Pathwise Instruction Plan
Reading Lesson: Making Connections Strategy
Mentor Teacher Observation 3
Raihan Duzan and Danielle Ciccotelli
Mentor Teacher: Mrs. Browning
Grade: 1st
Co-Teaching Method: One lead teach/ one observe
Subject: Reading
1. Learning Objectives
What are your objectives for student learning in this lesson? That is, what do you intend
students to learn?
Students will be able to make text-text, text-self, and text-world connections.
Students will listen to, read, and discuss both familiar and conceptual texts.
Students will effectively communicate when connecting experiences to the text.
Why have you chosen these objectives?
These objectives coincide with the standards that are being addressed in this lesson.
What Standards (National or State) relate to this lesson?
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LA.1.1.6.2: The student will listen to, read, and discuss both familiar and conceptually
challenging text.
LA.1.2.1.5: The student will respond to various literary selections (e.g., nursery rhymes,
fairy tales), identifying the character(s), setting, and sequence of events and connecting
text to self (personal connection), text to world (social connection), text to text
(comparison among multiple texts).
LA.1.5.2.5: The student will communicate effectively when relating experiences and
retelling stories read and heard.
2. Content Knowledge
What is the underlying content knowledge that the teacher must help the students understand?
 Making connections is a reading comprehension strategy in which students activate their
prior knowledge and make a variety of connections or associations to the text that they
are reading.
 There are three kinds of reading connections:
o Text-Text: students make connections between different texts
o Text-Self: students make connections between the text and themselves, including
but not limited to their personal opinions and experiences
o Text-World: students make connections between the text and the world around
them, including but not limited to events in history, current events, the physical
world, and individuals in society
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The effective communication of ideas and experiences involves the use of clear, concise,
specific language.
What are the tricky pieces in the content? When you deconstruct the content you are teaching
what are the pieces that are essential for children to understand?
Students will have difficulty with becoming aware that they are making text-text, text-self, and
text-world connections. This level of metacognition may be too developmentally advanced for
some first grade students. In addition, some students will have difficulty in distinguishing the
difference between the three types of connection and classifying their connections into these
three categories.
3. Student Grouping
How will you group students for instruction?
Whole group
Individual
Why have you chosen this grouping?
We chose whole group because this lesson will be an introduction to a comprehension strategy
that all students are required to learn. We chose individual grouping to assess students’
understanding and application of the comprehension strategy.
4. Methods
What teaching method(s) will you use for this lesson?
We will use whole group instruction for the introduction and guided practice of the
comprehension strategy. We will then use individual grouping during the assessment segment of
the lesson. During this segment, students will be required to apply the comprehension strategy
and make connections independently.
What students need specific accommodations in this lesson?
In our class, we have two ELL students, one “gifted” student, several high-ability students, and
three or four students who have difficulties with staying focused when instruction is conducted in
whole-group format.
What specific accommodations have you made for these student needs?
To accommodate our two ELL students and our LD student, we will be using tangible materials
that include explicit pictures and easy-to-read words. Furthermore, since we noticed that the ELL
students’ and LD student’s oral language is much stronger than their written language, we will
begin the lesson by reading the story aloud to our students to ensure that all students understand
the story. We will also begin and end the lesson with extensive modeling and discussion. To
further our support of our students’ oral language abilities, we will incorporate a cooperative
learning activity to give the ELL students meaningful interaction with the content and with their
peers.
To further support our ELL and LD students’ limited writing ability and our higher students’
strong writing ability, students will be able to choose whether they would like to write or to draw
during this activity. This activity is not meant to assess writing ability. As long as students are
able to describe their drawings such that their descriptions accurately represent a correctlyclassified connection that they have made to the text, the students are fulfilling the objectives of
the lesson.
To further assist our LD student in comprehending the material, we will provide him with oneon-one support during the assessment part of the lesson.
To accommodate our advanced students, the nature of the “making connections” activity is very
open-ended; thus, our advanced students will be able to include additional details in their
connections. The advanced students will have the opportunity to interpret the assignment, and
they will be encouraged to venture beyond the minimum requirements.
Why have you chosen this method or these methods?
To accommodate students who are often restless or off-task in whole-group situations, we are
incorporating activities that require more interaction between students and teachers or between
students and students.
5. Activities
What activities have you planned?
DAY 1
Opening (5 mins): First Danielle will implement a whole-group introduction to the making
connections comprehension strategy. She will ask the students the following question:
 What do you think it means to make connections?
Next, Danielle will guide students towards the understanding that making connections means to
relate the text to themselves and their experiences.
Then Danielle will discuss the three different kinds of connections, as follows:
 “Text-Text” means to relate the story to another story that you have read or heard before.
 “Text-Self” means to relate the story to your personal opinions or experiences.
 “Text-World” means to relate the story to the world around you, like a place in the world,
a person that you know, or an event in history.
Activity 1 (20 mins): After this introduction, Danielle will read the book, If You Take a Mouse
to School. While reading the book she will stop four times to model the making connections
strategy for this particular text.
For the first connection, Danielle will use a “teacher think-aloud” to model to students how to
make a connection to the text. After she makes her connection, she will ask students the
following questions:
 What kind of connection do you think I made: text-text, text-self, or text-world?
