Culminating Activity

Nora Pearson

Skylar Prizant

1. This DQ question we came up with is a problem is todays society. What we mean by that is many students look up words on google and just right the definition down and aren't even learning new words. So we came up with an activity to make the students figure out the words they don't know on their own by using a dictionary, thesaurus, and using the context of the readings they were given. This will help improve the students vocabulary tremendously and make their vocabulary stronger.

Standards:

1.    3.RV.2.5 Consult reference materials, both print and digital (e.g., dictionary), to determine or clarify the meanings of words and phrases

   
   

   2.     3.RV.2.1 Apply context clues (e.g., word, phrase, and sentence clues) and text features (e.g., maps, illustrations, charts) to determine the meanings of unknown words

      

Driving Question- How can we expand our vocabulary by reading?

Description of the DQ:

The driving question has an in-depth study. There is an issue if kids can’t expand their vocabulary, especially when they’re reading. If they get stuck on a word, they should know the necessary ways to help understand what the word means. The DQ provides opportunities for students to evaluate, analyze, present and defend their solutions because if they really know their new vocabulary that they learned, they will be using it in their life by talking to others with the new words that they have learned.

Lesson 1- Grabber and Introduction

This question, “What if we couldn’t read at all?” should hook the students on asking more questions about the topic. This should make the students question what would happen if none of them actually knew how to read. They would realize their idea of the world would be very different. This grabber would capitalize on high emotion and novelty because this would cause the students to be stressed about if they really do know how to read or how they could improve their reading. This also capitalizes on novelty because they will want to know how they can improve their reading more. The grabber does establish authenticity and relevance because the teachers will be trying to help improve the students vocabulary by reading more advanced texts, such as books or even articles. This grabber would be used by having the teacher start a discussion by simply asking the students what it would be like for them if they did not know how to read. This would engage all students to imagine their life without being able to read and how different it would be for them. The teachers would ask them what struggles they would face if they could not read certain words or even understand certain words.

 Culminating Activity

The activity we chose is a two week process which helps students learn new vocabulary words by reading. The activity is the students will be given a little segment from a book that is an appropriate level for them, and they have to circle words that they do not know. After they do that, then we will come together as a class and start discussing the ways that they can learn the words when they are reading. We will go through the different ways, such as keeping a dictionary or thesaurus handy, the context throughout the text, etc. Then the students will try and solve what these words mean throughout the opportunities that are given by the teacher. The students will do this in groups, so they can bounce ideas off of each other. Doing this activity in groups will help the students learn more rather than working independently because they can figure out the words together through the context that was given.  We will  judge the students through a grading rubric to see what they mastered and need to improve on.

Rubric: