All About Books and Text Features Inquiry Unit

All About Books and Text Features Inquiry Unit

Hey, y'all! At the beginning of each school year, we talk all about the different text features and parts of books and start building that academic vocabulary we'll be using all year. The last few years, we've been working hard on developing student-directed learning with an inquiry approach. So naturally, we can learn about and explore books in a natural, inquiry-based way. 

We start off by exploring the essential vocabulary and sorting the words into categories like fiction, nonfiction, and all books. Once we have an idea of what we're looking for, we dive into our books and look for examples of as many of the words as we can. 

We also need to know what these things are for. For fiction texts, we explore why we have characters, setting, plot, conflict, resolutions, etc. For nonfiction texts, we explore the uses of tables of contents, headings, diagrams, glossaries, and more. Students can use the graphic organizers to define these things and/or label them. 

In older classes or later in the year, we'll talk about point of view and author's purpose. We'll also use the story map to map out a quick picture book, and compare and contrast text features for both fiction and nonfiction texts. I love using an inquiry based approach with this so that students can see these things in action and apply their new skills right away. 

This unit is great for back to school season and building vocabulary. It includes lots of ideas on how to extend the learning and ways to assess students' understanding in authentic ways. You can find this unit in my Teachers Pay Teachers store here.

I'm always adding new resources to my TPT store so be sure to follow me to stay up to date on the lasted resources and ideas. I hope you have a wonderful week and I'll talk to you soon. 

Stay cozy,