Text Type: Nonfiction/Descriptive
Page Count: 10
Word Count: 62

Book Summary
What can you pretend to be? This book prompts students to think imaginatively and comparatively as they describe themselves. Students will learn descriptive words that relate to themselves as well as to individual animals. Detailed, supportive illustrations and repetitive phrases support early readers.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Visualize

Objectives

• Use the reading strategy of visualizing to understand the text
• Identify reality/fantasy in ideas, situations, and events
• Listen for and discriminate initial consonant /s/ sound
• Identify initial consonant Ss
• Recognize I as a simple subject in a sentence
• Recognize and use high-frequency words

Materials

• Book -- I Can Be (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Visualize, reality and fantasy, initial consonant Ss, high-frequency words, worksheets
• Discussion cards

      Indicates an opportunity for students to mark in the book. (All activities may be demonstrated by projecting book on interactive whiteboard or completed with paper and pencil if books are reused.)

Vocabulary

• High-frequency words: as, be, can, I, like, many, me
• Content words: also, cheetah, fast, just, lion, loud, meek, mouse, peacock, proud, silent, slow, slug, snake

Build Background

• Print the words loud, silent, proud, meek, fast, and slow in a column on the board. Use a different color for each word. Point to each word as you read it aloud to students. Repeat the process once and then have students say each word aloud as you point to it. Hand out cards with the same words printed on them. Say: This word is loud. Find loud and match loud. Students hear the word and see it repeatedly, which aids memory. Continue the process with silent, proud, meek, fast, and slow, repeating the target word multiple times within the directive as modeled above.
• Define the word meek as quiet, gentle, mild, timid, and letting others tell you how to act; show meek with your face and body language (shoulders slightly slumped, head tilted to one side, eyes looking up and away from the group). Define proud as feeling good about who you are or what you have done. Show proud with your face and body language (shoulders back, standing tall, making strong eye contact as you look around the room). Point out that meek and proud are opposites, just as loud and silent are opposites, and fast and slow are opposites. Ask students to name things that are loud, silent, proud, meek, fast, slow. Write these items to the right of the adjective words you've already listed in the left-hand column. These items may or may not be animals.

Book Walk

Introduce the Book

• Show students the front and back covers of the book and read the title with them. Ask what they think they might read about in a book called I Can Be. (Accept all answers that students can justify.)
• Show students the title page. Discuss the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name).
• Write the following repetitive sentence on the board: I can be as _____ as a ____. Read the sentence aloud, pointing to the words as you read them to students. Have students read them aloud; individuals can do this in unison as choral reading or as repeated reading. Explain that these words repeat throughout the book.

Introduce the Reading Strategy: Visualize

• Explain to students that good readers see pictures in their mind while they read. This is called visualizing. Remind students that seeing pictures in their mind while they read will help them understand and remember what they read.
• Model visualizing by talking about what you imagine in your mind while looking at the information on the cover. When I look at the cover and title of this story, I see pictures in my mind. I see myself being lots of different things: an astronaut floating in space (pause), a runner winning a race (pause), a pilot flying a plane (pause), an old man using a cane (pause), a whale deep in the sea (pause), and a princess eating a pea!
• Explain to students that in this book, they will imagine themselves being like some animals. They will visualize, or see pictures in their mind, of animals that are loud, slow, silent, proud, fast, and meek. Write the following words on the board (or have them pre-written on chart paper): lion, snake, peacock, mouse, cheetah, slug in the same order in which the words occur in the story. Point to each word as you read them aloud with students. (You can also choose to write the animal names to the right of the adjectives you wrote in a column earlier. This will reinforce the word combinations that will occur in the sentences in the story as they appear.)
• Think-aloud: I know that when I read, I can look at the pictures in the story, and I can make my own pictures in my mind. When I read about a lion, I can make him big, and scary, sitting still and lifting his head to roar loudly. (pause) I can see his furry yellow mane all around his head and the long claws on his paws. (pause) Or I can see him running across the grass chasing a zebra. Or I can choose to see him in a cage at the zoo, pacing back and forth, watching me. I can make these pictures in my mind as I read the story. Turn to your neighbor and tell what the lion in your mind looks like and is doing. (Allow 30 seconds for each student to tell his/her partner what he/she imagines.) Seeing pictures in your mind when you read a story is called visualizing.
• If time allows, ask students what they see in their mind when they hear the words snake, peacock, mouse, cheetah, and slug. Ask students to practice seeing pictures in their mind. Have them keep their eyes closed and simply raise their hand to signal if they see a picture of each word in their mind as you name it. You may need to have sample pictures available, particularly for slug, cheetah and peacock because some students have not seen these animals in books or in real life.
• 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 Comprehension Skill: Reality/fantasy

