Clair Hoey's List: Common Core - Fourth Grade

Reading and analyzing the poem "The Fieldmouse" by Cecil Frances Alexander (A series of four lessons).

Brainstorm, plan, and write an argumentative essay in the 4th grade (A series of six lessons)

Brainstorm, plan, and write an argumentative essay in the fourth grade (A series of six lessons).

Reading and responding to text-dependent questions by gathering evidence from the text and text features, organizing ideas, and writing an evidence-based response in the 4th grade (A series of seven lessons).

Interpreting a persuasive writing prompt, brainstorming topics and drafting and revising a persuasive response in the 4th grade for the prompt: Your school principal has decided to stop having recess. Write a letter to your principal telling him why you agree or disagree with his decision (A series of seven lessons).

Interpreting a narrative writing prompt, brainstorming topics and drafting and revising a narrative response in the 4th grade for the prompt: People say "Practice makes perfect." Think about a time when you had to practice something a lot before mastering it. Write a story about a time when you had to practice something for a long time before understanding it (A series of seven lessons).

Reading, analyzing, and gathering information and evidence from informational texts and using that information to write an informational text. This set draws on three texts about the relationship between the English settlers of Jamestown, Virginia and the Powhatan tribe (A series of ten lessons)

Reading, answering questions, and analyzing the text "The Great Chicago Fire" by Michael A. Signal (A series of six lessons).

Reading, answering questions, and analyzing a biographical text about jazz-legend Duke Ellington (A series of six lessons).

Reading, answering questions, and analyzing the text "The Settlers of Jamestown" by Erin Sawyer (A series of seven lessons).

Reading, answering questions, and analyzing "Backpedaling in Bicycle History", an article from the Washington Post's Kids' Post (A series of six lessons).

Reading, answering questions, and interpreting the article, "My Name is Otto Jan" from the Washington Post's Kids' Post "Kids Around the World" series (A series of six lessons).

Reading, answering questions, and analyzing "A Dog's Tale," a short story adapted from the original by Mark Twain (A series of six lessons).

Because the Internet contains a vast amount of resources and information, students must be able to weed quickly through sites to find the information they need. This lesson develops students' skills in Internet searching, skimming, and scanning through teacher modeling, think-alouds, and think-pair-share. In this lesson, students begin with a discussion and demonstration of skimming and scanning to find information on the Internet. Through a teacher-modeled activity, students learn how to use appropriate key terms to yield a manageable number of resources. Students then divide into groups of two to complete a bingo game, and during the course of the game, students will search a website to fill in a bingo board. A sample bingo board focusing on ancient Greece and Rome is included, but additional content area-related goals may be incorporated by changing the questions on the bingo board to match a particular topic.

An audio book collection of classic fairy tales and stories plus orgininal stories that can be downloaded and used in the classroom

Expository texts are a key component of literacy but often do not get introduced to students until the later grades. This lesson helps third- through fifth-grade students explore the nature and structure of expository texts that focus on cause and effect. Students begin by activating prior knowledge about cause and effect; the teacher then models discovering these relationships in a text and recording in a graphic organizer what the relationships that the class finds. Students work in small groups to apply what they learned using related books and then write paragraphs outlining the cause-and-effect relationships they have found.

In Emily's Runaway Imagination by Beverly Cleary, the character of Mama writes to the State Librarian, asking for help starting a library in their town. Inspired by the actions in Cleary’s book, students write to their school librarian, requesting that a specific text be added to the school library collection. Students use persuasive writing skills as well as online tools to write letters stating their cases. Students then have an opportunity to share their letters with the librarian.

Knowing the elements of a story aids students in their understanding of what is taking place in the book or novel. When students comprehend the story elements of characters, setting, problems, events, and solutions, they become more involved in the story and take a greater interest in details. In this lesson, students use a six-paneled comic strip to create a story map, summarizing a book or story that they've read either read as a class or independently. The story strips that result provide a great way to evaluate student's understanding of important events and elements in a novel. The students enjoy the artistic aspect as well!

This lesson plan uses Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are as an example to model the process of creating the story map comic strips; however, any book you and your students have explored recently that demonstrates the elements of character, setting, problem, events, and solutions will work.

This lesson uses the narrative text Granddaddy’s Gift by Margaree King Mitchell to help students improve their inferential comprehension, prediction, and discussion skills. As part of the Directed Listening-Thinking Activity (DL-TA), students participate in before-, during-, and after-reading activities. Before reading, students answer discussion questions to help activate prior knowledge. During reading, students are presented with a story-specific statement and must argue both sides of the issue and provide reasons for their thinking in small discussion groups. Students are then asked to make predictions as to how the story will end. After reading, comparisons are made between the ending of the story and the students’ predictions.

Before there were weather tools, people looked to the sky, plants, and animals for hints about what the weather would do. To remember these indicators, people coined weather sayings. But are these sayings true and reliable? This lesson explores the truth and reliability of weather-related sayings, such as, “Mare’s tails and mackerel scales make tall ships take in their sails.” Students brainstorm weather sayings then investigate the accuracy and origins of the sayings in predicting the weather, using print and online resources in their research. Next, students write about and illustrate their weather sayings then share their results with their classmates. Finally, students discuss skepticism and when it may be a good response to information that is presented to them as fact.