Rationale

The importance of the relationship between people and animals unit

We have selected to do a thematic unit that focuses on the importance of the relationship between animals and people. Our purpose is to demonstrate that through children’s literary, home and physical interactions with animals, school-aged children will develop empathy, social and emotional skills, self-esteem and self-reliance as well as develop interpersonal relationships with others. According to the Animal-assisted therapy at SOS Children's Villages Mersch in Luxembourg, "(animals) mirror what others do, rather than making judgments. Animals are not calculating - they give and take without making conditions. In their relationship with animals, children can learn to have relationships, build up a sense of trust, find comfort, take responsibility, and experience the effects of their actions and feelings." In addition, the SOS also explained that animals are impartial by having no emotions and act “neutrally” towards people. Therefore, they claim that they are devoid judgmental behavior so that what they give out is unconditional love. Consequently, the state that this enables children to have a relationship with them and thus learn to have healthy relationships with others, build up a sense of trust, find comfort, take responsibility, and experience the affects of their actions and feelings. There is a disadvantage to teaching a thematic unit. This disadvantage includes the possibility of a forced interpretation as stated in TLA (57). In order to combat forcing an interpretation on students, we will focus on helping students develop their horizons of possibilities through strategies such as: envisionment building skills, close reading, characterization, constructing social worlds, perspective taking and note taking. Another way that we will assist students is by demonstrating the use of “other related interpretive strategies-[such as] inferring patterns in characters’ practices or defining intertextual connections,” (TLA, 50) by using the text, The Black Stallion, the move, Over the Hedge, and the poem, He thought he Saw a Crocodile. For example, in formulating our tasks when studying characterization in The Black Stallion, we will select tools that will assist students in completing this task such as listing that will help students to define patterns. (TLA, 50) Other examples of tools we will use when looking at the movie, Over the Hedge, are a story chart to compare the different stories and events and also and a word wall that will help provide a visual display for new vocabulary they encounter in the unit. We will intersperse several activities in our lessons that will according to TLA, “immerse and facilitate [……] their participation in the activities.” (TLA, 52) For example, following our field trip to seeing retired police horses, we will have students share “their experiences as a lead-in to discussion about a critical approach.” (TLA, 52) With this thought, the students will be able to make predictions, record how they feel, think and also question why certain occur. This helps the students to problem solve and make inquiries why things are happening. Within the purpose for teaching these strategies, we will also frontload activities that direct them toward the larger purpose that is to become engaged and to understand the text. (Jago, 151) We will use whole class reading strategies that will touch on pre-reading activities of five chapters of The Black Stallion every week that will lead to post-reading activity that will address students’ inquiries and summaries of the text (TLA, 51). In class, students will share their summaries in small groups that will assist them when they “are articulating and extending their responses.” (TLA, 51) Our overall goal is to engage the students, build prior knowledge and ensure they can infer meaning by using interpretive strategies. We feel that with these strategies, we will avoid forcing interpretations onto the students.

As discussed earlier, animals can offer children a sense of worth that is may be missing in their lives. Animals can provide a sense of security and safety as well as responsibility also. These qualities of self-worth, security and safety are very important to children of all ages, especially to those children in middle childhood. As defined by the CDC website, middle childhood spans from children ages nine to eleven years old. This is the time when children are in elementary school. Typically, children in middle childhood are in the third, fourth and fifth grades. We have chosen to do a thematic unit because this type of interaction between people and animals are significant to school-age children, particularly in the area of communication. We want the students at the beginning of the year to have an understanding of relationships between people and animals. We will read the book, **__The Black Stallion__**, and view the movie, **__Over the hedge__**, and read a poem called __**He thought He saw a Crocodile**__ that all show relationships between people and animals.

The significance of the age bracket is that we are planning this thematic unit on the importance of the relationship between animals and people for fifth graders. Fifth graders fall into a very unique developmental category. According to the CDC website, middle childhood is a developmental time where making friends and body images are important. At this stage of development, children are aware of changes that their body is undergoing and how that may appear to other people. At this same time, making friends is also important. If a child has positive thoughts of their body image and has friends, they are doing well. The opposite holds true as well where a child cold have a negative thoughts of their body and an inability to make friends. Middle childhood is a challenging time that can have either positive or negative feedback.

