“Synthesis” is the ability to combine parts of a whole in new and different ways. It requires students to think flexibly, determine alternatives, and find new ways to accomplish a given task. A more advanced level of abstract thinking is needed for synthesis. The 25 lessons in this unit encourage students to go beyond the obvious to more original thoughts. Example: An illustration of a bulb connected to a battery is presented. “Electricity is stored in a battery.” Look at the accompanying pictures of batteries, wires, and light bulbs. “Which bulbs do you think will light up?”The sequential activities featured here are sure to develop critical thinking skills.

Packed with informative short stories, comprehension questions, and various research activities, this 23-lesson book provides valuable practice in the specific reading skill that emphasizes inference comprehension.The stories lack some facts that the reader must infer from the text in order to detect certain details. Questions following each story test student’s ability to recognize information that is implied but not directly given. 28-page book includes an answer key. Reading Level 3-4 | Interest Level 4-12

Reading. Thinking. Writing! Illustrations and corresponding sentences are combined in the 25 lessons featured here to challenge discrimination and comparison abilities. Rather than multiple choice answers or underlined responses, students are asked to write complete sentences. This extra step will reinforce the thinking process as students work through each of the intriguing activities. Difficulty progresses with each exercise.

Paying attention! The 30 lessons in this learning unit will teach students to listen, remember what they have been told, and execute the oral directions given. To begin, students listen as an explanation of each exercise is given. “On your worksheets there are three rows of boxes. You will be told what to do in each row.”Next children are given instructions. “Draw a line from the fish to the ball; make it go over the pig.” “Draw a triangle in the middle box.” While having fun with these imaginative activities, students will boost their listening, comprehension, and motor skills.

Paying attention! The 30 lessons in this learning unit will teach students to listen, remember what they have been told, and execute the oral directions given. To begin, students listen as an explanation of each exercise is given. “Your worksheet is filled with empty boxes that you will begin to fill.”Next children are given specific instructions. “In the middle box on the bottom row, put an 8.” “In the middle box on the top row put an M.”While having fun with these imaginative activities, students will boost their listening, comprehension, and motor skills.

Developing observation! Packed into this unit are 22 creatively illustrated lessons. Each boasts a drawing of a real-life situation complete with familiar objects. From “a visit to the ice cream parlor” to “a busy street corner,” students are given time to absorb the visual information from each picture. After putting the image aside, 12 questions are asked about what was depicted and students are asked to draw something they remember. Plenty of observation practice will be had by all as thinking and comprehension skills are given a workout.

A springboard for comprehension! The 20 cloze procedure lessons in this book will help students not only gain a greater understanding of concepts, but will assist in expanding their vocabulary.Questions follow each cloze paragraph exercise - thus insuring that students have a broad understanding of the story by incorporating thinking skills as well as recall activities. The questions involve inference, prediction, and relationship.Of course, creative content choice keeps it all interesting with subjects ranging from “dolphins” to “lightening” and “magical mold” to “the Loch Ness monster.”

The building blocks of reading! This 20-lesson unit is brimming with vocabulary-building activities that introduce children to verbs and adjectives. Word searches, puzzles, and color coding exercises are all used to teach the fundamentals. As students progress, they are able to identify and understand that “verbs” describe an action or mode of being, and that “adjectives” offer enlightening and colorful descriptions. Skills reinforced by these activities include recognizing verbs, understanding “present” and “past” tenses, learning about adjectives that “compare,” using adjectives to “tell how things look,” and more. Delightful illustrations keep students enthused while they get plenty of practice. A pre/post test is included.

Being able to determine main ideas is crucial to writing book reports, outlining, reading social studies and science materials, and general reading comprehension. That is why the lessons in this unit are so important.The 26 exercises in found here have been designed to help develop a thinking process for finding the main idea. Students begin by finding topics in sentences, then identify the main idea in a sentence. From here they move on to finding the focus of a paragraph, writing the main idea, and finally coming up with summary sentences for books. 28-page book includes an answer key. Reading Level 3-4 | Interest Level 4-8

What comes next after the letter g? Put these letters in ABC order – pdi. As children move through the 44 lessons in this book, they progress from letter ordering, to word ordering, and on to activities designed to build comfort and use of a dictionary. Once a basic familiarity with locating words is achieved, students are ready to use what they find. Activities follow on parts of speech and use of word meanings. The final exercises touch on multiple meanings - when the same word has two definitions in the dictionary.

