We are kicking off quarter two by jumping into our fiction unit in Reader’s Workshop. Fiction writers are storytellers who transport us to imaginary places, entertain, demonstrate a moral, inspire imagination, reveal aspects of life and various cultures, and give us a glimpse into human nature.  We will be using mentor texts to study realistic, fantasy, and traditional fiction. 

Today we focused on recognizing different text structures within a fiction text. We started with the most common structure, chronological order. Through our mentor text, The Raft, we identified phrases that gave us clues that time was passing. We stopped and jotted to document the clues throughout the story. We discussed that good readers pay attention to overall structure and how scene changes signal chronological movement. I encouraged the kids to practice this strategy in their own reading as a form of readers response. Later, we will make the connection in our writing and try to remember to include temporal words or phrases to show passing time.