Lesson Plan Template: EDIS 5400 & 4882

Context:
Course name: Dual Enrollment English
Grade level: 12
Length of lesson: 90 minutes
Students: 20 Students, 2 are identified as gifted, 5 speak English as a second language. 3 have
specific learning disabilities related to comprehension. One has a motor function disability that
makes it difficult to write, so I have provided resources for her in the class drive so that she may
participate in written activities through her Chrome book. They are all proficient at answering
discussion questions after reading, but generally receive low scores on end of unit tests. Most
have not been taught explicit reading strategies or strategies for monitoring themselves as they
read.
Current Unit: This lesson serves as a bridge between Beowulf and Grendel, as we are in the
final stretch of a unit built around culture and values that focused on Anglo-Saxons. Every
Friday we go over a new reading strategy and implement it into our class time. This acts as
continuous introduction of new tools for students to use as they read, allowing a week in between
mini-lessons to practice with each one. Eventually students will be able to choose which
strategies they would like to use for a given workshop, but this lesson is positioned as the second
in the sequence.
Lesson Plan Date: This lesson is second in a series of minilessons on reading strategies. The
previous week was focused on making inferences, combining what their background knowledge
with what they know about the text. It became evident after the final Beowulf test they took last
week that they were not retaining details from the reading, so this week is focused on monitoring
reading comprehension and making thinking explicit as they read. They are familiar with this
lesson format, as before we began reading strategies we did a similar structure with discussion
strategies.

Strategy Requirement Satisfied:

(Note: Refer to the list in the syllabus or the document called Lesson Plan Overview)

Objectives (KUD format)

SWBAT:
Know:
1. Students will know that tracking their thinking and annotating text serves as a form of
monitoring comprehension
2. Students will know that good monitoring consists of pausing to ask questions and make
predictions, comments, and connections to the knowledge they already have.

Understand:
3. Students will understand that using strategies to actively activate and monitor their
thinking will deepen their understanding of and engagement with the text.
4. Students will understand that monitoring comprehension involves multiple unseen
strategies that can be made explicit by externalizing thinking in the form of writing or
speaking.

Do:

5. Students will be able to find meaning in a text by making connections between what they
already know and the new information they read.
 6. Students will be able to use reading strategies to improve comprehension and to achieve
the purposes for reading: making and adjusting predictions; questioning the text; restating
main ideas and summarizing supporting details; and close reading.

SOLs: 10.4 The student will read, comprehend, and analyze literary texts of different
cultures and eras. (Borrowed because DE English does not line up with the regular 12th grade
SOLs)
b) Make predictions, draw inferences, and connect prior knowledge to support reading
comprehension.
m) Use reading strategies to monitor comprehension throughout the reading process.

CCSs: ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.1

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.1
Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as
well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters
uncertain.

Methods of Assessment:
[How will you know if the intended learning occurred?] Describe all methods of assessment used
in this lesson or which are related to this lesson and come in a future lesson (use the sentence
stems provided). After each assessment, indicate in brackets the number(s) of the related lesson
objectives that the assessment is evaluating.

