Power of One: Last Stop on Market Street

Tuesday, April 19, 2016
your driver,  Suzanne

I am soooo excited!  This is day 1...part 1...the first installment...oh, you get it...of what I hope to be a multi-part series: The Power of One.  The gist is that we need to teach deeply.  One way to do that is to find one slamma-jamma text and park it there.  
If you've been a part of The Curly Classroom for any length of time, then you know that we love picture books.  Well, it's been a little while since a picture book made my heart go pitter patter, and I was in a funk.  Fear not- my picture book love is alive and well!  I have Last Street on Market Street by Matt de la Pena to thank for that.  This verbiage on the second page sealed the deal, "The outside air smelled like freedom...".  I mean come on!!  

So let's get started!

Old or young woman?
Chalice or faces?
This book deals with the idea of perception and choosing to look on the bright side.  To start, show a series of perception images.  Students always have lots of fun listening to others' reactions and trying to see both pictures!  To get students thinking and prepare them to read, have them consider the following questions- Was any view wrong?  How can we apply this activity to our own thinking?  How does it relate to positive thinking? 

Pop a copy of the book under the document camera and read aloud.  Even the toughest of kids will crack at a good read aloud!

To work with the reading, I wanted to focus on our Figure 19 inferencing skills.  And I'm so excited about this NEW activity!! Do you know and love Nine Squares like we do?  I present to you a similar activity called Literary Dominos.  Have students work in small groups and divide the dominos evenly among the partners.  One student will go first and lay down a domino.  Students will read what is on both sides of the domino.  When a student finds a way that one of their dominos will connect to an idea presented, they will play their domino and explain the connection to their group.  If multiple group members find a connection, have each student explain and the group will choose the best pair.  If all else fails, you can always be the tie breaker.  The goal is to use up all of your dominos first.  I like this instructional strategy because it values creative and higher level thinking- create, justify, evaluate.  

Talk time: How can thinking positively change your outcome?

Give your students time to extend their thinking by asking them to write about this big idea.  You can use a mentor sentence from the book to teach/review a sentence pattern or grammar rule.
"His friend Colby climbed in, gave CJ a wave, and drove off with his dad." 
Mini-lesson: pitchforking verbs

"Nana squeezed the man's hand and laughed her deep laugh."
Mini-lesson: compound predicates















What is a favorite text that you would like to see with the Power of One?


AND...
Happiest of Birthdays to our favorite curly co-contributor, Lori!!

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