Lessons & Units :: Plot 3rd Grade Unit

Lesson 2: Analyzing Character Conflict Caused by the Plot

Lesson Plan

Ruby's Wish | 600L

Ruby's Wish
Learning Goal
Identify and describe how the problem in a story causes a conflict between the characters.
Duration
Approximately 50 minutes
Necessary Materials
Provided: Example Graphic Organizer for Direct Teaching, Guided Practice, Independent Practice Worksheet
Not Provided: Ruby’s Wish by Shirin Yim Bridges and The Story of Noodles by Ying Chang Compestine, chart paper, markers, guided reading or independent books on each student’s reading level

  • Activation & Motivation

    Activate prior knowledge by discussing tensions students have with their friends or families and how these tensions have affected their relationships.

  • Teacher Modeling

    will explain that in the plot of a story, a problem causes a conflict between characters. I will analyze the conflict in Ruby’s Wish by explaining how each character feels about the problem on a graphic organizer. (Direct Teaching Teacher Example is provided below in Teacher and Student Materials.) I will describe the conflict between the characters based on their feelings about the problem.

  • Think Check

    Ask: How did I determine how a problem affected the characters in the story? Students should respond that you read the story and identified the problem. Then you used evidence from the text to analyze how the characters felt about the problem and how this caused them to feel about each other.

  • Guided Practice

    will read The Story of Noodles by Ying Chang Compestine and discuss the problem in the book—the brothers have ruined their mother’s famous dumplings before the annual cooking contest. We will identify how the brothers feel about the problem and how their parents feel. Then, we will use their feelings about the problem to analyze and describe the conflict between the brothers and their parents. (Guided Practice Graphic Organizer is provided below.)

  • Independent Practice

    will read a Guided Reading or Independent Book on your level, thinking about a problem in the story. You will describe how a problem causes conflict between two characters using a graphic organizer. (Student Independent Practice is provided below.)

    TIP: You may want to have students listen to Chicken Sunday by Patricia Polacco for the Independent Practice.

Build Student Vocabulary annual

Tier 2 Word: annual
Contextualize the word as it is used in the story The mother asked her sons for help for the annual cooking contest.
Explain the meaning student-friendly definition) Annual means happening once a year, every year. The cooking contest is held annually. That means that it happens once every year.
Students repeat the word Say the word annual with me: annual.
Teacher gives examples of the word in other contexts At our school’s annual book fair, I always buy a few books for the class. Our town has an annual fireworks display on the Fourth of July. The St. Patrick’s Day parade is an annual event. It happens every year on March 17th. Every year in March, I get my annual medical exam.
Students provide examples What is something that you do every year? Start by saying, “I do ____________annually.”
Students repeat the word again. What word are we talking about? annual
Additional Vocabulary Words urged, dough

Build Student Background Knowledge

Before reading The Story of Noodles, explain that you are going to read a story about noodles. Even though different countries claim to have created the first noodle, the first written document of the noodle was in 25-220 A.D. in China. Early Chinese noodles were made of millet, a grain that is different then wheat. How did noodles come West? Explain that a legend explains that explorer Marco Polo visited Asia and brought noodles back to Italy. Many historians believe this legend is pure fiction. Before Marco Polo, Syrians and Italians learned to create wheat noodles and dry them to make pasta, without any knowledge of Chinese noodles.

Texts & Materials

Standards Alignment

(To see all of the ReadWorks lessons aligned to your standards, click here.)

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