Text Type: Nonfiction/Informational
Page Count: 20
Word Count: 1,279 

Book Summary
Seven Wonders of the Modern World is an informational book that describes seven remarkable structures made by humans. Readers will learn why the structures were built and why each has been designated a “wonder.” Photographs and illustrations support the informative text. 

About the Lesson 

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Summarizing

Objectives

• Use the reading strategy of summarizing to understand and remember informational text
• Identify main ideas and details
• Capitalize place names and other proper nouns
• Identify syllable division in content vocabulary

Materials

• Book -- Seven Wonders of the Modern World (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Main idea/details, syllable division worksheets

Indicates an opportunity for student to mark in the book. (All activities may be completed with paper and pencil if you choose not to have students consume the books.)

Vocabulary

• Content words: engineers, hydroelectric plant, landmark, observation deck, power plant, radio and television signals, scholars, shipping industry, skyline, suspension bridge, waterway, wildlife habitats

Build Background

• Ask students to tell what they know about the seven wonders of the ancient world (The Great Pyramid of Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Colussus of Rhodes, the Lighthouse of Alexandria). Ask them to tell what they think makes a structure a “wonder.” Have students tell about other interesting or unusual buildings or structures they have seen or heard about. Ask them if they are familiar with any of the modern wonders of the world.

Preview the Book

Introduce the Book

• Give students a copy of the book and have them preview the front and back covers and read the title. Have students discuss what they see on the covers and offer ideas as to what kind of book this is and what it might be about.
• Show students the title page. Talk about the information that is written on the page.
• Have students turn to the table of contents. Remind students that the table of contents provides an overview of what the book is about. After reviewing the chapter titles, model using the table of contents to summarize what the book is about.

Introduce the Strategy: Summarization

• Think-aloud: To summarize what I’ve read, I need to decide what’s important and what isn’t. Then, in my mind, I organize the important information into a few sentences and think about them for a moment. Since I haven’t read the book yet, it’s difficult to decide what’s important and what isn’t. I think all of the chapters must contain important information about each of the seven wonders, but I’ll have to read the book to find out.    
• Have students preview the rest of the book, including the photographs and illustrations and captions.
• As students read, they should 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

• Remind students of the strategies they can use to sound 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 words within words and prefixes and suffixes. They can use the context to work out meanings of unfamiliar words.
• Model how to apply word-attack strategies. Have students turn to page 13 and find the word suspension. Ask them to identify the base word (suspend), and to tell what it means (to hang).
• Have students read the paragraph on page 13. Ask them to use their own words to describe a suspension bridge.
• Remind students that if they are unable to determine a word's meaning from context clues, they can look in the glossary or a dictionary, or ask you what the word means.
• For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words or word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students mentally summarize the important information about each of the seven wonders as they read.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Have students read to the end of page 6. Tell them to underline the important words or phrases in the book that tell about the Channel Tunnel in the second chapter. If they finish before everyone else, they can go back and reread.
• When they have finished reading, have students tell what they underlined. Write the information on the board. Have students tell any details that make the information more interesting and add these to the list on the board. Model how to mentally summarize the information.
• Think-aloud: When I think about what I’ve read and the list we’ve made on the board, I say to myself: The Channel Tunnel was built to provide fast travel between England and France. The 95-mile-long tunnels, built on the bottom of the English Channel, took seven years to build. Trains, which carry cars, travel in two of the tunnels. The third tunnel is used if repairs need to be made or if there is an emergency. I’ll pause and think this over for a moment before reading the next chapter.
• Tell students to read the remainder of the book, looking for other important information about each of the seven wonders. Have them summarize the important information in their minds as they read.

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

Reflect on the Reading Strategies

• Ask students what words they marked in their books. Use this opportunity to model how they can read these words using decoding strategies and context clues.
• Reinforce how thinking about how to summarize the important information in the text keeps them actively involved in the reading process and helps them understand and remember what they read.