Diagnostic Formative Summative

Students will demonstrate
what they already know
aboutby
In a previous class, students
demonstrated what they
already know about reading
through text and making
inferences by contributing to
a google doc of quotes from
Beowulf and analysis about
how they provided insight to
the culture of the characters.
Students chose their quotes
and typed them into the left
hand column of the doc table,
and provided their analysis in
the right hand column.
Though they could perform
proficiently with isolated
passages, their scores on the
final exam showed me that
they understand thinking
strategies in isolation, and
they need improvement on
Students will show their
progress towardby
FORMAL: Tea Party strategy:
Students will show their
progress towards making
inferences about a texts main
ideas, and drawing on their
prior experiences by
performing the Tea Party
strategy with the beginning of
chapter 3 in Grendel, by John
Gardner in order to make
predictions and get themselves
thinking about the content
they are about to read. I will
facilitate a 5-7 min discussion
during which students will
share their We think
statements with each other.
Students will also be turning
in their note sheets since I
probably wont get to hear
from every individual student
during the discussion. In
Students will ultimately be
assessed (today or in a future
lesson) onby
Written Response: Students
will be assessed on their ability
to synthesize a text and provide
analysis of inferences in a
response paper written about
Ch. 3 of Grendel. By citing
specific moments in the text
that their inferences are built
on, and explain how their close
reading is situated within the
context of the piece.
This will show me how well
the strategies we have
practiced have transferred to
their ability to synthesize text
and analysis in a
comprehensive way that
incorporates the entire text
rather than just bits and pieces.
incorporating them during
reading. Teacher comments
on the clarity and depth of
analysis were provided in the
document for each student.
Based on this diagnostic,
students seem to need
scaffolding to keep their
thinking engaged as they read
through the text, so for
todays lesson, we are trying
out the pre-reading strategy
Tea Party.
U3, D5
SOL 10.4b
providing feedback on the K2, U4, D5, D6
written work, I will be looking
to see that students have: CCSS.ELA-
Incorporated LITERACY.RL.11-12.1
information from each
card into their SOL 10.4b, 10.4m
predictions.
Provided their
reasoning for why they
made the inference that
they did
This will inform me about
how much review of these
concepts needs to be included
in the set up for the close
reading activity later in the
lesson, and how much
modeling should be devoted to
the thinking behind
predictions and inferences.
D5, D6, U3
SOL 10.4b, 10.4m,
CCSS.ELA-
LITERACY.RL.11-12.1
INFORMAL: Think Silently:
Students will show their
progress towards monitoring
their thinking while reading by
tracking their thoughts and
ideas in the margins or on
sticky notes during a Think
Silently activity. This will
show their progress towards
predicting and adjusting
predictions; questioning the
text; restating main ideas and
summarizing supporting
details; and close reading
keeping their minds engaged
as they move through the text.
I will circulate around the
room and conference with
students as they read to
discuss how and when they
are stopping to jot things
down, and how this strategy is
improving their
comprehension and analytical
skills. I will address any
concerns they have before
they write their reflections.
This will inform future
instruction by giving me a
sense of how well they are
grasping the strategy and
monitoring their thinking. I
will know how much guidance
they still need working
towards the next units and
assessments.

K1, K2, U3, U4, D5, D6

SOL 10.4b, 10.4m

FORMAL: Reflection:
Students will show their
understanding about how
actively monitoring thinking
during reading aids in the
process of making prediction,
evaluating main ideas, and
providing strong close reading
analyses by assessing their
own progress in a self
assessment and written
reflection on their Think
Silently technique. The
questions will be listed on a
handout. I will collect these
reflections and return them in
the following class with
written feedback, and we will
go over questions as a whole
class. I will be looking for
responses that demonstrate:
Insights about how
active monitoring
effected the way
students perceived the
text
Authentic reflection on
students
implementation of the
Think Silently strategy
and how their
predictions or
expectations changed
between the pre-
reading and reading of
the chapter
An understanding of
how monitoring
 thinking aids in the
comprehension of text.
This will inform instruction by
giving me a concrete
benchmark from which each
student is moving in terms of
active comprehension
monitoring. This will let me
know how gradually to
increase the level of analysis I
expect from them in the
future.

K1, K2, U3, U4

SOL 10.4b, 10.4m

Procedures/Instructional Strategies
Each step should have bolded heading that identifies the activity, and then is followed by the
teacher scripting, student and teacher actions, and a description of the activity.
[Note: Any words that represent what I would say directly to students appear in italics.]

Beginning Room Arrangement:

[Changes in this arrangement that become necessary later will be noted in the plan]
Students will enter the classroom and choose a seat anywhere in the room. Desks will be
arranged in 4 pods of 5. This is a change from the usual classroom setup of 5 rows of 5 desks in
each.

1. [ 5 mins.] Welcome/greeting/announcements
[As students enter the room, I will be standing in the hallway to greet them and ask them to find
a seat anywhere in the room and copy down the agenda that is projected up on the board.]
[Switch to PPT slide 2] Hello everyone, happy Friday! I know were all tired and ready to be
home for the weekend, so lets take a minute to get those feelings out in the open so we can focus
for the rest of class today. Take two minutes to talk with an elbow partner about something
youre really looking forward to this weekend. I know youre in groups of five, so there will be
one group of 3 at each pod. If you dont have any plans this weekend, feel free to share a
highlight from this week, or something funny/weird that happened to you recently. Alright, start
now. [I will use this time to pass out the index cards for the tea party activity.]