The CDC website also explained that there is more peer pressure and academic challenges during middle childhood. Increased peer pressure can create stress and a poor self image if not handled properly. Children that have a strong self worth can face an increased amount of peer pressure with positive outlook. Other children may find peer pressure to be stressful. In addition, academics are becoming increasingly challenging as well. Children really have to be able to handle social and academic pressures at this time in their lives. Middle childhood is a period in children’s lives that can be complicated, but also quite rewarding. If a child can feel good about themselves and their abilities, they will do well at this point in their lives. One way children can help themselves during this difficult developmental stage is for them to feel a sense of worth and accomplishment. This can be achieved though engaging in thought provoking literature studies.

Although there are many benefits to studying literature, there are also disadvantage of teaching a themed unit. According to TLA, there is a disadvantage to teaching a thematic unit because it could, "force an interpretation on texts." (TLA, 57) How we plan to approach this potential disadvantage is that we plan on helping students with envisionment building. By helping students to step into the text, move around in the text and then step out of the text to reflect. Students will be able to form their own perspective of the text without us, the teachers, forcing our thoughts and opinions onto the students.

The study of literature has boundless benefits. According to Harry Ice, an English Professor at Butler University in Indiana, “Students develop intellectually as the content of great works of literature offers them the ways and means of delving into stories, and, through these stories, of having a vicarious experience of the human condition far greater than any of them could ever acquire on the basis of luck and firsthand encounters.” (Jago, 7) Studying literature enables people to employ the power of their imagination to take them to into someone else’s world. Students that are in middle childhood may see tremendous benefits to using their imagination to take them away from pressures from peers or body images for the moment. For someone in middle childhood, they may find solace in studying literature about animals.

We have chosen to study literature and animals in our unit to hopefully allow students to embark on an intellectual journey that will have lasting benefits. When organizing our unit, we will examine how children learn about animals and their environment. So, we considered putting the unit together in steps that begin with the student with their family, the community and school, their environment and the world and apply it to constructing social worlds. We decided to begin with a field trip where the student will interact with their families and the horses. We asked the students to bring carrots from home to bring to feed the horses. This makes the valuable connections between the importance of school and home. The reason for going on the field trip first was to build experiences and prior knowledge to build upon and further extend their connections by using strategies for interpretation of the text, movie and poem. The intertextual connections will further extend their knowledge by giving them the tools to further understand text.

We are basing the selection of our unit based on Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Systems Theory. This theory looks at the child and interactions with the environment. The very first level is the microsystem that included the child and interactions with family, school and neighborhood. The next level, mesosytem, looks at connections between teacher and parents, for example. The next levels get further and further away from direct interactions with the child, like the parent's workplace, cultural beliefs and the dimension of time. The importance of using this theory is that when there is a change in one level or aspect in an individual's life, there is a ripple effect where the other levels are affected as well. For the individual student, we are assuming they are further developing according to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs for self esteem and self-actualization. We will sequence our unit with a beginning trip to Mill Creek Farm. This farm is where retired police horses go to live the rest of their lives with dignity. This experience with the horses will enable students the opportunity to gain background knowledge. This experience alone will enable ESOL students to engage with the unit through physical contact with the horses. All of the students will have the opportunity work with the animals with the farm's trainers. We will //sequence// the unit by introducing the theme with a lesson on characterization of the Three Little Pigs. We will have a discussion of the important events and have students draw pictures and summarize. Then we will move into reading The Black Stallion and making pictures that will culminate into a book that the students can keep. We decided to place the book second because we thought we would have an exciting introduction to animals first, then begin reading about them. We will then have the students watch, Over The Hedge. We have this next to help put variation into the unit and to prevent student from getting bored as Jago describes. Then we also incorporate a poem, He Thought he saw a Crocodile. We also thought a poem would help break-up the unit with something fun and more ways to incorporate new learning. Our unit includes the following Sunshine State Standards: LA 5.1.6.2-6.7, L.A.5.1.7.6-7.8, L.A. 5.2.1.1-1.2, L.A.5.2.1.5, L.A.5.2.2.1-2.3, L.A.5.3.1.1-1.3, L.A.5.4.1.1, L.A.5.4.2.2, L.A.5.5.2.2 and L.A.5.6.1.1. We have also made sure to cover ESOL that apply strategies for helping to develop skills for listening composition, oral communication, reading and writing.

