In order to fully comprehend reading materials, students need to understand the cause-and-effect relationships that appear in a variety of fiction and nonfiction texts. In this lesson, students learn cause-and-effect relationships through the sharing of a variety of Laura Joffe Numeroff picture books in a Reader's Workshop format. Using online tools or a printed template, students create an original comic strip via the writing prompt, "If you take a (third) grader to."  Students use various kinds of art to illustrate their strip and publish and present their completed piece to peers in a read-aloud format.

In this lesson, The Jolly Postman is used as an authentic example to discuss letter writing as a genre. Students explore the letters to the storybook characters delivered by The Jolly Postman. They then learn how to categorize their own examples of mail. The Jolly Postman uses well-known storybook characters, from fairy tales and nursery rhymes, as recipients of letters. This children's storybook is therefore ideal for using as a review of these genres of literature and as a means of helping children begin to explore rhyme and a variety of writing styles. Several pieces of literature appropriate for use with this lesson are suggested.

In this module, students will use literacy skills to build expertise—using reading, writing, listening, speaking, and collaborative skills to build and share deep knowledge about a topic. This focus on research intentionally builds on Module 1, in which students explored the superpowers of reading. Specifically, students will seek evidence of culture, which can be thought of as the story of a group of people constructed through the generations; it can be evidenced through ancient and modern-day customs and traditions. The module will begin with a class study of the culture of Japan: Students will read Magic Tree House: Dragon of the Red Dawn, a book set in ancient Japan, paired with Exploring Countries: Japan, an informational text about modern Japan.

Find the rest of the EngageNY ELA resources at https://archive.org/details/engageny-ela-archive .

In this eight-week module, students explore the questions: “Who is the wolf in fiction?” and “Who is the wolf in fact?” They begin by analyzing how the wolf is characterized in traditional stories, folktales, and fables. Then they research real wolves by reading informational text. Finally, for their performance task, students combine their knowledge of narratives with their research on wolves to write a realistic narrative about wolves.

Paraphrasing helps students make connections with prior knowledge, demonstrate comprehension, and remember what they have read. Through careful explanation and thorough modeling by the teacher in this lesson, students learn to use paraphrasing to monitor their comprehension and acquire new information. They also realize that if they cannot paraphrase after reading, they need to go back and reread to clarify information. In pairs, students engage in guided practice so that they can learn to use the strategy independently. Students will need prompting and encouragement to use this strategy after the initial instruction is completed. The lesson can be extended to help students prepare to write reports about particular topics.

In this lesson, the teacher explains the difference between thin (factual) and thick (inferential) questions and then models how to compose question webs by thinking aloud while reading. Students observe how to gather information about the topic and add it to question webs in the form of answers or additional questions. Students practice composing thin and thick questions and monitor their comprehension by using question webs in small-group reading. This practice extends knowledge of the topic and engages readers in active comprehension.

This is a lesson for tropical rainforests that fits best for third- through fifth-grade students. There are multiple reading and writing strategies implemented within the lesson. Throughout the lessons, there will be opportunities to build upon prior knowledge, write, draw, and listen to sound effects of the rainforest. Students will use graphic organizers and websites to aid in the understanding and learning of rainforests. There are also extension lessons for students to create a list of questions in small groups to research. Throughout these lessons the students will be exposed to multiple media sources. 

This lesson uses the book Thunder Rose by Jerdine Nolen to reinforce the common elements, or text structure, of tall tales. As the text is read aloud, students examine the elements of the book that are characteristic of tall tales. Then using what they've learned over the course of the unit and lesson, they write tall tales of their own.

Our goal is for our students to become proficient readers and writers who display agency and independence. This interactive hyperdoc training module, about UDL and Reading Workshop, is designed to help educators develop an ever-growing toolkit of strategies that will remove barriers to learning and create options for how instruction is presented, how students express their ideas, and how we can engage students in their learning.

A multi-age primary classroom teacher uses formative assessment as a barometer of student learning. She records anecdotal notes about her students' reading progress within an assessment notebook and references the notes for future instruction.