This parent guide supports parents in helping their child at home with the 4th grade ELA content.

In this lesson, traditional stories of the Native peoples (i.e., narrative text) introduce students to the study of animals in Alaska (i.e., expository text). Students use the Internet to listen to a Yu'pik tale told by John Active, a Native American living in Alaska. They also use online resources to find facts about animals in Alaska. Students compare and contrast the two types of text in terms of fiction and nonfiction. The narrative stories provide students with a context to begin studying a content area topic; this lesson emphasizes the integration of curriculum.

This lesson will teach how characters evolve across a story, and that often times the important changes are subtle. This lesson uses accountable-talk during a read aloud of One Green Apple by Eve Bunting to demonstrate how, as readers, students can use the traits of their character as a lens through which to interpret deeper, more significant changes stirring within. They will ultimately use those observations about their characters to author an epilogue for their books. The epilogue will allow students to demonstrate what they have learned about their main character, and it will allow the teacher to assess how well the students understand their characters and the changes their characters experienced across the text.

Students examine books, selected from the American Library Association Challenged/Banned Books list, and write persuasive pieces expressing their views about what should be done with the books at their school.

This passage about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. includes three higher order thinking questions.

As a way to support teachers with English Language Arts (ELA) instruction during the pandemic, the NCDPI ELA team created choice boards featuring standards-aligned ELA activities.The intended purpose of these choice boards is to provide a way for students to continue standards-based learning while schools are closed. Each activity can be adapted and modified to be completed with or without the use of digital tools. Many activities can also be repeated with different texts. These standards-based activities are meant to be a low-stress approach to reinforcing and enriching the skills learned during the 2019-2020 school year. The choice boards are to be used flexibly by teachers, parents, and students in order to meet the unique needs of each learner.Exploration activities are provided for a more self-directed or guided approach to independent learning for students. These activities and sites should be used as a way to explore concepts, topics, skills, and social and emotional competencies that interest the learner. 

This project is a science based unit that incorporates using a makerspace. Students work together to research a local bird species and design and build a birdhouse to meet the specific needs of their species.

In this lesson students explore expository texts about natural disasters that focus on cause-and-effect relationships. As a class students record their understandings in a graphic organizer. Students then work in small groups and write paragraphs outlining the cause-and-effect relationships they have found.

Students will read a text, underline the instructions, and on a separate sheet of paper draw a flow chart that shows the instructions in the correct order.

This article illustrates the question how and why blowfish can pump themselves up to more than double their volume. It provides details about the scales which have turned into spikes that so that the fish can turn it into ball in situations of danger. The article also mentions that the fish is very poisonous but yet considered a delicacy in Japan with the poisounous parts cut out. The article is written for native speakers age 8 and up.

This scientific article illuminates the adaptation of chameleons to their environment. The text starts with basic facts about the geographic distribution and number of varieties of this species. It then explains how the color pigments in the skin become visible and invisible by cell contraction and how its tongue is adapted to catching prey. The last sections refer to camouflage and the size of the smallest chameleons. The text is child-friendly and written for native speakers 8 years and up.

This scientific article provides information and picture material to discuss the four functions of feathers: to fly, to protect from water, to protect from cold, to attract females. The text is written in child-friendly language for readers 8 years and up.

This scientific article explains the ethymology, the origin, and the retrieval of fossiles in quarries. An audio link provides an impression of children looking for fossiles in a quarry. The article is written for native speakers age 8 and up. The audio is spoken at a natural pace.

This article startswith illuminating the spectrum of visible and invisible light. It then defines the electromagnetic nature of light in form of minute energy packages. In the last section the text focuses on the danger of sunlight, which is mostly in the invisible part of the spectrum - the ultraviolet light. The article is written for native speakers age 8 and up.

This article opens with the question how to not lose orientation on an ocean with no landmarks nearby. The next section explains how longitudes and latitudes help for orientation in combination with information about time and the position of the sun. The last paragraph illustrates why longitudes were established only 250 years ago due to lack of exact clocks. The article is written for native speakers age 9 and up.

This article compares naturally occuring magnets with industrially produced magnets. It then explains how magnets attract metals and how a compass works. The text is written for native speakers age 8 and up.

This scientific article illuminates different features of owls: silent flight as an adaptation to night hunt, food, European varieties, social life, adaptation to night sight and hearing as well as the turning head. An audio report provides additional information. The text is appropriate for children age 10 and up.

This scientific article discusses three different hypothesis regarding the extinction of dinosaurs: 1. a meteor impact, 2. a vulcanic eruption, 3. a slow evolutional change makes space for new species. A weblink opens a page with interview questions directed to a German dinosaur researcher. The text child-friendly and appropriate for children of age 8 and up.

This scientific article provides an overview over static electricty. It starts with the discovery of static electricity and the ethymology of the word "electron." Then two different experiments are explained based on static electricity. In the last part the article explains the phenomenon on a molecular level. The text is written for native speakers age 9 and up.

This scientific article describes the different adaptations of flies to their environmental challenges. It explains the funtion of legs as taste and movement sensors, the spead of processing in a fly brain, and territorial behavior. Additional links provide supportive information for each of the sections. The text is written for native speakers age 8 and up.