District 11 Educational Support Services
Literacy & Language Arts

Grade 4, Quarter 1: October Unit

Overview                                                                              
 In the first quarter, fourth grade students will build on their summarizing skills as they deal with more challenging fiction and nonfiction texts. Students will also begin to make inferences in more complex literary texts. In nonfiction texts, students will be able to differentiate fact from opinion and identify sequence. As writers, students will begin to compose authentic pieces for specific audiences and purposes. They will work on basic researching skills. They will also be able to produce texts when given a prompt.

 

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Standards

Enduring Understandings - important ideas that students should carry with them years beyond the instruction received this year.

  • Different strategies and skills are required to understand a variety of materials.

  • People apply critical thinking skills when reading, writing, speaking, listening, and viewing.

  • People access, read, evaluate, and use a variety of resources to get information.

  • Throughout history, humans have used literature as a record of their experiences.

Essential Questions - most important “big picture” questions students should be able to answer after completing learning activities.

  • What does it mean to "understand"? Why do we need to understand what we read or hear? How do we use strategies and skills to understand a variety of materials?

  • What is critical thinking? Why is critical thinking important? How do we apply critical thinking skills?

  • Why do I need a variety of resources? How do I access information and use it responsibly? How do I evaluate resources?

  • How and why do humans use literature to record their experiences? How has history influenced literature and vice versa?

CSAP Tested Standards
Highest Frequency High Frequency Other Standards & E-skills

Reading
Fluency:
Use word recognition skills, strategies (e.g., predict) and resources to include, context clues, phonemic awareness, and structural analysis to decode. Apply word attack to read new and unfamiliar words.

Standard 1: Comprehension

1.b Summarize long text passages.
1.c Identify supporting details and main idea.
1.d Draw inferences using contextual clues.
1.e Identify sequential order in expository text.
1.h Use word recognition skills and resources (for example, phonics, context clues, picture clues, reference guides, roots, prefixes and suffixes of words) for comprehension.

(Students will understand and generate vocabulary specific to content. Students will use a range of strategies to build oral and reading vocabulary to include sight words and multi-syllabic words) Fourth grade students will read all Kindergarten words, First Grade words, Second Grade words, Third Grade words and: At the end of quarter one, students will be able to read 50 of D11 sight words. At the end of quarter two, students will be able to read 100 of D11 sight words.


Standard 4: Thinking Skills
4.a Determine author’s purpose.
4.c Differentiate fact from opinion.
4.d Make predictions and draw conclusions about stories.
4f Recognize the author’s point of view.

Standard 5: Research

5.a Use organizational features of printed text (for example, page numbering, alphabetizing, glossaries, chapter heading, table of contents, indexes, captions) to locate information.
5.c Take notes, outline, and identify main ideas in resource materials.
5.d Sort information as it relates to a specific topic or purpose.
5.f Select appropriate definitions from the dictionary, glossaries, and other sources.

Standard 6:  Literature

6.b Identify setting, plot, character, problem, and solution.
6.c  Use new vocabulary from literature in another context.

Writing: Writes for a Variety of Purposes

When given a prompt for new writing, students will use the writing process:  plan, draft, revise, edit.
Generate topics and develop ideas for variety of purposes and audiences. 
Address authentic audiences by publishing a class newsletter, writing a letter to an adult, writing a book report, etc.

Conventions, Mechanics, and Grammar

Write complete sentences sentences.
Know subject/verb agreement.
Spell frequently used words correctly.
Use upper and lower case letters correctly.
Use punctuation correctly.
End of  October: students will write a fully developed expository paragraph.
Go to
4th/5th Grade Rubric


During the 2007-2008 school year,  Literacy Resource Teachers and classroom teachers will be correlating textbook pages to the emphasized standards for each month. Also, teachers will be developing District 11 Diamond Lessons for each quarter.
 

Reading Programs

McMillan McGraw Hill

Open Court

Scholastic

Scott Foresman

Pearson

         

Writing Programs

Writers Advantage

Lucy Calkins

 

 

Lessons

Lesson 1: Lesson 1 Title
Duration: @ 1 class period

Standard information #: 
District Indicator:
 
Enduring Understanding:
 
Essential Questions:
 
Assessment:
 

Activities

  1.  
  2.  

Resources

Differentiation
Extension:
 
Support: