Language Learning in Grade 6

I seem to write often about what we are covering math, less so about what we do in Language! I thought I should write a post about what we have been doing lately in our language class. 

Since the New Year, we have been learning about the reading strategy of Making Connections in Language. We teach students to make connections in order to better relate to the text and better understand it. There are 3 types of connections that we generally make:

1. Text to Text - when we relate what we are reading to another book or text we have read
2. Text to Self - when we relate what we are reading to an event that has happened in our own lives
3. Text to World - when we relate what we are  reading to something that we know about that has happened in the world. 

In class we read a story called "Ryan and Jimmy and the Well in Africa that Brought them Together". This was read as a read aloud - I read it to the class - and had students answer questions about the story in their notebooks. This is an excellent, true story about a boy from Kemptville who has started a foundation to help provide clean water to thousands of people around the world. Students were able to make many connections to the text because it is similar to the founders of the ME to We movement, of which our students are very aware. 

We have also been reading Tuck Everlasting in class. In this story, we are learning that not everything that seems perfect is so. We read the story together and answered questions in pairs, groups and individuals. We are going to be completing a book summary of the story in the coming week. The students really seemed to enjoy this story. 

We have also been learning about formal letter writing and how it is different from writing a friendly letter. We have written a letter together as a class, have written letters with a partner and now will be writing a letter to Ryan and Jimmy asking them to come to the school to speak to our class. 

As part of Media, we will be reading a poster called "Are You Water Wise?" and making posters of our own to promote water conservation in our homes. We will be discussing some of the elements that advertisers use to gain our attention and make posters stick out in reader's minds. 

Our next language unit will focus on the strategy of Predicting. In this unit we will be reading a newspaper written from a pet's point of view and writing news articles of our own.