EXAMPLE: EDC 424 Lesson Plan
Name: Julie Coiro
Book: Spider, Spider
Author: Joy Cowley
TEXT OVERVIEW
Summary: This is a story about a spider that tries to get some food by inviting various insects to
join him for tea, but none of the insects he asks will stay around long enough. At the end of the
story, a bird asks the spider to come for tea and the spider scurries away in fear and hides under a
leaf.
Readability: Sunshine Books (Wright Group) Level E
Grade: I have chosen to use this book in the early part of first grade to be paired with instruction
in reading decodable CVC words and sight words. This book connects to a more difficult book
we are reading aloud together in Shared Reading to help see connections across texts. Each
student will read his/her own copy of the book.
OBJECTIVES
Comprehension: Students will complete a sequence chart to write the name of each animal in
the order it appears in the story and make inferences about how each animal’s words causes the
spider to feel.
Corresponding Common Core Standards:
 Reading Grade 1: Literature Key Ideas and Details #1: Ask and answer questions about
key details in a text.
 Reading Grade 1: Literature Integration of Knowledge and Ideas #9. Compare and
contrast the adventures and experiences of characters in familiar stories.
Corresponding GLE’s:
 R-1-4.2a. Respond to simple questions about a book’s content.
 R-1-5.3 Make basic inferences about the text.
Corresponding RIPTS:
 5.1 Design lessons that extend beyond factual recall and challenge students to develop
higher level cognitive skills
Word Study: Students will complete with 90% accuracy a word sort that matches each short o
CVC word to its picture, sorts these words by their word family (–ot, -op, and –og and oddball
o).
Corresponding Common Core Standards:
 Reading: Foundational Skills Kindergarten #3. Know and apply grade-level phonics and
word analysis skills in decoding words by distinguishing between similarly spelled words
by identifying the sounds of the letters that differ.
Corresponding GLE’s;
 R-1-1.1 Applies word identification and decoding strategies to sounding out regularly
spelled one-syllable words using letter-sound correspondence knowledge.
Corresponding RIPTS:
 3.2 Design instruction that meets the current cognitive, social, and personal needs of
students
Reader Response: After a discussion of how different insects make Spider (the main character)
feel by accepting or rejecting his invitation to tea, students will use the same predictable word
patterns from Spider, Spider to write their own page of three sentences for a class story about
Spider and the insects.
Corresponding Common Core Standards:
 Writing Grade 1: Text Types and Purposes #3. Write narratives in which they recount
two or more appropriately sequenced events and include some details regarding what
happened.
Corresponding GLE’s;
 R-1-16. Generates a personal response to what is read aloud and read independently
through a variety of means.
 W-1-4.1. Students will organize and relate a story line/plot of events by creating an
understandable story line when given a structure.
Corresponding RIPTS:
 3.3 Create age-appropriate lessons and activities that meet the variety of developmental
levels of students within a class
PREREADING
Prior knowledge: To activate prior knowledge, I will remind students about the book we’ve
been reading this week in our Sharing Circle called Miss Spider’s Tea Party. First, I will ask the
students if anyone remembers any of the animals that have been invited to the spider’s tea party.
I will ask several children for examples (e.g., beetles, fireflies, bumblebees, ants, butterflies,
moth). As students respond, I will take each animal’s picture card label out of the felt board set
they have been using in the Writing Center and place it on the board. I will then ask what makes
this tea party so strange, and students will respond that it’s about a spider that is asking a lot of
her enemies to a party and no one wants to come. I will ask how this makes the spider feel, and
why no one wants to come to the party (they are afraid they will be eaten). Then I will remind
students the story ends happily when Miss Spider meets moth, who tells all her friends that the
spider does not mean any harm, and all eleven insects joined her for tea. I will ask the children
if this story ends as they would expect (no) and to explain why (because most spiders would eat
all of those insects).
Vocabulary/concepts: I will tell children that we are about to read a story of another spider who
wants some insects to come to tea. I will tell them they will meet some new insects in this story.
