Build Background

• Ask students what they know about sound and how it works. Ask if they know how sound travels through air. Talk about different types of sound.
• Ask: If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it fall, does it still make a sound? Discuss students' answers.

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.
• Have students preview the rest of the book. Show students the title page, photos, charts, graph, and glossary.
• Show students the index. Review or explain that an index is an alphabetized list with page numbers that tell where readers can find information about topics in the book. Ask students to tell which page teaches about echolocation (page 20).

Introduce the Strategy: Main idea and details

• Review or explain that many books, such as this one, contain the main idea, or topic, of the book in the title (How Sound Works). Direct students to the table of contents. Explain that each chapter title provides a main idea about what will be discussed in the chapter; the body of each chapter contains details that tell more about the main idea. For example, ask students what they expect to read about in a chapter titled "Listening for Sound" (listening for sound).
• After reviewing the chapter titles, model how to apply the main idea and details reading strategy.
• Think-aloud: The table of contents gives me a much clearer idea of the main ideas I will read about in the book. I will pause after each chapter to review in my mind the main idea and the important details in each section. This strategy will help me keep track of the important information I read and will help me make sure I understand what I'm reading.
• 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 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, or other word endings. They can use the context to work out meanings of unfamiliar words.
• Model how to apply word-attack strategies. Direct students to page 9. Have them find the words sonic boom in the Math Minute section. Model how they can use context clues to figure out the meaning of the unfamiliar word. Explain that the sentences before the one containing the word describe jets that travel faster than the speed of sound. The sentence containing the unfamiliar words tells that these jets make a loud sonic boom when they break the sound barrier, which can be heard miles away from where the jet is flying. Tell students that these clues make you think that the words sonic boom mean an explosive sound made by jets moving faster than the speed of sound. Have students follow along as you reread the sentence on the page to confirm the meaning of the word.
• For additional tips on teaching word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students read the book to learn about how sound works, remembering to stop after each chapter to review the main idea and details in their mind.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Have students read to the end of page 12. Tell them to look for details about how sound works as they read. If students finish before everyone else, they can go back and reread.
• Model finding supporting details in text.
• Think-aloud: I made sure to stop after each chapter to review in my mind the important details. First, I reminded myself that the main idea of the second chapter was "Where Do Sounds Come From?" Next, I decided which of the details were important and which weren't. Then, in my mind, I organized the important information into a list of details and thought about them for a couple of moments:
  Sound is a form of energy caused by something vibrating.
  The greater the vibration, the more sound energy is created.
  Sound moves outward in all diretions.
• Tell students to read the remainder of the book. Remind them to think about, or review, the supporting details in their minds after they finish reading each chapter.

    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.
• Discuss how stopping to review in their minds the main idea and details of each chapter helps them remember the important information and better understand what the book is teaching.
• Have students complete the main idea and details worksheet. Discuss their responses as a group.

Teach the Comprehension Skill: Interpret charts and graphs

• Discussion: Explain that there are many different ways for an author to provide the reader with information. Some books use illustrations, others use photographs, and others, such as How Sounds Works, also use a third means of expressing information: charts and graphs. Explain that charts and graphs are often used to show concepts, relationships between items, and quantities.
• Introduce and model the skill: Review or explain that charts and graphs are most commonly used in nonfiction books. There are many different types of graphs, such as bar graphs, pictographs, line graphs, and pie graphs. Turn to page 8. Tell students that this is a bar graph. Explain that the bars along the left tell what is being measured (the speed of sound through a gas, liquid, and solid), and the numbers along the bottom tell the rate of measurement (feet per second, or fbs). Show students how this graph helps clarify the information in the text--it shows how sound waves travel more quickly through solids, such as glass, and more slowly through gases, such as air.
• Ask students to tell what increment the numbers at the bottom of the graph are increasing by (thousands) and what numbers it starts and ends with (0-15,000).
• Have students tell which solid is represented by the longest bar (glass) and how fast sound waves move through glass (14,764 fps). Ask how many feet per second sound waves move through water (4,921). Ask which of the three types of matter allows sound waves to move through it at the slowest rate (air, at 1,115 fps). Point out that this is how we typically hear sound (as it travels through air), even though it is the slowest mode at which sound waves travel.
• Have students turn to page 11 and find the Table of decibels. Ask students to define Sound Source (where sound comes from) and decibels (a measurement of sound).
• Check for understanding: Referring to the table on page 11, have students tell which sound is the least intense (a whisper) and which is the most intense (a jet airplane). Have students explain their answer.
• Remind students that they can help themselves understand and remember important information in nonfiction books by looking carefully at the information in charts and graphs.
• Independent practice: Have students complete the charts and graphs worksheet. When they finish working independently, discuss their responses with references to the text.

