Explaining Events, Procedures and Ideas

1. Write two versions on the board. A: "I woke up late. Then I missed the bus. Then I walked to school." B: "I woke up late because my alarm did not ring, so I missed the bus, which meant I had to walk."
2. Ask: "Which one tells me why?" Take answers and circle the joining words in B: "because," "so," "which meant."
3. Write on the anchor chart: "Retell = then, then, then. Explain = because, so, which meant."

1. Display the passage: "(1) In the 1920s, farmers on the Great Plains plowed up huge areas of grassland to plant wheat. (2) For thousands of years, the grass roots had held the soil in place. (3) Then, in 1931, the rain stopped and did not return for years. (4) With no roots to hold it, the dry soil turned to dust. (5) Strong winds lifted the dust into huge dark clouds called black blizzards. (6) Some storms carried dust all the way to the Atlantic coast. (7) Thousands of families lost their farms and moved west."
2. Ask the first question: "What happened?" Accept: "Huge dust storms blew across the Plains and families lost their farms." Write it at the top of the board.
3. Ask the second: "Why?" Most students will say "Because it did not rain." Write it, then ask: "It had stopped raining before, for thousands of years, and the soil did not blow away. What was different this time?" Push them to sentences 1 and 2.
4. Build the chain on sentence strips across the board, each strip with its sentence number: "Farmers plowed up the grass (1) → the roots no longer held the soil (2, 4) → the rain stopped and the soil dried (3, 4) → the wind lifted the dust (5) → families lost their farms (7)."
5. Explain why the numbers matter: an explanation of a text has to come from the text. A why that you cannot pin to a sentence is your idea, not the author's.
6. Read the chain aloud using joining words: "Because farmers plowed up the grass, its roots no longer held the soil, so when the rain stopped, the dry soil turned to dust, which meant the wind could lift it into black blizzards."

“Explaining is not retelling. Retelling says "then, then, then." Explaining says "because, so, which meant." And every "because" needs a sentence number — if the text did not say it, you cannot use it.”

1. Hand out: "(1) A boat sails into the lock, and the gates close behind it. (2) Workers open small gates, called paddles, in the front gate. (3) Water from the higher canal pours in, and the water in the lock rises. (4) As the water rises, it lifts the boat. (5) The front gates cannot open until the water on both sides is the same height, because the higher water pushes too hard against them. (6) When the levels match, the gates open and the boat sails out."
2. Pairs answer two questions: "What happens to the boat?" and "Why can't the front gates be opened straight away?" The answer to fish for: "Because the water on the far side is higher and pushes too hard against them (sentence 5), so workers let water in first (2, 3) until the levels match (6)."
3. Pairs build their chain on strips with sentence numbers. Circulate; if a pair writes "because they are locked," ask: "Which sentence says that?" Send them back to sentence 5.
4. Take one chain to the board and have the class read it aloud with joining words.

“In a procedure, every step is there for a reason. Ask the text: what would go wrong if this step was skipped?”

1. Students complete the printable practice sheet alone, answering "what happened" and "why" for each item and noting which part of the text supplied the why.
2. Early finishers write the Dust Bowl chain backwards, starting "Families lost their farms because..." and working back to the plowing.

1. Ask: "Was the Dust Bowl caused by the drought?" The answer to fish for: "Partly — the drought only turned soil to dust because the grass had already been plowed up." One cause is rarely the whole explanation.