Let's Make a Bar Graph

$Let's Make a Bar Graph book cover$

Grade K
3 skill lessons · 1 math-through-reading

Math

Skill lessons

The mathematics the book carries, taught directly. Printable workbook pages and teacher keys are not available for this book yet.

1The Four Parts of a Bar Graph
2Four Kids Have Cats
3Ask the Class, Keep the Answers

Math + reading

Math through the reading

The same book, entered through a sentence it prints. Change one word in the reading and the numbers change with it.

4The Word That Tells You Which Bar

Reading

Reading and language lessons

The same book read as a text. What a word means in its sentence, how a character is shown, how the writing is put together - no mathematics.

5Sentences that tell you to go and do it
6The line that stands over the list
7Finding out what data means without being told directly
8Most, fewest, or, how many

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Skill lessons

3 lessons on the mathematics the book carries. Printable workbook pages and teacher keys are not available for this book yet.

1. The Four Parts of a Bar Graph Representation · Naming and building the four parts of a bar graph

The book builds a bar graph one part at a time and names each part as it goes: the kinds of pets along the bottom, the numbers up the side, one bar for each kind, and a title at the end. Students assemble those four parts on a blank sheet in the book's own order, saying what each part is for as they add it. The representation is the content here. Nobody reads a value off a finished graph in this lesson, because the book's own finished graph is not in the words it gives us; what the book teaches in words is how the frame gets built.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Find the parts in the book (4 min)
Listen for the moment each part of Nan's graph appears and put a finger on the matching place on a blank sheet: the bottom edge, the side edge, the space above the bottom, the top. Say the part's name back with the book's word for it. Do not draw anything yet.
Word preview: bottom, side, title
She writes numbers on the side of her bar graph.
Nan adds a title to her bar graph.
2. Label the bottom (5 min)
Write the kinds of pets along the bottom edge of your sheet, one word per space, leaving a hand's width between them. Say what the bottom edge tells a reader: it tells what kinds there are, not how many. Check a partner's sheet has a word in every space before moving on.
Word preview: kind, label
Label the bottom and side of your graph.
3. Number the side (6 min)
Write the counting numbers up the side edge, starting at the bottom corner and going up, one number per line, evenly spaced. Say each number aloud as you write it. Then run a finger up the side and back down, counting, so the side is a ladder you can climb rather than a row of marks.
Word preview: numbers, side
She writes numbers on the side of her bar graph.
4. Add the title (5 min)
Write a title across the top that says what the whole graph is about, then read your title to another pair and let them say what they expect to find inside. Fix the title if what they expected is not what your bottom edge lists. A title that surprises a reader is a title that needs another word.
Word preview: title
Add a title.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Label the bottom (4 min)
Write the kinds of pets along the bottom edge, one word per space. Say what the bottom edge tells a reader: what kinds there are, not how many.
Word preview: kind, label
Label the bottom and side of your graph.
2. Number the side (5 min)
Write the counting numbers up the side edge from the bottom corner, one per line, saying each aloud. Run a finger up the ladder and back down.
Word preview: numbers, side
She writes numbers on the side of her bar graph.

Three levels

Support: Work on a sheet where the bottom spaces are already ruled and the words for the kinds are on cards to lay down rather than to write. Keep every other part of the job: the student still numbers the side from the bottom corner up, one per line, and still says what each edge is for.
At Grade: Build all four parts on a blank sheet in the book's order, saying what each part tells a reader as it goes on, and check a partner's sheet before adding the title.
Extension: Build the frame, then hand a partner a sheet with one part missing and let them name which part is gone and what a reader could not do without it. Say what goes wrong for a reader when the side has no numbers, and what goes wrong when the bottom has no words.

English learners

Bottom, side and title are position words a student can point to before saying, so accept a finger on the edge as a first answer and add the English on top of the pointing. The word kind is the slippery one here: it is not the kind that means nice, and in this book it means a sort of pet. Rehearse one frame per edge, the bottom tells what kinds and the side tells how many, and let a student say which kinds of pets are in their own home in their strongest language before writing the words in English.

