About the Book

Text Type: Nonfiction/Concept Book
Page Count: 10
Word Count: 16

Book Summary
Readers will love seeing their favorite pets, from bunnies to turtles, in this simple early reader. One-to-one picture correspondence, simple text, and familiar creatures will help children recognize the printed words for the animals they find in their homes.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Make, revise, and confirm predictions

Objectives

• Make logical predictions based on text/picture information
• Classify information and vocabulary from the text
• Discriminate medial sounds
• Associate the letter Ee with the short vowel sound /e/
• Recognize naming words
• Categorize words

Materials

• Book -- Pets (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Classify information, short /e/ worksheets
• Word journal (optional)

Indicates an opportunity for student to mark in the book. (All activities may be completed with paper and pencil if books are reusable.)

Vocabulary

• High-frequency word: the
• Content words: pets, cat, dog, bunny, bird, goldfish, mouse, turtle, hamster

Before Reading

Build Background

• Ask students if they have ever had a pet or would like to have a pet. Discuss the types of pets they have had, what makes a good pet, and why people have pets.

Book Walk

Introduce the Book

• Show students the front and back covers of the book and read the title with them. Ask them what they might read about in a book called Pets. (Accept any answers students can justify).
• Show students the title page. Discuss the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name).

Introduce the Reading Strategy: Make, revise, and confirm predictions

• Explain that good readers make predictions, or guesses, about what will happen in a story. Explain that making predictions can help people make decisions, solve problems, and learn new information. Emphasize that making predictions is more important than whether the prediction is right, or confirmed.
• Model how to make predictions about the book based on the cover information.
• Think-aloud: The title of this book is Pets. The pictures show a bunny and a cat. I predict that this book will tell me about different kinds of pets. Besides the bunny and the cat, I think there will be a dog in the book because dogs are very popular pets.
• Ask students to predict other animals that might be in a book about pets.
• As students read, encourage them to use other reading strategies in addition to the targeted strategy presented in this section. For tips on additional reading strategies, click here.

Introduce the Vocabulary

• Reinforce new vocabulary and word-attack strategies by pointing to something in the picture, such as the bird. Ask students what sound they hear at the beginning of the word. Ask what sound they hear at the end of the word. Have students find the word bird on the page and tell you how they know the word is bird. Repeat with other vocabulary words if necessary.
• Remind students to look at the beginning and ending sounds, and other parts that they recognize, to help them sound out words. They should also check whether the word makes sense by looking at the picture or rereading the sentence.
• For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words or word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students read to find out which animals people have as pets.

During Reading

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Give students their copy of the book. Have a volunteer point to the first word on page 3. Read the word together (The). Point out where to begin reading on each page. Remind students to read words from left to right. Point to each word as you read it aloud while students follow along in their own book.
• Ask students to place a finger on the page number in the bottom corner of the page. Have them read to the end of page 5, using their finger to point to each word as they read. Encourage students who finish before others to reread the text.
• Ask students which animals are listed as pets so far in the book.
• Think-aloud: I predicted that a dog would be a pet listed in the book. I was correct. When I think about pets my friends have, I also think about fish. I think this will be another pet in the book.
• Have students read the remainder of the book to check their prediction.

Have students make a small question mark in their book beside any word they do not understand or cannot pronounce. These can be addressed in the discussion that follows.

After Reading

Reflect on the Reading Strategy

• Ask students what words, if any, they marked in their book. Use this opportunity to model how they can read these words using decoding strategies and context clues. Point out the word bird. Ask students how they knew the word was bird and not bunny. Reinforce that the word ends with /d/ and the picture confirmed their decoding.
• Ask students what animals they predicted were in the book. Reinforce that making predictions about what they read helps them think about the text.
• Think-aloud: Making predictions makes me think about what I am reading. I read on because I want to see if my predictions are right.

Teach the Comprehension Skill: Classify information

• Discussion: Tell students that good readers often organize, or classify, information into groups. Explain that this strategy helps readers understand what they're reading.
• Introduce and model the skill: Ask students to recall the previous discussion about pets. Show students the front and back covers of the book again. Point to the pictures of the bunny and cat. Explain that both animals belong to a group called pets. Explain that we can organize information by placing things that are in the same group together. A bunny and a cat can both be pets, so we can put them in the same group or category.
• Check for understanding: Have students brainstorm animals that can be pets. Write the names of these animals in a list on the board. Encourage students to explain their reasoning. Point out that some animals are wild or endangered and cannot be kept as pets.
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the classify information worksheet. Discuss their responses.

Extend the discussion: Instruct students to use the last page of their book to draw a picture of a pet they have or would like to have. Have students share their pictures with the group.

Build Skills

Phonological Awareness: Discriminate medial sounds

• Say the words pet and ten. Have students repeat the words. Tell them the sound in the middle of both words is the same sound: /e/. Have students repeat the words and listen for the /e/ sound.
• Tell students you are going to say groups of two words. Have them listen carefully and tell you whether the middle sounds in the two words are the same or different. Say the following pairs of words: pig/fit; man/men; top/pot; hen/hide; sun/hot; tip/let; met/peg; web/like; leg/log.

Phonics: Short /e/

• Write the lower- and uppercase letter Ee on the board. Ask students to name the letter. Tell them that the letter e stands for the short /e/ vowel sound they can hear in the middle of the word pet.
• Write the word pet on the board. Underline the e. Model sounding out the word by running your finger under the letters while you blend the sounds: /p/ /e/ /t/. Have students blend the word with you.
• Then write the words hen, bet, get, ten, and met on the board. Have students blend the sounds in each word with you while you run your finger under the letters.
• Ask individual students to come to the board and circle the letter that stands for the short /e/ vowel sound in the words.
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the short /e/ worksheet. When students have completed the worksheet, discuss their answers.

Grammar and Mechanics: Naming words (nouns)

• Tell students that there are special words that name people, places, and things. Provide some examples from the book, say: A bunny names an animal or thing. Can you find any other words in the book that name an animal or thing? Reinforce that all of the pets in the book are naming words.

Word Work: Categorize words

• Refer to the names of the animals in the book and review how students grouped these under the category of pets during the Teach the Comprehension skill section. Tell students you can group these animals into other categories. Make a two-column chart on the board with the headings: Fur and No Fur. Have students look at each animal in the book and tell you under which heading to place the animal. Continue sorting using other categories, such as: tail/no tail; lives on land/lives in water, and so on.

Build Fluency

Independent Reading

• Allow students to read their book independently or with a partner. Additionally, partners can take turns reading part of the book.

Home Connection

• Give students their book to take home to read with parents, caregivers, siblings, or friends.

Extend the Reading

Writing and Art Connection
Discuss pets that students would like to have. Record the list on the board. Write the sentence I would like to have a ____. Tell students to choose a pet they would like to have. Instruct students to copy the sentence on their paper and draw a picture of the pet. Display on a class "Pets" bulletin board.

Science Connection
Provide magazines that students can cut pictures from. Make labels for three groups of animals on butcher paper: Pets That Fly, Pets That Live in Water, and Pets That Have Fur. Ask students to paste pictures for each group on the paper.

Assessment

Monitor students to determine if they can:

• make logical predictions based on available text information; revise and confirm predictions as they read
• accurately classify animals into correct groups during discussion and on a worksheet
• tell which words have the same middle sound during discussion
• associate the letter e with the short vowel sound /e/ and read some three-letter words with short /e/
• understand that some words name things and recognize them in the text
• correctly categorize words during discussion

Comprehension Check

• Retelling Rubric

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