• Explain to students that books can be about real things or about things in our imagination. Read the title again to students. Explain that the title often provides clues that let us know if the book is about facts, information, and real things, or if the book is about made-up things that we would only imagine in our mind. When something is made up and imagined only in our mind, it is called fantasy or make-believe. Invite students to share predictions about this book based on the cover and title.
• Explain to students that this book is about a little girl who imagines herself being like some animals. She imagines animals that are loud, slow, silent, proud, fast, and meek.
  Think-aloud: When I read the title on the cover, it makes me think of all the things I can pretend to be. When I pretend, it's not real. I can make believe I'm a roaring lion in a cage at the zoo, a proud peacock strutting its stuff with its feathers flared, and a slithering snake sliding across the soggy soil. I can also pretend to be a meek mouse moving along a wall looking for a morsel of food, (pause and demonstrate), a fast cheetah running across African grasslands, or a slow slug inching my way across a large leaf of lettuce (match your voice, facial movements and gestures with each description). Sometimes you like to pretend when you are in the play area. Your mommy is real, but when you pretend to be a mommy feeding the baby doll, that is fantasy or make-believe. Firefighters you see on the news who put out fires are real. But when you pretend to be a firefighter, that is called fantasy or make-believe because it's not really what you are right now. Adults drive cars all the time; that is real. But when you pretend to drive a car, that's not real. That is fantasy. Pretending, make-believe, and fantasy are not real, but they help us to think, imagine, and remember what we read.

Introduce the Vocabulary

• While previewing the book, reinforce the vocabulary words students will encounter. While looking at the picture on page 4 say: Look at this picture on page 4. Is this like the lion you saw in your mind? How is the picture like the lion you imagined? How is the picture different from the lion you imagined while you were visualizing? How is the picture like other lions you have seen in real life or in other pictures?
• Remind students to look at the picture and the letters with which a word begins or ends to figure out a difficult word. For example, point to the word snake on page 5 and say: I am going to check the picture and think about what would make sense to figure out this word. The picture shows the girl laying in bed and her body looks like a the body of a snake underneath her blanket. When I look at the first part of the word, it starts with /s/. The picture of the girl's snake-like body is a clue for me, and the /s/ sound at the beginning makes me think the word might be snake. There is the /k/ sound near the end of the word, so now I am pretty sure the word is snake. The sentence makes sense with this word. The word must be snake. Repeat this procedure for the animal names on each page.
• For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words and word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students visualize by making a picture in their head as they read.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Give students their copy of the book. Ask them to place a finger on the page number in the bottom corner of the page. Have them read to the end of page 3, using their finger to point to each word as they read. Encourage students who finish before others to reread the text.
• Model visualizing.
  Think-aloud: On page 3, I see a little girl who looks as if she is thinking. I know that people's eyes go up and off to the side when they think (demonstrate). Sometimes people prop their hand under their chin while they think, like this. So when I look at this picture, I visualize the act of thinking and can use that image when I read future stories. Invite students to show or tell how they visualize thinking.
• Review the main idea of the book: People can pretend to be many things. Look at page 4 and read the words with students, pointing to each word as it is read. Ask: Is the picture of a real lion or a girl pretending to be a lion? How do you know?
• Introduce and explain the visualize worksheet. Write the sentence I can be a _____. on the board. Have students copy this sentence in the smaller box at the bottom of their worksheet as it is, including the blank. Then ask students to draw a picture that shows something they can pretend to be in the box at the top of their worksheet. After they have drawn their fantasy picture, have students use their knowledge of sounds to fill in the blank in the sentence so their sentence tells about their picture. Encourage them to pair body movements or gestures to accompany their verbal descriptions of their pictures as they explain them. When students tell others in the group about their picture, ask each: How does your picture show this is fantasy and not real? Or: How does your picture show what is real and what is fantasy?
• Check for understanding: Have students read to the end of page 7. Encourage them to tell if the accompanying pictures show reality or fantasy and explain how they know.
• Have students read the remainder of the book. Remind them to use what they already know about reality and fantasy to help them understand new information as they read.

