Goals:
1. To help give students the opportunity to read and reflect on what they have read.
2. Students will write what they have learned from the book into their journals.
3. To help students try to become better writers
Resource:
1. Dekkers, Midas. Arctic Adventure. Meulenhoff Nederland, Amsterdam. 1982.
ISBN 0-531- 05704-6
Teacher Background:
This particular lesson does not involve very much interaction or knowledge from the teacher. The teacher must be available to the students if they have any questions about the book or the vocabulary from the book, but other then that this time is left for the students. Giving the students time to reflect on what they are reading is also encourageing them to read.
Materials:
1. The teacher will provide the journals to the class.
2. Each student will have a copy of the book Arctic Adventure.
Time: Overall, this lesson will take approximately three to four hours. The students will have 20 minutes a day for the whole week to read (1.5 hours), as well as twenty minutes after they are done reading to reflect in their journals about what they are reading(1.5 hours). The students will also have ten minutes a day to talk with their groups about what they have just read(1 hour).
Procedure:
Step 1- The student will be given this allotted time every day in order to be sure that they are doing at least some of the reading. There will be deadlines as well. The students will have time to read in class, but if they do not get the reading finished then they will have to do the rest at home. Since this lesson will start on a Monday, the students have to have up to Chapter 6, pg. 63, done by Wednesday.
Step 2- After the students have done the reading for each day, they will be asked to write into their journals about what they have learned. There will be no specific topic that the students have to write about, but they must write something every day.
Step 3- At the end of the week the students will be asked to write a 200 word essay in their journal about the book, Arctic Adventure.
Step 4- After this twenty minutes of journal time each day, the students will go into groups of three and talk about what they read for that day. This will ensure that everyone in the class is doing their reading and following the guidelines that have been set for them.
Step 5- The groups will be different every day, so the students will be integrated within the class.
Assessment:
Since there are five different points that the student must reach everyday, then they will hand in their journals at the end of every day. The journal will be assessed by the use of a point system. There is a total point total of 35 for this assignment. They will be marked as follows.
10 points= Student has had a journal entry for every day
8 points= Student has had a journal entry for four days
6 points= Student has had a journal entry for three days
4 points= Student has had a journal entry for two days
2 points= Student has had a journal entry for one days
0 points= Students have not completed any journals
21-25 points= Completed essay and had good content within the essay. Also had good spelling and writing skills.
16-20 points= Completed a satisfactory essay and had solid content within the essay. Also had decent writing and spelling skills.
0-15 points= Completed the essay but did not have good content within the assignment. Also did not show good spelling and writing skills.
Curricular Strands and Major Concepts:
1. Language Arts- The students will be reading everyday from the book Arctic Adventure. The students will write about what they have learned from the book.
2. Communication Arts- The students will get into groups and talk about what they have read.
Possible Extensions:
1. Students could create a vocabulary sheet from what they have read. After they get a good group of words, the teacher could collect them and give the class a vocabulary quiz.
2. Draw a character web about every character in the book Arctic Adventure.
3. Quiz the students on the required reading for that day.
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