TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

Teaching Nonfiction Genre for a Purpose

ECI 537 Childrens Literature
Elizabeth Rosinski
North Carolina State University

1. Introduction:

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

a. Vision: For this genre project, students will be reading current news articles from
various sources using the Close Reading approach. In this manner, the students goal is to learn
more about what is happening in the world around them, as well as outside of their country and
state. With this purpose in mind, students will develop the reading skills necessary to
comprehend informational texts, dissect them, and be able to produce a current event article
themselves. While reading and learning new information, students will be looking closely as to
how/why the author wrote each article and choose one of those styles to write their own as
(compare/contrast, description, question/answer, timeline, cause/effect).
b. Description of Audience: Fourth graders are children around the ages of 9-10. At
this age, according to Kiefer and Tyson, they are developing a sense of justice and concern for
others, interested in problems of the world, searching out answers from reading, seeking
information to answer questions, develop standard of right and wrong, and are less egocentric,
(2014, pp. 44-47). Because of this developmental level, this project fits right for the end of the
school year. At this point in the school year, most students have bumped up reading levels and
are developmentally aware and excited about learning events, people around the world. Articles
will be read as whole class, with peers, then finally alone, as an assessment piece before the
final assessment of their own article.
c. Rationale: Duke writes, teaching genre with purpose means creating compelling,
real-world purposes for students to use genres and then providing instruction in genre features
and strategies to serve those purposes, (2012, p. 2). I wanted to create something of meaning
to my students while still teaching the features and parts of informational texts and this quote
supports my idea. Many students are stuck reading books as an informational (or nonfiction)
unit to practice learning, but there is no connection to why it is important to learn how to read
these types of texts. This idea struck me when one of my own students asked me, Miss
Rosinski, when do you use nonfiction? After a brief discussion as to how almost everything I
read now is nonfiction, they asked as a group for the opportunity to read some articles as if they

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

are real-life adults. How could I say no to that? This project gives me the opportunity to reach
the idea that fourth graders are at a particular stage for development and they are yearning for
information about the world and applying their reading strategies to real-life items. As Kiefer
and Tyson wrote, I am responsible for childrens reading need and need to be aware of child
development and learning theory and of childrens interests, (2014, p. 39).

2. Description of Text Set:

In order to meet the needs and interests of the students, sources containing appropriate
levels as well as topics were researched. Rather than books, students will be reading current
news articles and practicing their reading strategies and identification of informational texts
features with current news articles. Internet sites will be an excellent way to keep track of
current events, (Kiefer & Tyson, 2014, p. 259), and will be another text students are reading.
Finally, students will read a book from the Who Was? book series. The book supports their
construction of background knowledge needed to make connections with other books read. I
found the articles via subscription my current school has, internet sites based off of librarian and
myself research, and the books from knowledge of how much my students love these books.
These texts will help reach the end goal of exposure to articles and reading for the purpose of
reading about the world and events going on, as well as building background knowledge to help
students continue to grow in their reading levels and comprehension skills. This text set will be
difficult and a branch away from the trend of instructing students using books, especially in
nonfiction, but Keifer and Tyson support this text set when they write, Adult ideas about what is
appropriate for a given age level are often less important than a childs desire to know about a
particular topic, (2014, p. 255).

3. Teaching & Assessment Plan:

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

a. Content Nonfiction books are defined as books designated to literature for

children that is based in the actual rather than the imagined, (Kiefer & Tyson, 2014, p
255). There are two reactions from students when a teacher introduces this as the next
genre that will be read together: a very positive, enthusiastic one, or an extremely
negative, almost sighing out of dread. Because of this, I have found that teaching with a
purpose that students are interested in takes away the negative approach, especially
with fourth graders who are yearning for a part and knowledge of the world. Teaching
nonfiction requires enthusiasm from the educator, and modeling of reading non linear.
Modeling texts are a great resource, but with fourth graders, they want to be part and
have their own text to follow. With this in mind, I am approaching this unit using Close
Reading. This instruction strategy models the text one time, then incorporates everyone
in the class to be part of the text, and interact with the features. Authors of nonfiction
choose a style to write their article in, which helps with organization and comprehension.
Using Close Reading and nonfiction, students interact with the author via the text and
working together makes the experience more influential and satisfying. At the end of the
readings, students will create their own nonfiction article on a topic they have read about
circling the whole experience. Students learn better and more deeply when their
learning is contextualized and genuinely motivated, (Duke, 2012, p. 2), which is why I
am listening to their wants when creating this teaching with a purpose unit.
Script: I have listened to what you want to read and the interest that you all want
to know more about what is happening in the world and the places around the world. So,
I have gathered articles and a book that we will read together. What genre of literature
are these articles going to be? Correct, nonfiction! We are going to look at how authors
write nonfiction, which will help us comprehend both these articles as well as something
you read outside of the classroom! We are going to look closely at the text, using our
Close Reading skills, to dissect the information and become pros on each topic. After

