Text Type: Fiction/Mystery
Page Count: 16
Word Count: 313

Book Summary
Erica and her dad ride their bikes to the bakery on Saturday morning to get a hot cinnamon bun. When Erica asks the baker for her usual, she learns that a lady just bought all the cinnamon buns. Erica and her Dad set out to discover who bought all the buns and why.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Ask questions

Objectives                                                                                     

• Use the reading strategy of asking questions to understand text
• Identify the problem and solution
• Manipulate final sounds
• Understand that y may represent the long /e/ sound
• Recognize and understand the present verb tense
• Recognize and understand position words

Materials

• Book -- The Cinnamon Bun Mystery (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Problem and solution, long /e/, prepositions worksheets

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 words: always, gets, says, they, when, know, where, saw, down, after, their, from, Then, come
• Content words: Erica, bakery, usual, Mr. Hoffman, baker, polka-dot, scooter, art center, Mrs. Garcia

Build Background

• Ask students if they've ever been to a bakery. Have them describe their favorite baked treats. Invite students to talk about edible treats they enjoy on special occasions, such as birthday cake at birthday parties or Halloween candy on Halloween.

Book Walk

Introduce the Book

• Show students the front and back covers of the book and read the title with them. Ask students to predict what they think the cinnamon bun mystery might be about based on the cover illustrations.
• Engage students in a discussion about mysteries. Ask students to tell what they think a mystery is (an event or situation that is hard to understand or explain).
• Review the title page. Talk about the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name).
• Preview the book up to page 10, inviting students to look at the pictures. Encourage student predictions as they preview the pictures.

Introduce the Strategy: Ask questions

• Review or explain that good readers often ask themselves I wonderÉ questions before and during reading. This strategy helps them better understand and remember information in the book.
• Use the picture of Erica and the baker on the front cover to model self-questioning.
  Think-aloud: The girl on the cover looks concerned about the empty tray where the cinnamon buns should be. I wonder why the tray is empty, and I wonder what the girl will do about the missing buns. I'll have to read the book to find the answers to my questions.
• Encourage students to share any questions they may have about the cinnamon bun mystery based on the pictures on the covers.
• 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

• Continue previewing the book, inviting students to talk about what they see in the pictures. Reinforce the vocabulary words they will encounter in the text. For example, while looking at the pictures on pages 8 and 9, you might engage students in a conversation in which they use the vocabulary word polka-dot.
• Model for students the strategies they can use to work out words they don't know. For example, point to the word bakery on page 3. Model using the familiar word part bake and context clues in the other sentences on the page to help students determine where the girl always goes on Saturday to get a hot cinnamon bun (to the bakery). Then read the sentence to students and ask if the word bakery makes sense and looks right. Remind students that they should always check whether a word makes sense by rereading the sentence in which it appears.
• For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words or word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students read the book to find out what happened to the cinnamon buns. Remind them to ask themselves I wonder questions as they read.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Give students their books and have them put a sticky note on page 9. Tell them to read to the end of this page. Encourage students who finish before everyone else to reread the text to find out more about the cinnamon bun mystery.
• When students have finished reading, ask why they think Erica is so intent on finding the cinnamon buns. (Accept answers that show students have thought about what they are reading).
• Model self-questioning.
  Think-aloud: On page 7, Erica's dad says that a lady with a big bag just came out of the bakery. I wonder if the lady is the one who bought all the cinnamon buns. I'm going to have to finish reading the book to find out.
• Have students read the remainder of the book. Encourage them to ask themselves I wonderÉ questions as they read.

Have students make a question mark in their books beside any word they do not understand or cannot pronounce. Encourage them to use the strategies they have learned to read and understand the word.

Reflect on the Reading Strategies

• Ask student what words, if any, they marked in their books. Use this opportunity to model how they can read these words using decoding strategies and context clues.
• Ask students to share examples of I wonderÉ questions they asked themselves while reading. Ask if they were able to find the answers to any of their questions.
• Model asking questions and finding answers.
  Think-aloud: When Erica and her dad went into the art center and found the empty bag on page 14, I wondered if Erica was going to ask the lady if she could buy a cinnamon bun from her. But later, when I realized that the lady was Erica's teacher from the art center, my questions were answered. Erica found out who bought the buns; it was the lady with the big bag, and she didn't have to buy a cinnamon bun because Mrs. Garcia offered her one.

