5th Grade humanities
On Monday or Tuesday (for the Molina rotation), we will have our first publishing party! Learners will share their small moment narratives with each other and celebrate the accomplishment of finishing their first writing pieces. This week, learners will begin reading The Birchbark House. The realistic fiction novel follows the life of about the life of a young Ojibwe girl beginning in 1847 near present day Lake Superior. This novel will begin our study of the following focus questions. What happened when explorers/colonists encountered indigenous people? How did they interact? How were indigenous people affected by colonization? Learners will participate in inquiry-based pre-reading activities in which they make connections between photographs, articles, and historical documents relating to the novel. Then, as we read the first two chapters, learners will begin to analyze the main character, Omakayas, and record their observations in a character map.
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This week, learners will continue their small moment narrative writing pieces. Learners will choose one small moment writing that they will publish by the end of the week. Learners will engage in mini lessons that support the editing and revision process, including: writing a strong hook/introduction and conclusion, elaborating on the climax/turning point of their story, and editing mechanics and grammar in their writing. Each day, learners will revise their draft writing and/or continue working on their final draft/published piece in Google Docs.
We will celebrate learners' hard work with a publishing party at the end of the week where learners will have the opportunity to share their published small moment pieces with the rest of the class. This week, learners will continue to study narrative writing, focusing on narrative story structure. Learners will complete story plot outlines as they identify the inciting incident, rising action, climax, resolution/falling action, and conclusion within a read aloud book and a short film. They will then apply their knowledge of story structure as they compare and contrast books with similar genres and themes.
Learners will also respond to two more personal narrative writing prompts. The intention is for learners to have several small moment writing pieces to choose from as they move forward with the writing process. It can be challenging to come up with what to write about for a small moment, personal narrative. Discussing the following prompts at home with your learners may be helpful in preparing them to do their best writing work. What is a time that you learned something? Or a time that you taught someone something? What did you learn or teach? What is one of the best things that has ever happened to you? Who was there? What made it so great? How did you feel afterward? This week, we will begin our narrative writing unit. Learners will review the main elements of narrative writing through mini lessons on setting, character traits, and point of view.. Learners will explore how they can describe a setting using the five senses, consider how a character is portrayed through their physical description and behaviors, and examine how stories are told differently in first vs. third person point of view.
Learners will apply their understanding of narrative writing elements by crafting a short personal narrative piece that focuses on telling a true story of a small moment when they had to overcome a challenge. Learners will share their writing with a peer, and begin thinking about whether this is a writing piece they would want to extend, revise, and publish. Learners will utilize excerpts from the mentor text Pasquala: The Story of a California Indian Girl by Gail Faber and Michele Lasagna to deepen their understanding of the elements of narrative writing and begin exploring how geography and climate affected the lives of native peoples in North America. |
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May 2018
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