English Language Arts and Reading.4.8.C

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The student is expected to

analyze plot elements, including the rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution; and

multiple genres TEKS talk image

Knowledge and Skills Statement

Multiple genres: listening, speaking, reading, writing, and thinking using multiple texts--literary elements. The student recognizes and analyzes literary elements within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse literary texts.

Instruct students to create a plot diagram in their reader’s notebooks for independent reference as they read and write. Task students with working in small groups to read a literary text and create a plot diagram with details from the text.

plot diagram


Further Explanation

This SE focuses on the organizational structure of a story. Students in fourth grade should be able to understand the basic elements of a story such as rising action, climax, falling action, and the resolution. Students should be able to examine these elements and draw conclusions about the construction of the story.

A story's plot provides its organizational structure. Although a story can be told in many different ways, the plot of any story generally includes the same basic elements revealed in the same forward-progressing order: rising action (where the suspense/tension/conflict required in all stories appears), the climax (the decisive point at which the reader knows how the conflict will be resolved), the falling action (where the consequences of how the conflict was addressed play out), and the resolution (the final outcome of a story). Once students understand that each of these structural elements plays a role in developing a story, they can examine how these parts were constructed and eventually draw conclusions about why they were constructed in that manner. This analysis of plot elements can confirm comprehension of the text or the need to review the text more carefully.

Research

Freeman, J. (2016). Story is king: how to be a great storyteller. School Library Journal, p. 40+. Retrieved from https://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A453920020/PROF?u=tea&sid=PROF&xid=1ff34e81

The author uses storytelling to build reading skills, such as plot analysis, synthesis, and understanding characters. She provides concrete examples for storytelling in the classrooms and gives a list of 21 classic folk and fairy tales that can be adapted for storytelling.