English Language Arts Grade 1
Educational Links

Reading: Informational Text Standard 1

Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.

• Aesop and Ananse: Animal Fables and Trickster Tale
  In this lesson from EDSITEment, students will become familiar with fables and trickster tales from different cultural traditions. They will explore how folktales employ animals in different ways to portray human strengths and weaknesses and how this wisdom is passed down from one generation to the next. These lessons introduce students to the world of folklore and explore how folktales convey the perspectives of world cultures.
• Animal Study: from Fiction to Facts
  This lesson describes how to use selected fiction and nonfiction literature and careful questioning techniques to help students identify factual information about animals. Children first identify possible factual information from works of fiction which are read aloud, then they listen to read-alouds of nonfiction texts to identify and confirm factual information. This information is then recorded on charts and graphic organizers. Finally, students use the Internet to gather additional information about the animal and then share their findings with the class. The lesson can be used as presented to find information about ants or can be easily adapted to focus on any animal of interest to students. Resources are included for ants, black bears, fish, frogs and toads, penguins, and polar bears.
• Dr. King's Dream
  In this lesson, students will learn about the life and work of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Students will listen to a brief biography, view photographs of the March on Washington, hear a portion of King's 'I Have a Dream' speech, and discuss what King's words mean to them. Finally, they will create picture books about their own dreams of freedom for Americans today.
• Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Hieroglyphs
  This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to the writing, art, and religious beliefs of ancient Egypt through hieroglyphs, one of the oldest writing systems in the world, and through tomb paintings. The lesson plan is in two parts. In this first lesson, the class creates a pictorial alphabet of its own and then learns and uses the symbols of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet. In the second lesson, Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Scroll Painting, students identify and represent in their own drawings figures from the Book of the Dead, a funeral text written on papyrus and carved on the walls of tombs to help guide the deceased through the afterlife.
• Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Scroll Paintings
  This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to the writing, art, and religious beliefs of ancient Egypt through hieroglyphs, one of the oldest writing systems in the world, and through tomb paintings. The lesson plan is in two parts. In this second lesson, students identify and represent in their own drawings figures from the Book of the Dead, a funeral text written on papyrus and carved on the walls of tombs to help guide the deceased through the afterlife. In the first lesson, Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Hieroglyphs, the class creates a pictorial alphabet of its own and then learns and uses the symbols of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet.
• From Fact to Fiction: Drawing and Writing Stories
  Getting children to use their imaginations when writing a story can sometimes be difficult. Drawing, however, can create a bridge between the ideas in a child's head and the blank piece of paper on the desk. In this ReadWriteThink lesson, students use factual information gathered from the Internet as the basis for creating a nonfiction story. Story elements, including setting, characters, problem, solution, and endings, are then used as a structure for assembling students' ideas into a story.
• If You Were a Pioneer on the Oregon Trail
  In this lesson from EDSITEment, students compare imagined travel experiences of their own with the actual experiences of 19th-century pioneers. After creating, as a class, oral stories about contemporary cross-country journeys, students learn about the experiences of the emigrants who traveled on the Oregon Trail. They then create works of historical fiction in the form of picture books, drawing upon the information they have learned.
• Like Father, Like Son: Presidential Families
  The lessons in this unit provide an opportunity for students to learn about and discuss two U.S. families in which both the father and son became President. Students will address questions such as: What types of people might become President of the United States? What type of training as a child do you think these father/son pairs had to enable them to become President? Students will explore how these Presidential sons were like their fathers, and will personally explore how they think they are like their own parents.
• Listen, Look & Learn: An Info Gathering Process
  In this lesson from ReadWriteThink, primary students will work together as a class group to seek for information on the sloth. A variety of resources and formats will be used with notes recorded on an information wheel graphic organizer.
• Literature Circles with Primary Students
  This lesson from ReadWriteThink is a structured guideline for helping students learn to think about the books they read, and to ask questions about books shared by other students. It is especially appropriate for mixed-age and upper primary classes, or for cross-grade buddy work.
• Mapping Our Worlds
  Students explore the world of maps and learn how to view the world around them in a two-dimensional format. They begin by depicting the familiar terrain of their favorite rooms. In order to understand the concept of boundaries, they then create maps of areas within their classroom. To reinforce the relationship of small to large and the concept of one area nesting within another, students then compare a series of online geographical maps, beginning with a map of their home state and ending with a map of the world.