2. [ 3 mins.] Bridge to Tea Party Pre-Reading Activity

[Switch to PPT slide 3] Okay, lets come back together and get our minds ready to do some
thinking and reading. I know a lot of us are probably still reeling from going over the Beowulf
test yesterday, so well be using today as an opportunity to move forward from something we
may have struggled with and alter the ways we think as we read so that we can not only
understand the things we read more thoroughly in the future, but understand the strategies that
help us get to deep understanding. Really comprehending complex content requires constant
thinking strategies, much more that just moving our eyes from left to right on the page.

Today we will be moving on from Beowulf, but not leaving the realm of that culture. We spent
some time last week finding quotes in Beowulf and practicing our inferencing skills on each one.
We were doing a pretty good job incorporating our background knowledge with what was in the
quotes, but then had some trouble synthesizing and talking about the text as a whole on the
exam. Yesterday at the end of class I modeled and explained the Tea Party strategy for getting
us thinking before we start reading a text. So today, Im going to give you all a chance to use this
strategy to get your minds thinking about the text as a whole before we actually start reading.
Can someone remind us all about how Tea Party works? [Call on someone to explain the general
structure, looking for responses like:
We all have a card with a line on it and we find other people with different cards and try
to figure out what the story is about
We all have different pieces of information that we can use to predict things about what
were going to read
If students have trouble remembering, provide another overview and remind them explicitly of
the modeling done in the previous classask a few students to model the idea to the class again
briefly.This might go as follows: So remember the way this works is that each of you have a card
with a short phrase on it from the text, and youll be walking around to see how much you can
figure out about the story from just whats on these cards. Can I ask a couple of you to model
this with the examples we used yesterday with the phrases from Beowulf? [Student modeling may
sound like this]
Student 1: I have a card that says Beowulf was a fierce warrior
Student 2: Mine says that Gredel was a terrible monster. Maybe Beowulf is going to fight
him! That would make sense because he is the main guy and Grendel is the main
monster

We will be making predictions about settings, characters, and plots of Grendel so that as we
begin reading, we can keep track of whether or not we were right or wrong about some things.
This will help keep our minds fully engaged with the text while we read.

3. [ 20 mins.] Tea Party

[10 min.] Share Cards

Go ahead and flip over the index cards on each of your desks and take a minute or so to think
about what the line on just your card might tell you about the story. Youll have four goals for
the next 10-12 minutes [listed on board]: share your card with as many classmates as possible,
listen to others as they read their cards to you, discuss how they could be related, and speculate
on what the cards, together, might be about.

[Pass out We Think/Reflection Sheets.] In just a second you can start walking around the room
sharing your card and making predictions with other people. See how much you can piece
together with the phrases you have. Go ahead and begin. [I will circulate around the room
listening as students share their cards and make predictions about the text. I will begin sending
them back to their chairs when I see that they have met with everyone or their conversations
begin to lag. Possible student dialogue may go like this:]
I have The would listen to each other at the mead hall tables so it sounds like its in the
same kind of culture that Beowulf was. Whats on your card?
Mine says season after season so I think that means that the story probably takes place
over a long period of time. Or maybe the narrator is, like, remembering something that
happened a long time ago or something.
Based on what I think about my phrase, I think yours might mean Commented [HK1]: Great additions. Another thing to think
Based on what I know about what this book is, I think my phrase is probably about about is if students are struggling to come up with ideas.
What might you as the teacher say to support students even
further?
If students are struggling to come up with ideas about their cards, suggest that a friend look at it
and have them talk it out. I might also ask prompting questions about previous discussions weve
had in class to get their minda thinking.

[5 min.] Formulating We Think Statements

Alright, sit back down at your pods of five and go ahead and share your cards with everyone in
the group. Discuss what you each heard and what you have on each card. Then, start to
formulate your We Think statement. Remember, this statement is just a sentence or two that
sums up what you think the text is going to be about based on the cards you each had. Feel free
to revisit some other groups if there is a different card you need to refresh your memory on.
Make sure that youre each writing this statement down at the top of your copies of Grendel so
that you can remember them while youre reading later. Ill be calling on group members at
random, so make sure youre all on the same page. [Students with difficulty writing by hand are
aware that they can use their Chromebooks to type out their statement. If some groups are Commented [HK2]: Good detail about meeting different
stalling, I will pause and offer some guiding questions: student needs.
What were some predictions you made based on each card?
Who do you think this could be about?
Based on what you remember from Beowulf, what might be happening?
I am looking for some variation in the We Think statements, as some cards could be
interpreted in a couple of ways.]

