Criteria grading and comments, lesson plan below.

Affirmation of culture 3.5

Use of First Language 3.5
Use of Visuals/Message Abundance 4
Explicit language and Content objectives 3.5
Accessing prior knowledge 4
Cooperative learning 3.5
Ongoing Assessment 3.5

I think it is hard to explicitly articulate how I would do these things. I look for ways to connect
in the moment. It is not so easy to plan for, but it is absolutely important to consider it
consciously. Similarly, assessment occurs during discussions and it is a responsive process.
Like if I’m getting examples that don’t fit I know I need to clarify. If I wrote all of these details
down, we’d be here a long time. So much happens in 5 minutes, it is hard to capture it all. I
also struggled with how to do both content and language objectives at once. I ended up
breaking them in 2 lessons, but that might not be the way to go.

Integrated Lesson

Grade(s): 4/5 Subject: Language Arts

Class Profile: 7 grade 5; 14 grade 4; 5 IEP; 1 Paragraph Writing: Main idea & 3 details
ELL (beginning level)

Paragraph Writing: Identifying Main Idea and Three Details

Communication & Critical, Creative, Reflective Personal / Social
Collaborating Thinking
I can describe different groups that I
I can respond to educational content I can ask questions, make predictions, belong to.
I can talk and listen with purpose and use my senses to gather I can explain why I make specific
information. choices
I can explore with a purpose in mind
and use what I learn.
Big Idea(s): what will students understand after the lesson is over (enduring understandings)?

- Questioning what we hear, read, and view contributes to our ability to be educated and engaged
citizens.

Essential Question(s): what questions will drive the lesson (connected to big ideas)?

- What is the main message in a text / media form (i.e. type of communication)? What is a main idea?
What are supporting details that help explain the message and make it clear for an audience?

Learning Intention (s): verb-based statements you could share with students to target learning and
 assessment.

Language and Content Demands

- Identify the structural elements of a paragraph: a topic sentence, supporting / explaining sentences
- Analyze and identify main ideas and supporting details
- Describe main ideas
- Compare details and explain how they do or do not support a main idea

Vocabulary ELL Adaptations and Assessment Considerations

- Sentence, main idea, paragraph, topic sentence,
explain, supporting details,
- Depending on competency with FL allow for
dictionary or technology translations
- Provide instructional examples in multi-media
formats (writing, pics, audio, etc.)
- Provide sentence and paragraph frames and allow
students to copy
- Assessment is mainly formative

The following is a general outline of how the lesson will proceed. I’m using a numbered format because
if time runs out or students run out of stamina, we’ll pick up where we left off. I’m going to use different
font for special considerations for ELL as well.

Steps
1. First group of steps are to review and introduce content language.
2. Introduce vocabulary objectives and provide visuals while at the same time assessing students
present knowledge of the vocabulary words: Sentence, main idea, paragraph, topic sentence,
explain, supporting details, concluding sentence.
a. Tell class that we will be learning about sentences, main idea, supporting details, paragraphs, and
topic sentences.
b. Display images and ask: What is the main idea? What is this picture about? Are there things in
the pictures that do not tell about or support the main idea?

c. Talk to a partner and together answer the questions, be prepared to share with the class. ELL
student can be part of a triad. Students will be reminded to talk slow and look at ELL student.
 i. The trees and the sidewalk do not support the main idea. The writing around the hockey rink
walls do not tell about or support the main idea.
ii. We could use Google translate if the ELL students’ language is in translate for us to hear stop
and hockey in their language and invite them to say it if they want to teach us.
d. Can we write a sentence to tell the main idea?
i. Is Stop a sentence?
ii. Is hockey a sentence?
e. Teacher uses this as formative assessment – how much review / teaching about sentences is
necessary. We will assume students forgot most of what they have previously learned about
sentences for this lesson.
f. How do we know what sentences are?
i. They have a subject or a main idea, and the subject is doing something. They have an
uppercase at the start and punctuation at the end. For example:
ii. The stop sign tells people to stop at the gate.
iii. Hockey players use sticks and pucks to play hockey.
3. Teacher then puts up paragraph example and collectively reviews that a paragraph is a group of
sentences that all tell about the same main idea.

