SIOP Lesson Plan: Story Structure

Background
Lesson Topic/Theme: Understanding the structure of a story by stating what happened in the
beginning, middle and end.
Background knowledge established prior to lesson:
Students will already be familiar with the story as it has been read aloud to them in previous
lessons. Students also know the names of different animals in English and have been taught
unfamiliar concepts such as the words curious and zoo prior to reading the story. Students have
been previously taught related motions for specific vocabulary words such as monkey, giraffes,
kangaroos, elephants and hungry.
English proficiency level: Beginners
Grade: 2
ESL classroom setting
State standard:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.2.5
Describe the overall structure of a story, including describing how the beginning introduces the
story and the ending concludes the action.

Preparation:
Materials:
Picture Cards with familiar vocabulary (used in warm-up activity to create a story)
Book: Curious George Visits the Zoo
Visual Aid (for teaching parts of the story)
Graphic Organizers
Objectives:
Language:
1. Students will be to use and understand the words beginning, middle and conclusion.
2. Students will be able to understand how these words are used to describe the storys
structure.
Content:
1. Students will be able understand how the beginning introduces the story.
2. Students will be able to understand how the end concludes the action.

3. Students will be able use a graphic organizer to apply this understanding when given a
story.
Key Vocabulary:
Beginning
Middle
Conclusion
Setting
Characters
Title

Motivation
Having students create their own personal story using the picture cards
Revisiting a book which the students previously enjoyed and incorporating it as part of
this lesson

Lesson Presentation:
Orally explain the objective for students (2 minutes)
Warm Up Activity: (10 minutes)
Students will work in pairs and will be given a bag with different picture cards. (Picture will be
of vocabulary words that students have previously learned.) Students will then tell the story
based on the card they pulled out of the bag.
Teaching Vocabulary: (10 minutes)
The teacher will teach the vocabulary: beginning, middle, end, setting, title and characters
Setting, title and characters are being pre-taught as they appear on graphic organizer activity
Then using the cards from the warm up activity the teacher will have the students work with their
partner and find the beginning, middle and end of the story they have created.
Graphic Organizer with warm up activity: (10 minutes)
Students will be given a graphic organizer and work with another pair to fill out the organizer as
they listen to that pairs story. Each pair will then share the other groups story that they had
listen to while explaining its structure.

Read Aloud: (10 minutes)

The teacher will read aloud the story once again to the students while the students use the
previously taught motions for specific vocabulary words.
Graphic organizer for read aloud book: (10 minutes)
Students will fill out graphic organizer independently. They will have a copy of the story in front
of them for reference.
Review Objectives & Assessment (5 minutes)
The teacher will list details from Curious George Visits the Zoo and as a class, the students
will state if this detail is from the beginning, middle or end of the story.
English and content objectives will be reviewed to conclude the lesson. Students will then rate if
they think they have mastered the objective or not by showing a thumbs up or thumbs down.

Graphic Organizer
Title: _____________________
Characters:

Beginning

Middle

End

Setting

Middle

Beginning

End