Families Level I
Text Type: Nonfiction • Word Count: 312

Book Summary
Families is a book about various members who can make up a family and how they are related. Since family structure can vary drastically these days, children may benefit from understanding the variety that exists. Children may learn from this book that no matter what their family tree may look like, their family is theirs and that means it's special.

Reader Supports

• One-to-one picture correspondence
  
• Familiar topic
  
• Repetitive patterns
  
• Repetition of high utility and content words
  

Reader Challenges

• Unfamiliar story words
  
• Unfamiliar topic
  

Lesson Objectives

Reading Strategies
Children should use a variety of strategies to decode words and bring meaning to print. The targeted strategy for this lesson is: Look inside out for word parts that help establish meaning.
As we know, families today can have many stepparents and stepsiblings, as well as half siblings. If these concepts are unfamiliar, it may be easier to look inside the word for a word that is familiar, then add on the prefix. Children may need to go back, reread, and summarize to be sure they comprehend what the author is teaching them. This will help establish meaning as they move on through the text. For others, the concepts in the book will be easier, and making connections will help them as they decode and establish meaning.

Word and Print Skills
Phonological Awareness
gr is grrrr
Focusing on the words great and grandma discuss with children that gr blends together to sound like grrrr.

Phonics
S plural vs. ’s possessive
Have children look for words that end in s. This is a good story to discuss the difference between plural and apostrophe s used as a possessive. Some examples of plural s are relatives: grandparents, parents, brothers, sisters, aunts, and uncles. Families can be used; however the -ies- makes the plural form more complicated.
Some examples of apostrophe s are mother’s, father’s, and people’s.

Word Work
High Utility Words
your, many, know, before, their

Punctuation
Recognizing that there are types punctuation other than final punctuation.

Comprehension
You will likely address a number of comprehension skills as children work to understand the text. The targeted comprehension strategy for this lesson is: Sequencing.

• As shown on page 16 in the book. This is a wonderful book to introduce the idea of family trees. Creating a family tree will help children gain a sense of belonging and feeling of pride in their family.

Visual Learning
Children will notice details in the pictures and the graphic organizers that will help reinforce vocabulary and help them understand the text.

Targeted Vocabulary Words
High Utility Words
your, many, know, before, their

Content Words
The names of all family members in this book are words that you may want to go over and discuss with children before having them read independently. These are words that can be put on a list or added to a class word wall or dictionary, if applicable.