Schema: camping, ducks, fall
Text-to-Self Connections: fishing
Cause and Effect: Because one duck slips, the effect is that the other ducks “sprawl.”
Use the Observation graphic http://www.eduplace.com/graphicorganizer/pdf/observe.pdf
to chart the activities that go with the five senses.
Inference: What do you infer that the whooo whooo noise is from?
Drawing Conclusions: What do you conclude about why the ducks are [...]
Schema: diesel trucks, Hansel and Gretel
Compare and Contrast: Use a graphic organizer such as the Venn Diagram, http://www.eduplace.com/graphicorganizer, to compare with the fairytale, Hansel and Gretel, by James Marshall.
Personification: The truck rigs are given personalities and speak as human characters.
Reader’s Theater: This story would lend itself well to a reader’s theater presentation. Students could ad [...]
Schema: sticks, playing with sticks
Text-to-Text Connections: Over in the Meadow, an old rhyme about the animals in a meadow; the rhyme goes something like, “over in the meadow in the sand and the sun lived an old mother turtle and her little turtle one…” See the lyrics at: http://www.songsforteaching.com/folk/overinthemeadowlyrics.htm
Also a connection with the Gingerbread Man [...]
Schema: ice from the fridge, icebergs
Text-to-text Connections: Gingerbread Man stories, stories where characters are being chased
Compare and Contrast: the animals that want to eat or cool off with the ice cube to characters in other versions of the Gingerbread Man. Compare the whale with the fox in the original story.
Sequencing: Sequence from the last animal [...]
Schema: turtles, desert settings, Grandma’s house looks like a sand dome
Text-to-text connection: other retellings of Little Red Riding Hood
Predicting: What do you predict the animals will do in order to save the turtles from the coyote?
Cause and Effect: Because Tortuga’s friends made the noise at Tortuga’s grandmother’s house, the effect is that Coyote is frightened [...]
Schema: beginning a new school year, going to a new club, church, or class
Text-to-text Connections: Miss Mingo and the First Day of School by Jamie Harper; First Grade, Here I Come by Nancy Carlson
Text-to-Self Connections: leaving parents to go to school, being afraid to try something new; what connection did Jake make with the book [...]
Schema: Gingerbread Man
Text-to-Text Connections: other gingerbread man stories such as The Gingerbread Baby and The Gingerbread Girl by Jan Brett, Gingerbread Mouse by Katy Bratun
Compare and Contrast: Both of these books have a Texas twist with characters and setting reflecting the southwest.
Sequence the events in each story.
Schema: Christmas trees, theme of the White House Christmas tree
Author’s Purpose: Gloria Houston and her family grew up in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina; the historical fiction story depicts what life was like in the early 1900’s during World War I.
Characterization: Characterize the mother in the story and use example from the text as [...]
Schema: Three Little other stories, food
Text-to-text connection: The Three Little Pigs, Texas town of Laredo, the Spanish terms, Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto.
Sequencing: In both stories, the events follow a similar sequence, with the third house in each one being the strongest
Compare and Contrast: How is the ending of this story different from that [...]
Schema: stew, Texas, tumbleweeds
Text-to-Self Connections: making vegetable soup
Text-to-Text Connection: The Little Red Hen, Armadilly Chili by Helen Ketteman, Stone Soup, Duck Soup by Jackie Urbanovic
Cause and Effect: Because Rabbit is so persuasive, the effect is that he motivates the others to bring some ingredients for the soup.
Predicting: What do you predict the animals will bring [...]