Teach the Comprehension Skill: Problem and solution

• Discussion: Ask students if they were surprised to find out that Erica knew the woman who bought all the cinnamon buns. Ask how the ending might have been different if Erica had not known the person who bought the cinnamon buns.
• Introduce and model the skill: Review or explain that in The Cinnamon Bun Mystery, as in most mysteries, there is a problem and a solution. On the board, draw a two-box vertical flow chart labeled Problem and Solution. Explain that stories typically have a problem and a solution. The problem is what is wrong, and the solution is what fixes the problem. Use a familiar example to fill in the flow chart with simple descriptions. For example, under Problem, write: I forgot my lunch at home this morning. Under Solution, write: I bought a school lunch in the cafeteria.
• Check for understanding: Ask students to identify Erica's problem in the story (someone bought all the cinnamon buns). Have them explain how she solved her problem (she found out who bought them).
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the problem and solution worksheet.
• Extend the discussion: Invite students to evaluate what they would have done if they had gone to the bakery and found their usual favorite treat missing.

Phonemic Awareness: Manipulate final sounds

• Tell students you are going to say some words from the story. Explain that you want them to say each word without the ending sound. For example, say big without /g/ (big).
• Have students practice omitting the final sound in each of the following words: bun (bu), just (jus), bag (ba), went (wen), past (pas), turn (tur), front (fron), down (dow), room (roo), and art (ar).

Phonics: Identify open vowel /y/

• Write the words bakery and lady on the board and ask students to identify the final/ending sound of the words (long /e/). Point to the letter y and explain that it stands for the long /e/ vowel sound. Have students brainstorm other examples of words that end with the long /e/ vowel sound and record them on the board (baby, city, daddy, many).
• Write the words fry and spy on the board. Invite students to explain what is different about the final sounds in these words (long /i/ sound). Explain that the letter y also stands for the long /i/ vowel sound in some words. Have students brainstorm other examples of words that end with the long /i/ vowel sound (by, cry, fly, my, try).
• Have students complete the phonics worksheet.

Grammar and Mechanics: Present tense

• Review or explain that a verb is one or more words that express an action, a happening, a state of being, or a process. The tense of the verb indicates when in time the action takes place.
• Write the following sentence from page 3 on the board: It is Saturday morning. Ask if the sentence indicates that it is Saturday now (present tense) or in the past (past tense). Have students determine how the author would have written the sentence using past tense. (It was Saturday morning.)
• Write the following present-tense examples from the book on the board and invite volunteers to change the examples to past tense: Bye, Mom, Erica says (said) as she runs (ran) out the door (page 4); Erica jumps (jumped) on her bike, and they ride (rode) to the bakery (page 5); They see (saw) a black scooter in front of the art center (page 12).

Vocabulary: Position words (prepositions)

• Review or explain that special position words, called prepositions are used to tell something's position.
• For example, explain that the first sentence on page 4 tells that Erica is leaving her house rather than arriving. Ask students which word explains where Erica is going (out). Explain that out is a proposition.
• Have students turn to page 5. Ask them to tell where Erica's dad waits (on the sidewalk). Discuss that the phrase on the sidewalk describes where Erica's dad is. Have students name the preposition (on).
• Write the prepositions after, before, down, and up on the board. Have students take turns using the words in sentences to show where things are.
• Introduce, explain, and have students complete the prepositions worksheet.

Independent Reading

• Allow students to read their books independently or with a partner. Encourage repeated timed readings of a specific section of the book. Additionally, partners can take turns reading parts of the book to each other.

Home Connection

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

Writing and Art Connection

• Have students draw a picture of their favorite bakery treat on the last page of the book and write a short personal account in present tense about themselves and the bakery treat.

Social Studies Connection

• Arrange for a field trip to a local bakery. If students are able to observe a baking process, incorporate a lesson on procedural text (How to bake a. . . ) after the observation.

• accurately demonstrate self-questioning while reading the story
• identify the problem and solution in the story
• hear and omit the final sound in words said orally
• understand that y may represent the long /e/ vowel sound at the end of a word
• understand that verb tense indicates when something happens
• understand and recognize words that indicate position

Comprehension Checks

• Book Quiz
• Retelling Rubric