Text Type: Fiction/Fantasy
Page Count: 20
Word Count: 1,727 

Book Summary
Morty is back in another episode of tomfoolery. When Morty's sister makes him mad, he decides to play a trick on her. But when the trick results in an embarrassing moment for his sister, Morty is filled with remorse.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Summarize

Objectives

• Use the reading strategy of summarizing to understand text
• Understand and identify cause-and-effect relationships
• Recognize adverbs used in text
• Recognize and understand the use of compound words

Materials

• Book -- Morty and the Mouse Town Talent Show (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Cause and effect, summarize, adverbs, compound words 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

• Content words: impatiently, indication, mischievous, mortified, offensive, rationalized, reassuringly, remorse, tolerate, wafted

Build Background

• Invite students to share what actions their siblings or friends do that bring up feelings of irritation. Discuss how students react to their friends and/or siblings when they behave that way.
• Ask students whether they have read any of the other books in the Morty Mouse series: Morty and the Oatmeal Babysitter, Level Q; Morty and the Suitcase Caper, Level Q; Morty and the Teacher's Apples, Level Q; or Chef Morty's Party Surprise, Level S. Discuss what they remember from the stories. Ask students why they think people enjoy reading serial stories and how already knowing about characters from previous books in the series helps them to better comprehend a new book in the same series.

Preview the Book

Introduce the Book

• Give students their copy of the book. Guide them to the front and back covers and read the title. Have students discuss what they see on the covers. Encourage them to offer ideas as to what type of book it is and what it might be about.
• Show students the title page. Discuss the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name).

Introduce the Reading Strategy: Summarize

• Explain to students that one way to understand and remember information in a book is to write a summary, or a brief overview, of the most important information in a chapter. Point out that a summary often answers the questions who, what, when, where, and why.
• Create a chart on the board with the headings Who, What, When, Where, and Why. Model summarizing using a familiar story.
  Think-aloud: To summarize, I need to decide which information is the most important to remember in a section. To do this, I can consider who and what the story was about, what happened, and when and why it happened. Then I can organize that information into a few sentences. For example, in the story The Three Little Pigs, the characters are the three pigs and the big, bad wolf. I will write these characters under the heading Who. Each pig built a house: one of straw, one of sticks, and one of bricks. A big, bad wolf blew down the first two pigs' houses, but he couldn't blow down the house of bricks. The pigs were safe from the wolf in the brick house. I will write three houses, wolf blew down stick and straw house, and wolf couldn't blow down brick house under the heading What. The wolf tried to blow down the houses because he wanted to eat the pigs. I'll write wolf wants to eat pigs under the heading Why. It's not clear when the story took place, but it happened at the three pigs' houses. I'll write three pigs' houses under the heading Where. When I organize all of this information, a summary of the story might be: Three pigs each built a house--one of straw, one of sticks, and one of bricks. A wolf blew down the straw and stick houses because he wanted to eat the pigs. All three pigs found safety in the brick house.
• Write the summary on the board. Discuss how you used the information in the chart along with your own words to create the summary.
• 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: Cause and effect

• Review or explain that a cause is an event that makes something happen, and the effect is what happens because of, or as a result of, the event. Create a two-column chart on the board with the headings Cause and Effect. Write the following sentence on the board under the heading Cause: I threw a ball in the house.
• Model identifying cause-and-effect relationships.
  Think-aloud: If I throw a ball in the house, certain events might happen as a result of this cause. For example, I might break something valuable. I also might have to apologize for being irresponsible. Sometimes there is more than one effect, or consequence, that happens as a result of a cause.
• Ask students to identify from the discussion the two effects that might happen as a result of throwing a ball in the house (breaking something valuable, having to apologize for being irresponsible). Write these under the heading Effect.
• Invite students to identify other possible effects of throwing a ball in the house (having to replace broken items, hurting someone accidentally, and so on).

