Learning Objectives

Students will be able to use context clues to identify and define unknown words in a
text.

Introduction
 (5 minutes)

 Show students two items that are opposites (such as a small ball and a large ball, or
something tall and something short).
 Tell students that opposites are pairs of words that have different meaning, such as
short/tall and big/little.
 Ask them to think of other opposites that they know and turn and talk with a
classmate to share their thinking.
 Play a short game where you do an action (arms up, crouch low, etc.) and ask students
to do the opposite action

Explicit Instruction/Teacher modeling

 (5 minutes)
 Introduce the read aloud by doing a picture walk of To & Fro, Fast & Slow by Durga
Bernhard.
 Ask students what they notice about the story from the illustrations during the picture
walk.

Guided Practice
 (10 minutes)
 Read aloud the story, pausing to explain that sometimes when we are reading we
come across a new word that we aren’t sure what it means, demonstrate how you can use the
context clues of the other words and the illustrations around the unknown word to understand
the new word.
 As you read, identify both opposite word pairs and new words and make a list of them
on the board with the help of the students.

Independent working time

 (10 minutes)
 Pass out the Crazy New Words worksheet and have students choose one of the new
words from the story and draw pictures to demonstrate their understanding of the new word.

Differentiation
Support:
 Pair students together to identify the meaning of the new word from the text
and encourage them to find the opposites.
Enrichment:
 Have students label their drawings and help them by allowing them to dictate
and/or just write the first sound of the word.
 Students can complete the Silly Opposites worksheet.

Assessment
 (5 minutes)
 Check that student work reflects an understanding of the new words using
context clues.

Review and closing

 (10 minutes)
 Pass out an index card to each student. Have students choose one of the
opposite pairs from the story and draw pictures of each thing on their index card to
demonstrate their understanding of opposites.
 Invite 3–5 students to come up to the front and share their opposite pairs with
the class.
 Review how to use context clues within a story to find the meaning of an
unknown word.