Classroom Activities:

Introduce Vocabulary: steamboat, board, paddlewheels, smokestacks, impressive, barrels, gangplank, deck

1. On the board or on sentence strips, write the sentence(s) from the book containing the vocabulary words. Write only one sentence per strip, if you have more than one sentence. Additional sentences may be necessary to provide context clues.
2. Cover each vocabulary word with a sticky note. You may want to reveal the first letter of the word as a clue.
3. Read the sentences aloud and have students predict words that would fit within the context of the sentence. Use the illustration to prompt ideas.
4. List student-suggested words on smaller sentence strip pieces and place below the sentence.
5. If the students do not choose the actual vocabulary word, remove the sticky note and discuss the author’s word. This activity will help students make connections between new vocabulary words and words that are more familiar. It will also develop the concept of synonyms.
6. Most of the vocabulary words for this spread deal with parts of a steamboat. Find or create a poster-sized picture of a steamboat. Make labels by writing the vocabulary words on cardstock. When discussing vocabulary, ask the students to tape the labels in the appropriate places to identify parts of the boat.

Standards: NL-ENG.K-12.3 Evaluation Strategies; NL-ENG.K-12.12 Applying Language Skills; NSS-USH.K-4.4 The History of Peoples of Many Cultures Around the World