Materials

Blank half-sheet of chart paper per pair
Printed source passage in this step
Marker per student
Word cards for pet kinds, one set per pair
Ruler or straight edge per pair
Word cards: bottom, side, title, label

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

2. Four Kids Have Cats Concept · Drawing a bar to a stated height on a numbered side

This is the one place the book states a number and shows what to do with it. Four kids have cats, so Nan's yellow bar stops at the number 4. Students take that one stated count and turn it into a bar of the right height on the frame they built, standing over the right word and stopping at the right number. The count is handed to them by the book; what students perform is the translation of a number into a height, which is the single move that makes a bar graph readable at all.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Read the count and find the number (4 min)
Hear the count the book states and find that number on the side of your own frame. Put one finger on the word CAT along the bottom and the other on the 4 up the side, and hold both. Say where the bar will have to go before anyone draws it.
Word preview: four, bar
Four kids have cats.
The bar goes up to the number 4.
2. Build the bar in cubes (6 min)
Stack four linking cubes into a tower and stand it on the word CAT, on the bottom edge of your frame. Count the cubes as you stack, one number word per cube. Slide the tower along the side of your frame and check the top of the tower lines up with the 4, not the 3 and not the 5.
Word preview: cubes
3. Draw and color the bar (6 min)
Draw the bar where the tower stood, one space wide, and color it yellow the way Nan colors hers. Start at the bottom line and stop at the 4. Then take the tower away and check the drawn bar still reaches the same number.
Word preview: color
Nan draws a yellow bar over the word CAT.
4. Say what the bar says (4 min)
Point at your bar and say the sentence it stands for, naming both the kind and the count: this bar is cats, and it goes up to four. Say it to a partner who is looking at their own bar, and check the two of you say the same number.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Read the count and find the number (3 min)
Hear the count the book states and find that number on the side of your frame. Hold one finger on the word CAT and one on the 4.
Word preview: four, bar
Four kids have cats.
2. Build the bar in cubes (6 min)
Stack four linking cubes, counting one number word per cube, and stand the tower on the word CAT. Check the top lines up with the 4.
Word preview: cubes

Three levels

Support: Keep the cube tower standing beside the drawn bar for the whole lesson so the height stays something to touch rather than to remember. Count the four cubes aloud each time before checking the top against the number, and let the drawing come last, traced along the side of the standing tower.
At Grade: Build the four-cube tower, check its top against the 4, draw and color the bar to that height, and say the sentence the bar stands for with both the kind and the count in it.
Extension: After the cat bar is drawn, take a count a partner states aloud for one other kind of pet, build that bar to that height on your own frame, and say which of the two bars is taller and by how many cubes, with both towers standing side by side to settle it.

English learners

The mathematics is entirely in the hands here, so a student can stack four cubes and stand them on a word before saying anything in English. Tall, taller and goes up to are the phrases to rehearse, and they are worth doing with a hand held flat at the top of the tower, because tall in English is used both for the bar and for a person and the gesture is what keeps them together. The frame this bar is cats and it goes up to four holds the kind and the count in one sentence; let a student say the count in their strongest language first and then take the English frame with a hand on the tower.

Materials

The frame built in the first lesson, one per pair
Printed source passage in this step
Linking cubes, ten per pair
Crayons in four colors per pair
Word cards: bar, tall, four

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

3. Ask the Class, Keep the Answers Application · Collecting and tallying survey answers as data

Before Nan draws anything she asks her classmates a question and keeps their answers, and the book gives that keeping a name: the answers are her data. Students run the same survey in their own room, ask one question of every classmate, and record each answer as it arrives. The mathematics is one-to-one recording and the counting of the marks, and the language work is asking the same question the same way every time so the answers can stand beside each other.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Decide the question (4 min)
Choose one question with a small number of answers, the way Nan chooses pets, and say it aloud twice exactly the same way. Write the possible answers as headings on a recording sheet. Agree as a class on the wording before anyone asks anybody, because a question asked two ways collects two things.
Word preview: question, data
Decide what idea you want to graph.
Ask questions to get data.
2. Ask everyone once (7 min)
Move around the room and ask your question of every classmate, once each. Make one mark under the answer they give, straight away, before you walk to the next person. Keep a finger on the name list so nobody is asked twice and nobody is missed.
Word preview: ask
She surveys her class.
3. Count the marks (5 min)
Count the marks under each heading and say the number aloud, touching each mark once as you count. Write the number beside its heading. Compare with a partner who asked the same question and settle any difference by counting both sheets again together.
4. Name what you are holding (4 min)
Hold up your sheet and say what it is with the book's own word for it: these answers are my data. Say who the answers came from and what question they answer, so the sheet means the same thing tomorrow as it does today.
Word preview: data
The answers are her data.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Ask everyone once (6 min)
Ask your question of every classmate, once each, and make one mark under the answer straight away before walking to the next person. Keep a finger on the name list.
Word preview: ask
She surveys her class.
2. Count the marks (3 min)
Count the marks under each heading, touching each mark once, and write the number beside its heading.

