Direct Instruction Lesson Plan Template

Grade Level/Subject: 4th Grade,

Central Focus: How we can use context clues to figure out
Reading/Closed Reading
the meaning of tough words and phrases, and cite where
we found those clues in the text.
Essential Standard/Common Core Objective:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.1

Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the

text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.4.4.C

Date submitted: March 16, 2015

Date taught: March 17, 2015

Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition and

understanding, rereading as necessary

Daily Lesson Objective: Students will be able to identify the meaning of difficult words and
phrases using context clues and by citing textual evidence, and create a T-chart in order to
display their meanings.
21st Century Skills:
Academic Language Demand (Language Function and
Vocabulary):
Critical Thinking and
Identify- students are identifying word meanings, and citing
Problem Solving- Reasoning
specific examples in the text to support their answer.
Effectively.
Create- Students are creating and structuring their own
Communication and
chart in order to organize their information.
Collaboration

Prior Knowledge: Students will need to have previous experience working with using context
clues and have an understanding of what that means. Students need to know how to reference
text. Also, they will need to have their list of unknown words and phrases from the poem A Boys
Song for the previous days lesson.

Activity

1. Focus and Review

Description of Activities and Setting

Yesterday, we talked about closed reading. Who remembers
what we are talking about when we say closed reading? Yes,
reading with a certain purpose. With Mrs. Harris, you read
through the poem A Boys Song. You read through it a few
times, and what did you do? Picked out words that you didnt
know or phrases that were unfamiliar and you wrote them
down on a T chart in your reading notebook, because our
purpose yesterday was to find those things that we dont
know. What else did we do? We wrote down what we thought
those words might mean on the other side of the chart. We
didnt really look up anything that told us what the words
mean, you just wrote down what you think it might mean.
Today we are going to continue working with closed reading,
but with a new purpose.

Time

5-10
mins

2. Statement of
Objective
for Student

3. Teacher Input

Today we are going to continue working with closed reading,

but with a new purpose. Today we are going to look at our
unknown word chart and actually try to figure out what they
mean using our context clues.. Then you will write down your
answer and cite that evidence from the text on your T chart
and Im going to take that up to look over and make sure that
you understand what we are going to do in our lesson today.
So like I said, today your new purpose for closed reading is to
look at those words and phrases that you dont know and use
context clues in order to figure out what they actually mean.
How do we use our context clues, just as a reminder to the
class? Student answer. Yes, we look at the words and
sentences around the word. How do we use that? We look at
the words and sentences around the unknown word and we
think about what we know about those surrounding words.
This is how we use the clues to help us, because the answer
might not just pop out to us. Sometimes we have to think a
little bit about what the clues are saying before we can find
the meaning of our unknown word. Once you have found what
you think the meaning is by using those context clues we are
going to do something called citing from the text. You are
telling me where specifically in the text you found your
answer. This means that you are quoting the poem and telling
me the exact words, the exact sentence that you used to help
you find out what those tricky words mean. Basically, this is
just writing down your context clues. Before we start working
with this Im going to have you listen to a video where
someone is actually singing this poem as a song. Yesterday
we talked about how helpful it is to read through things
multiple times, and I think that this will help you if you can
hear it being read aloud to you, make sure to follow along on
your copy of the poem. Teacher plays video. I think it will help
you be able to see what Im talking about if I show you exactly
the steps of how we can use our context clues and cite the
evidence. Our first word on our list from yesterday is lea, or
over the lea. I dont know about you guys, but when I first
read this I had no idea what this word meant, but lets look for
clues so we can figure it out. Lets look at the stanza that this
word is in. Where the pools are bright and deep, where the
gray trout lies asleep, up the river and oer the lea, thats the
way for Billy and me. I am first going to look at what is
surrounding the word lea. I see up the river. What do we
know about rivers? They are outside in nature, so a lea could
be referring to something outside. So Im going to write my

1
minute

15
minutes

4. Guided Practice

5. Independent
Practice

6. Assessment
Methods of
all
objectives/skills:

7. Closure

8. Assessment
Results of
all

clues up on the board. When I look at the rest of the stanza, I

see more things about water and fish, so Im pretty sure a lea
is outside. So, we are dealing with something outside. Oer the
lea, sounds like over the lea. Is there anything outside that we
might have to go over? Maybe mountains, or hills. So I have
something that is outside that I would have to go over like a
hill. So my meaning for the word lea is a hill. I know this
because of the words Up the river and oer the lea. That is
my textual evidence.
Now I want you in your groups to discuss what you think the
word maidens means in lines 17 and 18. Talk with them
about what you think the meaning is, then you will write down
what you used in the text to help you. The students discuss in
15-20
groups, and then come back for a class discussion on what
minutes
their meaning is and where they found it in the text. Each
group will report. Then they will do the same for the word
Banter
Now on your own I want you to look up what the following
things are, and cite from the text just like I showed you up on
the board on your own T-Chart. You need to make sure that
15-20
you are including the meaning, and then write exactly what
minutes
words and phrases you used in the poem to help you.
The teacher puts up the following words up on the board,
Nestling, hawthorne, clustering, gray trout, and hazel bank.
Students will need to identify the meaning of the word and phrase, as
well as citing the clues with evidence from the text for the 5 words that
they did independently. The students will need to correctly identify and
cite 8 out of the 10 words to be seen as meeting the objective. If the
student does not include both the meaning and the evidence for each of
the unknown words, or gets less than 7 out of 10 they will be seen as
not meeting the objective and will receive more practice.
Just to wrap up, you guys read through this poem, and it has
some pretty hard and unfamiliar words and phrases. When
you read, you will come across many words and phrases you
dont know. You can see this in books that you read, or even
on things that you will read on your EOG. As good readers we
5 mins.
can investigate and figure out what those words that we dont
know mean by using the text to help us. Then we can do
what? Cite where exactly in the text we found our answer.
This helps show that you know exactly how to use context
clues.
20 out of the 26 students mastered the objective. 6 students did not
meet the objective and are up for a reteach.

objectives/skills:
Targeted Students
Modifications/Accommodations:
Students who have trouble with vision were
allowed to come up to the board to view the
video and see the questions that are being
asked about the different words.

Student/Small Group
Modifications/Accommodations:
During the guided practice student groups who
were struggling when they were discussing
meaning as a group are to come to the back table
and have a more guided instruction and discussion
with the teacher.

Materials/Technology:
(Include any instructional materials (e.g., worksheets, assessments PowerPoint/Smart Board slides, etc.) needed to implement the lesson at
the end of the lesson plan.)

Smart Board
Copy of A Boys Song by James Hogg
YouTube Video reading of A Boys Song
White board
References:
Closed reading lesson reference sheet.
Reflection on lesson: I think overall the lesson went well. I think that I did a good job of showing
the students examples and applying to the different learning styles by talking and writing things
up on the board. I would have split the students into different groups, because keeping them on
task was an issue. Students struggled with actually finding the evidence in the text and
articulating that to me, so I would have shown more examples of highlighting in the text where I
found my answer.