Guided Reading Lesson Plan – Joseph Gangoo

Reading Level(s) Grade 6 – Guided Reading Level R

Objective/Strategy Deriving meaning from difficult words that are seldom used in
a text.
Book Beijing- Heart and Soul of China
Materials 4 books
4 pencils
4 Handouts (Shaping up Review)
Post it Notes
Paper to take notes on progress
Pen
Chart paper
Markers
List of Difficult words from previous session. (See pg.2)

Time: 18 minutes total

Before: 5 minutes
SCO 7: Students will be expected to respond critically to a range of texts, applying their
understanding of language, form and genre.
 Identify the conventions and structure of a variety of print and media texts and genres.
 Make connections with the purpose of each text or genre

Student Friendly Learning Outcome:

 I can recognize difficult words and find meanings and connections of these words to
other parts of the text.

Book Introduction
To start, the teacher will have all four books placed at the guided reading table, along with
pencils, shaping up review handout and post-it notes. When the students sit down at the
table, the teacher ask the students to leave the book closed and read the title and back cover
of the book.

“I would like to have group #2 take their seats at the designated guided reading table.
While I work with Group #2, I would like the rest of you take out your writing journal to do
some independent writing or the book chose for your independent reading” (The
independent reading and writing would have been modelled in the previous months to
prepare for the guided reading sessions)

Mini Lesson: APK

Let’s go over the difficult words from our first guided reading session. Can each of you
give me one word which you found the meaning of? What did you find out?
 List of Difficult Words from previous guided reading session:
Indigenous, Communist, Pronunciation, Preserved, Dynasty, Democracy, Embalmed.

Great work students!

Well, we still have more work to do in this book, Beijing – Heart and Soul of China which
as you know is about the city of Beijing, China. We will be continuing our guided reading
focusing on finding meanings of difficult words, or words we seldom see in text when we
are reading. Before we start reading, I want you to partner up with the person beside you
and ask these two questions…

What does the title “Heart and Soul of China mean to you?
After reading the back cover of the book, would you live in a big city like this? Yes or no?
Explain your answer with the person beside you.

The teacher will give the students some time to think about their answers and each others’
responses. As the students respond to these questions, the teacher will take notes on the
group discussion.

After the mini lesson, the teacher will thank the students for their contributions to the
discussion.

The teacher will also explain that when the teacher taps on their book during their reading,
that will be the signal to read aloud so the teacher can evaluate their reading.

“Great work students! Keep pushing through those difficult word and find those meanings!
Remember, when I tap on your book I need you to read aloud for a bit. I will also ask you
a few questions about the book as well.”

During: 9 minutes

To reinforce the strategy of understanding which words give us problems when reading a text,
we will explain to the students why it is important to find out meaning of difficult words and
build connection to the text.

The teacher may ask some questions like: What do you do when you are stuck on a
word? Do you sometimes use the dictionary or glossary to find meanings of words? Do
you read on and try to make connections other parts of the text to solve the word?

“Thanks for all these great answers! Now if we can pick up our books, lets start
reading quietly or silently!

As the students read quietly, Beijing – Heart and Soul of China, pages 16-25, the teacher will
listen in on each of the students reading asking a few questions to engage their thinking and
build connections to the text.
Once the students have been reading for about two minutes, the teacher will work their way
around, cueing each of the students to read aloud as well as asking a few questions…

“There are a few bold words in the text which are explained in the glossary. Did you
already know these words? Does this help with the understanding of the book?”

“Can you find 3 words, other than the ones bolded, that someone may have trouble
understanding? Mark with a post-it note please.” (The students will already know the
procedure of marking a book with the post-it notes from the previous session)

The teacher will be documenting conversations made with all the students. The teacher will
focus on the words that ALL the students had difficulty understanding.

After hearing all the students read and having all these questions answered, the teacher will
direct them to the Handout after the allotted time. (The teacher will explain the handout to the
students)

Explanation: “On the handout provided, I would like you to write down one thing you
loved from the book, three important facts from the book, four important words from
the book, and a summary of todays lesson, after our discussion on the book.

“Students, the information that you gather with the handout will be used in our next
session, the final section of this book. We will continue on word solving strategies.”

After: 4 minutes
The teacher will get the students to discuss and try to find out some meanings of difficult
words in the text.

Prompting Question: “Students before we start our handout, I would like you to tell me a few
words that you had trouble understanding during this reading.”

On the chart paper provided, the teacher will write down all the words that the students
had trouble understanding, either by word of mouth, or by collecting the post-it notes.
Once all the words are written down, the teacher will ask the students to work in pairs
to find the meanings. One pair would be responsible for column one of the chart and
the other pair would be responsible for column two.

“Even though we may not be finished defining all these words, lets define the ones we
have, and put the ones left over on our word wall.”

Keep up the great work students!

The teacher will, after some of the words have been defined, will have the students discuss
some of the meanings in relation to the text.
 Did some of the difficult words stop you from moving forward in the text?

Even if you don’t know all words, do you think that you can still understand the text?

What strategy did you use to understand the difficult words?

After asking these questions and discussing the answers, the students should feel
comfortable doing the “Shaping up review” handout.

The teacher will be documenting some of the strategies used to gain understanding of
some of the difficult words.
Must Do:

The “Must Do” activity will be the “Shaping up review” handout. It has already been
explained to the students, but we will go over it again with them. The goal is to have
the student understand the objective of this lesson, and recognize the important facts,
find meaning of difficult words in the text, and what they really enjoyed about the
lesson.

The handout emphasises what is important in the reading. It also gives the student a
chance to recognize difficult words to be defined. Even if the student doesn’t get all the
definitions for the words they found difficult right away, it could be used as a learning
extension inside, or outside the classroom.
Formative Assessment Strategy:

The teacher will be using the notes obtained during the whole process of the guided
reading session as a part of the formative assessment. By listening to the student read,
the teacher will have information on each student’s reading level, and what needs to
improve upon in their reading.
By the usage of questions documented in the guided reading lesson plan, this should
generate some discussion which a part of assessment will be. In addition, the shaping
up review activity will also be used as assessment tool for the next guided reading
session.