One by one, I will introduce the word card for each insect (spider, bee, earwig, caterpillar,
dragonfly, moth, grasshopper, bird) calling attention to the first letter in each word and the sound
that letter makes. We will say each word, match it with its picture, and say the first letter and
sound of each insect. I will also introduce the word “not” and ask students to look for it in the
story because we will learn more about this word and other words like it during Word Study.
Sight Word Review: Before we begin, we will quickly review these four sight words and find
them on our word wall: come, no, to, and me. I will tell students to look for these words as they
read their story.
Purpose for reading: Tell the students we are going to read another story about a spider who
invites some insects to tea. Let’s read to find out if this story ends like Miss Spider’s Tea Party
or if it ends differently.
GUIDED READING: (To build reading comprehension)
I will work with students in small groups. Students will rotate through the guided reading group.
Students NOT in the guided reading group will read the book in pairs (buddies). Each pair of
students will have a guided reading sheet to do while reading. I will read the title of the story and
give directions for guided and independent reading.
Independent Comprehension Activity:
“When you are not in group with me, you will be reading Spider, Spider with your reading
buddy. (Hand out guided reading sheet – see worksheet attached). The first time through, you
will read one page out loud and your partner will read the next page. Decide who will read first.
Pay attention to how the story ends because you might be surprised. Then I want you to read the
story a second time, one page at a time. After each set of pages, you will stop and think about
WHO the spider asked to tea and if they said YES or NO. Write the insect’s name in the first
space, write Yes or NO in the second space, and then circle the face that describes how Spider
felt in the third column. Then, read the next set of pages and fill in the next row of spaces on
your sheet. After you read the last page, very carefully, talk with your buddy about how Spider
feels now. Draw a picture of the face you think Spider has at the end of the story and write a
sentence telling why he might feel that way.
Answer to the comprehension activity:
 Bee, Earwig, Caterpillar, Dragonfly, Moth, grasshopper (They all said no, and spider was
sad).
 At the end, a Bird asks Spider if he wants to come to tea. Spider shouts No, No and hides
under the leaf. He is afraid! (Answers will vary: Child draws scared face for spider and
writes something like…“Spider is afraid the bird will eat him”).
Guided Reading Questions: Students in group will “whisper read” up to the pages specified
below. When each student has finished, I will ask the following questions:
Page 5: Initial Q: (Open): What’s going on? (literal)
Response: The bee and the earwig do not want to come to tea with Spider.
Follow-up Q: Why do you think they don’t want to join Spider for tea? (inferential)
Response: It’s like Miss Spider’s Tea Party!
Follow-up Q: What do you mean? How is this story like that one?
Response: The insects are afraid to be near Spider because he might eat them!
Follow-up Q: How do you think this makes Spider feel?
Response: Answers will vary (sad, upset, disappointed, lonely).
Follow-up Q: So, do you think this story will end like Miss Spider’s Tea Party?
Response: Answers will vary – (maybe these insects will end up coming to tea too
– so Spider will be happy. But maybe they won’t want to stay and Spider will be
sad).
Follow-up: Let’s keep reading the next two pages to see who else Spider asks to
tea.
Page 9: Initial Q: (Open): So, what’s happening now? (literal)
Response: Two more insects won’t join Spider for tea.
Follow-up Q: You are right. Which two animals won’t come this time?
Response: The caterpillar and the dragonfly.
Follow-up Q: Do you think they are afraid too?
Response: Answers will vary (yes, they don’t want to get eaten).
Follow-up Q: How do you think Spider is feeling now?
Follow-up Q: On the next page, Spider will meet a moth. What do you think might
happen when he meets the moth?
Response: Answers will vary. (Maybe it will be just like the moth in Miss Spider’s
Tea Party, and he won’t be afraid, and all the other insects will come back too. OR
No, I think he’s going to just as afraid as the other insects).
Follow-up: Well, let’s keep reading to find out what happens with the Moth.
Page 11:Initial Q: So, who predicted correctly?
Response: (Children point out who was correct or not). I did because I thought the
moth would not want to come to tea.
Follow-up Q: So, is this story turning out to be the same as Miss Spider’s Tea Party
or different?