• Martin Luther King, Jr. and Me: Identifying with a Hero
  Martin Luther King, Jr. Day provides a great opportunity to teach about heroes. This lesson explores ways to help students identify with Dr. King - an American hero who lived and died long before they were even born - through reading, writing, listening, and speaking activities that provide a glimpse into Dr. King's life. Students record what they know about Dr. King on a KWL chart. They then read aloud the picture book My Brother Martin: A Sister Remembers and add information to the KWL. They take a virtual tour of King's birth home and compare it to their own homes. Throughout the week, they explore Websites and other sources of information about Dr. King, record new information on the KWL chart, and keep a journal of their own thoughts and ideas. As a culminating activity, they plan a birthday party for Dr. King to celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
• Native American Cultures Across the U.S.
  This lesson discusses the differences between five Native American tribes within the U.S. Students will learn about customs and traditions such as housing, agriculture, and ceremonial dress for the Tlingit, Dine, Lakota, Muscogee, and Iroquois peoples.
• Portrait of a Hero
  Through the series of interactive activities, students will explore their beliefs about heroes and heroism. They will share names of familiar figures they consider to be heroes, and then closely examine their reasons for believing each one is a hero. Students will then view portraits of heroes from American history, and glean a bit of background information on each one.
• Silly Billy's World
  Lesson plans for 5 well-known children's read-aloud books on plants/seeds that encourage literature, writing and language skills from the common core.
• Stars and Stripes Forever: Flag Facts for Flag Day
  In this unit from EDSITEment, students learn what a symbol is while developing their understanding of how one particular symbol, the American Flag, plays an important role in the everyday lives of American citizens. An additional lesson, geared specifically to grade 2 students, focuses on the words and phrases contained within the Pledge of Allegiance. From this introductory page, teachers can access archival images needed to complete the unit.
• Stories in Quilts
  Heighten your students' awareness of how quilts tell stories that reflect the lives of the people who create them, and that record the cultural history of a particular place and time. Students will be able to understand how quilts and other cloth-based art forms are used to preserve family and community traditions and recognize that people of different countries and cultures use cloth-based art forms to pass down their traditions and history.
• The Meaning Behind the Mask
  Students explore the cultural significance of masks, discuss the use of masks in stories, and then investigate the role masks play in ceremonies and on special occasions in various African cultures. After students have studied these masks, they are then given an opportunity to choose a familiar story and make simple masks to perform the story.
• Under the Deep Blue Sea
  In this lesson, students have the opportunity to explore oceans and ocean life. Through creative writing and research projects, students will learn about the ocean and the creatures that live there. This resource is located on the Edsitement website.
• Unicorns, Dragons, and Other Magical Creatures
  This lesson will explore images of magical creatures from around the world. After discussing the special attributes of such creatures, students will view images of specific mythological creatures from two cultures--a unicorn from the South Netherlands and a dragon from Korea--and listen to stories about them. Finally, students will create puppets representing magical creatures of their own invention, or ones based on the creatures they've learned about, and put on puppet shows, dramatizing original stories about their creatures.
• Using Folk Tales: Vowel Influences on the Letter G
  In this lesson from ReadWriteThink, students are introduced to the irregular spelling pattern of hard and soft g at the beginning of words, using the folk tale genre. Students use the Internet to find and categorize animal names that begin with the letter g, and they also read a story about a giant.
• What's the Difference? Beginning Writers Compare E-mail with Letter Writing
  Students will compare an e-mail message and a letter on the same topic and discuss how they are written differently and why; recognize differences in the form and function of the two genres and how these differences impact communication style and conventions; develop their understanding of the choices they must make as writers with respect to the appropriate form, function, and audience for different kinds of communication.

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http://www.uen.org - in partnership with Utah State Board of Education (USBE) and Utah System of Higher Education (USHE).  Send questions or comments to USBE Specialist - Sara  Wiebke and see the Language Arts - Elementary website. For general questions about Utah's Core Standards contact the Director - Jennifer  Throndsen.

These materials have been produced by and for the teachers of the State of Utah. Copies of these materials may be freely reproduced for teacher and classroom use. When distributing these materials, credit should be given to Utah State Board of Education. These materials may not be published, in whole or part, or in any other format, without the written permission of the Utah State Board of Education, 250 East 500 South, PO Box 144200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84114-4200.