4. Raise your hand; Can we find the sentence that tells the main idea?
a) Do the rest of the sentences support or tell about the main idea “Rainbows”?
b) What if I added, my favourite colour is green? Does that tell about the main idea? Is it easy to do
this sometimes? Like if we were talking to someone about rainbows, can we go off topic, but the
other person doesn’t get confused? Why is it different with writing?
c) A topic sentence helps us stay on topic when we write, and it helps our audience know what is
important.
5. Teacher puts up new paragraph.
a. Raise your hand; Can we find the topic sentence that tells the main idea?
b. Do the rest of the sentences support or tell about the main idea “Max’s sister?”

6. Try writing some supporting details to explain these topic sentences. Raise your hand to give a
supporting detail:
 a. Cats are good pets.
i. Teacher takes one answer and writes it as spoken, then go back and ask if it looks right or if we
need to change it because we are writing for a reading audience, not talking. Creates a
sentence frame for students to use as a supporting detail: Cats are good pets because they can
be a friend to talk to.
ii. Ants are not good pets. Teacher takes one answer and creates a frame. Ants are not good pets
because they should not be in a home.
iii. Rocks are easy pets to keep.
iv. Teacher takes one answer and creates a frame. Rocks are easy because you do not have to do
a lot of work to take care of them.
7. Now it’s your turn to try on your own. Write detail sentences for the topic sentences. If you finish
quickly, try to add more details that explain the topic. ELL & other adaptations could be to copy the
rainbow paragraph, or to draw a rainbow and label the parts of the rainbow, teacher could ask
questions about the pictures to see if students can identify non-rainbow details.
8. Teacher reads students detail sentences to assess if most students were able to write good detail
sentences and what needs to be reviewed / re-taught in the next lesson.

9. Follow Up Language Lesson and 3 Details

a. Teacher re-posts or writes vocabulary for review: Sentence, main idea, paragraph, topic
sentence, explain, supporting details,
b. Teacher explains additional vocabulary (language demands): identify, analyze, describe, and
compare
c. Teacher invites class to look at the picture and analyze it. Teacher initiates discussion.
 i. What does it mean when we analyze it? How is this different from just scrolling through
pictures? When we are driving in our cars and looking out the windows, do we analyze what
we see? When we are working at school, we look closely at things to learn; we analyze.
d. Now analyze the picture. Can you identify the main idea of the picture?
i. Teacher writes down an answer from a student in a sentence frame: The main idea is fun at
the park.
ii. Teacher can use Google translate / and invite ELL student to teach us ‘park.’
10. Now identify and describe three details that tell about the main idea with a partner be prepared to
share.
i. Teacher writes down some sentence frames: One way to have fun at the park is to fly kites.
Another way to have fun at the park is to run with friends. You can also have fun at the park
by riding your bicycle.
ii. Let’s analyze another picture with the same main idea:

b. What are some details in this picture that tell about fun at the park?
i. If there is a waterpark you can play in the water. You can also play on the playground.
ii. Can you identify details that do not tell about the main idea? How might these details be
confusing to someone if they were reading about fun at the park? If the topic sentence was I
like to do three things at the park, but the next sentence was about the smelly bathroom, or
the tall trees with wasps nests – would this be confusing to an audience?
11. Draw and write three details that tell about the main idea for you. Make sure you focus on the topic.
12. Teacher provides a frame for students who need it.
a. These are three things I like to do when I go to a park. I like to ________. I like to
_____________. I also like to _________.
13. If ELL needs additional scaffolds, Teacher can use picture book rom ELL multi-lingual online libraries
to allow student to read in first language about parks (ideally this is a beginning level book that
teaches basic vocabulary like play, bike, etc.). If no first language book on parks are available,
teacher can look for a video? Teacher could also print one of these pictures and provide words for
vocabulary matching: tree, dog, bike, swing, lake etc. Teacher could also try to locate a commonly
recognizable picture of a park from students prior country to label.

Upon advice of my ELL 1 colleagues, I’m adding a graphic organizer for main idea and 3 details. I am not
using the “Hamburger” graphic because I honestly don’t think it translates / transfers (I’ve tried it
before), but I’m including a basic organizer below. Also I consider the advice to add another
collaborative task for step 5, but I’m thinking about the group I have in particular, and I don’t think
partners or collaborating is for every group.