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

we work together and become familiar with nonfiction features and styles of writing,
everyone will compose one of their own articles on a topic we have read about, or a
topic you know a lot about. We need to stay focused on the signals that give us clues as
to how the author is writing, and dive deep into the text to gather as much information on
each topic as possible. In this way, we can get to know some of the things that are
happening around the world and how they affect you.
b.

Lessons

Each day, students will work on a different step of the Close Reading

strategy. Students will read an article a week and will read the book over a course of two week
period. This organization and similarity of each day and week will help students stay organized
and will anticipate what is happening that day. Day 1 will be I read. In this process, I will read
the article out loud as students follow along with their copies. We will start out by having a prereading discussion consisting of predicting, questions, and background information. As I begin
reading, I think out loud some of the thoughts happening while I read to model what good
readers do, especially with nonfiction. This days reading stays focused on learning the gist of
the article. The second day will be We Read. In this day, students sit together or broken into
reading level groups working with a teacher and take turns reading the article again out loud.
We highlight the key-words found from our lists, main idea, details, and any important or new
information we need to remember. Students are becoming active readers on this day discussing
with each other, finding information they want to highlight to remember and becoming more
familiar with not only the information, but the actual text used. The third day is Peer Do/Yall Do
where students work with a peer to re-read the article and take a stance on what they read.
Together, they talk about a stance that they each want to take or their response on the article.
They can complete one of four tasks: create a poster to support or not the issue, write a letter to
the author critiquing their work, compare/contrast using a venn diagram this article to another, or
create five meaningful questions about the article or for the author. Day four consists of students
reading the article for a final time and using it as evidence to answer assessment questions.

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

Day five is a reflective day in a discussion format or blog post, then together we will create a
poster for our classroom documenting in a list format the titles of the articles, styles they were
written in, and how it affects their lives.
Schedule of articles/book:
1. Wheres the Water?
2. Rules For Safer Play
3. Hola , Cuba!
4. A Path for Panthers
5. Reading, Math Yoga?
6. Why an Entire Turkish Neighborhood Secretly Learned Sign Language (video
and website)
7. Drink up!
8. Researchers Unveil Three New Species of Colorful Miniature Dragons
9. A Who Was? book
c. Student Project For their final assessment piece, students will compose their own nonfiction
article. After reading so many varieties of styles and variety of topics, students will choose a
topic they want to research on their own, or a topic that they know much about (sport, animal,
place etc.) and research more to support their understanding.
They will start out by picking a topic. Then, they will research for two periods their topic
using the computers in the school. Students are able to use worldbookonline.com, or any other
encyclopedia website that we use during our other classes. During this time, they also must find
pictures for their subject that they will write their own labels or captions for. Finally, students will
choose one of the styles we have studied that authors write nonfiction in and compose their own
article in that style. The final product will be typed with pictures included. After being familiar with
the website, Tackk, students would use that to help them create their article.
After each reading, students will be answering questions aligned with the Common Core
Standards as a mini assessment. This last project leads the students to dive deeper, and to
produce what they are studying. Each article must include a title, subtitles, organized
information, at least two pictures with captions, and a clear layout.

