Main Idea and Key Details
What is the main idea of a text?
What the text is mostly about and what the author wants you to understand about it.
Why is text evidence important?
It supports your answer and shows where your thinking comes from.
What are the three main purposes an author may have for writing?
Persuade, Inform, Entertain
What text feature tells you what a section of a nonfiction text is about?
Heading
What are the three plants in the Three Sisters Method?
Corn, beans and squash
What are key details?
Important pieces of information that support or explain the main idea.
What is text evidence?
Information from the text that supports your answer or idea.
If an author writes a story about a kid getting lost in a corn maze, what is the author's purpose most likely?
Entertain
A reader looks at a heading before reading a section. What can the heading help the reader do?
Predict what the section will be about.
A text explains how planting three crops together benefits all of them. What is the most likely text structure?
Cause and effect
Read this passage. What is the main idea?
The Three Sisters method uses corn, beans, and squash together. The corn provides a structure for beans to climb. Squash grows along the ground and helps cover the soil. Beans can add nutrients to the soil.
Corn, beans, and squash work together in ways that benefit the garden.
A passage says, “The beans climb the corn stalk as they grow.”
What evidence shows that beans benefit from corn?
The beans use the corn stalk to climb.
If an author writes an article trying to convince farmers to use the Three Sisters method, what is the author's purpose?
Persuade
What is an example of a text feature that is not words?
Pictures or graphs
Why might an author include a picture of the Three Sisters garden?
To help readers visualize how the plants are arranged or understand the information.
Which detail would BEST support the main idea that the Three Sisters method is beneficial?
A. Corn can grow very tall.
B. Beans can climb corn stalks for support.
C. Squash can be green or yellow.
D. Corn is often eaten in the summer.
B
Which is stronger text evidence?
A. “I think the plants work well together.”
B. “The text explains that each plant provides a different benefit to the others.”
B
Imagine the author says, “The Three Sisters method allows farmers to grow several crops in the same space while helping the plants support one another.” What is the author's main purpose?
Inform, because it explains how the Three Sisters method works and its benefits.
A reader sees a bold word and doesn't know what it means. What should they do next?
Use context clues, break the word apart, look in the glossary
What should you do if you come across a word you don't know while reading?
Use context clues, look at word parts.
If a passage is mostly about how corn, beans, and squash help each other grow, what could be the main idea?
The Three Sisters method allows the plants to benefit from one another.
A student answers a question correctly but doesn't include evidence. Would their answer be fully supported? Why or why not?
No. They need information from the text to show how they know their answer is correct.
Which author's purpose is used when an author wants to teach the reader something?
Inform
A map shows where the Three Sisters method was traditionally practiced. How does the map help the reader?
It shows the location connected to the information
What is the name of the heading in the structure of a corn plant we read every day?
Early Cultivation