We will support the literacy practices of perspective-taking. (Reviewing what other literacy practices would fit). We have //selected// **__The Black Stallion__** as one of the texts to focus on because it is a classic novel, age appropriate, poses moral issues and children can identify with animals. Children can see how Alec, the young boy, takes on the responsibility of a powerful and wild animal. The students can think what they would do if they were Alec in the book (TLA, 111).

The theme of our lesson is **UNDERSTANDING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ANIMALS AND HUMAN BEINGS AND HOW THIS RELATES TO OUR LIVES.** On Monday which will be the introduction of our lesson we will discuss our expectations for the students which are for them to incorporate the task specific strategies that we model in their private readings for homework. They are to read one chapter a night for a total of five per week up to chapter 18, and to apply the tool of writing whereby they will enlist note taking, close reading, and characterization strategies to their text on a nightly base. A primary opportunity for generative thinking will lie in the fact that while they are undertaking these tasks they will also be given directions to record four important events and to list any questions from the entire five chapter section to bring to class for a fifteen minute small group peer discussion. They will further extend this activity by discussing their views, questions and interpretations in a whole class discussion at the end of the day (TLA, 51). The overarching goal for them to bring these four events in on a weekly basis is to give them prior knowledge and experiences along with group discussions for which to base their summary reflections upon to use in the culminating project. This is the larger purpose for which all the activities will be directed toward during our six week thematic lessons on the relationships between animals and humans. We will also mention that the entire class will take a field trip to visit retired police horses another opportunity they will have to make connections and to further extend their understanding of the main text The Black Stallion. This experience will also give them a framework to solidify cohesively the experiences of the entire class in the development of establishing a social world while reading the text. Here during their visit we will have them find out roles associated with the horse farm and taking care of the animals to create context as stated in the TLA (51). This event will go beyond the initial lesson because we will have them to write a brief story stating what they would do if they had a horse farm and what roles they would take on. Also, it will extend their experiences while stepping in to the text and building that social world (Langer) as they make comparisons to the way their family and classmates responded to the horses on the farm, and how the character, ‘Alec’ and his family and friends respond to the black in their text. In the Predicting Outcomes lesson they will be stepping out and objectifying(Langer) what they have read because they will have read the remaining four chapter 15-18 in their private at home reading time. Here is where they will utilize generative thinking with diary entries (TLA, 107). For example they will use a page to make an entry on both sides. On one side of the page they will pick a scene and list an occurrence that stood out to them. Then, on the other side, they will write their perception of the extracted text and reflect on how it relates to something familiar that they have witnessed or heard of occurring at home, in school, or in their community. To further extend this assignment and go beyond what they have read in the text they will also keep a dual entry journal in which they will split the pages into two columns (TLA, 108). In one column they will input a major event in the book that they read that week and make in the second column a prediction for believe will happen at the end of the text. Again, to further extend this activity they will use the statements in their journal in another page where they will again list the statement they extracted on one side, and on the right side they will make inferences about what they think is occurring in the text. The next task involves the student’s use of generative thinking to infer the meaning of the poem; **__He thought he saw a Crocodile__** by Jack Prelutsky**__.__** By using what they learned about predictions and making inferences they will explain what they think it could be, and the clues that led them to make their decision. All these activities connect to the final project for which they will use their predictions, illustrations and four major events they extracted from the text. Everything will be put into their storyboard comic anthology along with the real outcome of the story. For the culminating experience will tie together their experiences with family, school and their community and their relationship with animals by giving them a photo we will surprise them with of their family and classmates during their trip to the horse farm. Finally, all of these efforts employ strategies necessary for developing and integrating the four language skills of listening composition, oral communication, reading, and writing. (Monique)