[5 min.] Share Statements

Okay guys, is everyone done? [Pause for a moment] Were going to take a few minutes to quickly
share our statements. Before we do, who thinks that everyones statements will be pretty similar?
[Pause and count the hands] Okay, and who thinks that our groups might have come up with
different things based on the same cards? [Pause and count hands] Lets listen carefully and see
which prediction turns out to be true. [Call on one student from each group to share their
statements, make sue that less vocal students have a chance to share. If these students are not
raising their hands, I will call their names while standing near to them so that they can answer
while feeling that I am there to support them. I anticipate the groups will come up with fairly Commented [HK3]: How might you do this if these
different statements, so I will ask follow-up questions about how they reached their conclusions: students are not raising their hands?
I like that inference youre making, can you explain to us how you got there?
Which cards did you pull from the most to construct your prediction?
What steps did you take to get to that prediction? Share your reasoning with the class.
Possible student We Think statements:
We think that Hrothgar is an old man and something really bad happens in his mead hall
We think Grendel tells us some things from his point of view that we didnt know in
Beowulf
We think that someone is watching Hrothgar and his men for a long time but is really
angry and murderous and probably murders some of the people]

These are all excellent We Think statements! I noticed that a lot of you used similar logic to
create different predictions. So lets revisit the prediction we made before we shareddid all the
groups predict the same things from the statements on the cards? [Assess nodding/shaking
heads, call on one person and have them articulate for the class how well they think the activity
went. At the end of the conversation, I will ask students to do a give me five about how
confident they feel using the Tea Party strategy to make predictions about a text. Students can
show a range from 1 to 5 fingers, 1 finger stands for I am not confident about making
predictions and 5 fingers stands for I am very confident about making predictions. Give Me
Five is a frequently used informal assessment in the classroom that students are familiar with. If
students as a whole do not feel confident about making predictions, I will discuss a few more
strategies that can be used to build ideas around the lines on the cards, incorporating the work
they did with inferences earlier in the unit. I could do this by picking up one of the phrase cards
and thinking out loud as I make a prediction from it, pointing out how I use each individual word
to inform the larger meaning of the phrase, and then add in another card and do the same thing. I
could then model out loud how I use the predictions I made from each card to rework and revise
my previous predictions.]

[2.5 min.] Break

[Switch to PPT slide 4] Great, so now we are going to keep all our predictions in mind as we get
ready to start reading Grendel. Before we dive in, take a little break to stretch, get a drink, or
walk around for a bit. Im setting my timer for two minutes and 30 seconds.

Okay start heading back to your seats. [30 seconds left]

4. [ 20 mins.] Instructional Steps for Think Silently During Reading Strategy

[Switch to PPT slide 5] So we all have our predictions written at the top of our Grendel copies,
now were going to keep all the great thinking we just used during our Tea Party to keep our
brains working as we read through the text. Were going to try out a new strategy while we read
that will help us monitor our reading as we move through the text. [Ask one student to pass
around Think Silently handouts] Good comprehension is much more than just moving our eyes
from one side of the page to the other. Some of you might be familiar with the Think Aloud
strategy for reading, and we are going to do something very similar to that but with sticky notes.
Has everyone received a handout? This handout has lots of helpful stems you can use while
youre thinking to start and classify your thoughts as you write them down. As you can see there
are lots and lots of possibilities.

The way this Think Silently strategy works, is that as you read, pause frequently and write
down any connections you make, images the text creates for you, things youre confused about,
new predictions, or alterations of old predictions. Anything you think while you read, you write
down. This helps us make the unseen process of reading external so that we can make sure that
we are actively engaged the whole time. This is useful for everyone, regardless of reading level
or text complexity, because it forces us to pay attention to our thinking and better understand Commented [HK4]: And text complexity perhaps?
how we move through the text. Make sure that youre writing your thoughts on the stickies, and
make sure youre noting any questions that you have as you read. Well be compiling these at the
end to talk about as a class later. You should be responding at least once per paragraph, but
likely you will respond more often that that in some of the larger ones.

