Alignment to Assessment Standards and Purpose of Lesson

• SL.6.1 – Work Time A: Students engage in a Think-Pair-Share, which requires them to compose their thoughts before engaging in collaborative discourse.
• L.6.4c – Work Time B: Students set up and begin to collect unfamiliar academic and domain-specific vocabulary in their vocabulary logs. Students use dictionaries to clarify the precise meaning and/or part of speech of words they have reviewed in the first two lessons.
• L.6.4d – Work Time B: Students practice inferring the meanings of unknown words before verifying their preliminary definitions with a dictionary.
• In this lesson, students focus on working to become ethical people by showing respect and empathy as they share reflections on the guiding questions in Opening B. This is not mandatory—students share their reflections only if they want to do so. It is important to be sensitive to students’ and families’ feelings and experiences of myths and religious figures, and to acknowledge that these feelings and experiences may differ greatly. The main point students should understand by the end of this module is that a culture’s mythology teaches themes that are still relevant, contains figures whose attributes are valued across time, and asks questions about the human condition. The novel makes clear that the stories and figures of Greek mythology remain relatable because they can be reimagined to fit different environments and time periods.
• In these lessons, students will read excerpts of the anchor text rather than complete chapters to ensure sufficient time for students to think and respond to the text. If taking their texts home is an option, encourage students to preread the next chapter for homework. If there is extended time for language arts, reading the entire chapter in class might be an option. A synopsis is provided for each chapter to help support students’ understanding of the main events of a chapter and to fill in their knowledge when they are reading only an excerpt. It is important to understand and to convey to students that the synopsis is not the same thing as a summary of the text, which is a skill that will be built in this module and expanded upon in later modules.
• Consider reading aloud The Lightning Thief for these first lessons to ensure student comprehension, engagement, and enjoyment of the text. Once students build capacity, determine how they can take over responsibility for reading during class. Alternatives to read-alouds include: another fluent reader (including students or an audiobook) reads aloud to the whole class, small groups, triads, or pairs; individuals read silently; or a combination of any of these.
• Students are introduced to academic mindsets in the Closing and Assessment of this lesson. Academic mindsets refer to the motivational components that influence a student's desire and will to engage in learning. Research shows that academic mindsets are a better predictor of student success than any other determining factor. Students will develop an understanding of all four as the module progresses. The Academic Mindsets are:

1. I belong in this academic community.

2. I can succeed at this.

3. My ability and competence grow with my effort.

4. This work has value for me.

• Consider making these into an anchor chart for easy reference.
• At the end of the lesson, distribute the Homework Resources (See full module or unit download for all homework materials), and review the format of the document and this lesson’s specific assignment with students.

Opportunities to Extend Learning

• This unit is designed to focus on specific excerpts from the text during class so as to provide time for analysis. To cover the entire text, encourage students to read each chapter in its entirety outside of class time.
• Challenge students to create original sentences using their newly acquired vocabulary, while adding context clues to demonstrate their understanding of the definition.
• While looking up definitions, draw students’ attention to the etymology of the vocabulary, noting especially those words that include a Greek root.

How It Builds on Previous Work

• In the previous lesson, students were introduced to the module topic by looking at resources in the Infer the Topic protocol. In this lesson, they formally begin to explore the topic by launching the novel The Lightning Thief.

Support All Students

• Note there are differentiated versions of the entrance ticket used in Opening A and the Academic and Domain-Specific Vocabulary form used in Work Time B in the supporting materials download. ▲
• Students may be surprised, offended, confused, or upset by the way Percy uses some terms to describe himself (e.g., “troubled,” “mental-case”), especially at the start of the novel before they have a sense of his personality, what he means by some of them (e.g., “half-blood”), and then sense that he is generally using them self-deprecatingly. Time for debriefing and reflection might help get these concerns out into the open so they can be addressed and tracked throughout the text.
• ELLs may have smaller English vocabularies and thus will encounter (and need to log) a higher number of unknown words. Due to limitations in vocabulary knowledge, ELLs may be less equipped to differentiate among unknown words that are critical for comprehension of the text and those that are less critical. To ensure that they are focusing on vocabulary items important for comprehension, provide ELLs a short list of "target" unknown words to discern their meanings, rather than expecting them to apply strategies to any unknown word they encounter. ▲
• Ensure that students can both see and hear the instructions throughout this lesson and all others.

Assessment Guidance

• Monitor students as they make their initial entries into their vocabulary logs, ensuring they are recording correct definitions and that they understand the difference between academic and domain-specific vocabulary. Assure students who are still confused that they will have plenty of future opportunities to gather more examples of each type of vocabulary.

Down the Road

• In the next lesson, students will continue reading from The Lightning Thief, finding the gist of chapter 2, and thinking about how the author develops the point of view of the narrator.
• The vocabulary log introduced in this lesson will be referred to throughout the module.