Three levels

Support: Ask a question with two answers rather than four, and carry the question written on a card to read from so the wording stays the same at every desk. Ask half the class rather than all of it, and keep the one mark for one answer rule whole, because that is the part being learned.
At Grade: Agree the wording, ask every classmate once, mark each answer as it arrives, count the marks under each heading and name the sheet as data.
Extension: Ask your question in a second room or of a second group, keep the two sheets apart, and say what changed between them and what stayed the same. Say why the two sheets cannot be added together unless nobody was asked twice.

English learners

Asking the same question many times is ideal rehearsal, because the sentence is fixed and the student says it twenty times to twenty faces. Rehearse the question itself as the frame rather than a vocabulary list, and let a student carry it written on a card as long as they need it. The word data is new in any language and it names something visible here, so point at the marks on the sheet when saying it. A student may collect answers in their strongest language and write the marks under English headings; the marks are the record and they are the same in every language.

Materials

Recording sheet with heading spaces, one per student
Printed source passage in this step
Class name list per student
Pencil per student
Word cards: data, survey, answers

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

Math through the reading

The mathematics is reached through a sentence the book prints: change one word in the reading and the numbers change with it. These carry their own standards, matched against these lessons rather than inherited from the skill ones.

4. The Word That Tells You Which Bar Integrated · Students test the four words this book uses to order a bar graph, each, every, tall and over, by building what each word demands in cubes, then rebuild after one word is swapped and say what the new sentence made them do.

Students test the four words this book uses to order a bar graph, each, every, tall and over, by building what each word demands in cubes, then rebuild after one word is swapped and say what the new sentence made them do.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Collect the four words (4 min)
Students listen for the four instruction words as the book is read and take a word card for each as it arrives: each, every, tall, over. They put the cards in a row and build nothing yet.
2. Predict, then build, one word at a time (7 min)
For each card in turn, students say aloud what that word tells them to do to the frame, then build it in cubes and count what they built. They keep the build standing only if the counting agrees with what they said.
3. Swap one word and rebuild (6 min)
Given a book sentence with one word altered, students build what the new sentence demands beside the original build, count both, and say which word changed and what it did to the number of bars on the frame.
4. Report one word (3 min)
Each pair reports one word and the move it names, pointing at their own build as the evidence, in a sentence another pair could follow without the book in front of them.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Predict, then build, one word at a time (7 min)
For each card in turn, students say aloud what that word tells them to do to the frame, then build it in cubes and count what they built. They keep the build standing only if the counting agrees with what they said.
2. Swap one word and rebuild (6 min)
Given a book sentence with one word altered, students build what the new sentence demands beside the original build, count both, and say which word changed and what it did to the number of bars on the frame.

Three levels

Support: Work two words rather than four, each and over, and keep the built cubes in front of the student while they say what the word did. Say the prediction before every build even when it seems obvious, because saying it first is the part being learned.
At grade: Students work all four words, predict aloud before each build, and complete the swap with both builds standing side by side.
Extension: After the swap, students alter one word in a different book sentence themselves so the build changes, hand it to a partner without saying what they changed, and see whether the partner's cubes land where they meant them to.

English learners

The builds carry the whole meaning with no English at all, so a student can stack and place cubes correctly before speaking a word. The four words are the difficulty and each is slippery in its own way: each looks like a word for one thing while doing the work of all of them, over here means above and not finished or across, and tall is used of the bar rather than of a person. Preview each word with the cubes in hand rather than on a list, and rehearse one frame per word, for example this word says make one for every kind. Let students predict in their strongest language first, then take the English frame with a hand still on the build.