So, before we tackle this text, I want to ask you how you think this strategy will help us in terms
of predicting and adjusting predictions; questioning the text; restating main ideas; summarizing
supporting details; and close reading? [Allow students to think through these purposes for Commented [HK5]: Good alignment back to objectives.
reading and consider how this strategy might help. Call on a couple of hands to hear what they
predict. Possible responses include:
If we stop all the time to write something down we wont forget our ideas while we
finish reading
Our notes will give us places to come back to when we do close reading
When get a better idea of the main idea when we notice how our predictions do or dont
match up with whats happening

Im going to model this strategy for you with the beginning of the chapter so that you can see the
kind of thinking were going for. Ill be showing my annotations up here on the document
camera. We already made great predictions about what the text might be about with our Tea
Party strategy, so Im going to jump right in to the chapter. [The chapter will be projected on the
document camera so that students can follow along either on their own or up at the front. I will
physically step away from the doc cam when I start verbalizing my thinking so that it is clear that
these are my own thoughts] Commented [HK6]: This will make it really clear for
studentsgood thinking!

[10 min.] Modeling Think Silently

The first sentence is

It wasnt because he threw the battle-ax that I turned on Hrothgar.

[Step away from projector so that it is clear I am speaking my own thoughts] I already feel some
thinking happening. The pronoun here immediately makes me think that, because the title is
Grendel, and this is in the first person, that the character who is speaking is probably Grendel.
Im going to circle the I and write down on this sticky that I think Grendel is speaking. This is
an example of predicting, which youll see if you look at your sheets for thought stems. It also
says that someone threw a battle-ax, so this feels to me like we are hearing from Grendel either
during or right after some kind of battle. I wonder what battle that could have been, so Im going
to underline battle and write on this sticky to reflect on later when I find out where we are in
the story. [Model thinking in a way that makes the connections to Beowulf, activating that
background knowledge and connecting the literature in a way that shows them how this strategy
works.] Lets read a little further.

That was mere mind foolishness. I dismissed it, thought of it afterward only as you remember a
tree that fell on you or an adder you stepped on by accident,

Okay Im pausing here because I feel a little bit tripped up by the word adder. Im not sure what
it means, but I dont think its going to really inhibit my understanding of whats happening, so
Im going to circle it and write down on this sticky Adder? so I remember to go and look it up
when Im finished reading.

except of course that Hrothgar was more to be feared that a tree or snake. It wasnt until later,
when I was full-grown and Hrothgar was an old, old man, that I settled my soul on destroying
himslowly and cruelly. Except for his thanes occasional stories of seeing my footprints, hed
probably forgotten by then that I existed.

So now Im really feeling some things that remind me a lot of Beowulf. I remember Hrothgars
name as a major character from Beowulf, so based on my earlier prediction that we are hearing
this story from Grendels perspective, I think that this chapter is taking place at the same time as
some of the events in Beowulf. Im going to move back up and revise my prediction about
Grendel to incorporate this knew realization. The line It wasnt until later seems like
foreshadowing to me, but it also makes it sounds like Grendel is telling us this story from a time
after the events have already happened. Im going to write down a prediction that this chapter
starts with Grendel recounting a memory.

So that was the first paragraph, and I hope youre all feeling pretty curious about what is to
come. Before we start reading, What things did you notice about how I formulating my thoughts,
or how it looked to see predictions made on paper? Do you have any questions about how this
could look differently when you start reading on your own? [Allow for a discussion/debrief of
the strategy if students have questions. They will likely point out that I didnt use all the
strategies on their sheets; clarify that this is ok the stems are there to help classify or create
thoughts if were struggling, but we dont have to use them all. They might ask how often they
need to do the strategy; ask them what they noticed about how I did it and what they thought the
impact was, with a goal of helping them understand that they will each have different thoughts
written at different points.]

With this strategy there are really no wrong things to write down. The whole point of this
exercise is to be able to see our thinking on the paper, so the only wrong thing to write down is
nothing at all. This will reassure students who may be reluctant to write things down. For some
of us this might seem silly, but I think youll be surprised at how many things youll end up
noticing yourself doing that you usually wouldnt.

5. [ 30 mins] Silent Reading of Ch. 3 of Grendel

So now that we all understand the strategy, were going to take the next 30 minutes or so to put
into action while we read Grendel silently to ourselves. You are welcome to move your desks or
sit somewhere else around the room, just make sure you have a surface to write on. You can
borrow a clipboard if youd like to be on the floor. If you finish early, go back and reread
portions of the text and see if you have anything to add or change anything on your sticky notes.
If you dont quite get finished, dont worry too much, you can finish the last bits for homework.
Ill be up and around the room while youre reading, so make sure you raise your hand if you
have a questions and we can have a little conference. [Instruction listed on the board. I will
circulate around the room while students read, making myself available if someone raises a hand
or has a question about something. I will be informally taking note of the types of things they are
writing on their sticky notes and gauging how often they are pausing to write. These will be
things for me to keep in mind when I provide them with feedback on their reflections.] Commented [HK7]: I like that you are using this time to
collect data and are thinking about how it will inform your
feedback to the students.
Take about two more minutes to finish up what youre reading and writing. [Pass out Reflection
Sheets]

