B: Consider inviting students to use a web page annotation tool such as Diigo for annotating answers to text before they record them in their research notebooks.
  • Work Time B: Consider inviting students to use Readability to view the web page text without clutter.

Supporting English Language Learners

Supports guided in part by CA ELD Standards 4.I.A.1, 4.I.A.2, 4.I.A.3, 4.I.B.6, 4.I.C.11, 4.I.C.12

Important points in the lesson itself

  • The basic design of this lesson supports ELLs by helping them collect and organize the descriptive language they will need to write an informative piece about their expert group animal.
  • ELLs may find it challenging to process the volume of expert group animal text. Consider highlighting or numbering pertinent portions of each expert group animal text to help students. Alternatively, consider asking a student with advanced language proficiency to highlight pertinent portions of his or her expert group animal text to share with ELLs.
  • Mini Language Dives: Prep research guide questions and expert group animal texts by highlighting and discussing a few language structures that are critical to understanding the research questions and the answers. Example from the gazelle research guide questions: 

"What words in the text make you think so?" Tell ELLs: "So is a special word here. It tells you to go back to your answer to the first question. (Point to the question "What do you think graze means?") Tell ELLs that "What words in the text make you think so?" is the same as "What words in the text make you think that graze means eat?" or "What words show you that graze means eat?"

Levels of support

For lighter support:

  • During Mini Language Dives, challenge students to generate questions about the sentence before asking the prepared questions. Example: "What questions can we ask about this sentence? Let's see if we can answer them together."
  • Continue to work with evidence. Challenge students to make a claim about an animal along with three pieces of evidence, two of which are faulty. Invite them to ask students who need heavier support to choose the good piece of evidence. This could be turned into a game, in which strips of scrap paper with bad evidence are balled up and tossed from a distance into the recycling bin and good evidence strips are pasted onto a wall chart. Have students add quotation marks to the good evidence when appropriate.

For heavier support:

  • Remind students about respectful group interaction. Provide clarification questions and turn-taking sentence starters to ELLs. Examples: "I didn't understand that. Could you repeat it in another way?" and "That's a good idea. How about _____ also?"
  • Ask students to remember what evidence is. Spell this word aloud. Elicit synonyms for evidence, e.g., proof. Ask: "Why do you need to give evidence after you share an answer or an idea?" Reactivate background knowledge with a quick game, e.g., a kinesthetic activity in which students match shuffled "claim" cards to "evidence" cards from the target complex text.
  • Pay attention to word order when students ask and answer questions. If they are making errors with word order (e.g., "What we should draw?"), tell them that the words appear in a different order in questions. Write the error on the board or on a piece of paper and ask students if they can fix the error. Have them ask the question aloud using the correct word order. Use a similar approach for errors of omission (e.g., "What we draw?").
  • Pair ELLs with a partner who has advanced or native language proficiency and ask them to find another example of an informational page or book about their expert group animal. Finding additional examples can help ELLs become familiar with the genre of the narrative they will be writing in this module.

Universal Design for Learning

  • Multiple Means of Representation (MMR): Some students may need additional support with comprehension and transferring information into applicable knowledge. Provide copies of the anchor charts in advance so they can maintain focus, sketch, or take notes about their thinking, and access important information as they work independently.
  • Multiple Means of Action & Expression (MMAE): In this lesson, students use the Web Page Research Guide to research the millipede, and then research their expert group animal. Some students may need support in setting appropriate goals for their effort and the level of difficulty expected. Appropriate goal-setting supports development of executive skills and strategies. Offer scaffolds for students learning to set appropriate personal goals.
  • Multiple Means of Engagement (MME): During this lesson, some students may need additional support in linking the information presented back to the learning target. Invite students to make this connection by explicitly highlighting the utility and relevance of the activities to the learning targets. For example, provide an index card with the unpacked learning targets for students to reference. Include opportunities to refocus students' attention to the learning target and invite students to respond to how the activity is supporting their instructional goal.

