Gray Whale Informational Article and Comprehension Activities

This Gray Whale Informational Article and Comprehension Activities includes an article about gray whales in two formats (two-page color photos & one-page text), website resources for online articles and videos about gray whales, a fact sort sheet where students can sort facts about gray whales, a variety of note-taking sheets, comprehension activities, and mini-report pages.

Use these articles as a resource when researching and writing about animals. Read the article, look at a variety of web sites, and watch a couple videos to gather all our facts about the animal. Once students have the facts, sort the facts into categories and then write a research report.

This article works well with my Informational Writing Tools packet that scaffolds expository / informational writing about animals from researching facts to writing paragraphs.

See this blog post for more information about how I use this resource to teach informational writing.

Included in this Gray Whale resource are:

• Vocabulary Cards with key terms from the reading passage
• Vocabulary Activities – matching with and without photos & Frayer Model
• Informational Article in two formats (with and without photos)
• Websites for additional research: QR Codes & Google Site
• Graphic Organizers for note-taking
• Comprehension Activities such as short answer and cloze reading
• Fact Sort for students can organize the facts
• Summary Page
• Writing Pages for a mini-report

Some videos are on YouTube. Make sure you can access YouTube at school.