Main Body
What’s Your Story?
Learning Goals
In this chapter, you will learn to:
- Use the suffixes -tion and -ize to understand meaning
- Draw inferences and conclusions
- Summarize information from a text
- Discuss and respond to the digital story 7th Word
- Identify and correct sentence fragments
- Use subject-verb agreement
- Write a descriptive paragraph that describes an important place in your life
Get Ready to Read
- What is your favourite kind of story: funny, scary, dramatic, fantasy, or romantic?
- Try to think of a famous story (book, movie, TV show, video game) about:
- a relationship
- an adventure
- an accomplishment
- a special place
- a job or hobby
- a discovery
- How do you feel when your instructor asks you to write a story?
Vocabulary
Scan What’s Your Story? to find a bold word for each of the following.
1. A group of people or things that are similar in some way
2. A person who is involved in an activity
3. Changed or affected by someone or something
4. Produced or caused something
5. Producing good effects on the body or mind
6. So confusing or difficult you feel like you can’t do it
7. Something that greatly affects people’s emotions
8. Succeeding at something by working hard
9. The act of saying who or what something is
10. Very useful, helpful, or important
Word Pattern
–tion is a suffix that means “the act of.”
–ize is a suffix that means “make or become.”
Use the vocabulary words and affixes above to build a word for each definition below.
11. ___________________________: the act of participating
12. ___________________________: to make categories
13. ___________________________: the act of identifying
14. ___________________________: to make a drama
Reading Strategy
Readers check their understanding of a text while they read. One strategy is to stop after each paragraph and try to retell the main idea in your own words.
Try this strategy as you read What’s Your Story?
Check Your Understanding
1. A good way to check your understanding of a text is to summarize it. A summary is an explanation of the main ideas of a text. A summary does not include details or examples. It does not include your opinion of the text. Write a summary of the six types of stories described in this chapter.
2. An inference is an educated guess about what a text is saying, using your knowledge and logic. What’s Your Story suggests that students should avoid exploring personal stories with lots of difficult emotions when at school. Make an inference about why this might be a good idea.
3. As we read, we form our own thoughts about the text. We form judgments, or opinions. This is often called drawing conclusions. Draw a conclusion about which category 7th Word fits into best. Give reasons.
Writing Task
Another way to check our understanding of a text is to apply what we have learned. Try this:
1. In the text, locate the five activities Joe Lambert recommends for finding a story to tell.
2. Choose one of these activities and try it.
3. Play with yo