Chapter 26: Going Out

Teacher's Guide Chapter Author: Shauna Tamar Harris 5th Grade Hayes ES #542, Clark County School District __________________________________________________________________

Chapter Overview: This chapter is entitled "Going Out" and it aptly named because in this chapter, the Ingalls family moves away from their little homestead and heads out into the unknown.

Chapter Themes: Hope

Chapter Activities



  • Language Arts
    • Telephone Talk
      • Have students think carefully about the different emotions that Laura might feel when they are getting ready to head out, as well as the events that led to these emotions. In a three column paper (first column titled Laura's Emotions, 2nd Column: Linked to, and 3rd Column: Story's Events), record these down. Next, have the students write a 7 digit telephone number - real or made up - vertically down the let side of a piece of paper. Using ideas from the 3 column paper write a poem about Laura's emotions. The number of words the student will write for each line of poetry must match the number on the left.
      • Standards Addressed
        • ELA 4.5.4 Draw conclusions and make inferences supported by textual evidence
        • ELA 5.5.8 Use expanded vocabulary in writing
    • Point of View
      • Does Laura tell the story and speak directly to you using the pronoun "I"? Do you see the story through one particular character's eyes and emotions, but this character doesn't talk directly to you using the pronoun "I"? This activity will help the students to understand point of view and author's voice. Find a paragraph in Chapter 26. Read it carefully. Ask yourself the two questions above. On a blank piece of paper rewrite the same paragraph from a different point of view. For example if the paragraph uses the pronoun "I", rewrite the paragraph using the pronoun "he, she, or they." In another paragraph justify your reasons for rewriting the paragraph they way that you did. Use examples from the text to support your judgements.
      • Standards Addressed
        • 5.2.7 Retell the the main ideas of text
        • 5.2.9 Select and use a variety of skills and strategies during reading to aid comprehension
  • Mathematics
    • Wagons Aweigh
      • All that gear in the wagon must have weighed a ton. Do some research on the items that Pa out into the wagon on the Internet. Estimate the gross weight of all the gear that he packed. After your research, contrast your estimation to the real thing.
      • Standards Addressed
        • 3.5.1 Estimate and convert units of measure for weight and volume/capacity
        • 5.5.4 Represent and solve problems involving combinations using a variety of methods
    • Quilts that Ma Made

When Pa packed the wagon, he spread quilts on the floor to soften the ride. Quilts were a part of everyday life for frontier women. They used scraps from flour sacks to bolts of cloth purchased from the mercantile to sew them. They were not only a warm covering on a bed, they were functional pieces of art.

Have students design their own 9-Patch quilt block out of different colored construction paper shapes. Different polygons made different blocks and overall designs.

Standards Addressed:

MA 5.4.1 identify , classify, compare, and draw triangles and quadrilaterals based on their properties

MA 5.4.5 predict and describe the results of combining, dividing, and changing shapes into other shapes

  • Social Studies
    • Prairie Vittles
      • What is a Dutch Oven? What do you think Ma fixed for supper on the way to Independence? Form the class into small groups. Do some research on the Internet about food on the frontier. Present your findings in a poster or PowerPoint to your class.
      • Standards Addressed
        • 5.3.2 Generate keywords for a research topic or problem and conduct a search of electronic based sources

    • Fiddle Me This...Fiddle Me That

At the end of the book, Pa breaks out his fiddle and starts to play. Laura can't sleep with the lively music so Pa begins to play something soft and she drifts off.

Have students turn to page 332-335. Read the stanzas of the songs that Pa plays. Can you write a stanza of your own using the information you have learned as you have read the book? Can you find on the Internet some sites where you can hear the songs?

Standards Addressed:

Social Studies 5.4.28 read, interpret, and analyze historical passages

Science

Activity 1: Save the Prairie!

Many a conservation agencies are currently working to restore the American prairie, which has suffered through the years from human encroachment and suppression of wildfires, among other factors. Invite your students to consider ways in which they might help to popularize the effort to preserve and restore America's prairie. Divide your students into groups and ask each group to include skits, posters, advertisements, public service announcements, letter-writing campaigns, a web-site featuring a "prairie plant/animal of the month, " and anything else your students can come up with.

Standards Addressed:

SCI Organisms and their Environment L8C: Students understand how living and non-living components of ecosystems interact

Historical Overview of Chapter Themes


Additional Resources




  • "Kirsten's Cook Book: A peek at Dining in the Past with Meals you can Cook Today" 1994 American Girls Collection, Pleasant Company

2 comments:

Selena said...

I like the idea of the lesson, Telepone Talk. It definitely has the students working on the high end of Bloom's. I would like to add that to my repertoire of activities, if you don't mind.

Christy G. Keeler, Ph.D. said...

Like Selena, I really like the 3-column format of the Telephone Talk activity. For the numbers along the column, will they be creating poetry lines with that number of syllables?

Also, rewriting a paragraph from a different perspective is a great idea. Perhaps you could then have them write stories about themselves from first- and third-person perspectives.

Do you have some science activities to suggest?