Read Works
Read Works: Now That's a Big Bird!
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about the skull of a prehistoric terror bird found in Argentina. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Healing Paws
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about a girl who volunteers to train dogs to help people with disabilities. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Pete vs. the Python
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about a beagle trained to sniff out pythons. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Saving Hawaiian Monk Seals
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about the decreasing population of the Hawaiian monk seals. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Mammoth Fossil Found
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about a man who found the fossil of a wooly mammoth. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Device May Help Blind People See
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about a new device that can give sight to people blinded because of retinal damage. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Read Works
Read Works: Heavy Metal
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about problems created by electronic waste being thrown in landfills. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Scholastic
Scholastic: Investigating Nonfiction Part 3: Independent and Guided Reading
This article provides tips for using nonfiction with guided reading and independent reading. The following strategies are shared: ways to help kids select "just right" nonfiction books; lessons to use with nonfiction in guided reading...
Read Works
Read Works: Main Idea 3rd Grade Unit
[Free Registration/Login Required] A three-lesson unit teaching students to use the first and last sentence to identify the main idea of a paragraph and the first and last sentence in each paragraph to identify the main idea of a...
Utah Education Network
Uen: 1st Grade Act. 11: Fairy Tale Riddles & Puppet Shows
During this multi-day unit, students will engage in segmentation and blending skills. Students will work with fairy tales and include them into a puppet show.
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Supporting Details
A six-slide presentation explaining the importance of using supporting details and describing different types of details that can be used to support an idea.
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Supporting Details
This tutorial focuses on supporting details using a video of a paragraph from a book showing the topic sentence and two strong, reliable, supporting details. This is followed by a slideshow that stresses the need for variety in the types...
Read Works
Read Works: Theme 3rd Grade Unit
[Free Registration/Login Required] This site provides a series of three lesson plans designed to teach students to identify and support the theme of a fable and a fiction selection based on main idea and supporting details. Lessons are...
Read Works
Read Works: Main Idea 4th Grade Unit
[Free Registration/Login Required] A two-lesson unit on main idea and details through which young scholars use the topic sentence to identify the main idea of a paragraph and categorize details as main idea or supporting. With free...
Read Works
Read Works: Fifth Grade: Five Lesson Unit: Leaf by Leaf: Autumn Poems
[Free Registration/Login Required] A five lesson poetry unit focusing on main idea, tone, theme, author's purpose, and figurative language in poetry. Texts must be provided by the teacher, but handouts that go along with the lesson are...
Read Works
Read Works: Main Idea Kindergarten Unit: What the Book Is Mainly About
[Free Registration/Login Required] Lesson uses Amazing Tigers! by Sarah L. Thomson and Ladybugs by Monica Hughes to teach students to use titles, pictures, and text to identify the main idea of an informational text. Ideas for direct...
Other
Scribd.: Kindergarten Reading Comprehension Lesson Plan: Main Idea and Details
A five-day lesson plan to teach students how to find the main idea of a story and generate a title, identify facts and details from a story, and differentiate between main idea and supporting details.
Read Works
Read Works: Main Idea 1st Grade Unit
[Free Registration/Login Required] Students learn to use titles and supporting details in both fiction and non-fiction texts in order to identify the main idea of the book in this three-lesson unit. The lessons utilize the books Animal...
Education Development Center
Tv411: Summarizing: Activity 3
In this activity, students choose the correct category to which details belong. Being able to categorize helps students to identify the difference between main ideas and details.
Read Works
Read Works: Grade 2: Three Lesson Unit: Author's Purpose
[Free Registration/Login Required] A series of three lesson plans designed to teach learners to identify author's purpose including to entertain, to inform, and to persuade. Lessons are based on the books The Adventures of Taxi Dog by...
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Reading Informational Texts Using the 3 2 1 Strategy
Students can count on using the 3-2-1 strategy to help them successfully comprehend and write about an informational text.
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University
De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Pioneer Families [Pdf]
"Pioneer Families" is a one page, nonfiction, reading passage about pioneers who traveled west in wagon trains, the hardships they faced, and how they worked together to build communities. It is followed by questions which require...
Scholastic
Scholastic: Informational Text: Reading Response: Main Ideas & Details [Pdf]
This graphic organizer can be used with students when they read informational text. Students will write the main idea in a central oval and then write four details that support the main idea of this reproducible graphic organizer.
Read Works
Read Works: Main Idea Kindergarten Unit: Using Details to Create a Title
[Free Registration/Login Required] Lesson uses Amazing Gorillas! by Sarah L. Thomson and In the Wild: Leopards by Stephanie St. Pierreto to teach students how to use textual details to create a title for informational text. Ideas for...