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4th
grade
Train to Somewhere ONE
OPTION FOR READING
By Eve Bunting
Before
reading
Vocabulary
words: adopt atlas misery carriage platform couple
To introduce the vocabulary words, use the
strategy, “Guess The Covered Word” using the text box on page 46.
Diary Entry: May 25, 1880
My
husband and I read about the misery of
children
without homes or families. We have so
much happiness to share with a child of our
own
that we are going to be the first couple
of our
town in Iowa to adopt a little boy coming
from
the East. I checked the atlas to look at
our
route, and it will be a long journey – three
days’
travel by carriage to the train station.
There,
we’ll wait on the platform for the train
to arrive.
We can hardly wait to meet our new son!
During
reading
While
the students are reading, find the vocabulary words and place sticky notes
in the text where the words are found.
After
reading
Share
the sentences that use the vocabulary words and discuss what the words
mean. Compare the diary entry with the story. Do you think the couple
is disappointed that the child they adopt is a girl?
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4th grade
Train to Somewhere ANOTHER
OPTION FOR READING
By Eve Bunting THIS
SHOULD TAKE PLACE OVER
A
COUPLE DAYS (2 or 3).
Before
reading
Complete
a GTCW (see the first page for the Guess The Covered Word example)
(See Strategies That Work by Stephanie
Harvey for more inference ideas.)
Comprehension Strategy: Inferences
“When you read, you use all your senses.
You see things in your mind’s eye and hear the sounds you connect to that
about which you are reading. When you really get into what you are reading,
you can sometimes almost taste, smell, and feel the physical sensations
you would actually have if you were in that situation. You get “lost”
in the book and may sometimes be startled if someone interrupts your reading.
As you read, you imagine the situation about
which you are reading, and you infer things the author has not told you
in the text. You infer why things happen, why characters behave the way
they do, and how characters are feeling. You enter the world created by
the author, and you create images and inferences based on what the author
tells you and your own knowledge and beliefs about that world.
The imaging and inferring thinking process
is the perfect complement to the summarizing and concluding thinking process.
In order to summarize and conclude, you usually read part to whole --
synthesizing word meanings into sentence meanings, sentence meanings into
paragraph meanings, and so forth. In order to image and infer, however,
you do the opposite – you usually read whole to part. You use your background
knowledge and your understanding of the whole text, so far, to image and
infer the situations in the text. You use your background knowledge and
understanding of the sections and paragraphs to image and infer events
or features not stated in sentences. You use your background knowledge
and understanding of the sentences to image or infer details not given
in those sentences.” (See GRTFBW, page 46).
During
reading
The
“ERT” or Everyone Read To… strategy encourages children to really read
the text. See GRTFBW, chapter 18, pages 169-173 for more details.
Some of the guidelines found on page 173:
- Choose
text for which you think children need page by page guidance
- Plan
a before and after reading activity which will develop comprehension
strategies.
- Lead
the children through the text a page or two at a time. Have students
read to find out or figure out important events or information.
- Include
questions to which the answers are not literally stated, but which can
be inferred.
- Have
the children raise their hands when they read the part that helps them
to figure out the answer.
- When
most hands are up, ask a volunteer to give you the answer. Ask someone
else to read the parts aloud that helped them figure out the answer.
- When
the answers are not literally stated, ask children to explain how they
figured it out.
During Reading ERT strategy:
ERT page 48
- Everyone
read to FIND out why Miss Randolph packed larkspur in her emergency
bag.
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why the children are traveling on the train.
ERT page 50
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why Nora and Marianne want to pretend to be sisters.
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why Marianne touches the feather in her pocket as
she says, ‘She’ll be there. She’ll want me.”
ERT page 53
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why does Marianne think the wheels are mumbling “clickety-clack,
clickety-clee, I’m coming, Mama. Wait for me.”
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out what does Zachery mean when he says, “Cor blimey!”
How do you know?
ERT page 54
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out how the children feel as they are seated on the stage.
Why?
ERT page 57
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out if Marianne is right when she says it is better if
she is not chosen. Why or why not?
- Everyone
read to FIND out what Marianne remembers about her past.
ERT page 58
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why Susan’s behavior changes so quickly.
ERT page 61
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out how does Marianne feel about not being chosen yet.
ERT page 62
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why the woman gives Marianne an apple.
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out what clues from the story helps you know that the
story is almost finished.
ERT page 64
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out why Mrs. Book does not complete the sentence, “Is
she all…”
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out what kind of person is Mrs. Book.
ERT page 65
- Everyone
read to FIGURE out what happens when the story is over.
After
reading EACH ERT PAGE… read 48 and then have a discussion, read page 50,
have a discussion, etc.
Teacher
should lead a discussion of were the students used inferences in the text.
Some teachers use these prompts from the book, Guided Reading the Four
Blocks Way on page 78 to encourage discussion about inferences:
- Even
though it isn’t in the picture, I can see the…
- Mmm,
I can almost taste the…
- It
sent chills down my spine when it said…
- For
a minute, I thought I could smell…
- I could
hear the…
- I can
imagine what it is like to…
- I can
picture the…
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