4th-grade Lesson Plans

Lesson Title: Virtual Book Club Focused on Characterization
Created and Submitted by: Griselda Mascorro, Michelle Martinez, and Alejandra Garza
School Names: Dr. M.E. Malakoff Elementary, A. Trautmann Elementary, and JBJ Muller Elementary (respectively)
District: United ISD
Roles: School Librarians

Grade Level: 4th Grade

Lesson Plan Objectives:
At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
1. communicate locally and globally with peers using digital resources.
2. practice safe, responsible, legal, and ethical behavior while using digital tools and resources.
3. respond to literature via discussion board.
4. describe the interaction of characters including their relationships and the changes they undergo.

ELA-R TEKS:
§110.15. English Language Arts and Reading
(6) Reading /Comprehension of Literary Text/Fiction. Students understand, make inferences and draw conclusions about the structure and elements of fiction and provide evidence from text to support their understanding. Students are expected to:
(b) describe the interaction of characters including their relationships and the changes they undergo.

Other Content Area Addressed:
§126.7 Technology Applications, Grades 3-5
(2) Communication and collaboration. The student collaborates and communicates both locally and globally using digital tools and resources to reinforce and promote learning. The student is expected to:
(c) collaborate effectively through personal learning communities and social environments;
(d) select and use appropriate collaboration tools.

Standards for the 21st-Century Learner Indicators:
3.1.2 Participate and collaborate as members of a social and intellectual network of learners.
3.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to organize and display knowledge and understanding in ways that others can view, use, and assess.
3.1.6 Use information and technology ethically and responsibly.

Classroom Teachers – School Librarians Collaboration:
• Librarian from each campus will coordinate eChalk /Discussion Board Training for participating students, teachers, and librarians.
• Students from each campus and participating class will receive training from the district technology coordinator and librarian on online etiquette, log in using assigned username and password, and will reply and post to discussion board.
• Teacher and librarian will collaborate to generate a timeline for chapter readings for novel The Cricket in Times Square by George Selden.
• Participating librarians will work in partnership to generate chapter questions to post on discussion board.
• Teacher and librarian will read and discuss novel. Teacher and librarian will monitor student participation in an online discussion board.
• Librarian posts weekly discussion question to discussion board.
• Teacher allocates time for students to respond to weekly discussion questions using laptops.
• Participating librarians monitor students’ weekly posts ensuring that all students are participating and using proper online etiquette.
• Librarians respond to students’ posts.

Measurable Outcome or Final Product:
After educators model netiquette and post questions, students post responses related to characterization questions on the online discussion board within the assigned timeline.

Assessment Tool: Discussion Board Use/Response to Literature Rubric

Resources:
• The Cricket in Times Square novel (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 1960) - a copy of book for each student and teacher
• Discussion Board Questions

• Discussion Board Use/Response to Literature Rubric
• eChalk Software
• Laptop computers

Estimated Lesson Time: Two days

Instructional Plan Outline:

Preparation:
• Schedule eChalk training for participating students, teachers, and librarians.
• Participants received trainings on online etiquette and eChalk Discussion Board.
• Teacher and librarian generate timeline for novel study readings and discussion questions.

Motivation:
1. Librarian explains to students that they will be participating in a virtual book club and will be responding to questions via a discussion board.
2. Did you know that online literature discussions are an activity that university students participate in? Example: http://wowlit.org/blog/2013/04/01/inquiry-intro-cultural-authenticity-in-traditional-literature-when-apples-grew-noses/
3. Educators will model how to infer character traits by taking evidence from the text and combining it with their experiences and knowledge to understand how characters change in the story.
4. Students will be instructed to support their ideas with evidence from the text when replying to a discussion board question.

Presentation:
5. The school librarian models how to post and reply using a sample question using required format. (ex. School Name/Student Name/re: ____________).
6. Using discussion question #1: What problems might a country creature face in a busy city? The classroom teacher and librarian use a Cluster Map to think aloud and generate responses to this question. Educators model writing a sample discussion board post.
7. Together the students and educators use the Discussion Board Use/Response to Literature Rubric to evaluate the educators’ sample post.

Guided Practice:
8. Educators support students as the respond to Question #1 by monitoring posts and ensuring that the rubric criteria are being met.

Closure:
9. Educators ask students to share their thoughts on why the characters might have changed in the story. Educators ask students to reflect on how thinking about characters in this way helps them to better understand and enjoy the stories they read.
10. Librarian, teacher, and students reflect on the experience of participating in an online discussion board and real world applications.

Assessment:
11. Educators monitor student participation on the discussion board.
12. Educators assess students’ postings using Discussion Board Use/Response to Literature Rubric.

Extensions:
13.  Using the resources on the eChalk class page, students will explore landmarks/historical sites of New York City mentioned in The Cricket in Times Square. Students will use Google Maps to take a virtual field to New York City and view land marks mentioned in the novel.

Lesson Plan Resources

Discussion Board Questions

Discussion Board Use/Response to Literature Rubric

ELAR_4_6_B_Mascorro_Martinez_Garza_TEKS_Alignment_Lesson_Plan