    Extend the discussion: Tell students to work with a partner to complete the chart on page 16 titled What could be making the noises in this chart?

Grammar and Mechanics: Conjunctions

• Explain or review that a conjunction is a word that links together two parts of a sentence. Examples of conjunctions include: and, but, because, when, for, or, so, and yet.
• Ask students to turn to page 13. Write the following sentence from the book on the board: The middle ear and the inner ear are designed to transfer sound. Explain that the conjunction and connects the two descriptive phrases of the sentence, middle ear and inner ear. On the board under the example, write the following: Its shape helps gather sound waves. Its shape moves them along to the middle ear. Discuss how the author chose to link these two phrases (Its shape helps gather sound waves and move them along to the middle ear.) instead of writing two repetitive sentences one after another. Explain that this is an example of how conjunctions help writers make their writing more fluent, or smooth flowing.
• Ask students to turn to page 5. Write the following sentence from the book on the board: Vibration occurs when an object moves quickly back and forth. Explain that the conjunction when connects the description (an object moves quickly back and forth) with the example (vibration occurs). Discuss how the conjunction links the two parts of the sentence together.
• Check for understanding: Have students complete the conjunctions worksheet. Review student answers aloud. 

Word Work: Suffixes

• Review or explain that a suffix is a word part added to the end of a base word to change the meaning of the word. Ask students to brainstorm some examples of suffixes while you write them on the board (-ion, -ing, -ed, -s, -ful, -es, -ly, -ness). Label the list Suffixes.
• Write the word quest on the board. Ask a volunteer to tell the meaning of the word or look it up in the dictionary (a journey for adventure). Write the word question on the board. Explain that the suffix -ion has been added to make a new word. Ask a volunteer to tell the meaning of the new word (something asked).
• Tell students to turn to page 8. Ask them to find and circle all of the suffixes they can find (-es in particles and gases; -er in closer, slower, farther, colder, and warmer; -ly in quickly; -s in solids, particles, and liquids).
• Emphasize that adding a suffixes to a word can change the meaning of the word. For example, -ion often makes a verb into a noun, -ly makes an adjective into an adverb, etc.
• Point out that the author compares many things on page 8. Ask which suffix is added onto a word that compares (-er). Point out that there are five words used to compare in this paragraph: closer, slower, farther, colder, and warmer.

    Check for understanding: Have students find the three words that compare on page 10 (closer, farther).

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.

Home Connection

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

Science Connection

• Provide the materials necessary for students to experiment with the Try This! sections of the book: Vibration on page 7, Sound in Solids on page 8, and Pitch Practice on page 12. Encourage them to also figure out the Math Minute on page 9.

Writing Connection

• After completing the Science Connection above, have students choose one experiment to comment on. Have them write at least two paragraphs, one explaining how to do the experiment and the necessary materials, and another describing how it works and the science behind it. Have students present their experiment and read their writing to the class.

Monitor students to determine if they can:

• consistently use the strategy of finding the main idea and supporting details in text to understand and remember information; record main ideas and details on a graphic organizer
• analyze and interpret charts and graphs in nonfiction text and on a worksheet
• understand the use of conjunctions in text and to complete a worksheet
• identify and understand suffixes

Comprehension Checks

• Book Quiz
• Retelling Rubric