Response: It’s different.
Follow-up Q: Good. Who can tell us how this story is different?
Response: In this story, the moth doesn’t stay for tea.
Follow-up Q: You’re right. And what does the moth do in Miss Spider’s Tea Party?
Response: The moth makes friends with Spider and gets all the other insects to
come to tea too.
Follow-up Q. Well, let’s keep reading to see if anything else is different about this
story. Be careful – the author does something tricky at the end!
Page 15: Initial Q: So, what happens at the end?
Response: This time, the spider runs away and hides!
Follow-up Q: What do you mean? How do you know?
Response: Look at the picture. Spider is hiding under a leaf.
Follow-up Q: So, why is he running away from his own tea party?
Response: This time, the bird asked him to come to tea, and he’s afraid he will get
eaten, so he says no and hides.
Follow-up Q: You are right – Spider is afraid of the bird, so he’s not happy at all. So,
this story ends really differently then Miss Spider’s Tea Party. Who can tell us how
this story is different?
Response: Answers will vary. (The spider is not happy in this story; None of the
insects join him, etc.)
Follow-up Comment: Good – you figured it out! The author tricked us with a
different kind of surprise at the ending of this story. We can make connections
between these stories to help us understand them.
RESPONDING
After reading the story, I will bring the students back together as a group and ask:
Q: What was the same about these stories?
A: A spider asked a lot of different insects to tea.
Q: What was different about these stories?
A: In one story, the insects finally came to tea and Spider was happy. In the other
story, the insects did not come to tea and Spider was sad. And, at the end of this
story, Spider crawled away and hid because he was afraid.
Q: So, when authors write their own stories, they get to decide what happens to
the characters. Hmm…what if we wrote our own class book where Spider asks a
lot of different insects to tea. Some of the insects could say yes, and some could
say no. You could even have some animals ask Spider to tea if you want! You can
decide which insect or animal you would like to bring and how this makes Spider
feel.
After a brief discussion, I will explain the class story writing activity.
“In the writing center, you will find sentence strips to write your own sentence about who the
spider asks to tea, just like the author of Spider, Spider. And then, you get to decide if this insect
will come or not. Then, you will make your story just a little different by telling if this made
Spider sad or happy.
Let’s do one together: (HERE ARE THE SENTENCE FRAMES)
“___________________, _______________ come to tea.”
“No, no, Spider not me.” OR “Yes, Yes, Spider, I will come to tea.”
This made Spider ______________________ (sad or happy).
EXAMPLE (My model):
Flea, Flea, come to tea. No, no Spider, not me. This made Spider sad.
EXPLORING: Integrate your Word Study Demonstration into this section of the lesson
plan.
Word study principle: The study of short vowels and word families, specifically short O CVC
words and the word families –ot, -op, and –og.
Why this is important: This practice supports early readers who “may have trouble isolating
and attending to the medial vowel and it is a good idea to compare word families that share the
same vowel before contrasting different vowels” (WTW, p. 167). Introducing word families with
pictures ensures students understand the meaning of each word and may help with early
decoding skills by offering a picture prompt.
When in development taught: Reading short vowel CVC words by chunking them into their
onset and rime patterns is appropriate for kindergartners in the beginning stage of reading and
the letter name-alphabetic stage of spelling.
Illustrations in Text: The words “no” and “not” are in this story, which provides a context for
talking about the long and short vowel sounds of the letter /o/. Hot can be used as a starting
place to talk about CVC short o word families including –ot, -op, and –og.
Activity: I have chosen to do a teacher-directed word sort with words belonging to the word
families –ot, -op, and –og. I will include two oddball words, also from the story: no and to. Both
of these words, from their sigh word list, have an o at the end, but they do not say short o. This is
to help students different long o from short o words as well, and to get them to pay attention to
how to “decode” sight words.