Vocabulary

Key: (L): Lesson-Specific Vocabulary; (T): Text-Specific Vocabulary; (W): Vocabulary used in writing

  • cite, evidence (L)
  • invertebrate (T)

Materials

  • Performance Task anchor chart (from Unit 1, Lesson 1)
  • Working to Contribute to a Better World anchor chart (from Unit 1, Lesson 1)
  • Equity sticks
  • Millipede: Web Page Research Guide (one for display)
  • Millipede: Web Page Research Guide (answers, for teacher reference)
  • Close Readers Do These Things anchor chart (begun in Module 1)
  • Millipede web page (found on page 2 of the Millipede research notebook; one for display)
  • Expert Group Animal research notebooks (distributed in Lesson 1; one per student)
    • Web Page Research Guides (pages 12-16)
    • Sketch page (page 20)
  • Expert Group Animal Web Page Research Guides (answers, for teacher reference)

Materials from Previous Lessons

New Materials

Assessment

Each unit in the 3-5 Language Arts Curriculum has two standards-based assessments built in, one mid-unit assessment and one end of unit assessment. The module concludes with a performance task at the end of Unit 3 to synthesize their understanding of what they accomplished through supported, standards-based writing.

Opening

OpeningMeeting Students' Needs

A. Reviewing Learning Targets (5 minutes)

  • Direct students' attention to the posted learning targets and read them aloud as students follow along, reading silently: 
    • "I can read a web page closely in order to answer research questions."
    • "I can cite evidence from the text to support my answers to questions."
  • Remind students that they explored the words cite and evidence in Lesson 2. Point those words out on the Academic Word Wall and select volunteers to share with the class what they mean. (Cite means to provide, give, or quote. Evidence is facts and information taken directly from a source to support a claim.)
  • For students who may need additional support with comprehension: Invite students to rephrase or restate the learning targets using more familiar language or synonyms. (MMR)

Work Time

Work TimeMeeting Students' Needs

A. Guided Practice: Using the Web Page Research Guide to Research the Millipede (15 minutes)

  • Draw students' attention to the Performance Task anchor chart and reread the prompt.
  • Focus students on the Working to Contribute to a Better World anchor chart, specifically apply my learning. Remind students that as they will be applying what they learned through creating the performance task.
  • Point to the second bullet under the prompt ("an informational page ...") on the anchor chart. Remind students they will work on this part of the performance task in this unit.
  • Use equity sticks to call on a student to read the second bullet aloud:

"An informational page with a physical description of your animal, its habitat, its defense mechanisms, and predators"

  • Remind students that in the previous lesson they found the gist of their web page, as well as the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary words. As a result, they understand what the text is mostly about and are ready to dig in to find out more about their animal.
  • Display the Millipede Web Page Research Guide and use equity sticks to call on a student to read the first question aloud for the whole group.
  • Point out the Close Readers Do These Things anchor chart and focus students' attention on the final criteria.
  • Display the Millipede web page. Remind students that the first question asks them to look at the photographs for details about the millipede. Ask them to discuss with an elbow partner:

"What details do you see about the millipede in these photographs?" (a long segmented body, lots of legs, curled into a ball, and different colors--black, yellow, red, brown.)

  • Model recording this answer in the box on the Millipede Web Page Research Guide.
  • Repeat with the next two questions on the Millipede Web Page Research Guide. To locate the answers in the text, tell students you will read the appropriate paragraphs of the text aloud and you would like them to follow along and read silently in their heads. Model recording evidence from the text when appropriate in quotation marks and remind students that they need to use evidence from the text whenever they can in their answers. Refer to the Millipede: Web Page Research Guide (answers, for teacher reference) for the answers.
  • For ELLs: Mini Language Dive. Highlight language structures that are critical to understanding the second bullet of the Performance Task anchor chart. Examples: "informational page" and "physical description of." Work on comprehension of these phrases--for example, by eliciting paraphrases of these structures. Examples: "a website that gives you facts," "writing or speaking that tells you facts about." Ask questions about the structures: "Where do you find an informational page?" "What does an informational page have?"
  • For ELLs and students who may need additional support with comprehension: Ask students to restate the gist of their web page to a partner using a sentence frame: "The text is mostly about...." (MMR, MMAE)
  • For ELLs: Mini Language Dive. For students who need heavier support, highlight language structures that are critical to understanding this question. Example: "What details do you see about the millipede in these photographs?" Work on comprehension of this question--for example, by checking their response using a sentence frame: "I see...." You can highlight the words in the question to draw attention to how they appear in a different order from the words in a response (do you see vs. I see).

