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Lesson Plan Rationale Chart:

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

Grade level: 4

Strategy

Research or Reference
Support

Leaning In is an effective strategy

that encourages students to
visualize the story from the text in
their minds, and to embrace the
fact that our mental pictures and
movies we develop when
processing a story are unique, and
that sometimes they will help us
realize details from the text we
want to lean in and examine more
closely, and write about to gain a
deeper understanding.

Bucker, A. Notebook Connections:

Strategies for the Readers
Notebook (2009): 38-42, 54-57

Students will respond in the form

of the Fab Five in their readers
notebook, which is an effective
strategy for students to retell and
sequence a story without feeling
the need to write every single
detail.
Using Graphic Novels can deepen
and extend a text, and can help
students make inferences because
readers must construct their
understanding of the story
through a visual text.
Being able to make meaning from
a mix of visual elements and texts
is an important skill.

Leaning In is a strategy to help

students see (infer) details that
may be in their mind but the
author didnt necessarily write.
This helps students infer why
these details matter and derive
meaning from the text (42).
Students begin their entry with
five sentences about what they
read in the book. It can be a
sequence of events, details about
one event, or a full summary. The
catch is they are limited to five
sentences that will help me
understand what they read (55).
Kristo, J., Garthwait, A., McClure,
A. Teaching Childrens Literature
in an Era of Standards (2015): 126
The national Council of Teachers
of English (2008) issued a
statement asserting that comicstyle reading may develop
comprehension in the same way
that picture books support the
mental imaging experienced by
proficient readers. One critical
element of reading is making
inferences. In formats with
complex pictures that deepen and
extend text, readers must
construct an understanding about
characters and situations as they
attend to details and subtleties
(McCloud, 2006) (126).

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Moline, S. I See What you Mean
2nd edition (2012): 9-13.
Visual information literacy is
about making meaning with a mix
of visual elements (11).

Sandra ODowd Language Lesson Plan:

Text: American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

Common Core
Standards for Unit:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.4.6
Acquire and use
accurately gradeappropriate general
academic and domainspecific words and
phrases, including those
that signal precise
actions, emotions, or
states of being (e.g.,
quizzed, whined,
stammered) and that are
basic to a particular topic
(e.g., wildlife,
conservation, and
endangered when
discussing animal
preservation).
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.4.3
Use knowledge of
language and its
conventions when
writing, speaking,
reading, or listening.
CCSS.ELALITERACY.L.4.3.A
Choose words and
phrases to convey ideas
precisely.*
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.4.3
Write narratives to
develop real or imagined

Essential Question
for Unit:
Can closely examining
both verbal and nonverbal clues help us to
better understand
another persons
perspective so we can
imagine and describe
how they might feel
about and respond in
real-life situations?

Grade level: 4

Unit Understandings (Big

Ideas):
We will read a page from the
graphic novel American Born
Chinese by Gene Luen Yang that as
very limited text. The students will
need to use this picture to visualize
(lean in) and imagine might be
happening in the excerpt and
between the characters. The
students will recompose the
excerpt by picking a character from
the excerpt page for whom they
will write a fab-five imagined,
narrative diary entry retelling of
what they visualize is happening in
the picture and at least one
sentence stating how the selected
character responds to or feels
about the interaction. The excerpt
addresses bullying and hopefully
will inspire thoughtful responses in
their imagined characters.
Students will be invited to invent
details for what might have
happened before or after, or what
the relationships between the
characters might be. They will
need to use words and phrases
that signal precise actions,
emotions or states of being,
referring to the text excerpt to
support their choices. Every
student will be asked to underline
their two favorite five-dollar
words that they feel are especially

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experiences or events
using effective
technique, descriptive
details, and clear event
sequences.
CCSS.ELALITERACY.W.4.3.B
Use dialogue and
description to develop
experiences and events
or show the responses of
characters to situations.
CCSS.ELALITERACY.W.4.3.C
Use a variety of
transitional words and
phrases to manage the
sequence of events.
Common Core Standard
Specifically Addressed:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.4.6
Acquire and use accurately gradeappropriate general academic and
domain-specific words and phrases,
including those that signal precise
actions, emotions, or states of being
(e.g., quizzed, whined, stammered) and
that are basic to a particular topic (e.g.,
wildlife, conservation, and endangered
when discussing animal preservation).
Learning Experience Sequence:

great selections because they

perfectly described the action,
emotion, or state of being of the
character they are aiming to
convey.

