Reading for Life Lessons

Minnesota ABE Supplemental Services, Linda Strand, 2004-2005

And the Minnesota Literacy Council

Focus: Reading a Table of Contents (Reading for Life, volume 2, unit 18: Table of Contents)

Objectives: Learners will be able to read and interpret information found in a Table of Contents

Key Vocabulary: location, page, index, table of contents, alphabetical order, appendix, unit, chapter, topic, subtopic, references

Materials: a variety of books with Table of Contents pages

Procedure:

Real-life application:

            T shows one of the books (non-fiction works best). T says: “I have this book on ______. I would like to read the whole book, but I don’t have time to do it. I am most interested in ________ (T mentions something that would be a part of the book). How could I find the part of the book that deals with that subject without reading the whole book?”

T elicits and discusses with students differences between a table of contents and an index.

Table of Contents challenge: Students find and list 10 things with table of contents pages. They can do this at the learning center, at home or on a class trip to the library. They should try to find different types of material (e.g. textbooks, magazines, cookbooks, Yellow Pages, etc.)

Comparison: Each student chooses four books. Then they find and compare the Table of Contents pages. T may wish to draw up a chart to help them.

Progress to Reading for Life, v.1 competency worksheets: Applicable worksheets: RFL v.2, unit 18

Progress to multiple-choice format activities: Some to be created by MLC – coming soon

Extensions: Some to be created by MLC – coming soon