      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.

• 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.

Reflect on the Reading Strategy

• Think-aloud: When I read page 5, I visualize a little green snake I once saw in my garden and a big black snake I once saw in a tree. I can see them in my mind. That helps me know what the little girl in the picture is visualizing.
• Ask students to explain how visualizing -- seeing pictures in their mind -- helps them to understand, and then remember, the story. Explain to them that visualizing can also help us to set personal goals. Sometimes we want to set a goal for ourselves, such as riding a bike without training wheels. We need to see ourselves doing it in our mind. If we actually practice what we see ourselves doing, we can reach our goal. We can learn to ride that bike with no training wheels.

Reflect on the Comprehension Skill

• Discussion: Review what students drew on their visualize worksheet. Ask them to explain whether their picture represents reality or fantasy and why. Ask students to explain how thinking about reality and fantasy -- or what is real and what is make-believe -- helps them to understand, and then remember, the story. Accept individual answers.
• Compile the pictures students have drawn into a student book. Allow students to check the book out of the classroom library to be read aloud at home (See Descriptive Writing Connection under Extend the Reading at the end of this lesson).
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the reality and fantasy worksheet as reinforcement for this skill.
• Enduring understanding: In this book, you learned about reality and fantasy. Why is it important to be able to pretend and imagine in your mind? Sometimes we remember ideas better if we can be creative and imagine new connections in our mind. At other times, we need to focus on what is true and real. Knowing the difference between reality and fantasy helps us to be stronger thinkers and readers.

Phonological Awareness: Discriminate initial consonant /s/ sound

• Say the word silent aloud to students, emphasizing the initial /s/ sound. Have students say the word aloud and then say the /s/ sound. Repeat with snake, slow, and slug.
• Read pages 5 and 9 aloud to students. Have them raise their hand when they hear a word that begins with the /s/ sound.
• Check for understanding: Say the following words one at a time and have students give the thumbs-up signal if the word begins with the /s/ sound: loud, sip, mailman, sock, sorry, little, said, suit, moose, sell.

Phonics: Identify initial consonant Ss

• Write the words silent, snake, slow, and slug on the board and say each word aloud with students.
• Have students say the /s/ sound aloud. Then run your finger under the letters in each word as students say the whole word aloud. Ask students to identify which letter represents the /s/ sound in word. Have students trace Ss on their neighbor's back while making the /s/ sound. Ask students to use big arm movements to write Ss in the air while making the /s/ sound.
• Have students practice writing the letter Ss on a separate piece of paper while saying the sound. Students experiencing difficulty with letter formation may benefit from tracing the letter in the air or on a wall, textured carpet square, sandpaper/salt tray, or the back of a friend. This provides a visual-spatial and textured space on which to practice feeling the letter as it is traced.
• Check for understanding: Write the following words that begin with the /s/ sound on the board, leaving off the initial consonant: silent, snake, slug, slow. Read each word, one at a time, and have volunteers come to the board to add the initial Ss to each word.
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the initial consonant Ss worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.