Objective for lesson:

Students will acquire and use gradeappropriate words and phrases that signal
precise actions, emotions or states of being
that are basic to the topic of possible
responses to bullying in school via
recomposing a graphic novel excerpt into a
fab-five retelling and response journal entry
from the perspective of one of the characters
in the text.

Materials: Text, Readers Notebook, document camera,

imaginations
1. Hook/Accessing prior knowledge:
I. Has anyone in this room ever had someone at school say
something about you or to you that hurt your feelings?
Without sharing what was said, and who said it, I want you to
think back to that time and remember how it made you feel.
Id like to ask for volunteers to please share with me words
that really precisely describe the emotion you felt.
II.
Has anyone ever been the person who said something about
or to another person that you know hurt his or her feelings
and you regretted it?

Differentiation
ELL and/or below
grade-level
readers:

Limited Text
Model
activity
Students
can talk to
desk
partners for
assistance
Word

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III.
IV.
V.

What did you do about these feelings? Did you talk to your
friend and let them know how you felt after what they said, or
after what you said?
Have you ever been a witness to bullying? What did you do?
Do you think that everyone will respond and feel the same
way when they are bullied? How about when they bully?

2. Introduce Text/Lesson:
I. Technology: Project text selection on document camera - read
what Greg says
II.
Theres a lot happening in this story, much of it is being being
told through pictures. We have four frames telling a story,
but only one has text. Pictures, graphics and illustrations can
really convey a lot of meaning. Today were going to examine
this to recompose the story you see before you in pictures,
into a narrative.
III.
When we are reading a story, any story, and visualizing that
story in our heads, does every student in the classroom have
the same exact pictures in their mind of whats happening in
the story? (no)
IV.
Were going to explore that reality with our stories today.
Looking at this same picture, were going to visualize what is
happening and tell our unique story we imagine in our head.
Each of us is going to imagine we are one of the characters
from this page (Jin, Greg, Amelia or Sally), and in a fab-five
readers journal entry from that characters perspective were
going to write about what happened and how our character
feels about and/or responds to this exchange of bullying.
3. Word mining/Model Lesson/Guided practice:
I. Students will write: Leaning In: When Bullying Happened at
School today Journal by ___(characters name)_____ at the
top of their readers journal.
II.
Students will be tasked to select their character, and to take a
few minutes to visualize the story they believe is happening
in the excerpt, and how they visualize their imagined
character would respond to or feel about what they believe
has happened, based on the visual and text clues and
flavored by their invented supporting details.
III.
Will offer and ask students for examples of Five-dollar words
(words that they think are so perfect to accurately describe
an action, emotion or state of being) and will write them on
board under action/verb/what a character did and
emotion/state of being that the think of when they read the
picture story from the graphic novel excerpt. Students will
write these same headings into their readers journal so they
can compile their own list of words or phrases that are basic

mining
group
activity to
help
augment
vocabulary
we can use
during
readers
notebook
activity
Will assist
students
who need
help during
activity.

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IV.

V.

VI.

to the topic.
Students will then be given a few minutes to work on this
independently and can speak with desk partners if they would
like to. They will compile a list of five-dollar words that
describe what their selected character is doing in the excerpt
and how their character feels about or responds to what is
happening, listing those words under the action/verb/what a
character did and Emotion/state of being. Students will be
instructed they must list a minimum of 3 words in each
column in their readers notebook.
Model I will project for the class my list of five-dollar words,
and will my readers notebook journal entry. The journal entry
will retell the excerpt from my characters perspective and
provide my characters response to it (action and emotion) in
the fab-five length. I will show them that I underlined the
places in my journal entry that I used my precise five-dollar
words (dont need to use all of them from my list, will pick the
at least one that truly fits the best).
Check for understanding: Ask students for feedback. I want
them to tell me why my story is supported in the details of
the text, or why not. Ask students for volunteers to suggest
other words that might just as well or better work in my
sentences. Will ask if the sequencing matches the picture
and text from the excerpt.

