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Skills Resources

These are the skills that are to be covered in your group for the months of August and September 2006. Tribal Council groups meet twice a week.

[NOTE- In the process of being worked on!]

Expectations for Reading Groups time-
1. Categorizing, shelving, and choosing classroom library books to read [there are around 550-600, currently]
2. Talking and working with a reading partner/Tribal Council group
- Partners sit side by side with their reading selection in the center.
- Partners will model discussion skills.
- Partners will take turns making decisions.
3. Exploring the Reading Scouts binder [which is one center], class website for Reading [which is another center], and reading passages box as well as the other centers
4. Everyone will receive a survey about reading, and it will be placed in a class binder to look at throughout the year.

Why A Million Dollar Word Dictionary?
1. I will discuss our word wall at the front of our classroom, where words are seperated into various categories.

Questioning Before, During, and After Reading 1. First, what is a question? Do they always have to be answered? Or can questions just be asked to get our minds going? [Here is a very long sheet I will be referencing.]
2. We will read a very basic non-fiction selection, and then we will be categorizing the questions we asked into questions that are answered in the text, questions answered from someone's background knowledge, questions that use clues from the text to answer, questions that can be answered by further discussion in group, and questions that require research from another source besides the book.
3. We will discuss something called "question-answer relationships".

Discovering and enjoying completing activities that pertain to main idea... Here are some of the activities team members will complete...
1. Group members will be given newspaper article clippings without their headlines. In pairs, students will determine the main idea of the newspaper clipping, and then they will determine for two more articles. They will work up to where they do this individually. I will have the headlines and then spread them out on the meeting table for the group members to match up with the articles after they have reviewed. [NEAT HINT- The main idea of an article or reading passage is usually evident in the first or second paragraph… and the last paragraph or two usually summarizes the main idea.]

Skills needed to create a quality written summary
1. We will be discussing this list in our Tribal Council.
2. We will begin reading My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George as a group [the first chapter]. We will practice summarizing as we read, every few paragraphs and then later, every page. I will use some of the author's words as well as some of my own to model to the group. The group will then take on the responsibility of demonstrating quality summarizing skills. We will keep the list of summarizing skills handy during this lesson.
3. The group will be taught the Four Rules for producing summaries.

Identifying main idea words

Taking out words that repeat themselves and aren't needed in the first place

Outlining the main idea and supporting details

Relating main idea and supporting ideas out loud or on paper
4. We will practice highlighting all the verbs on one page [which will be retyped for the student to mark up and keep]. We will highlight all of the verbs and come up with synonyms for the strongest verbs. We will then write a summary based on the strongest verbs we came up with. This teaches each group member to develop his or her own voice when writing a summary. For extra practice, we may also highlight time-order words such as next, before, after, and during in another color.
5. Group members will then write a one-page summary of what happened in the first chapter of My Side of the Mountain.