- State College Area School District
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- Searchable Terms - Language Arts
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Searchable Terms - Language Arts
Use these bookmarks to quickly access the various sections of this lengthy web page:
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Reading Thematic Concepts (coming soon!)
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If you are searching for a picture book to teach a specific language arts concept, the SCASD elementary librarians have created a way for you to easily find one. Five or more titles have been identified as great choices for each of the concepts defined below.To locate these books, please follow these directions:- Go to your school's catalog web page
- Broaden your search by setting the location to Elementary Schools (please see the screen capture below) rather than narrowing the search to just your specific building
- In the Find box, type in the letters ELA followed by the specific searchable term from the list below, for example: ELA Adjective -- the ELA makes the search work much more specifically for you so that you find a carefully curated list created and maintained by the SCASD elementary librarians
- Click on the Keyword search button
- Review the list of suggested titles from all of the elementary schools in the district
- Check out the book or books that you think will work best for your lesson -- remember, you may borrow books from other school libraries by using the Hold option (please check with your library's staff for help with this, as needed) OR
- Click here for directions on how to request a book from another library.
The following language arts terms are searchable -- for best results, please use each term as it specifically appears below (for example, use the singular version of the term as noted below rather than the plural version). A definition of each term is provided for your convenience.
If you have any suggestions of additional titles that are great to use when teaching any of these concepts, please feel free to let your librarian know so it could be added to the list. Your suggestions are welcomed and appreciated.Adjective - describe a noun or pronoun
Adverb - a part of speech that modifies a verb, adverb, or adjective
Affix - a prefix or suffix
Alliteration - the repetition of initial consonant sounds in neighboring words
Allusion - an implied or indirect reference to a familiar book, person, place, or event
Ambiguity - unclear or uncertain word or expression meaning
Anagram - a word, phrase, or sentence formed from another by rearranging its letters
Analogy - finding the similarity between two things
Antonym - a word that is the opposite in meaning to another word
Aphorism - an original thought, spoken or written in a concise and memorable form
Appositive - two adjacent nouns have the same referent stand next to one another (“My father, Ned”)
Atmosphere - prevailing tone or mood
Autobiography - the story of a person’s life written by him or herBuilding Community - texts that support the social dimension of a classroom literacy community
Captions - explanation of a picture or illustration
Caricature - a description exaggerating the peculiarities or defects of persons or things
Cause and Effect - cause statements stem from actions and events, and effects are what happen as a result of the action or event
Characterization - description of character and traits
Chart - a graphic representation of informationClose Reading - ritual of rereading and examining text through various lenses for deeper understandingComparing Characters Across Texts - identifying characters, settings and main events from sources and looking for commonalities and differences
Compound Word - a word composed of two or more smaller words
Conclusion - the ending of a story or the summarizing of ideas
Conflict (sometimes referred to as Tension) - a struggle or clash between opposing characters, forces, or emotions
Context Clue - information from the reading that identifies a word or group of words
Circle Story - stories that begin and end in the same place
Cutaways (sometimes referred to as Cross Sections) - an illustration that reveals interior components or structure
Descriptive Language - allows the reader to picture the scene or setting in which the action of a story takes place
Dialect - a special variety of language
Dialogue - conversation between people
Exaggeration - to make a overstatement or stretch the truth
Figurative Language - language that cannot be taken literally since it was written to create a special effect or feeling
Flashback - a device used in literature to present action that has occurred before the beginning of the storyFluency - books that support rate, expression and prosody
Foreshadowing - a device used in literature to create expectation or to setup an explanation of later developments
Glossary - a list at the back of a book, explaining or defining difficult or unusual words and expressions used in the text
Homonym - a word of the same written form as another but of different meaning
Homophone - two or more words pronounced alike, but different in spelling or meaning
How To - modeling how to create or do various crafts and skills
Hyperbole - an exaggeration or overstatement
Idiom - an expression with special meaning that cannot be understood from the meaning of the individual words in the phrase
Imagery - figurative description