3. Student Activity:
I. Direct Instruction/Explain activity:
i. Pass out copies of excerpt
ii.
Project on board expectation summary: 1. Write 5
complete sentences 2. You are one of the characters in
this story. Write their name in your heading. 3. Retell
the story from this page from your characters
perspective. Use your the text and what you visualized
to decide what your character will retell 4. Include at
least 1 sentence that explains how your character feels
about or responds to this interaction. 5. Use at least 1
five-dollar word that precisely describes an action or
emotion in your entry.
iii.
Students will be given about 5-10 minutes to compose
their narrative.
II.
Check for Understanding/Formative Assessment: While
students are working on this activity, teacher will circulate
room, observe and check for understanding to inform
instruction and provide extra support and assistance if need.
4. Sharing/Check for Understanding/Feedback/Closure:

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I.

II.

Students will be asked to volunteer to share their Fab-Five

entry:
-What from the text made you decide this is how your
character felt?
-What is your five-dollar word? Why do you feel that is the
prefect word? How come you selected X word rather than Y
word?
-Why did you decide to include this detail?
-Did anyone else write his or her story from this characters
perspective? Is your story the same or different? Can you
please share? How can we have two different stories from
this same characters perspective?
-How did the picture tell you this story?
Closure Leaning into pictures really helps us to gain a
deeper understanding of a text. Recomposing a text also
gives us the opportunity to dig deeper into a text. Word
choice is very meaningful and important, and its important
we as writers are deliberate about thinking of and finding a
word that very precisely describes the action or emotion we
want to write about.

Summative Assessment/Closure:
I. Students can respond to the entire prompt with complete
sentences and assignment will be assessed based on rubric.
Evidence of Understanding:
Formative: Students will acquire and use grade-appropriate words and phrases that
signal precise actions, emotions or states of being that are basic to the topic of possible
responses to bullying in school via working collaboratively as a class and independently
to identify and use words and phrases that precisely describe emotions, actions or
states of being for characters in our story. When we are working as a whole class, I will
check for comprehension by making note of students contributions and making sure
were on track. I will also formatively assess while the students are writing their
vocabulary and journal entries independently.
Summative: Students will acquire and use grade-appropriate words and phrases that
signal precise actions, emotions or states of being that are basic to the topic of possible
responses to bullying in school via their readers journal entry. Please see rubric.
Summative Assessment: Readers notebook entry rubric:
American Born Chinese
Student Name:
Element
Five-dollar Word
list

Target (2)
Student wrote at
least 3 words each

Needs improvement (1)

Student wrote at least 1
word each that they believe

Incomplete (0)
Student did not
respond to this

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Fab-five response

Total ______/4
Notes:

that they believe

precisely describes
an action, or an
emotion or state of
being for their
selected character (6
words total)
Student used at least
one of the words in
their fab-five
narrative.
Student wrote 5
complete sentences
that retell the story
from the excerpt,
which is logically
sequenced, and
wrote at least 1
sentence that states
their characters
response or emotion
about the exchange.

precisely describes an
action, or an emotion or
state of being for their
selected character (6 words
total) Student used at least
one of the words in their
fab-five narrative.

portion of the
writing prompt

Student wrote in response

to the prompt, but did not
write 5 complete sentences
that retells the story from
the excerpt and/or did not
write at least 1 sentence
that states their characters
response or emotion about
the exchange.

Student did not

respond to this
portion of the
writing prompt

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American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang. 2006. Square Fish Books, NY. P 184