Read Aloud | Proportfolio

Lesson Plan

T&L Lesson Plan: Read Aloud Activity

Standard and Objective
1. Standard and Objective
  Gold Standard – Uses appropriate conversational and other communication skills
2. Essential Literacy Strategy
  The essential literacy strategy is joint attention. This is when an adult and a child are focusing on the same aspect of a given item. This could be that the adult and the child are focusing on the same page of a book, the same drawing hanging in an art gallery, or that they are listening to the same song at the same time.
3. Learning Objective:
  1. The students will use multiple seven to eight-word sentences to discuss what happens to Molly Lou Melon throughout the book. The will spend the discussion time listening to each other – taking turns.
  2. This decision is based on the observations that the students often give short answers to questions as well as talk over one another.
Text/Level & Reasons for Test Selection
1. Text Complexity:
  The text level is level L which is above the reading level for First Graders; therefore, it fits with the technique of an interactive read aloud ,which is the technique being used in this lesson. Additionally, the language complexity is difficult which will challenge the students in this group.
2. Content:
  The content of the text offers many opportunities for the students to discuss previous experiences because the text discusses moving and dealing with bullies.
Instructional Technique and Scaffolds to be Used: The interactive read aloud technique will be used, which involves prompting students to become involved in developing shared comprehension about a story by discussing the events of the story with one another. Additionally, students will be scaffolded with the use of partner talks, book gestures, and read alouds.
Materials: book (Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon)
Procedure:
1. Before Reading
  1. Process Schema: Readers often enjoy talking about the books that they read because it helps them understand the story better. Today, we are going to read Molly Lou Melon, and we are going to stop and talk as the story goes on.
  2. Content Schema: This story starts with Molly Lou Melon listening to the advice her grandmother gives her. Does anyone know what ‘advice’ is? Talk to your partner about some of the advice you have been given in your life! … When Molly Lou Melon moves away from her grandmother, she doesn’t get to hear the advice very often. Have any of you ever moved? AND started a new school? Did you like having to move away and go somewhere totally new? Talk about this with your partners as well.
  3. Set purpose to reading: Let’s read Molly Lou Melon and see how well Molly Lou Melon does in a new environment.
2. During Reading
  1. Stopping Point 1: [Fumble Fingered – So she did.] “Wow! Molly Lou Melon’s grandmother gave her a lot of advice! I heard some great advice being shared during our discussion time. Would anybody like to share about some of the advice they have received?” (listen to children sharing and add in when needed) “When people give you advice, do you try to follow it? I know I do!”
  2. Stopping Point 2: [and start in a new school.] “Oh my… Molly Lou Melon looks pretty scared here.. I know I was when I went to a new school. I heard some of you talking about the new schools you have been to. Were you scared on your first day? What were you scared of?” (wait for responses. When child answers what they were scared of, ask them if it turned out to be true.) “I’m sure Molly Lou Melon felt just as scared as you did on her first day at this new school.”
  3. Stopping Point 3: [Buck-tooth Beaver – Ronald Durkin felt very foolish.] “Goodness. Molly Lou Melon has been called Shrimpo and Buck-tooth Beaver in her first two days at school! BUT!! She wasn’t sad or upset was she? How did she react to Ronald Durkin being mean to her? How can we be like Molly Lou Melon when somebody hurts our feelings? What can we do?”
  4. Stopping Point 4: [Ronald Durkin give Molly Lou Melon a stacking penny.] “Wow. Molly Lou Melon was so nice to Ronald that he decided to be nice too. Because Molly Lou Melon was so nice to Ronald Durkin even though he was mean to her, Ronald Durkin learned how to be nice to others. What can you do nice for somebody today? What can you do nice for somebody every day?”
3. After Reading: “Molly Lou Melon wrote a letter to her grandmother thanking her for all of her advice. She told her grandmother that she was right, about everything! Molly Lou Melon didn’t get mad at Ronald at all throughout the story; I bet that was hard… What can we do help us remember to always be kind to others no matter what?” (respond accordingly to how children answer the question)
Plans for Assessment FOR Learning

I will note student responses using a chart with four squares as well as my general observations. I will record the class’s responses to the following questions:
1. What is some advice that you have received before?
2. Were you scared on your first day? What were you scared of?
3. How can we be like Molly Lou Melon when somebody hurts our feelings?
4. What can you do nice for someone every day?
These will be recorded in my assessment notebook.

Justification for Lesson Plan:
  I chose to read the book Molly Lou Melon to the class because I know that most of our children are from Military families. Because the children were from military families, they may have had to move before and even start going to new schools. They also are all old enough to have experienced somebody being mean/rude to somebody else; we’ve even had it in our classroom at various times. Molly Lou Melon addressed both moving to a new environment and facing what it has to offer, as well as dealing with a bully and how to appropriately respond to a wrongful action.
  Because the goal for this lesson is to further the children's ability to use multiple seven to eight word sentences, it meets the goal of an interactive read aloud - reading for the purpose of instruction (Strategies that Work 47). Before reading the story, I asked the children if they had ever moved before and if they had ever started a new school before. Out of the two questions, every child in the room answered yes to one or the other. The children told me multiple pieces of advice that they have been given over their few years of advice. "My grandma tells me to always smile, just like Molly Lou Lemon's Grandma does! Isn't my smile pretty, Miss Tiffany?" (Yes she said Lemon and not Mellon.) Two of the children (not related) found out that they had been given the same advice during different situations. I prompted them to discuss with one another about how the advice affected them in their own situations.
  The strengths of this lesson were that the children actively responded and interacted with one another during this read aloud. They listened to what one another had to say, and they responded accordingly. One downfall that I noticed was that the children didn’t have as much in common about their moves (houses and schools) as I was hoping they would have. Obviously, I couldn’t have predicted this, but I could have been better prepared to where I would have backup questions if the ones I originally prepared hadn’t sparked enough conversation.