Teach the Comprehension Skill: Main idea and details

• Discussion: Ask students to tell which of the seven wonders they would visit if they could and why. Have them discuss why they think these structures were chosen above all others to represent the wonders of the modern world.
• Review or explain that many books are about one thing. Show students the book and ask them to tell the topic (seven wonders). Draw a web with a large center circle and seven attached circles. Write the words Seven Wonders in the center circle. Have students name the seven wonders, and then you write them in the attached circles.
• Introduce and model the skill: Direct students to the table of contents. Explain that each chapter contains a main idea and details about a different “wonder.” Have students find the chapter title that begins on page 7. Review or explain that the main idea is what the chapter is about (Netherlands North Sea Protection Works), and that the supporting details tell more about the main idea. Explain that finding main ideas and details in text and using them to mentally summarize as you read is a good way to understand and remember information.
• Check for understanding: Have students turn to page 9 and tell the main idea of the chapter. Write Canadian National Tower on the board. Have students provide examples of details that tell more about the Canadian National Tower. Write student responses on the board. Model how to use the information on the board to mentally summarize the chapter.
• Independent practice: Give students the main ideas/details worksheet to complete. Discuss their responses.

    Independent practice: Instruct students to use the inside cover of their book to write which of the seven wonders they think is most interesting and to tell why.

Grammar and Mechanics: Capitalization of proper nouns

• Write the following sentences on the board: The Great Pyramid of Giza is still standing. and He hopes to see a pyramid one day. Circle the words Pyramid and pyramid, and ask students to tell why the word is capitalized in one sentence but not in the other. Review that proper nouns are always capitalized.
• Write the following sentences on the board and ask volunteers to make a check mark beside the sentence in which the underlined word is written correctly.

- The rabbit’s Tunnel is long and dark.
- The Channel Tunnel is 95 miles long.
- The golden gate led to a magical land.
- The Golden Gate Bridge is painted red.

• Have students turn to page 12. Ask them to find the name of a country, a city, and an ocean. Review that these are proper nouns that are always capitalized.

   Have students go through a chapter of the book, circling the proper nouns. Then have students select three of the nouns and use them to write sentences on the inside cover of the book.

Word Work: Content vocabulary

• Write the words bridge, tunnel, and waterway on the board, and ask students to say each word. Have them tell the number of syllables in each word, and write the numbers students provide next to each word.
• Review or explain that it is important to know how to divide words into syllables, both for speaking and for reading.
• Review the following syllable rules and provide an example of each:

1. Each syllable is a “beat” of a word.
2. Every syllable has only one vowel sound. It may or may not have any consonants.
3. Words are divided between syllables.
4. When two consonants come between two vowels, the word is divided between the consonants. Example: wonder/won-der
5. A prefix or suffix usually makes a separate syllable. Example: longest/long-est
6. A consonant followed by le at the end of a word forms a separate syllable. Example: table/tab-le

• Write the following words on the board: residents, vehicles, earthquake. Ask students to use the inside back cover of their book to write how each word should be divided into syllables. Discuss their responses.
• Give students the syllable division worksheet. Check their answers. Provide additional words and dictionaries for students who are having difficulty.

Independent Reading

• Allow students to read their books independently or with a partner. Encourage repeated timed readings of a specific section or the entire book (in the case of short books). Additionally, partners can take turns reading parts of the book.

Home Connection

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

Writing Connection

• Have students select one of the seven wonders and write a mystery story about it. Tell them to use information from the book to make their stories more believable. Have students edit their stories for content and mechanics before sharing with the group.

Social Studies Connection

• Have students work in small groups to further research one of the seven wonders. Have them create a poster, diorama, or replica of the wonder. Have them present their findings and models to the group.

Monitor students to determine if they can:

• use the reading strategy of summarizing to understand and remember information about each of the seven wonders of the modern world
• identify the main idea and supporting details in a chapter to summarize information
• identify proper nouns and understand that proper nouns are always capitalized
• divide content vocabulary words into syllables

Comprehension Checks

• Book Quiz
• Retelling Rubric