Weekly Updates 2026-2027

8/31/26-9/4/26

English Language Arts

Readings:

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family

Skills Practiced:

Students practiced close reading skills, underlining bold printed words and specific directions
Students practiced inferring character traits and connecting their thoughts to specific text.

Writing:

Students began working with the writing process: Brainstorm, choose an idea, elaborate, and then build their writing.
Students wrote a paragraph about someone who changed their life or how they helped change someone else's life.
Students wrote a paragraph about a trait of a good problem solver.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students began discussions of identity and community
Students discussed who they are and what makes them who they are (readers, athletes, languages spoken, cultures they are a part of, who they grew up with, ETC.)
Students analyzed maps of Chicago and the surrounding areas.
Students identified states bordering Illinois and reviewed how to use maps.

Skyline Unit 1 Lessons 0 & 1

9/7/2026 - 9/11/2026

English Language Arts

Readings:

All the Pretty Ponies

Skills Practiced:

Students practiced close reading skills, underlining bold printed words and specific directions
Students practiced using sensory details to apply to their writing.
Students analyzed ways an author uses inference and sensory details to build out a story.
Students analyzed the weekly story for action words, built out the sentence and then created images with captions to practice visualization.

Writing:

Students mapped out their favorite celebrations and connected two of their favorite foods involved in the celebration.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students analyzed maps of Chicago, Illinois, The United States, and the World.
Students identified neighborhoods, states, and countries that surrounded us.
Students identified Chicago neighborhoods
Students used a compass to discuss which neighborhoods surround our school.

Skyline Unit 1 Lessons 1

9/14/26 - 9/18/26

English Language Arts

Readings:

The Girl From Yamhill
The Diagnosis Part 1 and 2
Introduction to Polio
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

Skills Practiced:

Students practiced close reading skills, underlining transition words
Students Identified transition words related to time, and non-time transition words
Students analyzed dialogue and corrected sentences by adding quotation marks, commas and ending punctuation.
Students analyzed vocabulary and played word bank with the class. Teaching each other about the words they were assigned.
Students answered comprehension questions for the story “Introduction to Polio”

Writing:

Students created events for a personal narrative
Students shared their events and gave feedback to others about sensory details
Students reflected on their writing and built our more details from peer feedback and asking themselves questions about their writing
Students analyzed their writing for vague vs detailed ideas.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students analyzed different types of maps: economic, outline, state, state capital, climate and political
Students analyzed facts about Chicago

Skyline Unit 1 Lesson 1

9/21/26-9/25/26

English Language Arts

Readings:

The Diagnosis Part 1 and 2
Introduction to Polio

Skills Practiced:

Students compared two sources identify firsthand and secondhand accounts
Students compared the stories "Introduction to Polio” and “The Diagnosis”
Students analyzed sequence of events through transition words and story details.
Students analyzed vocabulary, defined each vocabulary word and used them in a sentence.

Writing:

Students created events for a personal narrative.
Students used a planning page to build out stronger details for their events.
Students worked on conferencing skills with other peers to build feedback and constructive language.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students analyzed different types of maps: economic, outline, state, state capital, climate and political.
Students analyzed geographical features around the world.
Students discussed geographical features labeling them human features or physical features.
Students took their own notes in the journals, writing down ideas of geographical features and how Chicago has specific geographical features that help create our communities.

Skyline Unit 1 Lesson 2

9/28/26 - 10/2/26

English Language Arts

Readings:

The Star Patient Surprises Everyone, Part 1 and 2
An Oxygen Tent and Chocolate Milkshake

Skills Practiced:

Students analyzed the stories for similes and metaphors.
Students took literary devices and transitioned them to literal meanings.
Students analyzed actions related to cause and effect.
Students analyzed characters for traits and then explained their reasoning basing it around text evidence.

Writing:

Students created introductions
Students created similes and metaphors for their narrative
Students created a body paragraph containing three events.
Students analyzed essays to discuss strong introductions and body paragraphs.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students discussed the importance of geographical features in Chicago
Students learned about the reversal of the Chicago River
Students analyzed a map and used a key to describe what is on the Chicago River
Students took bullet notes, analyzing for the important information about Native American groups and how Lake Michigan and the Chicago River supported their families.

Skyline Unit 1 Lesson 2

English Language Arts

Readings:

The Great Accordion Concert
Goodbye Silver, Hello Sticks
Back to School

Skills Practiced:

Students analyzed author’s words for feelings and emotions
Students analyzed the main character and tracked how she changed through the course of the story.
Students analyzed stories and completed timelines of major events from each chapter

Writing:

Students created paragraphs.
Students added details to their writing.
Students rewrote a draft of their narratives,
Students analyzed peers' writings to help identify areas where they can build their stories.

Social Science

Skills Practiced:

Students discussed the importance of resources
Students analyzed resource maps
Students wrote about the idea of human made features vs natural resources making a bigger impact on Chicago.
Students read about grape protests on the West Coast that lead to a civil rights movement for workers.

Skyline Unit 1 Lesson 2 Part 3/4