1. The document discusses strategies for teaching students to understand nonfiction texts, including learning text structures, features, and the author's purpose. 2. It provides examples of various nonfiction text structures like description and compare/contrast. 3. Teachers are encouraged to help students analyze an author's big idea, organization, potential biases, and evaluate whether the author's point was clearly made.

1. Teaching for Understanding in Nonfiction

2. N on F iction… the Good the Bad the Ugly

3. ©Angela Maiers, 2007 The G ood

4. ©Angela Maiers, 2007 Girls, Too !!!!

5. ©Angela Maiers, 2007 The Bad

6. The Ugly

9. We can sooo change that!

10. © Maiers, 2008

11. Thinking about Fiction

12. “ Life” Story “ Book” Story (THEME) Fiction = Stories of Life

13. The Orange

14. BIG IDEA (Whole text) Main Idea ( Section Level)

15. M ain Idea vs . B ig Idea

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21. BIG IDEAS in Nonfiction

23. ©Angela Maiers, 2006 Bears 1. 2.

24. P E N G U I N F R A N L A N T I N G

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34. ©Angela Maiers, 2006 Convention Purpose How it Helps Caption Information directly relating to a photo or illustration Tells the reader what to focus on in the picture that is important Comparison Show size relationship between two or more objects of ideas Helps the readers take something familiar to show how it relates or compares with something new Close-Up A smaller more detailed section of the larger photo or illustration It allows the reader to see inside or a smaller part of a large area so we can understand it in a more detailed way Table of Contents Located in the front of the book to share a list of key topics or chapter in which the book addresses in the order in which they appear in the text It allows me to see the chapters and topics and know exactly what pages they are on so I can get to the information I need in the quickest way. Glossary Index Cutaways Print Size

35. Captions Labels Graphics Images Font Color Layout TOC Glossary Headings

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46. Visual Text: Cross Section ©Angela Maiers, 2006

47. Text Structures Following the Road to Meaning

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55. Signal Words Point the Way… © Maiers, 2008 Text Structure & Signal Words Description/ Hierarchical List Cause & Effect Compare / Contrast Problem/ Solution Question & Answer Sequence For instance For example Furthermore Such as Also To begin with Most important Also In fact In addition And to illustrate Since Because This led to On account of Due to As a result of For this reason Consequentially Then…so… Therefore thus In like manner Likewise Similar to The difference between As opposed to After all However And yet But Nevertheless On the other hand One reason for the… A solution A problem Where The question is One answer is Recommendations include How When What Next Why Who How many The best estimate It could be that One may conclude Until Before After Finally Lastly First…last… Now…then On (date) At (time) First, second Meanwhile Not long after initially ©Maiers, 2008

57. ©Maiers, 2008 Grades 2-4 Grades 4-8

58. BIG IDEAS in Nonfiction

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