Title: Drowned City
Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans
Author/Illustrator: Don Brown
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Copyright: 2015
Reading Level:
Fountas and Pinnell: Level W-X
Lexile: GN 920 L
Accelerated Reader: 5.6
A beautifully written and illustrated graphic novel that
will captivate, intrigue, and evoke anger in students who are too young to
remember much about the catastrophic events of Hurricane Katrina.
Suggested Delivery: Independent Read
2 electronic resources to support and extend the text:
This is a link to the author’s website. This website
includes other illustrations that the author has drawn, information about the
book and the author himself as well as information about other books that he
has written.
This is a link to an LA Times article that was published on
the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The article discusses the
events that happened as well as the book that Don Brown wrote about it. The
website also talks about another children’s book that was written about
Hurricane Katrina that students can read if they want to learn even more and
liked Don Brown’s novel.
Key Vocabulary:
1. Careen- To move
swiftly and in an uncontrollable way in a specified direction.
2. levee- A landing place built to prevent the overflow of a
river onto the land.
3. Storm Surge- A rising of the sea as a result of pressure
changes and the wind
that comes with a storm.
4. stagnant- A body
of water that has no current or flow and often has an
unpleasant smell as a consequence.
5. viscous- Having a thick, sticky consistency between solid
and liquid.
6. squalid- Extremely dirty and unpleasant, especially as a
result of poverty or
neglect.
Before Reading Strategy:
Don Brown uses very vivid vocabulary throughout the text.
Have students look through the pictures and find some examples of great
vocabulary words that he uses. They will then choose one and create a shades of
meaning chart either on paper or using paint sample swatches. Encourage
students to come up with an even better choice word than the author does to put
for the best option. If they have trouble, allow them to use his word as the
best choice but make sure that they are giving at least 4 other words that are
decent and only one that is a poor choice or boring word.
Students can create a shades of meaning wall that is
vivacious just like the vocabulary used in their writing should be. This wall can be a great resource to use when thinking about word choice while speaking as well as in their writing.
During Reading Strategy:
While students read, they should fill out a graphic
organizer that is set up like a timeline and has all of the dates that are stated in the text. This will help guide students through the graphic novel
as well as to understand how many days and even months the Hurricane
devastated the city of New Orleans for. There should also be a place where
students can put other information from the text that they think is important as well as vocabulary that they either have not seen before or think is important to discuss in their book talk. The graphic organizer can serve as a reference when creating their book talk and info graphic.
After Reading Strategy:
Students will present a book talk about the graphic novel
discussing how it is a graphic novel but also a nonfiction text and detailing
the events that happen in the book. The students will create an info graphic as
a visual aid to show while they are presenting their book. The info graphic can
include any information that they feel is important for other students to know
about their text.
Here is a model of an info graphic that students could create for the text.
Writing Activity to demonstrate Inferential Comprehension:
Students will pretend to be FEMA workers and will write a
letter to the president or other important official that discusses what they
did wrong and how they could have helped the city of New Orleans better than
they did. The letter will included:
a) Proper heading and ending for a letter.
b) At least 2 major problems for the people who
were stranded in the city.
c) At least 3 major mistakes that the president and
other officials made during
the aftermath of the storm.
n d) At least 3 suggestions for how the President and
the country can make if
another situation like Hurricane Katrina happened.
e) Cite at least 5 different pages in the text as
evidence for your ideas and
suggestions.
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