Focus Calendar: Weeks 12-14 & 34-36

1. Focus Calendar:Weeks 12-14 & 34-36 Author’s Purpose FCAT Testing Cluster 2 Strand A LA.A.2.2.2 The student identifies the author’s purpose in simple text.

2. “They may forget what you said but they will never forget how you made them feel.”-- Anonymous

3. Persuade Inform Entertain Describe The Pied Piper

4. Clarifying the FCAT Benchmarks • Grade 3, 4, and 5 • Benchmark- LA.A.2.2.2 • The student identifies the author’s purpose in simple text.

5. The Social or Communicative Intent of a Piece of Writing(to describe, to explain, to give instruction, to tell a story, to persuade, or to recount an event). • Students recognize there is a purpose for reading • Students read the text with a different level of intensity depending on the purpose in mind. • Students need to recognize purpose, know why the author wrote the story, and to read for meaning. • Without knowing the purpose the selection, they themselves will have no purpose for reading.

6. Strategies and Tips for Author’s Purpose #1 Look for negative or positive words that indicate how the author regards the topic under discussion.

7. Strategies and Tips for Author’s Purpose #2 When you have no word clues, read the passage carefully and decide on your overall impression. Ask yourself if you feel impressed, or surprised, or shocked. This may help you understand the author’s viewpoint.

8. Strategies and Tips for Author’s Purpose #3 The main reason authors write nonfiction passages is to inform. They may also hope to instruct, persuade, or entertain their readers.

9. Strategies and Tips for Author’s Purpose #4 Where you read a selection can provide an important clue as to an author’s purpose. Newspaper editorials are usually intended to persuade. School texts are intended to instruct.

10. Strategies and Tips for Author’s Purpose #5 It may help if you know who the author is. Humorous writers, for example, probably want to amuse and entertain you.

11. Graphic Organizer: T-Chart Genre Author’s Purpose

12. What Does It Look Like on FCAT? 3rd Grade Item Type – Multiple Choice Response Attributes Distractors may include, but are not limited to, the following: • facts or details from the passage that do not represent the author’s purpose, • incorrect interpretations of the author’s purpose.

13. What Does It Look Like on FCAT? 4th Grade Item Type – Multiple Choice Response Attributes Distractors may include, but are not limited to, the following: • *facts or details from the passage that do not represent the author’s purpose, • *incorrect interpretations of the author’s purpose. • Distractors should NOT be a list of general categories (e.g., to inform, to persuade).

14. What Does It Look Like on FCAT? 4th Grade Item Type – Short Response Response Attributes • *SR items will be scored with a holistic rubric that defines the performance criteria for each score point. • *An example of a top-score response for each SR item will be included.

15. 4th Grade

16. What Does It Look Like on FCAT? 5th Grade Item Type – Multiple Choice Response Attributes Distractors may include, but are not limited to , the following: • *facts or details from the passage that do not represent the author’s purpose, • *incorrect interpretations of the author’s purpose.

17. Other Resources/ Support: Author's Purpose

18. Author’s Purpose Websites Author’s Purpose Game: http://www.oswego.org/ocsd-web/match/term/matchgeneric2.asp?filename=kderitteauth Author’s Purpose Test: http://www.poquoson.org/pes/VASOLs/view.html Author’s Purpose Practice: http://www.manatee.k12.fl.us/sites/elementary/palmasola/rcap1.htm Author’s Purpose Post Test: http://unx1.shsu.edu/%7Etxcae/Powerpoints/prepostest/authorpovpostest.html