Guiding Comprehension

Cause and Effect • Inferential

The water near shore was frozen for many miles. What caused the water to freeze?

The cold temperatures of the Antarctic winter.

Main Idea and Details

• Literal

The main idea of pp. 158–159 is that the mother penguin leaves the egg in search of food. Find one detail which supports this idea.

Possible response: After three days, the mother penguin comes to the end of the ice.

then… use the skill and strategy instruction on p. 159.

If… students have difficulty identifying finding a detail,

Main Idea and Details

Understand Graphic Sources

• Literal

Often in expository nonfiction, there are photos, illustrations, or graphics (such as charts, graphs, diagrams, and so on) that give us additional information about the article. Look at pp. 158–159. What are the graphics on the pages, and what do they tell you?

Illustrations of fish, squid, and krill; they show what these sea creatures look like.

SKILLS
STRATEGIES IN CONTEXT

Main Idea/Details

TEACH

Remind students that
supporting details are small
pieces of information that tell
more about the main idea.
Explain that, authors will often
give us some information that is interesting but does not help us understand the main idea.
These details are not supporting details.
Model finding details that
support the main idea that the
mother penguin must leave her
egg to look for food.

MODEL I read on p. 158 that
the mother penguin walks or slides on her belly and uses her flippers and webbed feet
to move along. These are interesting details, but they don't help me understand the idea that the mother penguin had to leave her egg to look for food. I don't think these are supporting details. On p. 159, I read that it takes the mother three days to get to open water. This does support the idea that the mother penguin leaves her egg. This is a supporting detail.

PRACTICE AND ASSESS

Have students find another supporting detail for the main idea that the mother penguin leaves her egg to look for food. (She dives into the water to hunt.) To assess, check that the detail supports the main idea; otherwise it is not a supporting detail.

"Penguin Chick"
by Betty Tatham

Student Edition
Unit 2, pp. 154–167

Expository nonfiction gives information about the real world. Read for facts about emperor penguins that you might not know.

On a cold winter day in the frozen Antarctica, a female emperor penguin lays an egg. Now the father penguin takes over. The father rolls the egg onto his feet and into a brood patch. Here the egg will stay warm in a fold of skin covered by feathers. The father will care for the egg until the baby penguin hatches. Then he will care for the newly hatched chick. While caring for the egg and chick, the father does not eat. He lives off his body fat. He spends his time with other fathers. They stand close together to help keep each other warm.
As the father cares for the egg, the mother joins other female penguins that leave the rookery where they laid their eggs. They are hungry and must travel far to reach the sea. Once there each mother dives into the sea, using her flippers to swim in search of food. She feeds on sea creatures including krill, very small sea organisms that look like tiny shrimp.
While the mother is gone, the chick grows inside the egg. When it is time for it to hatch, the chick pecks at the inside of the egg. Soon the egg cracks and breaks apart, and the chick emerges wet and tired. The chick cannot survive in the cold, so it snuggles in the father's brood patch to stay warm.
After feeding, the mother makes the journey back to the rookery. On her return, she cuddles with her chick and begins to preen its down feathers. The soft down helps protect the chick from the cold. She also feeds the chick by bringing up food she had in her stomach and giving it to the chick.
Now she will stay with the chick and the father will go for food. He will feed himself and come back with food in his stomach for the chick.
The parents continue to take turns caring for the chick and going for food. All the time, the chick is growing. Soon it is big enough to leave the brood patch. It cuddles with other young penguins to stay warm, but it returns to its parents for food.
Over time, the chick grows waterproof feathers. Then the chick can go to the sea and hunt for food. In a few years, it will be old enough to find a mate and have its own egg.



	Close
	Context Clues Explain that sometimes we can figure out the meaning of new or difficult words by looking at the words around the word we don't know. Find the word rookery on p. 158. Point to the clause where she laid her egg and explain that these words are a clue to the meaning of the word rookery. They tell us that a rookery is a place where the mother penguin lays her egg. Encourage students to write down new words and their meanings as they come across them in the selection. When possible, help them use context clues to figure out what the words mean. Adaptation Many animals have special features that help them survive in their environments. These features have developed over a long period of time; animals of the same species without these features died. This is called adaptation. Have you ever seen a chameleon? The chameleon changes its color to blend in with its environment. If the chameleon is in a tree surrounded by green leaves, the chameleon is green. If it is lying on a brown branch, it is brown. It can be very difficult to see. Arctic foxes and hares change color too. They are white in the winter, so they are difficult to see against snow, and they are brown in the summer. These adaptations have two purposes. First, the animals are protected from their enemies, who can't eat them if they can't see them. It is also easier for them to catch their prey, since the prey often doesn't see them until it's too late!

"Penguin Chick"by Betty Tatham

"Penguin Chick"
by Betty Tatham