Polk Bros Foundation
Illustration Planner
One way to help your pupils more fully understand an idea from the text they are reading is to require them to draw or sketch the concept. This page provides some space to plan the details your students want to include in their...
Achievement Strategies
Fishbone for Main Ideas and Details
A key reading comprehension skill is the ability to identify the main idea and supporting details used in a passage of informational text. Here's a template that encourages young readers to practice this skill. They list the who, what,...
East Stroudsburg University
In Your Own Words... Paraphrasing
How can you put a passage in your own words without changing the meaning of the original text? That is the question facing many young researchers. The advice modeled in this presentation is that writers read the passage carefully,...
Curated OER
Printing and Publishing
Explore African literature and artwork in a multicultural literacy and art lesson. Begin with a read aloud of Tiger and the Big Wind: A Tale from Africa, and afterward, have kids retell the main events in the story. They...
Mary Pope Osborne, Classroom Adventures Program
The Backpack Travel Journals
Strap on those backpacks, it's time to travel through history with this literature unit based on the first four books of The Magic Tree House series. While reading through these fun stories, children create story maps, record...
Curated OER
Main Idea and Supporting Details
Young readers locate the main ideas and supporting details while they read. Students will answer questions pertaining to the main ideas found in three different reading passages.
Curated OER
Outline It!
Fourth graders investigate how outlining can aid in comprehending text. In this reading comprehension lesson, 4th graders outline an article they read in groups of two. Students take turns reading the article, identifying the main idea,...
Curriculum Corner
Informational Text Graphic Organizers
Examine informational text with a three-page worksheet that focuses on taking notes, identifying the main idea, and locating supporting details in order to form a summary paragraph.
Curriculum Corner
Informational Text Graphic Organizers
Accompany informational text reading—independent or whole class—with a worksheet that challenges scholars to examine the text's main idea, details, take notes, and record vocabulary words and their meanings.
Curriculum Corner
Informational Text Graphic Organizers
Analyze informational text with a set of three worksheets that focus on the main idea and supporting details, and reinforces note taking skills, and the use of context clues to define new words.
Curated OER
Only the Facts
Practice the strategy of summarizing to gain meaning and knowledge from an informational text. Young readers highlight supporting details and main ideas, and then they use this to summarize two articles: "The Great Quake" and "What...
Curated OER
Writing Organizers
Eight graphic organizers to choose from? That's right! Each of these organizers relates to writing or reading. From narrowing a writing topic, to responding to literature, to planning a writing project, you'll find many purposes for...
Curated OER
A Fantasy Story: Baby Bear's Space Journey
Give this literacy worksheet to your beginning readers to help them draw out key details and retell in their own words. They read a short fantasy story about a bear in space which includes dialogue, onomatopoeia, and a simple story line....
Curated OER
A Listening Doll: Create Traditional Native American Storyteller Dolls
In this wonderful cross-curricular lesson, your youngsters will learn about Pueblo Indian storyteller dolls by creating their own! They discuss the tradition of story telling, especially in reference to Native Americans. Consider ending...
Curated OER
Introduction Paragraph
Key parts of an introductory paragraph (grabber sentence, connecting information, thesis) are highlighted in a presentation that uses color-coded sample paragraphs to illustrate how these parts combine to form a complete opening paragraph.
Curated OER
Left-to-Right Reading
Left-to-right, left-to-right, that's the way we read and write! Watch this short video clip and teach your young learners this chant before they start writing!
Anti-Defamation League
10 Ideas for Teaching Black History Month
Celebrate Black History Month with the help of 10 ideas that delve deep into the history, major events, contributions, famous African Americans, and sheds light on how scholars today can take a proactive stance on current civil rights...
Curated OER
Cooking in Britain Today
Learners explore British cooking vocabulary. In this ELL vocabulary lesson plan, students identify and describe various foods, match foods with adjectives, discuss their opinions about British cuisine, then read food critic reviews. Four...
Curated OER
Transportation Workers
Summarizing a text means being able to identify supporting details. Your class can learn about transportation workers in Chicago as they read a one-page informational passage. When they are finished reading they'll explain what they've...
Polk Bros Foundation
I Can Analyze a Story or History Completely and Carefully
Start off analysis of a text with a worksheet that asks pupils to complete several tasks. Class members note down a couple of characters or people and their distinguishing traits, describe the most important event, summarize the text...
Curated OER
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
In this story structure lesson, students read the book A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and identify the characters, setting and main themes of the book. They answer a list of study questions about the book.
Curated OER
What's the Big Idea?
Students choose a paragraph from a book of their choice, identify the main idea, and draw an illustration of the main idea. They write original paragraphs, illustrate them, and trade with a partner, identifying the main idea of the...
Curated OER
Critical Reading Skills Worksheet
In this critical thinking worksheet, students fill out a graphic organizer about a story they read including predicting, main idea, values, and more. Students complete 5 sections in the graphic organizer.
Curated OER
Building Blocks Of Comprehension: What Is The Big Idea?
Students engage in a instructional activity that is about finding the main idea of a passage of reading. They use a passage while focusing upon the words and defining vocabulary. The students work on fluency and then identify the main idea.