Reading guide: Alejandro’s Gift

  Genre: Realistic Fiction

 

Focus Strategy – Read ahead

 

Focus Skill – To recognize cause and effect relationships

 

p. 328:

NOTE LITTLE DETAILS: What is Alejandro’s home like?

 

p. 329:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE-EFFECT: Why does Alejandro plant a garden?

MAKE PREDICTIONS: What do you think a visitor “from the desert itself” might be?

 

p. 330:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE-EFFECT: What causes the ground squirrel to visit Alejandro’s garden?

IDENTIFY CHARACTERS’ EMOTIONS: How does Alejandro feel after seeing the squirrel?

 

p. 331:

SPECULATE: What small friends does squirrel bring? What other animals might come?

 

p. 333:

PROBLEM SOLVING: Why is time passing more quickly for Alejandro?

MAKE PREDICTIONS: Has the story described the kind of desert life you predicted? What do you predict will happen next?

 

p. 334:

SPECULATE: Why do you think the larger desert animals don’t visit Alejandro’s garden as the smaller animals do?

NOTE DETAILS: Why does Alejandro have plenty of water?

 

p. 336:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE-EFFECT: Why does Alejandro go through the tiring work of digging a water hole?

 

p. 337:

TEXT STRUCTURE: Where on these pages can you find information to help you fill out your cause/effect chart?

 

p. 338:

INTERPRET STORY EVENTS: Why do the animals come to the second water hole?

 

p. 339:

NOTE DETAILS: How does Alejandro know that the animals come to his second water hole?

IDENTIFY CHARACTERS’ EMOTIONS: How do you think Alejandro feels when the larger animals finally come? Why?

 

Seeds Can Sleep by Mary Brown

 

pp. 342-343:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE-EFFECT: What helped the lotus seed survive for so long?



Title.

Genre: Expository Non-Fiction

 

Focus Strategy – Adjust reading rate

 

Focus Skill – To use book parts to locate information

 

p. 353:

NOTE DETAILS: What are the four layers of the earth?

COMPARE AND CONTRAST: In what ways are the outer core and the inner core the same? In what ways are they different?

SPECULATE: Do you think people will ever explore the center of the Earth? Why or why not?

 

pp. 354-355:

USE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE: In what way is the Earth’s surface like a puzzle?

DRAW CONCLUSIONS: Why might scientists study the movement of the Earth’s plates?

FOCUS SKILL – LOCATE INFORMATION: Where on pages 354-355 would you find information about how the Earth might look in millions of years?

 

p. 357:

MAIN IDEA: When an earthquake happens, does its force move in one direction or in all directions?

AUTHOR’S CRAFT/INTERPRET IMAGERY: Why do you think the author compares the movement of an earthquake’s force to the movement of ripples on a pond?

 

p. 358:

CAUSE-EFFECT: What causes tsunamis?

MAKE COMPARISONS: Why is a tsunami more dangerous than ordinary wave?

 

pp. 360-361:

SUMMARIZE: What kinds of underground movements form mountains?

NOTE DETAILS: Which type of mountain range are the Himalayas?

CAUSE-EFFECT: Why does Mount Everest keep growing?

FOCUS SKILL – LOCATE INFORMATION: Where on pages 360-361 would you look to find out where Mount Everest is in relation to other places?

 

pp. 362-363:

DRAW CONCLUSIONS: What might this area look like if the river had flowed for hundreds of thousands more years? How do you know?

CAUSE-EFFECT: Why is erosion still going on today in dry, sandy places like this one?

CAUSE-EFFECT/DRAW CONCLUSIONS: Where do you think small rocks come from? How do you know?

FOCUS SKILL-LOCATE INFORMATION: Why does the heading “Going, Going, Gone” appear on these pages?

 

Reading guide: The Armadillo from Amarillo by Lynne Cherry

Genre: Informational Narrative

 

Focus Strategy – Reread to clarify

 

Focus Skill – Cause and effect

 

p. 374:

SPECULATE: Armadillo knows he is in San Antonio. Why does he ask, “Where in the world am I”?

DRAW CONCLUSIONS: What does Armadillo do after he leaves San Antonio?

 

p. 376:

SYNTHESIZE: What is Armadillo learning about the world as he walks through Texas?

MAKE COMPARISONS: What is a difference between the canyons and the plains near Amarillo?

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE AND EFFECT: What is the effect of Armadillo’s climbing up to higher ground?

 

p. 378:

FANTASY/REALITY: What parts of the story so far are factual?

FANTASY/REALITY: What things in the story make it a fantasy?

MAKE AND CONFIRM PREDICTIONS: Have your predictions about the selection turned out to be correct so far? What do you think will happen in the next part?

 

p. 380:

NOTE DETAILS: Why does the town of Amarillo have that name?

COMPARE AND CONTRAST: Who has a better idea of where he or she is in the world – Armadillo or Eagle? What makes you think so?

 

p. 383:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE/EFFECT: What causes Armadillo to hold tightly to Eagle’s neck?

SYNTHESIZE: What does Eagle mean when she says “these planets turn round the sun”?

DETERMINE CHARACTERS’ EMOTIONS: How does Armadillo feel on this flight? Why do you think that?

 

p. 384:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE/EFFECT: Why does Eagle suggest that she and Armadillo ride on the rocket ship?

FANTASY/REALITY: How does Eagle and Armadillo’s ride on the rocket ship show that this story is a fantasy?

 

p. 386:

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE/EFFECT: What happens as Armadillo and Eagle fly higher and higher into the sky?

DRAW CONCLUSIONS: What does Eagle mean when she says, “We’re out of this world”?

SPECULATE: What do you think is the deep blue background behind the white clouds that astronauts see when they look at Earth from the Moon?

MAKE/CONFIRM PREDICTIONS: Has this part of Armadillo’s journey turned out as you expected? How do you predict the journey will end?

 

p. 389:

IDENTIFY WITH CHARACTERS: Imagine you are Amarillo looking at Earth. What does this view make you realize about the world?

FOCUS SKILL – CAUSE/EFFECT: Why does Armadillo get homesick?

PROBLEM/SOLUTION: How do you know that Armadillo answered his question, “Where in the world am I?”

 

Title.

Genre: Expository Nonfiction

 

Focus Strategy – Use text structure and format

 

Focus Skill – Locate information

 

p. 404:

 

COMPARE AND CONTRAST: How are our ideas about comets today different from people’s ideas about comets long ago?

NOTE DETAILS: Who are astronomers?

FOCUS SKILL – LOCATE INFORMATION: Where on these pages would you look to find out where comets come from? Explain your answer?

 

pp. 406-407:

 

CAUSE-EFFECT/SUMMARIZE: How does a comet begin its travels?

SUMMARIZE: How does a comet change as it gets closer to the Sun?

FOCUS SKILL – LOCATE INFORMATION: What is solar wind? Where else in the book could you find the meaning of this term?

COMPARE AND CONTRAST: How are a comet’s tails different? How are they alike?

 

pp. 408-409:

 

CAUSE-EFFECT: Why don’t comets glow when they are far from the Sun?

MAKE PREDICTIONS: Has the selection discussed what you predicted it would discuss? What do you predict the author will tell you about next?

COMPARE AND CONTRAST: How are comets’ orbits different from planets’ orbits? How are they are alike?

AUTHOR’S CRAFT: Why do you think the author compares the Moon’s movements to a comet’s movements?