Project2

A. Terminal Objective with Rubric for Assessment

When given a fictional story and a blank Story Map (Project 1, Table 1.5 ), the student will be able to complete the Story Map to identify all of the literary elements within the story (characters, setting, problem, events, and solution) with 80% accuracy according to the following rubric.

Table 2.1

B. Instructional Sequence To be able to identify all literary elements, students will first need to have experience with identifying EACH element. 1.Students will recall the definition of the word character (who or what the story is about) and then practice finding characters within a story. 2. Students will recall the definition of the word setting (where and when a story takes places) and then practice finding settings in different stories. 3. Students will realize that within every fictional story, the character faces some sort of problem that needs to be solved by the end of the story. 4. Students will recognize that the important events that happen in a fictional story are sometimes called the plot. Students will practice identifying important events rather than strictly retelling the story (telling all of the events). 5. Students will identify the solution to the character’s problem, recognizing that this often comes at the end of the story. The instructional strategy would include: All of which are further explained below.
 * 1) Preinstructional activities
 * 2) Content presentation
 * 3) Learner participation
 * 4) Assessment
 * 5) Follow-through activities

1. Pre-instructional Activity

(The designer adapted the following activity from [])

Supplies needed: a top hat, magic wand, 1-3 pictures of famous heroes or book characters; 1-3 pictures of exotic or fun places (i.e. castles, tropical beaches, amusement parks, or planets), 1-3 pictures that illustrate real or imaginary problems/challenges that children or grownups might face (i.e. doing homework, wizards, dueling, a sporting competition, flying to the moon, etc.)

Activity: The teacher places the pictures inside of the top hat. With the hat sitting upside down on a table in front of the class, the teacher explains that stories are like magic. The teacher taps the brim of the hat with the magic wand and then pulls out one or more of the character/hero pictures from the hat. The teacher shows the picture(s) to the class and explains who it is a picture of if they don’t already know. The teacher continues to say that these heroes are the story’s main characters.

The teacher taps the hat again and pulls out a picture of one or more of the fun or exotic places, and then explains that stories can magically whisk the reader away to far away places. These places are called the story’s setting. When a reader reads a story, it can transport the reader to any place or setting.

The teacher then asks the class if a character and setting are all that is needed for writing a story. After the responses die down, the teacher states that most stories start with a problem or challenge that the hero (main character) must resolve. The teacher taps the hat again and pulls out a picture of one or more of the challenges/problems. The teacher explains that a story’s problem can be any kind of problem; an ordinary everyday problem or an extraordinary problem. The main part of the story will be the hero trying to solve the problem—this is known as the plot. The hero won’t usually solve the problem on the first couple of tries, but the story usually ends when the hero finally solves the problem. The teacher explains that the initial problem, the journey the character takes to try to solve the problem, and the ultimate resolution of the problem all comprise the story’s plot.

The teacher explains to the class that now that they’ve had an overview of the parts of a story, the students will take some time over the next few days taking a closer look at each of the parts.

2. & 3. Content Presentation and Learner Participation

Table 2.2

(for a more clear version of Table 2.2, click on the pdf link below)

4. Assessment

To assess how well the third grade readers met the instructional goal, the teacher would give a local assessment of a teacher-made Story Map (see Project 1, Table 1.5) and assess student's response using the rubric described above (Table 2.1). Third graders in the school district are also assessed quarterly through the Reading 4Sights test and yearly through the PSSA. While each of these assessments assess many reading skills and applications, some questions from each of these assessments include identifying elements of fiction stories. It would be these two assessments (4Sights and PSSA) that would be the ultimate final assessment of how well students met the terminal objective described in this project.

5. Follow-through Activities

Students will be asked to identify these literary elements throughout the rest of their educational career. Therefore it would be imperative that the teacher continue to monitor and evaluate (either formally or informally) the student’s ability to identify these elements throughout the remainder of the school year. The designer of this project recommends that the teacher formally assess students every other month using the Story Map (Project 1, Table 1.5) and rubric (Table 2.1). Informal assessment can take place with each story that is read. Student's performance on both types of assessment will determine the necessity of reviewing or reteaching of the terminal objective.

C. Strategy for Teaching Terminal Objective

The teacher would begin with direct instruction. The preinstructional activity and content presentations are all direct instruction, of course allowing for some learner participation along the way. Each of the feedback activities could be considered indirect instruction in some ways. Although the teacher would have already instructed the class on each objective it is possible that the objective really “clicks” with the student through the feedback activity in which they participate.

Following the direct instruction of the fourth objective, there is an opportunity for some group learning/practicing which would be considered interactive instruction.

At the teacher’s discretion, each of these objectives could have an independent study practice (homework) as the need arises.

D. Student Groupings and Media Selections

Much of the direct instruction will take place in the whole group setting. Students participating in the feedback portion of the lesson will need to have a computer with internet access available to use.

The groups for the feedback portion of objective 4 will be based on the predetermined reading groups established by the teacher. Each group will work together to complete one listing of the main events.