6. [10 min.] Reflection on Think Silently

Alright, class. Its time to come back to the real world and reflect on how this strategy worked
for us. Each of you should have a reflection sheet that I passed out while you were reading. Go
ahead and fill in your responses to the list at the top and then respond to the questions on the
bottom. Then, attach the sticky notes that you wrote questions on anywhere on the paper. We will
start class on Monday by going over those questions as a way to refresh our memories about
what weve read today. [During this time, I will either be walking around the room checking
student progress on the reflection sheet or finishing up a student conference that may not have
gotten resolved during reading time. A potential exchange might look like this:
Me: How did you feel about this strategy? What did you find challenging?
Student: I dont think I ever really compared it to anthing else Ive read
Me: Okay, well lets take a minute right now to think. [point to annotation] what does this
moment remind you of? Think about what else weve read in class recently
Student: Beowulf maybe? I guess its similar but I wasnt really thinking about that while
I was reading
Me: Keep that one in mind the next time we read something and try to make some
connections, you dont have to wait until we break out this strategy again. ]

7. [2 min.] Closing
Okay, guys, the bell is about to ring so finish up those reflections. Great, great effort today,
were really working towards mastering some very helpful strategies. Well be using this Think
Silently strategy pretty frequently to get more practice, and by the end of this unit we should be
masters at monitoring our own thinking, reading texts closely, and making/revising predictions
all along the way.

Dont forget to drop your reflections in the basket on your way out. Have a great weekend!

Differentiated Instruction to accommodate one or more of my profiled students:

(This is where you identify specific aspects of this lesson which have been differentiated in order
to address the needs of one or more of your profiled studentsidentify them by name)
One way I attempted to make my classroom environment functional for all my students was to
build in time for them to get their buzzing thoughts out in the open at the beginning of class so
that their working memory would be freed up to focus on the subject matter. I also built in a
small break between lessons to avoid fatigue from maintained mental exertion. This let them
move around if they felt like they needed to, getting out excess energy that could interfere with
their attention.

I displayed all instruction on the board so that students with attention difficulties could always
look up for a reminder of the tasks at hand. This included the list of questions to keep in mind
while reading, so that if they realize halfway through that they have forgotten to write things
down, they can return and re-center themselves around the questions.

The text in this lesson is not differentiated, as all students are working with Grendel by John
Gardner, but the instructions make it very explicit that this class period is meant for them to
practice these new strategies on a new textit can actually be beneficial if it is slightly
challenging. The structure of the Tea Party allowed me to talk one on one with students who
were struggling to connect ideas and create predictions without distracting from the overall goal
of the class. For the English Language Learners, the work at the beginning with groups allowed
for them to talk with other students and get clarification about what their specific cards meant if
they were having trouble. As this strategy is good practice for students at all reading levels, the
gifted students perform the same tasks, but are provided with chapters four and five as well, so
they may complete more during the class period. They will also be given a reflection sheet with Commented [HK8]: Differentiation does not just mean
higher level response questions to allow them to stretch their thinking even further. more work. Think about how you can differentiate through
content, process, and product.

This lesson included explicit modeling of a reading strategy, giving students a concrete depiction
of the thinking going on in my brain as I read. This provided them with a frame around which
they could construct their own ways of thinking about the text as the read. It helped gear them
towards the learning goal about understanding that reading well consists of many silent thinking
processes.
Materials Needed (list):
1. Index cards for tea party activity
2. Clipboards
3. Teacher Computer Commented [HK9]: Will this be one teacher computer or
4. Projector does this include technology for all of the students? I know
you mention Chromebooks at some point in your lesson so I
5. Text of Grendel ch. 3 am unsure
6. Document Camera

Incorporation of Course Readings:

This lesson heavily incorporates the Beers readings on pre and during reading strategies, as they
are the main focus of the lesson. I based my pre-reading activity on Beers tea Party strategy,
which is a great tool for getting students making inferences, seeing causal relationships,
comparing and contrasting, and drawing on their prior experiences. This got them making
predictions and actively thinking about their own thinking, which was a goal of this lesson. This
was a low pressure activity, so students could feel comfortable making guesses without worrying
too much about being wrong or right.

