Book Summary
Stanley DeCapers and his class are on a field trip to the Anasazi ruins in Colorado. Stanley is determined to solve the mystery of the vanishing Anasazi. With a friend's help, he manages to slip away from the group and strike out on his own to search for clues. He meets a mysterious security guard who helps him learn about how the Anasazi left these dwellings to move to a different area. When Stanley asks why they moved, the guard tells him that there are some mysteries the sky will never reveal. 

Vocabulary
Challenging Words
ancestor
camouflage
descendant
disapproving
disintegrate
drought
kiva
mesa
Native Americans
petroglyph
ruins
summon 

Reproducible Worksheets
Worksheet 1-Mystery Story Features Chart
Worksheet 2-Context Clues

Lesson Objectives

Comprehension
You will likely address a number of comprehension skills as students work to understand the text, for example, identifying character traits and evaluating character actions. The targeted comprehension strategy for this lesson is: identify structure and features of a mystery story.