Friendship Across Boundaries: Return to Sender

Lesson 8
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ELA

Unit 5

5th Grade

Lesson 8 of 29

Objective


Defend if all members of the family have equal amounts of hope and fear. 

Readings and Materials


  • Book: Return to Sender by Julia Alvarez  pp. 92 – 106

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Target Task


Writing Prompt

Read the following statement: All members of the family have equal amounts of hope and fear. 

Do you agree or disagree? Defend why using evidence from the text.

Sample Response

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Key Questions


  • Both Tyler and Mari had an emotional reaction to the stars. Compare and contrast their reactions. 

  • Why does Mari think her two sisters would be unable to get used to life in Las Margaritas? 

  • Read the quote from page 98: "And by now, it didn't matter if Mamá's picture was on the altar for the dead. Her whole family had deserted her, except for me. It was as if she had really died." Explain the significance of this quotation. 

  • Read the quote from page 101: "Each time it was like a needle going through my heart." What type of figurative language is this? How does it help a reader better understand the family's feelings? 

  • Read the quote from page 105: "In those ten minutes of terror, we had been reminded that we were living on borrowed kindness and luck." Summarize what happened during the ten minutes of fear. Do you agree or disagree that they are living on borrowed kindness and luck?

Vocabulary


civilized

adj.

polite, reasonable, and respectful

preoccupying

v.

thinking or worrying about often

insistent

adj.

demanding something happen

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Common Core Standards


  • RL.5.2 — Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text, including how characters in a story or drama respond to challenges or how the speaker in a poem reflects upon a topic; summarize the text.
  • RL.5.3 — Compare and contrast two or more characters, settings, or events in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., how characters interact).

Supporting Standards

L.5.4
L.5.4.b
L.5.5
RF.5.3
RF.5.4
RL.5.1
RL.5.4
RL.5.10
SL.5.1
W.5.10

Next

Close-read a text in order to determine the challenges of being an undocumented Mexican laborer. 

Lesson 9
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