Word Choice with Baloney, Henry P.

Grade Level Focus: 6^th grade

Focus Trait: Word Choice

Mentor Text: Baloney, Henry P.

Author: Jon Scieszka

ISBN: 0670892483

Mentor Text Summary: Henry P. Baloney needs to come up with a very good, very believable excuse for being late to szkola yet again--or he's in big trouble with his teacher Miss Bugscuffle. Henry has a doozy of a story as any child would have to stay out of trouble.  You see, it all started when he misplaced his trusty yellow no. zz zimulis. One thing led to another, and before he knew it, he was on a razzo blasting off into space, where he eventually landed on the planet Astrosus. All went well there, as the intrepid explorer entertained the Astro guys with his funny piksas--until they decided Henry and his piksas would be entertaining to eat. Things go on in this way until somehow, miraculously, Henry P. Baloney ends up back in his classroom, a mere seven minutes late--but still one writing utensil short!

About the Author: http://www.jsworldwide.com/

“ I always tried to really motivate kids by getting them excited about stuff – and even being a little mysterious about it, just saying, "I don't know. We got this stuff. We have to figure it out. It's up to you guys," and then lay something on them. And I always found that really piqued their interest better than lecturing them. 

“When I sit down I don't really think, "Who is my target audience?" I think about, "What's the best way to tell this story?" I try to imagine my audience really being grabbed by it, including the kind of knucklehead guys sitting in the back who often don't think stories are for them.”

Lesson:

1.       Read the book, Baloney, aloud to the students.  Don’t read the last 2 pages, which are the decoder pages.  Let the students think the words are silly and made up.

2.       Ask the students to make a list of words they don’t recognize, such as Cumulus, fracases, aamu, and sighing flosser, and you record them on the Elmo, while the students record the words on paper at their desk.

3.       Read the book again, this time, instruct the students to raise their hands when they hear an unfamiliar word.  Have the student predict the meaning of the word using context clues and the illustrations.  All students should be making their own individual predictions, but record individual student definition responses on the Elmo to create a class list of definitions.

4.       Show students the decoder page at the end of the text.  Share the list of words from the pages, their definitions, and the place in the text where they appear.

5.       Compare Scieszka and Smith’s definitions with the class list, as well as with individual students.
 
6.       Students need to know that words and how they are used or presented in a story adds character to the writing.

7.       Hand out a teacher model of a Sausage Story to your students with these instructions: "This story is a riddle. The story has nothing to do with sausage. But its title--Sausage Story--is a completely appropriate title. Your task is to figure out why it's called Sausage Story. Good luck.”
a.       Example in PFD format: http://www.writingfix.com/PDFs/left_brained_prompt/sausage_sentences_examples_OH.pdf

8.       This is very tricky for student to do, so offer a hint, such as The sausage is not the whole story; in fact, it's just a sentence in the story. Which sentence could it be? Students will now really look at all the sentences.

9.       Discuss with the students that it is usually the last sentence in the paragraph.  Show them a different sausage sentence than the one in the teacher model, explaining that this is a sausage sentence too. Ask them to think about structure again.
 Now show them the story's sentence with the explanation visually demonstrated.

 

Every yellow warbler rested during Gideon's skillfully yodeled ditty.

What is a sausage sentence?  It's a meaningful string of words whose beginning and ending letters match.  The key is that the words must create a sentence that make sense; it's easy to write nonsense or semi-nonsense using this structural challenge. It's hard to write one that might actually appear in a story.

11.   Challenge students to write a sausage sentence including their individual made up words.

12.   Allow time for the students to write the sentence.

13.   Once students have written their sentences, have them read the sentences aloud in small groups of 3-4.  Have students provide feedback to each other through a checklist. Does the sentence follow the correct word sequence?

14.   Once students have written a sausage sentence they like, their job is to write a story that either begins or ends with the sentence. This is really an interesting thinking and writing challenge, if you do the exercise well, which means you write a story where the sentence doesn't stand out so strongly that future riddle-solvers immediately call it out as being the unusual sentence. To do this, a writer finds himself/herself really looking at the specific words in the sausage sentence, and then building a context for them (with the story's other sentences) so that sausage sentence doesn't glare at you as just a weird-sounding sentence.

15.   Challenge students to write a piece like Baloney, where words are not limiting, but are endless, meaning going beyond actual "real" words.  Remind students to provide a decoding page, so you  know the made up words and their definitions. 

Ohio Academic Content Standards for the Lesson:

Content Standard: Acquisition of Vocabulary

Benchmark: A. Use context clues and text structures to determine the meaning of new vocabulary.

Indicators: 1. Define the meaning of unknown words by using context clues and the author’s use of definition, restatement and example.

Additional Resources: http://6traits.cyberspaces.net/mini-wc.html

                                 http://www.ttms.org/writing_quality/word_choice.htm

                                 http://www.asblibrary.org/word-choice.html

                                 http://www.kimskorner4teachertalk.com/writing/sixtrait/wordchoice/howto.html