During our time together, we finished reading our story - Landon's Pumpkin. At the end of the story was a recipe for how to roast your own pumpkin seeds. We used this authentic text to answer some great comprehension questions!
Next, we took a look at a story about a character named Rosario. Here is Rosario's story:
An Ocean Scare
Rosario was enjoying her vacation in the California sun. She was lying on a raft in the ocean. This was perfect, Rosario thought. There was no noise - no children screaming, no horns honking - and there were no papers to grade. All she could hear was the crashing of the waves onto the beach. Rosario sighed and looked around her a the beauty of the ocean. Then she saw something long and gray coming toward her on an approaching wave. She thought, "This could only be one thing!" and started yelling for help. She paddled back to shore as quickly as she could. She made it to the shore in one piece, but she realized that many people were laughing at her.
We used information from the text and our own knowledge to answer the following questions (text + personal knowledge = inference).
1. What is Rosario's job?
Text - "there were no papers to grade"
+ Knowledge - teachers grade papers
Inference - Rosario must be a teacher.
2. Where does Rosario live?
Text - "no horns honking"
+ Knowledge - you would hear horns honking in heave traffic areas like cities
Inference - Rosario must live in a city.
3. What did Rosario think she saw in the water?
Text - "something long and gray" and she started "yelling for help"
+ Knowledge - sharks are long and gray and you would yell if you saw one
Inference - Rosario thought she saw a shark in the water.
Students not only had to go back in the text to find the clues / evidence, but they also had to answer each question in complete sentences using part of the question in the answer (pulling back in the skill we covered last time we were together).