4. CCSS Addressed

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

*CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.1 Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining

what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.
(answering questions and thinking out loud during discussion readings)
*RI.4.2 Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details;
summarize the text.
(highlighting and responding to texts)
*RI.4.4 Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words or
phrases in a text relevant to a grade 4 topic or subject area.
(looking at the key-words for each article and composing their own)
*RI.4.5 Describe the overall structure of events, ideas, concepts, or information in a text
or part of a text.
(finding the style the text is written as)
*RI.4.8 Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in
a text.
(looking at author style, using evidence when answering questions)
*RI.4.10 By the end of year, read and comprehend informational texts, including
history/social studies, science, and technical texts, in the grades 4-5 text complexity band
proficiently, with scaffolding as needed at the high end of the range.
(the variety of text levels the articles are)
*CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.4.6 With some guidance and support from adults, use
technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing as well as to interact and
collaborate with others; demonstrate sufficient command of keyboarding skills to type a
minimum of one page in a single sitting.
(assessment)

5. Desired Outcomes

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

With this unit, my goal is to make nonfiction leave the classroom and the stiff lesson
plans that usually come with it. I want to take the students to real-life situations almost
mimicking adults who use reading skills they learned to read current news articles. In this sense,
reading becomes more than learning the features and taking a test, rather, students are
engaged in the world and text, learning about new people, ideas, or events, and using that
information to compare author styles, critique the text, as well as, the accuracy of facts
provided. Duke provided me with this idea of instruction as she described the steps for teaching
with a purpose and wrote, teaching genre with purpose, you create a situation in which your
students have a purpose- beyond satisfying you- for conveying information on a specific topic to
an audience for whom they genuinely want to explain or clarify the topic, and compared to
whom they are more expert, using a genre- such as informational magazine article- that exists
in the real world, not just the classroom, (2012, p. 10). The final outcome of my unit, an original
nonfiction article that students create, align with Dukes definition of teaching with purpose and
brings the whole purpose for reading informational texts full circle. Kiefer and Tyson also helped
with the formation of this project when they wrote, Children are curious about the world and
how it works, (2014, p. 255).

6. Appendices
a. References:
Duke, N. K. (2012). Reading and writing genre with a purpose in K-8 classrooms. Portsmouth,
NH: Heinemann.
Kiefer, B. Z., & Tyson, C. A. (2014). Charlotte Huck's Children's Literature: A Brief Guide
(Second ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
b. Annotated Bibliography of Text Set:
Bubar, J. (2015, February 9). Drying Up. Scholastic News, 77, 4-5.
The drought in California is causing Californians to live life safely and
is
causing destruction to the land which will eventually affect everyone
and everything if it continues.

TEACHING NONFICTION WITH A PURPOSE

Bubar, J. (2015, February 23). Hola Cuba!. Scholastic News, 77, 4-5.
The U.S. is meeting and finding a way to fix its relationship with Cuba in
order to help the Cubans live a better lifestyle.

Bubar, J. (2015, May 11). Reading, Math...Yoga? Scholastic News, 77, 6-7.
Schools are incorporating Yoga into their daily curriculum to teach students a sense of
mindfulness which helps with their overall performance in and out of school.

Dolasia, M. (2015, April 27). Why An Entire Turkish Neighborhood Secretly Learned Sign
Language. DOGO news.

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http://www.dogonews.com/2015/4/27/video-of-the-week-why-an-entire-turkishneighborhood-secretly-learned-sign-language
An entire town learned sign language for one of the community members to make him
feel accepted and "normal."

Humenik, Z. (2015, June 15). Drink up! Time for Kids.

http://www.timeforkids.com/news/drink/248031
Scientists and doctors are concerned with the amount of water
that
active children are drinking which can lead to serious issues other
than dehydration. This article gives tips on how to consume more
water.

Kellaher, K. (2015, May 11). A Path for Panthers. Scholastic News, 77, 4-5.
Florida Wildlife Corridor has created pathways for the animals living in southern Florida,
mainly endangered species like the panthers to avoid cars and humans taking over and
killing the animals. The pathway is intended to help the animals, especially the panthers
travel safely for their food and other survival needs.

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Manning, A. (2015, June 10). Rules For Safer Play. Time For Kids.
http://www.timeforkids.com/news/rules-safer-play/247476
Doctors across the country are concerned about the amount of
concussions happening on the sport fields. They are coming up
with new policies to decrease the amount happening and to help
athletes.

Multitude of Authors. Who Was? Book Series. Penguin Group, New York, NY 2013.
Students can choose one of the books in this series to read and learn information from
with a partner. They cover everything from people, places, as well as big events.

Solis, K. (2015, April 30). Researchers Unveil Three New Species of Colorful 'Miniature
Dragons'. DOGO news. http://www.dogonews.com/2015/4/30/
researchers-unveil-three-new-species-of-colorful-miniature-dragons
Deep in the Amazon Rainforest, scientists found a rare lizard that is part of the dragon

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family and hope to work towards keeping these rare animals safe.

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