I loved this book because it blends poetry and literature! There are nice clear examples of Haiku in the book and they fit together to create a great plot line. Students often believe that a poem itself is the end result - they read it, look at the picture, and then move on. This book allowed them to see that a series of poems can be blended together to create a story.
The illustrations in this book were wonderful. There is so much information held in those pictures that add to that text. I really want my students to take the time to blend what they read from the fairly limited text with the rich illustrations to create inferences and understand the plot. (RL.2.7) The Common Core Standards ask the kids to go beyond the words and use what the illustrator adds to the text to improve comprehension through prediction, imagery, and inferencing.
I used the 'poetry tree' in all of my lessons in this unit to create a tool that pulled together all of the ideas and kinds of poetry. The kinds of poem are listed down the trunk and the ways that poetry help us are listed on the leaves.Some of my later lessons that allow me to use this vocabulary and the poetry tree are: Poetry What is it?, Reading Acrostics-Poetry of Letters, Poetry Takes Shape, Synonym, Adjective, Verb.. Put them in a Cinquain, Pieces of Meaning in Free Verse Poetry, Don't Worry-Alliteration and Onomatopoeia Help Us, and Long Vowels & Limericks-Looking at Poetry.
Underlined words below are lesson vocabulary words that are emphasized and written on sentence strips for my Reading & Writing word wall. I pull off the words off the wall for each lesson, helping students understand this key 'reading and writing' vocabulary can be generalized across texts and topics. The focus on acquiring and using these words is part of a shift in the Common Core Standards towards building students’ academic vocabulary. My words are color coded ‘pink’ for literature/’blue’ for reading strategies/’orange’ for informational text/'yellow' for writing/’green’ for all other words.
Common starting point
We discussed how rhyme, rhythm and other elements of poetry add meaning to the text (RL.2.4) in a previous lesson, but it is worth emphasizing again. Students need to realize that the author uses these techniques to specifically help the reader better understand the text and that they bring so much meaning to the poem or story.
This is one of the lessons in the beginning of my poetry unit. I used the 'poetry tree' in all of my lessons in this unit to create a tool that pulled together all of the ideas and kinds of poetry. The kinds of poem are listed down the trunk and the ways that poetry help us are listed on the leaves. I discussed repetition, rhyming and repeated words in my other lessons, including Poetry: What Is It?, Poetry Takes Shape, Reading Acrostic:The Poetry of Letters, Synonym Adjective Verb-Put Them In A Cinquain , Pieces of Meaning in Free Verse Poetry and Don't Worry: Alliteration and Onomatopoeia Help Us.
Give the purpose of the lesson
Model
Guided Practice
As I read my kids were using other reading strategies - predicting (I think that...) imaging (that family looks different that what I thought) and inferring (Is he named Mooch because he begs?). Encourage this - it's truly to epitome of what we are looking for - readers who use a variety of reading strategies to comprehend the text. Point out these strategies as students use them and guide the class toward more independent use.
Explain the task
Let kids work and use formative assessment
Create a plot line
Explain the task
Scaffolding and Special Education: This lesson could be scaffolded up or down, depending on student ability.
Students with language challenges may struggle more with this lesson because of the writing involved. They may benefit from working with a partner or from prompts on the whiteboard. They may have the verbal skills to describe the story elements (what the problem is...), but not the skills to describe it in writing. For the haiku writing, I helped a few students with their Haikus.
Those with higher language abilities should be challenged to use more inferences and higher level vocabulary. Instead of just describing the problem - 'the dog made a mess'- they could infer that 'the dog was bored so he got into trouble and created a mess'.