Materials

Linking cubes, twenty per pair
Paper frame with a labelled bottom edge, one per pair
Word cards, four per pair
The four book sentences, enlarged
One altered sentence for the swap

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

Reading and language lessons

4 lessons on the reading and language the book carries - what a word means in its sentence, how a character is shown, how a text is built. No mathematics: these are matched against the English language arts curricula, which are a different and smaller set than the mathematics ones.

5. Sentences that tell you to go and do it Concept · Recognising a sentence that tells the reader to do something

The back of this book turns and speaks straight to the reader, and it does it with a kind of sentence that appears nowhere else in the text: no subject at all, just a telling word at the front. Students read the list aloud and hear those six opening words, sort a do-it sentence from a tells-about-Nan sentence, weigh the shortest instruction against what it leaves unsaid, and then give an instruction of their own. The skill is recognising and using imperative sentences; nothing is graphed, counted or compared.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Read a how-to list out loud (6 min)
The teacher reads the passage below once. It is a list that tells you how to do something. Read it again together, one sentence at a time. Say aloud the very first word of each sentence after the heading: decide, ask, label, use, give, add. Then say who the list is talking to.
Word preview: decide, ask, label, add
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.
2. Sort a telling sentence from a telling-about sentence (5 min)
Read the two passages below with the teacher. One tells you to go and do something yourself. The other tells you about somebody else doing it. Hold up one finger for the one that tells you to do it and two fingers for the one that tells about Nan. Then say the word at the start of each that made you decide.
Word preview: you, she
Label the bottom and side of your graph.
Nan colors the bars for the other kinds of pets. She uses her data to know how tall to make each bar.
3. Find the shortest instruction in the list (5 min)
Read the passage below. Two of the list's instructions are printed here. Say aloud which one is shorter, and say what it tells you to do. Then say what the list leaves out of that instruction that a reader still has to work out for themselves.
Word preview: shorter, title
Give each bar a different color. Add a title.
4. Give an instruction of your own (4 min)
Read the two instructions below. Then give a partner a one-sentence instruction of your own about something you both know how to do, beginning with a telling word the way these do. Your partner does it. Swap and go again.
Word preview: instruction
Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Read a how-to list out loud (5 min)
The teacher reads the passage once, then read it together one sentence at a time. Say the first word of each sentence after the heading, and say who the list is talking to.
Word preview: decide, ask, label, add
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.
2. Sort a telling sentence from a telling-about sentence (4 min)
Hold up one finger for the passage that tells you to do something and two for the one that tells about Nan, then say the word at the start of each that made you decide.
Word preview: you, she
Label the bottom and side of your graph.
Nan colors the bars for the other kinds of pets. She uses her data to know how tall to make each bar.

Three levels

Support: Read the list one instruction at a time and act each one out together as a mime before saying anything about it. Ask for one opening word only, and say it with the child. Two instructions is enough.
At Grade: Say the first word of each instruction in the list and say who the list is talking to.
Extension: Say the first word of each instruction, then say what every one of them is missing that an ordinary sentence has, and say who a reader supplies in its place.

English learners

The English imperative drops the person doing the action, which some languages mark instead with a special verb ending, so a subjectless sentence can read as unfinished rather than as a command. Say each instruction twice, once as printed and once with you at the front, so the missing word is heard as deliberate. Invite children to give an instruction in their strongest language and notice whether their language names the person. Rehearsable frame: This one tells me to ___.

Materials

Let's Make a Bar Graph, the passages printed in this step
Pointing finger
Word cards: decide, ask, label, add, you, she, shorter, title, instruction

