Esperanza Chapters 4, 5, and 6

WOh me oh my I’ve gotten behind on my blogging! Here are the plans that I used for Esperanza Chapters 4-6:

Esperanza, Chapter 4

Family trees

We interpreted these two examples of Esperanza’s family tree and my own family tree as an expansion of the pre-reading activity found in the Teacher’s Guide.

Students create their own family tree with written descriptions of several family members. This is a writing assessment, and the parameters are contained in this document (it also includes three separate rubrics so that you can find one that fits your students’ proficiency level).

Pre reading discussion

We discussed the pre-reading question from the Teacher’s Guide.

Read aloud

I read chapter 4 aloud to students.

Re-reading and post-reading

Students re-read chapter 4 while completing this Esquema.

We reviewed the Esquema and discussed the comprehension questions included in the Teacher’s Guide.

I did the Quién lo dice activity orally with the students as a listening practice. They had to write down the letter of the character (I had the list on the board) and write down the translations for each quote.

We did the currency/coinmill activity together as a class on the overhead.

I did not use the reading on the civil war (saving it for a sub plan day!) nor the chapter quiz that are included in the guide.

Esperanza, Chapter 5

Before we jumped into the chapter, we reviewed what had happened in the novel so far. I made a reusable class set of the pre-reading “cut up the events and put them in order” review activity from the Teacher’s Guide, and students worked with a partner to complete it.

Then, we discussed the pre-reading discussion questions from the Teacher’s Guide.

Listen and draw

I read chapter 5 aloud to students. While I read, they drew a mural of what they understood. Whenever they didn’t understand something, they stopped me and I clarified before moving on.

I read it a second time while they kept working on their murals, adding more detail.

Post-reading comprehension

We discussed the comprehension questions from the Teacher’s Guide.

I projected the fill-in-the-blanks vocabulary activity from the Teacher’s Guide, and students worked individually to complete it before we reviewed it as a class.

Word sort activity

Students completed this word sort that I created using words from Chapter 5 (instructions here). I made a reusable set, as I recommended doing in the instructions. Students were able to use their books as they worked on it so that they could look up how the words were used in the chapter.

Formative assessment

Students did the letter writing activity from the Teacher’s Guide as a formative writing assessment.

Content connections to go deeper

We did the public transportation reading from the Guide and discussed the questions. This was great timing, because our city is in the middle of a heated debate because of a bill that would ban any city worker unions, which would have a huge effect on our public transportation.

Esperanza, Chapter 6

Before jumping into the new chapter, we did the ‘Which character?’ pre-reading review activity.

Reading choice for differentiation

Students had the choice to read the chapter individually, out loud with a partner, or in a small group with me. I told students that when my small group finished reading, I would give a short quiz on the chapter. This encouraged them to get started quickly and stay on task so that they finished the chapter before my group did.

I gave a three question quiz that counted as a Work Habits (Citizenship) grade. I asked the students to respond in English to these three questions:

1. Write down anything you know about the guy named Edgar
2. Write down anything that you understood about Alberto’s journey to the US or his life there
3. Write down how Esperanza is feeling at the end of the chapter, and why.

Comprehension support: ¿Antes o durante?

In this chapter, much of the ‘action’ is actually a character describing something that has already happened. My students have a difficult time separating action from information (or previous action), so we used this slideshow (I could only attach the PDF here; answers are on the last two pages) to do ¿Antes o durante? (Before or during?).

Re-reading and graphic organizers

Students then re-read the chapter and completed this Esquema. It is a modified version of the one in the Teacher’s Guide, because my students needed a little bit more structure/direction.

We reviewed their Esquemas as a class. When we discussed Edgar’s funeral (event #1), we did the Novena reading from the Teacher’s Guide.

We did the chapter and book review activity from the Teacher’s Guide with the Inside/Outside circle format.

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I received express, written consent from the publisher to share the materials that I created and to use the cover image and title of the novel in this blog post. I am not compensated in any way by the author or publisher for writing this post.

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Using novels in class:

• How should I use novels in class?
• “Is this novel REALLY Level 1?” – Which factors contribute to text complexity?
• Traffic Light Activities to keep the reading process novel
• Use speed dating to help your students find their perfect book.
• Are my students ready to read this book?
• El Nuevo Houdini lesson plans