I then incorporated the Think Aloud strategy from Beers, but I adapted it for silent reading. I
wanted students to have an opportunity to practice monitoring their comprehension and thinking
on their own, so having them write their thoughts worked really well. I think following the tea
party strategy with this one works really well because they have already begun making
predictions about the text, so they can dive into it with their thinking already activatedthey
already have something to write down as the find things that support/dont support their
predictions. This also provides them with notes they can return to when the reread, adding new
ones or writing on old ones. I modeled this explicitly, as Beers suggests, to show them what deep
thinking about reading looks like and to give them a frame to model heir own thinking on.

I crafted a lesson around a situation I encountered in my 4882 placement when the students
worked and worked with the text and then performed very poorly on an exam asking them to
recall and discuss the story. I have never seen a lesson like this taught with them, and my mentor
teacher was blown away when we taught a lesson on inferencing earlier this semester, so I
predict she has not done many strategy lessons with them.

Materials Appendix: (e.g., supplementary texts, Ppts, overheads, graphic organizers,

handouts, etc.)

Appendix A: Grendel ch.3 by John Gardner

Appendix B: Class Slides
Appendix C: Tea Party Phrases
Appendix D: Think Silently Handout
Appendix E: Reflection Sheet

Appendix A: Text of Grendel by John Gardner

LINK to Grendel ch.3 by John Gardner

Appendix B: Class Slides

LINK to Slides
Appendix C: Tea Party Phrases

Id watched it all from the eaves of the They would listen to each other at the
forest. meadhall tables

A lean, aloof, superior man of old age. Season after season

The men would walk back to Hrothgars I was filled with a wordless, obscurely
hall for help. murderous unrest.

The blind old man went in He sang of battles, marriages, funerals, and
hangings

I gnashed my teeth and clutched the sides of A stab at truth, a snatch at apocalyptic glee
my head
Appendix D: Think Silently Handout

Think Aloud (Silently)

Connecting: Response:
This is like I feel
This reminds me of My viewpoint is
This is similar to I like
I dislike
Reflecting: I agree
I disagreeMy opinion is
I realized that
Next time Ill
I wonder if Visualize:
I like this because I picture
I see
I visualize
Summary:
This is mainly about Questioning:
The overall idea of this Why/What/When did?
story/part is How did?
This paragraph was about Where was?
Is there?
What if?

Clarifying:
Predicting:
I was confused when
I predict
I am not sure of
In the next part I think
I didnt expect
I think this is
This made me rethink
Appendix E: Think Silently Reflection

Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Think Silently Reflection

Part I: Read each statement below. Put a 1 by the items you do often, a 2 by the items you
do sometimes, and a 3 by the ones you do rarely.

When I pause to write a thought . . .

______ I make my mind try to visualize the scene. (visualizing)

______ I try to figure out which parts have confused me. (monitoring comprehension)
______ I compare what has happened now with what happened previously. (comparing)
______ I ask questions about whats going on in the text. (questioning)
______ I make myself connect what I know to whats happening in the story. (connecting)
______ I make comments about what I like or dont like. (commenting)
______ I anticipate what a character might do next. (predicting)
______ I make comments about what the author is doing to give me hints about the characters,
plot, or setting. (commenting)
______ I wonder what the author wants me to figure out at this point. (questioning)
______ I try to figure out if I need to reread a section. (monitoring comprehension)
______ I predict what will happen next. (predicting)
______ I try to imagine what is happening in the text. (visualizing)
______ I think about characters or events to see how they are alike or different. (comparing)
______ I ask myself how this is like something else Ive read. (connecting)
______ I stop and ask myself if I understand what Ive read so far. (monitoring comprehension)

Part II: Look at the numbers you put in the blanks in Part 1 and then answer the questions
below.
1. What do you look for most often when you pause to think?
2. Why do you think you do that the most?
3. What do you do the least?

Part III: Complete the following sentences to help you plan what youll do in the next
Think Silently activity.
1. This strategy helped me because
2. I need to keep practicing (predicting, connecting, comparing, visualizing, monitoring
comprehension, identifying solutions, questioning) because

Part IV: Reflecting on your use of Think Silently, respond to the following question in at
least two sentences.
1. How did this strategy help you get better at close reading?