Grammar and Mechanics: Simple subject

• Write the following sentence on the board: I can be as slow as a slug. Read the sentence aloud with students.
• Explain that a simple subject of a sentence is who or what the sentence is about. Say: In the sentences in this story, the simple subject is I because the little girl in the story is telling about herself. She is the subject of the story, so she tells the story in her own words, starting each sentence with I. When you tell a story about yourself, you use the word I to start your sentences. I is the simple subject of each sentence when you tell something about yourself.
• Reread the sentence aloud to students. Emphasize the word I.
• Ask volunteers to ask make a sentence using the simple subject I. Write each sentence on the board. Circle the simple subject I in each sentence.

      Check for understanding: Have students locate and circle all the simple subjects I in the story. Have them read the sentences to a partner.

Word Work: High-frequency words

• Tell students they are going to learn words that they will often see in books they read. Using different colors, write the words: as, be, can, I, like, many, and me on the board (or have them pre-written on chart paper) and read the words aloud. Have students read each word with you.
• Ask students to write the word as on the top of their desk with their finger as you spell it aloud with them, pointing to each letter on the board as you say the letter name with students. Repeat for be, can, I, like, many, and me. You can also ask students to write these words in the air or on the back of a partner.
• Read the first sentence on page 3 aloud to students. Point to the word like. Explain that the word like is often used to explain which object is the same as, or similar to, another. A panther is like a lion. A dog is like a wolf. Like can also mean preferring or enjoying, as in: "I like chocolate ice cream" or "I like kittens more than puppies." Have students use the word like in oral sentences with a partner.

      Check for understanding: Using different colored pencils, crayons, or highlighters, have students locate and highlight every occurrence of the word like in the book. Have them write the word like on a separate piece of paper several times. Then have each student use the word like in an oral sentence. Repeat the exercise with the words be, can, many (page 3), as (page 4), and me (page 10).

• Independent practice: Introduce, explain and have students complete the high-frequency words worksheet.

Independent Reading

• Allow students to read their book independently. Additionally, partners can take turns reading parts of the book to each other.

Home Connection

• Give students their book to take home to read with parents, caregivers, siblings, or friends. Have them identify what is real and what is fantasy for the listener.

Descriptive Writing Connection
When students have finished their visualize worksheet, collect and bind all the worksheets into as a class book that can be sent home on a rotating basis for each child to read aloud to a parent or sibling. Students who take an interest in or who are developmentally ready for the challenge can create their own I Can Be books in the same format as the original. They can choose six animals from the T-chart created during the Science Connection and use the accompanying adjective for each animal to complete I can be a____. for each page.

Science Connection
Using chart paper, create a T-chart that can be hung in the room for future reference. Across the top, title the chart Animals. Have students list animal names in the column on the right. After you have written a dozen animals, go back and read each animal name, pausing for students to add a word that describes that animal, which you can write in the left column. For example, you might elicit: striped tiger, fluffy chick, brown bunny, grizzly bear, stinky skunk, spotted gecko, woolly llama. Students may want to search magazines for pictures to be cut and pasted on the chart. An additional related activity is to cut out dozens of animal pictures and categorize them into groups according to similar features by gluing them on separate 11 X 17 pieces of construction paper. Groups might include animals that have feathers, animals that swim, animals with four legs, animals that make good pets, animals that lay eggs, and so on. Small groups of students can think up their own categories and labels rather than you supplying the labels and having students fit animals into each group.

Skill Review
Discussion cards covering comprehension skills and strategies not explicitly taught with the book are provided as an extension activity. The following is a list of some ways these cards can be used with students:

• Use as discussion starters for literature circles.
• Have students choose one or more cards and write a response, either as an essay or a journal entry.
• Distribute before reading the book and have students use one of the questions as a purpose for reading.
• Cut apart and use the cards as game cards with a board game.
• Conduct a class discussion as a review before the book quiz.