Mentor Text

What on earth is a non-narrative text? That was my first question when I was trying to find something to bring in as a mentor text. My subject area is English, so what could I possibly bring in that would be unique and interesting, and acceptable as per Peterson's suggestions of non-narratives. That't when it occurred to me!
During my practicum, my associate teacher and I were looking for resources the students could use to answer questions after creating an inquiry based lesson. The lesson was essentially just showing the students two pictures. They were to take a close look at the picture, followed by a think-pair-share. The students discussed what the picture was about, where it was taken, who took it, and why. The students were asked to come up with their own questions and post it to the picture on the Smartboard. After collecting the questions, we grouped them and asked the students to find the answers. The problem was, how do you get a class of grade 4/5 students to find anything on the internet? Google? Do they even know how to use Google when they're 8 or 9? That's when we decided to do exactly what Peterson suggests in Chapter 3. Provide keywords, giving them accessibility to find quality information. The key was to narrow down the information. Two websites my associate teacher seldom used are: Teaching Kids News and Newsela. Both sites provide students with news articles based on current events, but translated into child-friendly language. Newsela takes the articles one step further and breaks down the articles into different reading levels. (Side note- great resource for differentiated instruction!)

Anyhow, according to Peterson my non-narrative form is categorized as a news article, in the form that informs. I thought it was a great non-narrative because it's a way of taking abstract content that students do not identify with and give it meaning. The other great aspect about these two websites is that it is divided into different content areas. Which means it's cross-curricular! (Always a plus, no?)

Some of my fantastic classmates also suggested that with Newsela, you can even use the different reading levels/versions of the same article to dissect the key facts that are included in all versions. You can make an entire lesson based on the essential components to news articles or the writing conventions of media literacy. Using news articles opens up the possibility of learning about media literacy, writing conventions, current events in science, or social studies. These mentor texts can be guides to any cross-curricular lesson. I really do think articles like these emphasize the importance of literacy across the curriculum. All teachers teach writing!




http://teachingkidsnews.com/

https://newsela.com/