 * As for my overt instruction ** practices I will model my processes for characterization by demonstrating step by step what I expect from them during their reading of the text during their private reading time. I will also scaffold the selection of specific text to be extracted that will be used as the four main ones taken out for daily group discussion sessions. For the students who may struggle with comprehending my guidelines I will take into account these various ZPD’s by approximating a composite ZPD to taken to account individual differences in experiences and ability levels as mentioned in TLA ( 53). I will also orient them to again as mentioned in TLA to adopt a particular stance or position with the goal of establishing themselves as critical readers. As they participate in our literary community my focus is to direct them toward developing a “point-driven” stance (Hunt & Vipond, 1992) leading them to decipher text and understand the big picture (TLA, 54). (Monique)


 * As for situated practices ** students will use their understanding of prior knowledge of instruction scaffolded by myself, their experiences on the field trip to the horse farm with family members and classmate, along with the main text, __The Black Stallion,__ and the poem __He Thought He Saw a Crocodile__ and integrate them with how they all tie in with their relationship with animals. For example, this will be done through the activities using the diary, the journal, mini group discussions with their peers which will lead to whole group discussions, interpreting the meaning of the poem, and lastly including all these strategies to create the storyboard comic anthology. Again, the family, school, and community will be an integral part in the student’s collaborative efforts during discussion, enlisting task specific strategies to attend to interpreting text, and reaching our goal of leading them to infer meaning and to become engaged readers of a literary work. Meanwhile, from their personal encounter with animals along with their families and classmates they will foster an empathic view on life and cultivate mature interpersonal relationships with others. (Monique)


 * While immersing and facilitating** students I will explain the purpose for doing the focus lesson on characterization which is to assist them in determining motivation for the character’s action in the main text **__The Black Stallion__**, as well as supporting text to be used during this curriculum unit series. The ways in which you will extract this information from the text is to incorporate the use of various literary tools. For example, one such tool is the characterization template that I modeled for you to use during our introduction lesson to help you with you independent home readings. All subsequent tools such as tools used such as listing, mapping, and the use of the story chart will be essential in building on what you already have acquired to help you infer meaning from the text. Also, these literacy practices will assist you in also working with characterization for the movie **__Over the Hedge__** we will watch later on in the series. Once you have mastered the use of these literacy practices by using these tools you will have gained a working knowledge of the character’s traits thus having a better understanding of the motives for their actions in the text. Therefore, once we encounter our next lesson for predicting outcomes with its subsequent activities you will be able to acquire more strategies to help you critically assess your understanding of the text. The purpose for these activities in the predicting outcomes lesson is to allow you to record and evaluate your reactions to what you have read in our main text reading **__The Black Stallion__**__.__ The tools of writing will be employed as you write these reactions in a diary, and a journal. Every strategy learned through these literacy practices are used to help you to gain prior knowledge and experiences to use for our culminating project. That final project as we have already mentioned and have demonstrated to you our expectations again is the storyboard comic book anthology. This is where you will be putting all of the information you have gathered from your note taking, characterizations, outcome predictions etc. to be included with illustrations of your choice to be put in your book. We will even tie in cohesively information that such as your reflection summary from our field trip to the retired police horse farm to involve in this project not only your school work, but your time with your family, community, and your encounter with animals. (Monique)