Index - alphabetical listing of names, places, and topics along with the numbers of the pages on which they are mentioned or discussed
Inferencing (sometimes referred to as Drawing Conclusions) - a judgment based on reasoning rather than on a direct or explicit statement
Informational Writing - nonfiction work, primarily to convey factual information
Irony - the use of a word or phrase to mean the exact opposite of its literal or usual meaning
Main Idea - the author’s central thought; the chief topic of a text, expressed or implied in a word or phrase
Map - the insertion of one or more maps in a textMemoir - a record of events written by a person having intimate know knowledge of the individual, based on personal observations
Metacognition - awareness of one’s own thinking and learning processes
Metaphor - expresses an idea through the image of another object
Mood - the prevailing emotions of a work
Narrator - the person who relates a story or account
Narrative - text which conveys a story or which relates events or dialogue
Noun - a person, place, thing, or quantity
Onomatopoeia - the use of words whose sounds express or suggest their meaning
Oxymoron - combines contradictory terms
Paradox - an opinion or statement contrary to commonly accepted opinion
Parallel Stories - two or more stories which take place simultaneously that are told in one
Parody - a humorous or satirical imitation of a serious piece of literature or writingPersonal Narrative - a first-person story describing something that happened to the narrator
Personification - an object or abstract idea given human qualities or forms
Persuasive - defends a position, opinion, or issue
Phonemic Awareness - the ability to hear, identify, and manipulate individual sounds-phonemes--in spoken words
Plot - the structure of a story, the sequence in which the author arranges events in a story
Point of View - the way in which an author reveals characters, events, and ideas in telling a story
Pourquoi - a folk tale that explains how or why something came to exist
Predicting - to foretell what will happen
Prefix - a unit of letters attached to the beginning of a root word to change its meaning
Preposition - a class of words that are used before nouns or pronouns to form phrases functioning as modifiers of verbs, nouns, or adjectives, that typically express a spatial, temporal, or other relationship
Pronoun - a word that takes the place of a noun
Pun - a play on words
Punctuation - the practice or system of using certain conventional marks or characters in writing or printing in order to separate elements and make the meaning clear
Rhyme- words having similar ending sounds
Satire - using ridicule or making fun of human vice or weakness
Schema (sometimes referred to as background knowledge) - organized knowledge accessed during reading
Setting - the description of the surroundings or environment of a specific place
Simile - a comparison of two unlike things in which a word of comparison (“like” or “as”) is used
Sequencing (referring to the concepts of: Beginning/Middle/End) - the successive order of two or more things
Solution - explanations, answers, resolutions
Stereotype - something that is assumed about a group of people, but isn't always true
Strong Ending - makes the story feel complete; pulls all the elements of the story together in a powerful wayStory Arc - the continuous progression or line of development in a story
Strong Lead - opening sentences which grab the reader
Superlative - exaggerated in language or style; the highest degree of comparison between adjectives or adverbs
Suffix - a syllable or group of syllables fixed to the end of a word to modify its meaning
Symbolism - a device in literature where an object represents an idea
Synonym - one of two or more words that have highly similar meanings
Table of Contents - a list of articles or chapters and the page on which they start
Theme - a topic of discussion or writing; a major broad enough to cover the entire scope of the literary work
Tone - the attitude of the author toward the audience and charactersTransition - a word, phrase, or sentence that is used to create coherence in writing by showing the relationships of ideas between sentences and/or paragraphs
Understatement - representing something as less than it is
Verb - words that express action or relation between two things
Visualizing - seeing something in your mind
Voice - writing words in a way that portrays personality
Wordless - a book that contains illustrations but no textWriting About Reading - a written representation of something you readfrom the text by Kylene Beers and Robert E. ProbstAgain and Again - events, images, or particular words that recur over a portion of the novelAha Moment - a character's realization of something that shifts his actions or understanding of himself, others, or the world around him/herContrasts and Contradictions - a sharp contrast between what we would expect and what we observe the character doingMemory Moment - a recollection by a character that interrupts the forward progress of the storyTough Questions - questions a character raises that reveal his or her inner thoughtsWords of the Wiser - the advice or insight a wiser character, who is usually older, offers about life to the main characterComing Soon!*****How to add concepts to this list: please talk to your building librarian.We welcome suggestions!For librarians' use only: click here to review our process.
Last Modified on November 9, 2020