Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Who Wants to be Popular?


The Popularity Papers by Amy Ignatow is an adorable graphic novel about two young girls’, Lydia and Julie, quest to become popular. As Lydia and Julie do experiments, they find they have different interest and they never realized before. They also realize they have talents that they never knew about. Not only do they find out new talents but they also test their friendship. Along the way they make new friends and come to realize that being popular is not the most important accomplishment in school.
                Since I am talking about a graphic novel, I cannot forget to mention the pictures. The pictures actually remind me of some of the drawings that a few of the girls in my school used to draw. They look like the drawings that middle school or high school aged students would draw. I also liked how the book was written in each of the two girls’ handwriting, which makes it easy to know who is writing. 
Teaching Resources:
Vocabulary: This book was a pretty easy read even for 4th graders. I would just have the students look up the words on their own as they come across them, that way I don't have to spend time teaching them. I may go over them in class if many people are having problems with similar words. 
Before reading: I would talk to the students about what makes a book a graphic novel. Then I would show the students what the book looks like and how the pictures show what happens in the book. After the students have looked through the pages, in a group discussion, I would ask them based only on the pictures from the book, what are some things they think might happen and explain why they think this might happen?
During Reading: I would ask them to write in their daily journal at least a few times about their thoughts about what happened in the sections they read.
In Addition to all of this I also have a 6th Grade lesson Plan:
Content Standards: 
1.      Grade 6 Writing- 3. Communicating with others 3.1, 3.2, 4. Applying English Language Conventions 4.1, 4.2, and 4.3. Persuasive: 30. Write a a persuasive piece using “least to most important” arguments.
2.      Grade 6 Writing-  1. Reading and Responding 1.4, 3. Communicating with others 3.2, 4. Applying English Language Conventions 4.1, 4.2, 4.3. Capitalization / Punctuation / Usage, 3. Use capitalization, punctuation, and usage rules from previous grades.
Learner Background: 
             The students will already understand that when you write a persuasive paper you start with your least important argument and move to your most important argument. They will also have already read and discussed The Popularity Papers.

Student Learning Objective(s): 
o   The students will be able to write a piece that is persuasive and has 3 strong supporting details.
o   The student will also be able to write using appropriate capitalization, punctuation, commas, maintain consistent person, and use paragraph conventions
o   The student will be able to cite from their book.

Assessment: 
            I will use a detailed rubric for grading the students. The students will be assessed using the criteria in the attached rubric.

Materials/Resources: 
·         Chart paper
·         The Popularity Papers
Learning Activities: 
Initiation: 
            To initiate the lesson, I will ask the students to summarize the graphic novel The Popularity Papers. Then I will remind the students using the chalkboard the main parts of a persuasive piece. I will ask them to raise their hands and tell me what these parts are. As they answer I will write what they say on the board. Then I will tell them that they are going to write a persuasive piece on which character in the book was the most popular. 15 minutes

Lesson Development:
            On the first day:
            The students will fill out their graphic organizer (attached) with example and page numbers from the book. I would give 30 minutes for this part.
             Then I will teach a lesson on how to appropriately cite their quotes and paraphrased information. On a blank piece of chart paper I will write out the rules as follows:
1.      If it is a direct quote, meaning 3 or more words are taken directly from the text you must put quotes (“”) around the whole thing.
2.      After the (“”) but before the (.) you must write the (author’s last name and the page it came from). Example (Smith 34)
3.      If you paraphrase meaning you take an idea from the book then you still need to put the author and page number in parentheses, but you do not need quotes.
4.      You do not need to make a works cited page since I know which book you are using.
I will leave this up in the classroom so they can refer to it while writing their papers. I will also tell them that it is very important to cite what you use to give the author credit. I would use the analogy that if they took a math test and got a 79 on it and someone copied off of them on some of the problems and got a 90 how would you feel? I would take about 15 minutes to do this part.
            On the second day:
            The students will write for 45 minutes using their graphic organizer on which character was truly the most popular.
            On day three:
             The students will read only their arguments to a partner. On this day they will tell one another if they think they need more supporting arguments, or what they should take away or consider re-arragning as far as order for least to most strong. 30 minutes
            On day four:
            The students will make corrections to their papers and add needed elements to their papers. The students will write the final draft of their paper one hour.
             
Closure:
 When the lesson is all done I have the students talk about what they wrote about. I would also have them discuss with me on what they liked and disliked about this paper. I would take about 15 minutes for this part. 
 

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