Grade 6 Language Arts/Reading

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Course Overview

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In Grade 6 Language Arts/Reading, Ms. Dara Oswald leads students to discover the basic elements of literature in a variety of literary and informational texts. She helps students to look for key ideas and reinforcing details in literature and then learn how to effectively communicate ideas in their own work. The course provides review and practice of the conventions of standard English in grammar, spelling, and vocabulary.

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Scope and Sequence

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Unit 1 – Short Story – Elements This unit discusses the short story, including characterization and character traits, conflict, point-of-view, plot, making predictions, narrative, and summarization. The poem is also discussed and comparing and contrasting genres. Pronoun types, pronoun shifts, and intensive pronouns are also covered, as well as using writing to show, not to tell.

Unit 2 – Vocabulary Building StrategiesThis unit discusses the short story, Lomax, including word impact on meaning and tone, and scene to overall structure. Also covered are denotation and connotation, synonyms, antonyms, using a Frayer Model, words with multiple meanings, prefixes, suffixes, and word roots. Also included are spelling tips, and context clues including definitions, synonyms, antonyms, and examples.

Unit 3 – Reading for Meaning This unit covers the genres folktale, fable, and myth. It uses the folktale The Fox and the Crow to illustrate theme and discusses reading graphic stories and using inference and conclusions. It uses the story of The Three Little Pigs to illustrate perspective and comparing and contrasting genres and uses the essay Eulogy of a Dog to discuss vocabulary, author's purpose, and persuasive techniques. In addition, the biographical story, Corrie ten Boom is used to illustrate tone.

Unit 4 – Figurative Language and Narrative Writing This unit discusses poetry, including alliteration, similes, metaphors, rhyme and rhythm, and personification. Also covered are onomatopoeia in graphic stories, and vocabulary, hyperbole, and idiom in drama, as well as preview in narrative writing, laying the groundwork, story development, details – including parentheticals and nonrestrictive elements – and how to conclude a story well.

Unit 5 – Reading for Information This unit discusses informational versus narrative text, as well as sequence, description, and comparing/contrasting in an essay; cause/effect, problem/solution, main idea, supporting details, fact/opinion, and summarization in an article; and comparing and contrasting authors in biography and autobiography.

Unit 6 – Argument and Persuasion This unit discusses argument, including what an argument is, claim and evidence in an article, comparing and contrasting author implications through photos, discussion types, and five discussion steps.

Unit 7 – Real-World Reading Skills This unit discusses text features, skimming, scanning, commonly-confused words, dictionary skills, combining sentences, conjunctions, sentence fragments, commonly misspelled words, subject-verb agreement, end-of-sentence punctuation, commas, apostrophes, titles, number, and capitalization.

Unit 8 – Informative Writing This unit discusses traits of formalized writing, the four-square writing approach for formatting a paper, choosing a topic/main idea, adding supporting details to a paper, writing a thesis, adding supporting details to paragraphs, adding transition words and personal stories, writing an introduction, "hooking" your readers, writing a conclusion, and drafting and finalizing your paper.

Unit 9 – Reading Across Genres This unit uses the short story Shooting Stars to discuss vocabulary, setting, shades of meaning, imagery, motivation, actions, and relationships. It also covers verb tense; action, helping, and linking verbs; and integrating information.

Unit 10 – Research and Persuasion This unit discusses researching a topic and writing a persuasive essay, including identifying your topic, doing research and gathering information, and reflecting on new information. It further covers planning, drafting, revising, editing, publishing, and presenting a persuasive essay.