(Bloom’s questioning level: comprehension)
 Why do you think it is that type of connection? (Bloom’s questioning level: application)
Based on students’ answers, Danielle will guide students towards the correct answer. Then she
will add her connection to the “sticky note” that coincides with the kind of connection that she
made. She will either write out her connection or she will draw her connection to illustrate to
students that they will be able to choose whether they would like to write or to draw.
This modeling process will be repeated two more times.
For the fourth and final connection Danielle will ask students to stop and think of a connection
that they have made to the text. (Blooms questioning level: analysis) Then, she will ask students
turn to their “shoulder partner” to share their connection.
Danielle will then use the “name sticks” to choose three students to share their partner’s
connection. She will then choose one of these three connections to record as our fourth
connection to the text. She will guide students through this process by asking:
 What kind of connection do you think s/he made: text-text, text-self, or text-world?
(Bloom’s questioning level: comprehension)
 Why do you think it is that type of connection? (Bloom’s questioning level: application)
Based on students’ answers, Danielle will guide students towards the correct answer. Then, she
will add their connection to a “sticky note” by either writing out their connection or drawing
their connection.
Closing (5 mins): Danielle will then review the four connections made by herself and by the
student. She will also review why each connection is either a text-text, text-self, or text-world
connection.
DAY 2
Opening (5 mins): First, Raihan will ask the students to join her on the carpet. Then, she will
review the types of connections that the students learned about the previous day by asking the
following questions:
 What do you remember about making connections to the books that we read? (Bloom’s
questioning level: knowledge, comprehension)
 What is a connection? (Bloom’s questioning level: knowledge, comprehension)
 What is a text-text connection? Can you give me an example? (Bloom’s questioning
level: knowledge, comprehension, application)
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What is a text-self connection? Can you give me an example? (Bloom’s questioning
level: knowledge, comprehension, application)
 What is a text-world connection? Can you give me an example? (Bloom’s questioning
level: knowledge, comprehension, application)
 Why are connections important? (Bloom’s questioning level: knowledge, comprehension,
application)
Based on students’ responses, Raihan will guide students toward the correct responses, as
follows:
 “Text-Text” means to relate the story to another story that you have read or heard before.
 “Text-Self” means to relate the story to your personal opinions or experiences.
 “Text-World” means to relate the story to the world around you, like a place in the world,
a person that you know, or an event in history.
 Connections are important because they help us understand what we are reading.
Activity 1 (20 mins): Bloom’s task level: application
After this introduction, Raihan will explain to students that they will be making their own
connections using a decodable book that they have read before (All Kinds of Teams). The
students will be expected to follow along as Raihan reads the first two pages. Then, she will
guide them through making a connection, classifying the connection, and deciding whether to
draw or to write the connection on the paper.
Next, she will allow give the students a choice between reading the rest of the book on their own
or reading with the teacher. The students who choose to read on their own will sit at the back two
tables, and they will be allowed to read using the “reading pipes”, which is a telephone-like
device that allows them to listen to themselves whisper-read. These students will be expected to
read individually and make as many connections as possible. The students who finish early will
be expected to explain their connections with another student who has finished early. (This
instruction will be given out as necessary.)
The students who choose to read along with Raihan will sit at the front three tables, and they will
follow along in the book as Raihan reads. She will stop every three or four pages to give students
time to make connections to the book, and she will support the struggling students as necessary.
Once the students have made their choices, Raihan will give each student a copy of the book as
well as four half-sheets of paper, dismiss the students to their areas, and conduct the activity.
Closing (5 mins): Bloom’s task level: synthesis, evaluation
Once Raihan has finished reading the book with the teacher-guided group, she will bring all of
the students back together for a brief discussion. During the discussion, students will share one
connection that they made, classify the connection, and describe how their connection related to
the story.
6. Materials
What instructional materials will you use, if any?
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Teacher sticky notes
Class set of blank half-pages (at least 3 for each student)
Markers
Big Book- If you take a Mouse to School
Class set – All Kinds of Teams (decodable book)
Why have you chosen these materials?
The teacher sticky notes, markers, and big book will allow us to demonstrate and guide our
students through the strategy. The blank pages and class set of decodable books will allow us to
differentiate by giving the students the opportunity to read by themselves or to read with the
teacher, as well as the opportunity to write or to draw. Furthermore, the materials serve as handson learning tools that support our students’ preference for tactile activities.
7. Evaluation
How and when do you plan to evaluate student learning on the content of this lesson?
We will evaluate our students on Day 2 during the individual practice activity. First, while
students are working on their connections, we will briefly interview each student at least once
regarding the connection(s) that they are making. We will also collect the connections that the
students made to the decodable book, and the students will be evaluated based on the following
criteria:
 Level 1: Does not make connections with the text.
 Level 2: Talks about what text reminds them of, but cannot explain or relate clearly to the
text.
 Level 3: Relates background knowledge/experience to the text.
 Level 4: Uses background knowledge to enhance comprehension and interpretation.
Background knowledge is clearly related to the text. Makes text-to-text, text-to-self, and
text-to-world connections.
Why have you chosen this approach to evaluation?
The Day 2 task will allow us to assess individual students’ understanding of the strategy. By
interviewing students and collecting each students’ connections, we are ensuring individual
accountability for the content. The rubric that we are using is adapted from a rubric that we are
required to use per the requirements of RED4324: Teaching Reading in the Intermediate Grades.
The rubric will allow us to place our students’ many connections on a comparable level so that
we can determine which students are succeeding and which need additional support.