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

6. The line that stands over the list Concept · Reading a heading and saying what it does for a reader

This book carries one true heading, and it is a question: it announces what everything below it is going to be about, and then six sentences answer it. Students read the heading with its list, tell it apart from a question that asks the reader to go and do something, meet a stretch of the book that has no heading at all and invent one for it, and finish by saying what a heading is for. The skill is reading a text feature. The bar graph itself is an image the transcript does not carry, so no step sends a reader to it.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Read a heading and what comes under it (6 min)
The teacher reads the passage below. Its first sentence is a heading, and everything after it belongs under that heading. Say the heading aloud. Then say aloud one thing from underneath it, and say how you knew that sentence belonged there.
Word preview: heading, under
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.
2. A heading that asks and a line that asks (5 min)
Read the two passages below with a partner. Both of them ask something, but only one is a heading standing over a list. Say which is which. Then say what the heading asks you to expect underneath it, and what the other one asks you to go and do.
Word preview: heading, question
How to make a bar graph?
Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have?
3. Read a stretch with no heading over it (5 min)
Read the passage below. This part of the book has no heading standing over it at all, it just tells you what Nan does next. Say aloud what these two sentences are about. Then make up a heading of your own that would fit over them, in four words or fewer.
Word preview: about, fit
Nan adds a title to her bar graph. She shares her bar graph with her class.
4. Say what a heading is for (4 min)
Read the heading and its list below one more time. Then tell a partner, in one sentence, what a heading does for somebody reading a book. Say whether the list would be harder to use without it, and why.
Word preview: heading
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Read a heading and what comes under it (5 min)
The teacher reads the passage. Say the heading aloud, then say one thing from underneath it and how you knew it belonged there.
Word preview: heading, under
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.
2. Say what a heading is for (4 min)
Read the heading and its list again, then tell a partner in one sentence what a heading does for a reader, and whether the list would be harder to use without it.
Word preview: heading
How to make a bar graph? Decide what idea you want to graph. Ask questions to get data. Label the bottom and side of your graph. Use your data to draw your bars. Give each bar a different color. Add a title.

Three levels

Support: Read the heading on its own, twice, before reading anything under it, and ask only for the heading back. Then read one instruction and ask whether it belongs with the heading, accepting yes or no.
At Grade: Say the heading aloud, then say one sentence from under it and say how you knew it belonged there.
Extension: Say the heading, then say which single sentence under it would be hardest to understand if the heading were taken away, and why that one.

English learners

Headings look like sentences but do a different job, and a reader new to English may read straight through one as though it were the first line of the text. Read the heading, pause a full beat, then read the list, and use your hand to show the heading sitting above rather than in front. Invite children to say what a sign or a heading at home tells them is coming next. Rehearsable frame: The heading says ___, so this part is about ___.

Materials

Let's Make a Bar Graph, the passages printed in this step
Pointing finger
Word cards: heading, under, question, about, fit

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

7. Finding out what data means without being told directly Application · Working out what a new word means from the sentences around it

An informational book teaches its own vocabulary as it goes, and this one does it twice over: it uses data and then explains it in the very next sentence, and it uses surveys and never explains it at all. Students take the explained word first, find the sentence doing the explaining, put it into their own words, use it in a sentence of their own, and then face the word the book leaves undefined and reason it out from its neighbours. The skill is deriving word meaning from context; no data are ever counted or graphed.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Meet a new word and find its meaning nearby (6 min)
The teacher reads the passage below. It uses a word you may not know, data, and then the sentence right after it tells you what data are. Say the word aloud. Then say, in your own words, what Nan's data are, using the sentence that told you.
Word preview: data, answers
Nan wants to ask her classmates about their pets. Nan asks what pets her class mates have. She surveys her class. The answers are her data.
2. Find the sentence that explains a whole term (5 min)
Read the passage below with a partner. Its second sentence explains what the two words in front of it mean. Say aloud which sentence is the explaining one. Then say the explanation back in your own words, without using the word bars.
Word preview: explain, shows
Nan can make a bar graph with her data. A bar graph shows data using bars.
3. Use the new word in a sentence of your own (5 min)
Read the passage below, which uses data twice more. Say aloud what Nan does with her data here. Then say one sentence of your own that uses the word data, about something you could ask your own class.
Word preview: data, uses
Nan colors the bars for the other kinds of pets. She uses her data to know how tall to make each bar.
4. Say which word the book never explains (4 min)
Read the passage below once more. It uses the word surveys, and the book never stops to say what surveying is. Say what you think it means from the sentences around it, then say which nearby sentence helped you most.
Word preview: surveys
Nan wants to ask her classmates about their pets. Nan asks what pets her class mates have. She surveys her class. The answers are her data.

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Meet a new word and find its meaning nearby (5 min)
The teacher reads the passage. Say the word data aloud, then say in your own words what Nan's data are, using the sentence that told you.
Word preview: data, answers
Nan wants to ask her classmates about their pets. Nan asks what pets her class mates have. She surveys her class. The answers are her data.
2. Say which word the book never explains (4 min)
Read the passage again. Say what you think surveys means from the sentences around it, and say which nearby sentence helped you most.
Word preview: surveys
Nan wants to ask her classmates about their pets. Nan asks what pets her class mates have. She surveys her class. The answers are her data.