I intend to **model** my processes for doing a characterization by demonstrating its use during our introductory lesson. At this time, I will make the students aware of our expectations for how they will acquire information regarding the main characters in the text only. I will make sure that they are aware that the purpose for them doing this lesson is for them to ascertain the motives of these characters actions in the text. I will also do an assessment on the fly by paying attention to the silent questions (Pace, B) and ask if they have any enquiries. After addressing these questions I will continue to look for clues that they understand my directions. For, those that continue to look confused I will have modified instructions to accommodate them as stated in TLA an approximate ZPD for those who differ in experiences and ability levels. Then, I will list the features of and outline of the template on the board, and demonstrate how as they read they are to fill in the component parts. For instance, I will demonstrate through the use of the book the Three Little Pigs how I would list first who the character is, then begin to fill in the template with the “act” they are involved in, in that chapter, the “situation” as it is understood by the character, “agent” what the character’s morals are, the “purpose” what their aim is and finally list the character’s “attitude”. Step by step I will model what I expect for them to do with while using the main text, **__The Black Stallion__** nightly as in their private readings. (Monique)
 * Orienting ** will encompass my strategies to steer my students toward working collaboratively to reach their goal for becoming equipped to read literature and apply what they have acquired to use at home and for developing life skills. My class will be conducted in a manner which exemplifies fairness and maintain a sense of availability for students to address their concerns. Students will be treated with respect and I will recognize that the students have various learning styles, and continually adjust my teaching to accommodate fit their cultural experiences and knowledge base. Classroom management will be in place to address certain issues and I will create along with the students a community atmosphere conducive to them as a whole. My main concern is to always be attuned to the students needs (TLA, 54). (Monique)

The main objective though in **orienting** them would be to direct students in becoming critical readers of literature enabling them to make interpretations, and infer meaning from complex text. In doing so I would ultimately be leading them toward taking a particular stance as alluded to in TLA (54) to obtain the big picture from the text they are reading. This is the foremost reason instructing them in the implementation of various task specific strategies modeling and scaffolding procedures so that they can get to the pertinent aspects of efferent reading (Rosenblatt). Then they will be able to make pertinent enquiries and expand their “horizon of possibilities” (Langer) for which they create a social world that covers what they know and expands upon that knowledge. In other words, we want them to acquire the skills to comprehend valid interpretations of the texts (Rosenblatt) As stated in Rosenblatt’s rules for a valid interpretation this when encountering a text an, interpretation cannot be contradicted by the text, nor can anything be projected for which there is no verbal basis. This means they have to have a “real” experience with the text as if they become “one” with what they are reading and enter into the social world they have created. (Monique)