“Evaluation” is the most abstract and complex level of critical thinking. To evaluate or make judgments, students must accept a given criteria as the standard before being able to come to an accurate conclusion.The 25 lessons in this unit provide practice with personal values, accuracy of facts, recognizing bias, and using reference sources.Example: “You want to go to a summer camp. What makes a good one?”The sequential activities featured here are sure to develop critical thinking skills.

From Dust Storms and Glaciers to Tsunamis and Droughts, this lesson unit explores 13 different natural phenomena. Students are challenged to increase their comprehension skills by reading the information-packed stories, then answer questions and work the crossword puzzles that follow. Students read-and-learn oodles of insightful facts. They will learn, for example, that thousands of tons of dust can be lifted by a storm that boasts 25 miles-an-hour winds. Reading Level 3-4

This is the first of a three-volume series that may be used in sequence to help provide continuity in building a foundation for reading proficiency, or it may be used for reinforcement. Contents Include: - 5 Storybooks (1 for each: Long A, Long E, Long I, Long O, Long U) - 5 Word Lists (1 for each Vowel Family) - 27 Additional Long Vowel Stories - Chicken Little & The Wise Owl story - Directions for Use Five make-and-take-home storybooks - each long-vowel centered - are included in this volume. While each cover is illustrated, inside pages have been left blank for children to create their own imagery. These animal-inspired stories turn monosyllabic, rhyming families into appealing, fun-to-read tales. (The prerequisite is that students know the consonant sounds, the blends, and the consonant digraphs - ch, sh, wh, th.) Word lists for each long-vowel family are listed and can be used for spelling lists, extended study, or flash cards. Finally, several pages of additional long-vowel stories can be used for additional reading, writing, and illustrating.

From “Armadillos” to “Gliders” and “Amelia Earhart” to “Magnets,” this 26-lesson unit features success-oriented comprehension activities that focus on a controlled vocabulary and utilize high-interest stories. True to its goal of encouraging students to absorb what they read, the exercises in this book follow up informational reading with effective comprehension questions. 32 Pages includes answer key. Reading Level 2-3 | Interest Level 3-12

Reading for comprehension. Packed with informative short stories, comprehension questions, and various research activities, this 23-lesson book provides valuable practice with the reading skills needed to locate specific information in written text. Each fact-based story is followed by questions that require students to locate the information in the story and give precise answers. Subjects covered range from “The Stars in the Sky” and “Amazons,” to “Komodo Dragons” and “Going Bananas.” 28-page book includes an answer key. Reading Level 3-4 | Interest Level 4-12

These 50 nonfiction stories and activities are a sure-fire way to improve fluency and comprehension skills! Simple sentences and short, easy-to-read paragraphs are paired with compelling illustrations for a strong picture-text correspondence. Age-appropriate topics and a controlled vocabulary motivate students and help ensure success. Follow-up activities focus on specific reading skills such as finding the main idea, making inferences, reading for details, locating information, using context clues, and more. The activities featured in this book utilize the direct-approach fluency formula: read and re-read decodable words in connected text. Research shows that repeated readings turn slow, choppy readers into faster, smoother, more fluent readers. By doing the five follow-up activities that accompany each short paragraph, students will read the same paragraph a minimum of four times: 1. Read the paragraph when first presented with it. 2. Look back at the paragraph to respond to the follow-up exercises. 3. Complete the cloze reading activity involving the paragraph. 4. Follow the direction to “Re-read your completed paragraph to make sure it makes sense.” Reading Level 2-3

Grade Level: 1-2 From understanding the concept that “a sentence tells one complete thought” to actually writing coherent sentences, students will find the 20 lessons in this book to be both enlightening and entertaining. The exercises begin with the basic sequencing of a few words into short sentences and progress to viewing an imaginative illustration and writing an original sentence to describe it. 24 pages. Activities Include: Sentence Recognition Sequencing Words into a Sentence Writing Original Sentences