The words included in the word sort are:
-ot = pot, hot, cot, dot -og = hot, log, frog, jog
-op= hop, top, mop, pop
oddball: no, to
Instruction: To teach students to differentiate the short o sound in CVC (closed syllable) words
compared to the o sound in open syllables (like no and to), and to differentiate between the
ending sounds/letters in three short o CVC word families including –ot, -op, and –og, I will: (see
WTW, page 168 for more details about the following – but for your actual lesson plan, please
write out all of these steps)…
Explain/Model:
Provide Guided Practice:
Do New Example:
APPLYING: Provide Independent Practice
I will provide students two activities in the word study center to practice reading CVC words
with short o in the middle. One activity will be one with a partner (listening, speaking, writing)
and one will be done independently (reading, writing).
Activity one: (see attached) Sort –ot, -op, and –og., and oddball words and match with pictures.
Talk with partner about how the o sound is different in CVC words and no/to.
“In the word study center today, you will work with a partner to cut out and glue the –ot, -op,
and –og. words and pictures into your word study notebook. Use this sheet here (refer to
attached). Sort the words by their word family and line up each word with its correct picture.
Some words will only fit in the “oddball” category. Talk with your partner about why the words
are oddballs.”
Activity two: (see attached) Writing/reading words that fit the ot and at word families.
“After you finish your word sort, you will write the short o cvc words in your word study
notebook and draw a picture for each word. Mix up the order of the words so they are not I their
word families. Bring the words home tonight and read them with your parents.”
ENGAGING ALL STUDENTS
For the reading response activity, some students may have difficulty copying the insect words
from the book onto the activity sheet. For these students, I will have a set of index cards with
each insect written on one card next to its picture. Once the student matches the insect’s name to
the card, he/she can place the card directly above the space on their worksheet to make copying
easier.
For all students, I will have a model of my three sentences for them to use to write their own
sentences. Some students may struggle with writing lengthy sentences or clearly forming all of
the letters. For these students, I will provide a “writing template” with common parts of the
sentence starters already written on the sentence strips. Students who have difficulty writing
their full sentences on the sentence strips can work from these partially completed sentence strips
to fill in the correct insect’s name, their response (yes/no) and the feeling word for Spider’s
reaction (happy/sad).
SAMPLE (partially completed sentence strips students can complete to compose their story)
“___________________, _______________ come to tea.”
“________, _______ Spider not me.” OR “_____, _____ Spider, I will come to tea.”
This made Spider ______________________.
EVALUATION:
Comprehension: To evaluate students’ guided reading sheet, I will use the following rubric.
Good for you!
Almost there!
Coming along!
You wrote the correct insect
You wrote the correct insect
You wrote the correct insect
type in the correct order for all type in the correct order for
type in the correct order for
six insects.
four or five insects.
three or fewer insects.
You wrote “Yes” or “No” to
show you understood each
insect’s decision.
You wrote “Yes” or “No” to
show you understood each
insect’s decision.
You wrote “Yes” or “No”
after some of the insects but
not all of them.
You circled the happy or sad
face correctly for each insect
to show you understood how
the insect made Spider feel.
You circled the happy or sad
face correctly most of the
time.
You circled the happy or sad
face correctly three or more
times.
You wrote a few words that
told how the story ended.
You drew a picture to show
you understood how the story
ended.
You wrote a sentence and
drew a picture to show you
understood how the story
ended.
Word Study: I will know whether students can read and sort short o CVC words by whether
they achieved 90% or better on the word sorting activity. I would also ask students to meet with
me to read aloud all of the words in the word sort. To keep track of where students are, I will
place them on this rubric. I would want all students “independent” after two weeks time.
Student
Independent
(90-100%)
Needs more practice
(70-80%)
Needs instruction
(less than 70%
correct)
Reader Response: I will evaluate the students’ three-sentence addition to the class story by
seeing whether they followed the correct sentence pattern and if they chose the correct words to
indicate Spiders feelings about each insect’s response. I will also ask students to read their page
(and possibly others in the class book) after all the pages have been compiled.
Spider, Spider (Partner Guided Reading Activity)
WHO did Spider
ask to tea?
Did the insect
come?
YES or NO
How did spider
feel?
How did Spider feel at the end? Draw your own face and write a
sentence about how Spider felt. Tell why Spider felt that way.