Text Features

Whether you teach English/Language Arts or Health Occupations, your students need to understand informational text features.  I discovered this lesson on the web (courtesy of Milton High School in Milton, FL).  It has some great resources to teach text features.

Introduction to Text Features 
(PPT with Cornell Notes Guide)

Text Features Presentation from mrsweeks

Click here for Cornell Notes to match presentation.

"A Close-up Look at the Ol' Pigskin" Lesson

Attention Grabber
Video Clip
Review
Text Features in the Real Word PPT
Application
Text Features Team Comparison Handout
After reviewing text features with the students, give them a chance to apply their knowledge.  The handout challenges students to use the provided text features to quickly find information on the teams.
Applying to Content 
Text Feature Detective Handout
This allows students to transfer reading skills to other content areas.
Assessment
Article:  "On the Offense"
The Lexile Level is 1180 (bottom of 9-10 grade band range).  Students should read the article and then be asked to identify, explain, analyze, and determine meaning for a variety of text features.

Literacy Practice with the Ash Hi Chat

The school paper comes out today!  Kathy Saunders, AHS English teacher, has a great literacy tip to use with Ash Hi Chat:

• Divide the class into groups.
• Assign an article for each group.
• Groups read the article, identify the main idea, and then write an objective summary. (This addresses the Reading Information Standard and district literacy goals.)  Mrs. Saunders suggests having students create a poster or PowerPoint with this information.
• They report back to the class through presentations.

Mr. Dillion and his students work very hard to create a great resource for our students.

The Ash Hi Chat Really Writes

Asheboro High School's newspaper, The Ash Hi Chat, rolled out its first edition of the school year today.  Last year, Jonathan Dillion took over the reins as adviser and worked especially hard to make reading the paper an important part of AHS.  Mr. Dillion emails teachers a few days before an edition comes out and provides ways it can be incorporated in various content areas.  He has added prize giveaways for students who complete the newspaper's crossword puzzle, which is always based on facts from the reading.  There is also a game show-style class take over called "Chat Challenge" where one lucky class is ambushed and challenged to correctly answer trivia questions based on the articles all for the chance to win big prizes.

Hey Social Studies, Art, and English/Language Arts teachers, how could you use this student-created political cartoon featured in Ash Hi Chat in your classes?

The cartoon compliments the editorial article written by Mariam Kahn, "Do Parents Influence Our Political Views?".  <--(click here) The article can serve as a great starting point for lessons with or about politics, argumentative writing, research, discussion, statistics, psychology, parenting, and more.

Image credit:  cartoon by AHS student Elizabeth Pruitt

~Chandra

The Times

"For the Times They Are A-Changin" may be a familiar Bob Dylan song for some.  The title really resonates with me because, for one, we are definitely aware of the need for a change in the way we teach to meet Common Core standards.  Shift one from the CCSS is to include more informational text into a student's daily instructional time.  That concept brings me to my second connection to the song.  The New York Times (commonly referred to as just The Times) are changing by providing help for teachers in incorporating their articles into instruction.

Please click here to see how The Learning Network has teamed up with The New York Times.  If this has been helpful to you, please share how you used the resource.

~Chandra