Three levels

Support: Read only the last two sentences of the passage. Say data, have the child echo it, then read the answers sentence and ask what data are, accepting the word answers on its own.
At Grade: Say what Nan's data are in your own words and point to the sentence that told you.
Extension: Say what Nan's data are, then say whether the book's own explanation of data would work for a reader who had not read the sentence before it, and say what it leaves out.

English learners

A definition folded into running text is easy to read straight past, especially when the sentence carrying it looks like every other sentence. Read the unknown word, pause, then read the defining sentence with emphasis, and mark the pair with two fingers. Invite children to say the word for answers in their strongest language before meeting data. Rehearsable frame: ___ means ___.

Materials

Let's Make a Bar Graph, the passages printed in this step
Pointing finger
Word cards: data, answers, explain, shows, uses, surveys

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.

8. Most, fewest, or, how many Concept · Hearing what a question word is asking for

The book ends by asking the reader four questions in a row, and each one opens with a different asking word. Students hear the four as questions and find the mark that marks them, separate most from fewest, sort a pick-one question from a how-many question, and then notice that the questions point away from themselves to something a reader has to have in front of them. The skill is understanding what a question word demands. No question is answered in any step, and the module reaches no quantity: the graph these four questions send a reader to is an image the transcript does not carry.

Full lesson — 20 minutes

1. Hear four questions in a row (6 min)
The teacher reads the passage below twice. After the first sentence, every sentence is a question. Put a finger up as each question ends, so you can feel where one stops and the next begins. Then say the mark that shows a sentence is asking, and say what the very first sentence does instead of asking.
Word preview: question, question mark
Use Nan's bar graph to answer these questions. Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have? Do more kids have cats or dogs? How many more kids have dogs than birds?
2. Say what each question word is asking for (5 min)
Read the two questions below with a partner. One asks for the most and one asks for the fewest. Say each word aloud. Then say what the difference between them is, using your hands to show a tall thing and a short thing.
Word preview: most, fewest
Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have?
3. Sort an either-or question from a how-many question (5 min)
Read the two questions below. One offers you two things and asks you to pick one. The other asks you to say a number. Hold up one finger for the pick-one question and two fingers for the number question. Then say the word at the start of each that told you which it was.
Word preview: or, how many
Do more kids have cats or dogs? How many more kids have dogs than birds?
4. Say what these questions need before they can be answered (4 min)
Read the passage below once more. Its first sentence tells you where to go to answer the questions. Say aloud what it tells you to use. Then say why reading the questions alone is not enough to answer them, and what a reader would need beside them.
Word preview: use, answer
Use Nan's bar graph to answer these questions. Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have? Do more kids have cats or dogs? How many more kids have dogs than birds?

Short version — 9 minutes

1. Hear four questions in a row (5 min)
The teacher reads the passage twice. Put a finger up as each question ends, then say the mark that shows a sentence is asking.
Word preview: question, question mark
Use Nan's bar graph to answer these questions. Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have? Do more kids have cats or dogs? How many more kids have dogs than birds?
2. Say what each question word is asking for (4 min)
Say the words most and fewest aloud from the two questions, and say the difference between them, showing a tall thing and a short thing with your hands.
Word preview: most, fewest
Which kind of pet do the most kids have? Which kind of pet do the fewest kids have?

Three levels

Support: Read one question at a time and ask only for a finger each time a question ends. Say question mark together and point at one. Two questions heard is enough; leave the word question out.
At Grade: Put up a finger for each of the four questions and name the mark that shows a question.
Extension: Put a finger up as each question ends, then say which of the questions asks for the longest answer and which asks for the shortest, and say what about the asking word decides it.

English learners

Asking words carry the whole demand of an English question and they sit at the front, where a listener is still tuning in. Say each asking word on its own before reading its question, and gesture the shape of the answer: one finger for pick one, a spread hand for a number. Invite children to say an asking word from their strongest language and hear the English one beside it. Rehearsable frame: This question wants me to say ___.

Materials

Let's Make a Bar Graph, the passages printed in this step
Pointing finger
Word cards: question, question mark, most, fewest, or, how many, use, answer

Standards & curriculum

Choose your curriculum above to see the standards for this lesson.