B. Expert Group Work: Researching the Expert Group Animal (30 minutes)

  • Invite students to take their Expert Group Animal research notebooks and move to sit with their expert groups. Ask them to open to their Expert Group Animal Web Page Research Guide.
  • Explain that the questions on this research guide will help them closely read the text and locate important information.
  • Focus students again on the Working to Contribute to a Better World anchor chart, specifically use my strengths. Remind students that as they should use their strengths as they work together in their expert groups. Focus students on take care of our shared spaces and remind students that as they will be working on shared computers, they will need to be sure to use them appropriately and clean up after themselves when they are done so others can use them when they are finished.
  • Give students 5 minutes to read the questions on their Expert Group Animal Web Page Research Guide.
  • Ask them to open their web browser and type the web page URL at the top of page 10 of their research guide into the browser's address bar.
  • Invite students to begin. Remind them to confer with their group as necessary before recording on their research guides and to use evidence from the text to answer questions when they can.
  • Circulate to support students in reading their web pages and answering the questions. Refer to the Expert Group Animal Web Page Research Guides (answers, for teacher reference) to support students.
  • Please note that some of the questions about predators cannot be found on the web page that students are directed to view. When students get to this question, encourage them to use a safe search engine to find the answer to this question. This may require teacher modeling, but give them the opportunity to problem-solve in their group first.
  • Refocus students' attention whole group. If productive, cue students to think about their thinking:

"What strategies helped you succeed in finding the information for your Expert Group Animal Web Page Research Guide? I'll give you time to think and discuss with a partner." (Responses will vary.)
  • For students who may need additional support with persistence: Provide students who may need additional support with reading with printouts of selected, shorter passages from the text. This gives students an opportunity to read a grade-level complex text that is differentiated based on length, not complexity level. (MMR, MME)
  • For ELLs: Mini Language Dive. Highlight a few language structures that are critical to understanding the expert group animal text and answering the questions on the research guide. Example from the gazelle text: 

"During the hot, rainy summers springbok primarily graze on grasses and turn to browsing on shrubs in the colder and drier winters. They are also fond of feeding on flowers when available, and when water is scarce springbok seek out moisture-rich roots, tubers and succulent foliage." 

Point out how this part of the paragraph uses four synonyms to repeatedly describe what gazelles eat.

Closing & Assessments

ClosingMeeting Students' Needs

A. Sketching (10 minutes)

  • Display a copy of the sketch page and ask them to open to their copy in their Expert Group Animal research notebooks.
  • Explain that this page is designed to help them think about their animal's characteristics and practice drawing the animal, which will be included in their performance task.
  • Ask:

"What do you notice about the criteria for these sketches?" (It is based on their research; it is realistic.)

  • If productive, cue students to listen carefully and seek to understand:

"Who can tell us what your classmate said in your own words?" (Responses will vary.)

  • Explain that these sketches are a visual way to demonstrate their knowledge about their animal and its defense mechanisms. Reassure them that the purpose is not to have the most beautiful or artistic drawing, but to have a sketch that communicates important information about their animal (what it looks like, where it lives, how it protects itself). 
  • Tell students that you would like them to do a quick sketch for their first draft from an image on their web page.
  • Focus students on the learning targets. Read each one aloud, pausing after each to use a checking for understanding protocol for students to reflect on their comfort level with or show how close they are to meeting each target. Make note of students who may need additional support with each of the learning targets moving forward.
  • Repeat, inviting students to self-assess against how well they worked to contribute to a better world in this lesson.
  • For ELLs and students who may need additional support with planning: Rephrase the question: "What should you draw for your animal? Should you draw things from your imagination? Or should you think about what you learned and draw real things?" Display a model drawing from the internet or from a former student. Point out how features in the model are based on research. (MMAE)

Homework

HomeworkMeeting Students' Needs

A. Accountable Research Reading. Select a prompt and respond in the front of your independent reading journal.
  • For ELLs and students who may need additional support with reading and writing: Refer to the suggested homework support in Lesson 1. (MMAE, MMR)

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