Introduce the Vocabulary

• Remind students of the strategies they can use to work out words they don't know. For example, they can use what they know about letter and sound correspondence to figure out the word. They can look for base words, prefixes, and suffixes, and use what they know about syllables. They can use the context to work out meanings of unfamiliar words.
• Explain to students that although this book does not have a glossary containing the meanings of the word, they can use context clues within their sentences and paragraphs to help them figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words.
• Model how students can use prior knowledge or the context of the sentence to figure out the meaning of a word. Read pages 10 through 12 in the book aloud to students. Have students follow along as you reread the following sentences on page 12: Morty's sister, the last to climb in, was in a disastrous state. She had a very offensive stink about her.
• Ask students to think about the events that occured right before the preceding sentences (Morty put garlic and stinky cheese vinegar in her shampoo bottle). Ask them to use the events of the story to explain what they think the word offensive means.
• Model how students can use the dictionary to find a word's meaning. Have them locate and read the definition for offensive in the dictionary. Have students compare the dictionary definition with their definition of the word. Then have students follow along on page 12 as you read the sentence in which the word offensive is found to confirm the meaning of the word.
• For tips on teaching word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students read the book to find out what happens at the Mouse Town Talent Show. Encourage them to underline information while reading that answers the questions who, what, when, where, and why.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Have students read to the end of page 8. Encourage those who finish before others to reread the text.
• Create a new chart on the board with the headings Who, What, When, Where, and Why. Model summarizing important information so far in the story.
  Think-aloud: As I read, I thought about the information that answered the questions who, what, when, where, and why. After reading these few pages, I can now fill in the Who column in the chart on the board: Morty Mouse and his family. I also know from the very first page that it is Saturday morning, so I can write that in the When column. So far, they are at Morty's home, so I will write that in the Where column. I may need to add more to this column later.
• Have students share information that explains important events so far in the story. Remind them that important events are those that are necessary for someone to retell the story correctly and that these events do not include details about what happened. Write these events on the chart under the What heading. (Morty is grumpy because his sister took too long in the bathroom and tattled on him.)
• Have students turn to page 4 in the book. Write Morty pounded on the bathroom door under the heading Cause on the cause-and-effect chart on the board. Ask students to use the text to identify in the story the effect of this event. (Morty woke up everyone in the house.) Write this information on the chart under the heading Effect.
• Introduce and explain the cause and effect worksheet. Ask students to write the information from the board on their worksheet.
• Write the following cause on the board: Morty's sister took too long in the bathroom. Have students write the cause and an effect on their worksheet. (Cause: Morty's sister took too long in the bathroom; Possible effects: Morty missed his cartoon, Morty got angry and dirtied the bathroom.) Discuss with students how this cause had more than one effect.
• Check for understanding: Have students read to the end of page 12. Remind them to underline information that answers the questions who, what, when, where, and why while reading. When students have finished reading, have them discuss with a partner the important information they underlined (What: Morty tampered with his sister's shampoo, perfume, and lipstick).
• Ask students to identify what caused Morty to tamper with his sister's beauty products (she tattled on him about his mess in the bathroom). Have students write this cause-and-effect relationship on their worksheet. When students have finished, discuss their answers.

    Have students read the remainder of the book. Have them underline information in the chapter that answers the questions who, what, when, where, and why.

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

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.
• Discuss the important information students identified from the story in the chart on the board under the headings Who, What, When, Where, and Why. Discuss with students any additional information from the story that should be added to the chart.
• Independent practice: Introduce and explain the summarize worksheet. Have students write the information from the chart on the board on their worksheet and then write a summary of the story. Invite volunteers to read their summaries aloud once everyone has finished their work.

Reflect on the Comprehension Skill

• Discussion: Discuss with students the cause-and-effect relationships in the story listed on the chart on the board.
• Have students reread page 13. Ask them to identify a cause-and-effect relationship from this page and write it on their worksheet. (For example, Cause: Morty's sister started to cry; Effect: Morty started to feel guilty about what he had done to her.)
• Independent practice: Have students identify two additional cause-and-effect relationships from the end of the story and write them on their worksheet. Instruct them to use the back of the worksheet to add more boxes to their chart if necessary. If time allows, discuss their responses.
• Enduring understanding: Although Morty behaves badly toward his sister, he admits what he did, tells the truth, and accepts the consequences of his actions. Now that you know this information, why is it important to tell the truth, even when it might bring negative consequences?

Grammar and Mechanics: Adverbs

• Have students turn to page 3 and read the following sentence aloud: But instead he stood outside the bathroom, waiting impatiently for his sister to come out. Ask students how Morty was waiting (impatiently). Explain that impatiently is an adverb that describes the verb waiting.
• Review or explain that adverbs are words that describe or modify verbs or adjectives. Adverbs express the time, manner, or degree in which a verb occurs. They usually tell how something happens. They may also tell how often, how many, or how much.
• Ask students to identify the root or base word of impatiently (impatient). Explain that many adverbs are formed by adding -ly to the end of an adjective.
• Have students turn to page 4, and read the following sentence aloud to them: Morty groaned loudly when he heard his little brothers scamper downstairs toward the television. Ask students to tell how Morty groaned (loudly). Explain that loudly is an adverb that describes the verb groaned. Ask students identify the root or base word of loudly (loud).     

    Check for understanding: Write the words complete, cheerful, and silent on the board. Have student volunteers come up to the board and add -ly to each word. Then have students use the resulting adverb in oral sentences with a partner. Invite pairs to share their sentences aloud.

• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the adverbs worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.

Word Work: Compound words

• Write the word mouthwash on the board. Ask students which two words were joined together to create the word mouthwash (mouth and wash). Explain that a word created by joining together two separate words is called a compound word.
• Write the following sentence on the board: His daydream was interrupted by an even stronger awareness of that horrible taste in his mouth. Have students read the sentence and identify the compound word in the sentence (daydream).
• Ask students which two words are joined together in the word daydream (day and dream). Explain to them that the definitions of the two separate words can help students figure out the meaning of the bigger word (a dream you have during the day while you are awake).

    Check for understanding: Have students reread pages 5 and 6 in their book. Have them identify and circle the compound words on the pages (bathroom, toothpaste, and wastebasket). Ask students to circle the two words in each compound word. Have them use these words to discuss the meaning of each larger word with a partner. Then discuss the meaning of each word with students as a group.

• Independent practice: Identify, explain, and have students complete the compound words worksheet. If time allows, invite students to share their sentences aloud.

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 discuss with someone at home how to summarize as they read the story.

Narrative Writing Connection
Ask students to write a story about a character who plays a trick on a brother, sister, relative, or friend. Have them describe what the character did, why he/she did it, and what happened as a result. Invite students to illustrate and share their stories.

Performing Arts Connection
Have students plan a class talent show. Discuss with them how they will advertise the show, how to sign up their fellow classmates' acts (make sure everyone who participates is comfortable doing so), how to schedule the event, and how they will present the show.