Thinking About Theme
We are starting a new reading unit. The unit will focus on the following common core state standards:
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.5.1 Quote accurately from a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.5.2 Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text, including how characters in a story or drama respond to challenges or how the speaker in a poem reflects upon a topic; summarize the text.
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.5.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative language such as metaphors and similes.
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.5.5 Explain how a series of chapters, scenes, or stanzas fits together to provide the overall structure of a particular story, drama, or poem.
In this unit, we will review these topics that we have studied earlier this year or in fourth grade:
Readers use the author’s words to back up their claims about a text.
Readers use their prior knowledge and experience along with information from the text to draw inferences from the text.
Readers understand that stories are often written using a predictable structure called a story arc.
Readers summarize fiction by telling who, what, when, where, how, and why.
We will be covering new ground as well:
Readers can identify two or more themes in stories, drama, and poems.
Readers understand that characters respond to challenges in ways that help the reader understand the theme.
Readers can explain how setting shapes the theme of a story.
Readers use thinking maps to construct written responses to questions they are asked.
Gnomes Read, Write, and Think 
