Author Project Books and Picture Books!

This is a great FREE project to motivate your students to explore new genre and to read more than one book by an author. They start by researching an author and and writing five facts they learned about the author's life.

Have them choose two books by the author and summarize them briefly, and lastly they should rate the books. When they're finished they can discuss their authors and novels in small groups. Laminate the cards and arrange them in a index card box in ABC order so they're available for students to view.

Click on the cover for more information.

Thanks!

Ruth

Close Reading Informational Text Polar Bears

WHO DOESN'T LOVE POLAR BEARS?

I've never known anyone who doesn't love polar bears! Ask your students to state facts about polar bears and they'll most likely tell you they're cute, white and live at the North Pole. 

Wonderful. But definitely not enough information. They may think polar bears are cute because they have polar bear stuffed animals that aren't fierce predators and that have white "fur" unlike real polar bear fur that's translucent. 

Trust me when I tell you I had a friend's young son tell me that Eskimos have polar bears as PETS!!!!  I kid you not!

When our social studies curriculum included Native American cultures, I chose the Inuit (Eskimos) and each year, we did in depth research projects about them, as well as study animals indigenous to the Arctic region.

At that time, I developed several nonfiction packets that gave my students activities that  were both tied to English language arts, social studies and sometimes science.  I love to teach integrated units if possible. 

The information in this packet, describes polar bears lives, how they survive in the frigid temperatures and helps students make important assumptions about the fate of polar bears. 

The article is set up with columns on the right hand sides so you students can take notes about vocabulary words, concepts they may not understand or to write opinions about the article.

I love designing pages and used scenic photos of the Arctic with less opacity, so they wouldn't interfere with the text, then laid photos of the bears over the scenery. The pages print out beautifully and students love the realistic photos. 

This is my most recent informational text resource. Stay tuned for more! :)

Enjoy! 

Ruth

You may also like another informational text article about the CHEETAH

Click on this link...

Common Core ELA Informational Text Article 

Examples of two of the pages

Teachers Comments :

~ Great work- kids very interested in topics! Thanks!

~Thank you for this wonderful product.

~ Love this!

~Thank you! Such good practice:)

~ Awesome!

~ Love this! Thank you!

~Great Common Core questions!