A few weeks ago I was walking through Barnes and Noble with my family. We don’t go there often, but every once in a while the kids get gift cards and they love browsing through the thousands upon thousands of books. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a book called Robot in Love that I knew would be great. The cover is just perfection. I’m so glad I took a second to flip through it because my first impression was right! Immediately, I texted Katie and told her that we just had to do something with it! We decided that we would make a special edition of Rooted in Reading for 2nd and 3rd grade teachers.
Well, when I was creating the grammar component for our unit, I just knew my 4th graders would LOVE it. So, I decided to carve out a week of small group plans for a little Robot in Love. I started the week off reading the story to them, and they got a kick out of it! The ending is unexpected and had them all giggling 🙂
After reading the story, we reviewed subjects, predicates, simple sentences, and compound sentences.
Then we used sentences from the text to identify the subjects, predicates and sort into two categories: simple and compound. 
As we brought the sentences back together, we went through each one You’ll even notice some errors in the picture below. We had some great teachable moments as we were discussing each sentence. This was also great editing practice for my 4th graders.
The next day we took sentence cards and decided whether they were written correctly or not. We edited the sentences and sorted into two categories. We also labeled subjects, predicates, conjunctions, and punctuation.
You’ll noticed that the entire week we labeled like this:
Subjects: Pink, Predicates: Blue, FANBOYS (conjunctions): Yellow, Punctuation: Green
That kept everything very consistent.
On our last day of small groups we put together silly sentence puzzles. We were working on compound sentences, so they used two subjects, two predicates, and FANBOYS to create their sentences.
I kept everything in a table caddy so that it would stay organized. Students loved pulling out random cards and creating silly sentences. We used green pipe cleaners (cut apart) for the commas.
As students created sentences, they edited for capitalization and punctuation. It was definitely a fan favorite.
Wanting a little more for the book? Check out this FREEBIE that Katie made!
I should mention that we have two sets of grammar activities included based on the grade level that is using the unit. We have simple sentence activities, compound sentence activities, or you could use both. Either way, there is a little something for everyone 🙂
Of course there is sooooooo much more included than grammar, but I just had to show you how even my 4th graders can benefit from Rooted in Reading.
Click HERE to find the book on Amazon. Click HERE to check out the unit.
I should also mention that we cover a lot of other skills in the unit. Here’s a little peek:
Inferring, Schema, Comparing Technology Then and Now, Character Traits, Vocabulary, and more
Hey, y’all! My name is Amy Lemons and I am passionate about providing students with both engaging and effective standards-based Math and ELA lessons.
Sample a day of Rooted in Reading with these lesson plans and activities for Reading Comprehension, Vocabulary, and Grammar!
3 Responses
Couldn’t read article bc I couldn’t get past the fact you seldom go to the Barnes & Noble. I’ve gotten tons of ideas for school just by going to Barnes and Noble!!!!!
Ha! We don’t have one close to us at all 🙁
So…does this mean you are considering making a Rooted in Reading 4th grade curriculum?!? I loved it for my second graders! Now I’m in fourth, and can not find any program that compares to Rooted in Reading! It is amazing