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Students use maps to do research.

Nonfiction!

July 21, 2022 by Shardul Oza in curriculum

I know it is the middle of summer, but I finally had time to reflect on and write about one of my favorite units in both reading and writing: nonfiction! I’ve tried out many different kinds of nonfiction units over the years and while I still love our Biographical Essays: Researching People Who Inspire Us unit, I have enjoyed the students’ enthusiasm and engagement in all of them. 

Nonfiction literacy is so important. It ties into media literacy and understanding and learning about the world around you, is a life skill (you will always need to understand and explain information!). There are so many facets to it between learning about facts vs opinion, critical literacy, synthesizing information, and more. But most of all, it is fascinating and FUN.

Some essential elements: you MUST have great mentor texts (we had a lot of success with Pink is for Blobfish by Jess Keating, fun and unexpected biographies, and were amused and enthralled by the Disgusting Critters series by Elise Gravel). I should (and hopefully will) write a separate post about choosing resources critically, but in the meantime, just a reminder to consider perspective/voice/stereotypes/bias especially when thinking about biographies or informational texts that talk about the past. It’s key to show students that there is variety in types of nonfiction as too many people write off nonfiction because they’ve only been exposed to textbooks or “boring” books. Remember research is a fascinating challenge! You can use many different types of materials (people, books, articles, photos, videos, other graphics like maps) to discover more about something. We wrote a post about Learning Through Photos and another post about how we used photographs as primary sources in our Black History Lesson: Sit Ins.

While we love essays and the painted essay especially (as detailed in this post that’s also linked above), there are many ways to share nonfiction and talking about cool facts is the first one! Let students talk about what they learn. Research or reading nonfiction does not have to be silent independent work. Finding our more should be joyful, collaborative learning with lots of opportunities to share. We once wrote books in groups about different countries in Africa, and students were so excited to share what they learned with other groups and pool their research together within their group. They also used a lot of resources that were not books or written texts, like videos, photos, maps, and people (whom they interviewed).

Also, don’t insist that everything needs to be shared in a written format. Nonfiction books use all kinds of graphics and sometimes they are more effective than explaining something in words. We allowed our students to find a certain number of photos online and explicitly taught into what makes a good illustration or accompaniment to some text, using lots of mentor texts and examples of different kinds of graphics. Read our review of One Word From Sophia by Jim Averback to hear about a wonderful read aloud to introduce using different graphics.

What I’ve learned from teaching nonfiction over the years is that CHOICE is huge here. Students are already so knowledgeable about so many things, so let them use their expert status at school too! We had our students write all about books and our only caveat was that their topic had to be something they knew a lot about and that was appropriate for school. They are excited to share what they know about something they care about, we all get a reminder about how reading and writing are fundamentally communication tools above all else, and we (teachers) get to be amused by all the hilarious and creative topics, details, and facts students generate.


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July 21, 2022 /Shardul Oza
nonfiction, curriculum, reading, writing, units, books, research
curriculum
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We are now reading and reviewing ARC's !

June 11, 2018 by Shardul Oza

We feel so hip, so cutting edge! It is no surprise to any of you who follow us here (or on Twitter) how much we love literature. We have seen on a daily basis how transformative it can be for us personally, but also for our students. As a result, we are now reading ARC's ( Advanced Reader's Copies) to continue our ongoing quest of excellent, thoughtful, diverse literature. If you are someone who is looking for a reader (or two! ) feel free to reach out to us! 

We have loved reading the ones we have received so far. We especially loved How to Love a Jamaican by Alexia Arthurs. The very first piece (Light Skinned Girls and Kelly Rowlands) in her short story collection blew our minds from the get go with its nuance, humanity, and the way it got at the depths of the many layers in our identities. Beautifully done-- we hope you can snag a copy this summer (It is officially out July 24th, 2018)! We would definitely use it with high schoolers!! 

What books are you loving this summer? What book are you desperate to get your hands on-- tell us, tell us! 

We're official! ;) 

We're official! ;) 

June 11, 2018 /Shardul Oza
literacy, read aloud, summer reading, diverse voices, discussion, representation, research, resources
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Biographical Essays: Researching People Who Inspire Us

March 19, 2018 by Shardul Oza in curriculum

We have been working hard on a nonfiction biography focused unit in Reading and an essay writing unit in Writing. Students perused the biographies we have in our classroom (so many amazing picture books and the Who Was.. series that is at a good level for 3rd graders), and then chose three people they’d like to research and write about. We had already done a number of read alouds of picture book biographies so were able to get our students excited about people they weren’t initially familiar with and showcase some amazing women and PoC. We also looked at photos, video clips, and listened to music. They were hooked!

One thing that was important to remember going into this unit is that research is not only done through reading (even though we love books and LOVE recommending books to children) - we used photos, videos, video clips, maps, and more! Photos are a great way to start talking about primary sources AND verifying information using more than one source. Ask a student to look at a photo and share what they know about the subject ONLY from looking at that photo. You’ll be amazed. Our students were incredibly engaged and motivated and wanted to know all about their research subjects. One child who researched Josephine Baker asked to listen to her music, another asked to read Maya Angelou’s books, and another wanted to look at Keith Haring’s paintings (and more!).

After collecting lots of research, we asked students to come up with 2 reasons why their research subject is or was exceptional and make sure they had evidence to back up those two reasons. We talked about how we might think someone is exceptional (or amazing, awesome, wonderful, etc), but we can give examples to prove it our readers and convince them as well. Our students used a color coded graphic organizer to plan our their two reasons with details and examples.

Our color coded example essay about Jane Goodall.

Our color coded example essay about Jane Goodall.

A note about the color coding - before writing this essay (our any essay), we taught our students about the format of the painted essay from the Vermont Writing Collaborative. We LOVE the painted essay. It’s clear, color coded, concrete, tangible, and organized. We’ve used it with 3rd graders and 5th graders (and have seen it used with younger students) and its structure could help you organize your writing for the rest of your life.

The students used color coded planners to start organizing their ideas and then continued through all the stages of the writing process (they are familiar with the writing process from Writer’s Workshop). One revising technique we found really helpful was having students color their essays (with crayons or colored pencils) to match the parts of the painted essay. This way, when they weren’t sure what color to use for a word, phrase, or sentence, they had to ask themselves if that word, phrase, or sentence needed to go elsewhere. It makes the process of revising for organization so much more tangible!

Mini-lesson on editing and revising using our example Bessie Stringfield essay.

Mini-lesson on editing and revising using our example Bessie Stringfield essay.

Finally, we shared our essay at a publishing party where family members and the school community were invited to come learn about some amazing people. We loved seeing adults learning about inspirational humans they had never heard about (or knew very little about) like Major Taylor, Wilma Rudolph, Josephine Baker, Misty Copeland, Bessie Coleman, and so many more. While we highlighted these people by sharing incredible books about them, we didn’t say any version of, “Oh it’s Black History Month, learn about black people!” Instead, we said, here are some awesome books about amazing people.. read and enjoy!

March 19, 2018 /Shardul Oza
essay, writing, research, biography, Black History Month
curriculum
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