A primary focal point in **facilitating** students in this curriculum unit plan on relationships between animals and humans is the give students the proper strategies, tools to utilize them, and activities to keep them on task for their final project. Our hope is that they pay attention to the careful selection of these lessons and applicable activities given to them and that they connect with their experiences at home and school. More importantly, what they are learning all make use of ESOL Performance Standards for developing and integrating the four language skills. And are sequenced to build their awareness of the steps taken to get them to their larger purpose which is getting the “big idea” out of the text they have read. Therefore, all literacy practices set forth are used to help students to reach our goal which is the culminating experience of creating a storyboard comic anthology. A literacy event which will house all of the tools they put into practice during the entire curriculum project. The end result of facilitating students will be brought together cohesively in their depictions of how animals and humans relate with all the information they have gather during the lessons, activities, and field trips. Making a significant effort to include these items involves their use of information from home, the field trip, school and their environment.(Monique) // Generative thinking // : I will encourage and provide many opportunities for generative thinking during my lessons. During the vocabulary lesson, I will help students to look at new words and try to decipher the meaning themselves. With this thought, I am encouraging the “building meaning form context clues.” (Jago, 47) Students will have to look beyond the text for meaning. The vocabulary lesson begins with an activity where the students have to make a body biography. As Langer discussed, this lesson will help develop the stepping in and moving through the envisionment process. The body biography entails having the students think about specific aspects of their character. So, the students have to think go beyond the text and find diction that will best express characteristics. During the perspective taking lesson, I am asking students to read a chapter and think about why The Black cannot race. As Langer discussed, this lesson helps to build on the stepping back and rethinking portion of envisionment building. Students have to think about the text to come-up with a reasonable conclusion. During the social construction lesson, students are thinking of a pasture and how that ties into the story and what influences helped to shape the picture. They will then draw and describe their ideas to further signify this relationship and also their use of generative thinking. According to Langer, students need opportunities for thinking and helping students hone in on their thinking skills. Getting students to think beyond efferent reading was my goal in my lessons. (Amanda) // Overt Instruction // : As described in class, overt instruction/direct teaching interrupts meaning making process by designing a learning experience. During the perspective taking lesson, I have the students reading a chapter and then answering a question. After students share their ideas, I will provide overt instruction and ask them to think about the bigger picture. With this thought, I will be using Freytag’s triangle that plots structure. I ask the students to consider the bigger picture and the author’s ideas that were included or left out to help build meaning. I will be facilitating learning by helping students to consider certain questions about the text. Students will be engaged in literacy practices as they are reading the text, The Black Stallion. (Amanda) // Situated practice // : The field trip will provide a wonderful opportunity for a student to learn from their environment, especially the ESOL students. The interaction between the students and animals will have a significant impact on their learning. As mentioned earlier in our rationale, children benefit from interaction with animals according to SOS Children’s Village. In addition, with our students being in middle childhood, according to the CDC, children need to feel responsible. This field trip will include rules from the farm owners when being around horses, feeding them or grooming them. From personal experiences with my young daughter, I know there are very specific rules to how to behave around horses. So, students have to be responsible for their behavior while attending the field trip. We also thought the field trip would create a more exciting learning environment for our students. Prior to going on the field trip, students will have their own background knowledge of horses. Some students may have absolutely no background knowledge of horses beyond books and movies. Other students may have had experiences with seeing horses or even riding them. So, students take with them their existing knowledge and understanding, then they go on the field trip and learn about the horses. They take their new knowledge and combine that with their prior knowledge and then write about that when they return to the class. It is very important for students to see how their thoughts grow and change. (Amanda) To immerse and facilitate the students, I will explain, for example, during the vocabulary lesson, that they will encounter unfamiliar words in many texts and they can approach them in a variety of strategies that I will teach them. Students can discover an unfamiliar word, then I will ask them to revisit the text to see if they can find the meaning within the text. Students will become immersed in the text to find meaning. My job is to help facilitate their learning. My strategy is to look for the meaning within the text. (Amanda) I will model close reading as described by Patricia Kain in the introduction lesson. I will read the text, The Three Little Pigs and take notes of events and characters that I think are important. This will provide students with the essential scaffolding they will need with doing this on their own. I will show them how to close read and they watch. Then I will ask them to do the same when they are reading. When students begin close reading they are practicing expanding their ZPD. (Amanda) I will orient students during discussion of chapters. Students will act respectfully to one another and listen to each other’s perspective. They will in turn learn valuable tools on how to behave in the classroom. As mentioned in TLA, there are rules that have to be followed while learning. Having classroom discussion is a perfect way to orient them into how to conduct themselves in a classroom of other students. They can take this experience and incorporate into society. (Amanda) I will facilitate learning by asking a lot of questions. I will mold my questions to engage students to think about the text. My goal, as is the goal of teaching and/or parenting, as we discussed in class, is for our students to no longer need us. I want the students to know they have learned essential tools in how to ask questions about the text. I also plan on providing a lot of extra help to those students that are struggling, especially the ESOL students. (Amanda)

Assessment plan – I have included this information in the lesson plans. I will be using a lot of formative assessments through reading checks and also group discussions. The culminating project is the summative assessment. Evaluation Plan – If I notice there are too many A’s or F’s in the unit, I will know that this is a direct reflection of my lesson plans and activities. I will have to reconstruct the lesson plans and activities for next use of the unit. In order to understand exactly how the students felt about the unit, I will survey them at the end to see what they liked or disliked. I will also ask the students at the end of the unit if they feel they have a better understanding about the importance of the relationship between people and animals. I will ask the students if they have developed a greater appreciation of animals because of the unit. I will also ask students if they are eager to learn more about animals or to read more stories with animals. (Amanda)