- Hello, readers, and welcome to Read, Write, ROAR.

Today, we will focus on the big question, how can I be a world changer?

We will learn to read words with many different types of syllables in them.

And we will read a story about an inventor.

For today's episode, you'll need something to write on, even a scratch piece of paper, or an envelope.

And something to write with, like a pencil or a crayon.

Come and join us for Read, Write, ROAR.

- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by the Michigan Department of Education, the state of Michigan, and the W.K.

Kellogg Foundation.

Additional support by, and by viewers like you, thank you.

(upbeat music) - Welcome, readers.

When I'm reading, and I come to a long word that I've never seen before, I remind myself that I don't need to read the entire word all at once.

Instead, I can break that word up into syllables or word parts to help me read that word more accurately.

By learning about the different kinds of syllables, we can learn how to break long words up into syllables.

Remember, a syllable has one and only one vowel in it.

Our vowels are A, E, I, O, U, and oftentimes the letter Y.

Sometimes a syllable might have more than one vowel in it, but those vowels will always work together to make only one vowel sound.

Our goal today is to learn how to read words with many different types of syllables in them.

Are you ready to get started?

Me too, here we go.

Here is our first word.

This is a word that I don't know how to read.

Let's get ready to loop and swoop this word together, so we can figure out what it says.

Remember, our first step when we're going to read a word is to look for any vowels in that word, and place a dot under them.

I'm going to place a dot under O, E, E, E, and E. We have a lot of vowels in this word, don't we?

Now I'm going to scan across my word, and see if I can find any vowel teams that I should underline.

As I scan across my word, I'm going to look for those vowel teams.

And if I find any, I'll go ahead and underline them.

I found this vowel team right here.

These two E's work together I know to say the long E sound.

Now I need to decide where I'm going to split this word.

Before I do that, I can kind of tell that it's a compound word.

I see two words that are working together to make a new word.

And in this word, I think that this E is going to make this O say a long O sound.

Does that word look familiar to you?

Are you ready to figure out where we need to split this word?

Are we going to split it between two consonants, a consonant and a vowel, or between two vowels?

Here we go.

I know that I see more than one vowel in this word.

So I know I'm going to have to split this word three different times.

Let's get ready to loop and swoop.

Store, K, per.

Storekepper.

That doesn't sound like a word that I know, but do you remember that this vowel team, these two E's, will work together to say a long E sound?

Let me try and read it again.

Store, key, per, storekeeper.

As I was reading, I noticed that there was also this R controlled vowel right here, ER.

Remember, an R controlled vowel will not make a vowel say its long or short vowel sound.

This word is storekeeper.

The storekeeper was so excited to open his brand new store on Main Street.

Are you ready, readers, to try the next word with me?

Can you get out your scratch piece of paper and pencil?

And here we go, let's try the next one together.

Here is our next word.

This is also a word that I don't know how to read.

I'm really going to need your help with this one.

On your paper, can you write down these letters?

C, U, S, T, O, M, E, R. Do you have those letters on your paper?

Great.

Now remember, our first step is to look and see what vowels we find in this word, and to place a dot under them.

Can you place a dot under the vowels on your word on your paper?

And I'm going to do the same up here.

When you're finished, look up here, and let's see if we found the same vowels.

Did you place a dot under U, O, and E, like I did?

You did?

Great job, readers.

If you didn't, that's okay.

Take a second, and fix it up.

Now we need to decide if there are any vowel teams that we should underline in this word.

Will you scan across your word on your paper, and see if you spot any vowel teams to underline, and I'll do the same on mine up here.

I didn't find any vowel teams, did you?

Next, we need to decide if we should split this word between two consonants, a constant and a vowel, or between two vowels.

Now I know this word has three vowel sounds, so I know I'm going to need to split it into three word parts, because remember, each word part can only contain one vowel sound.

Will you get ready with your writing utensil to loop and swoop this word with me, so we can read it together?

Here we go.

Cus, to, mere, custom mere.

That doesn't sound like a word that I know, but I remember that this R controlled vowel, this E, would not say a long or short vowel sound.

Let me try and read this word again.

Cus, to, mer, customer.

Customer is somebody who buys something.

This is a word that I definitely have heard before.

Great job, readers.

Can you try one more with me?

You're getting so good.

I think you can do this last one on your own.

Get your papers ready.

Here is our last word.

Oh my goodness, this is a long word.

Good thing we have so many reading strategies that we know to help us read this word.

On your paper, can you write down these letters?

N, E, I, G, H, B, O, R, H, O, O, D. I'll give you a second to get all of those letters written down on your paper.

All right, readers.

You know the first step.

We have to find any vowels in this word, and place a dot under them.

Can you do that on your paper, and I'll do the same up here on mine, and then we'll check them together.

Did you place a dot under E, I, O, O, and O?

You did?

Great job, readers.

Now we need to scan across our word, and see if there are any vowel teams that we should underline in this word.

Go ahead and scan across the word on your paper, and I'll do the same up here.

If you find a vowel team, go ahead and underline it.

Did you find a vowel team?

Me too.

I found these two O's that will work together to make one vowel sound.

I also noticed that there's this E, I, G, H. And I know that those letters work together to say A, like in the word eight.

I'm gonna keep that in mind as I read my word.

Readers, now it's time for us to loop and swoop this word, so that we can read it together.

I know word has three vowel sounds.

So I'm going to have to break it up into three word parts, because each word part can only contain one vowel sound.

Do you have your writing utensil ready?

Are you ready to loop and swoop with me?

Here we go.

Neigh, bor, hood, neighborhood.

This word is neighborhood.

I've heard of this word before.

I live in a neighborhood with lots of houses, and lots of dogs.

Readers, you did a wonderful job today working with all these different syllable types, and remembering what we've learned over the course of all of our lessons.

We put all of that together to read some really long words.

You did a fantastic job.

Don't forget, when you come to a long word in your own reading, break out the into syllables and word parts, and work with each of those, and attack them one at a time to help you read those long words.

Readers, you're doing such a fantastic job reading all of these long words with more than one type of syllable in them.

Let's try reading some of these types of words in a story.

Are you ready?

Here we go.

The store kepper, storekepper, that doesn't sound right, but I do see this double E vowel team.

And I remember that that actually works together to say E, not E, let me try reading that word again.

The storekeeper, storekeeper, was looking to open his bookstore in a new location.

He was looking for the perfect neigh, bor, hood, neighborhood, full of kids and families.

He worked hard, and found just the right spot.

He was so excited to sell a book to his first custom mere, custom mere.

That doesn't sound right, but I did notice when I was reading this word that there's this R controlled vowel right here.

So I know that E isn't going to be a long or short E. Let me try it again.

Customer, customer, during his grand opening.

Readers, you did a wonderful job reading all of these words with more than one type of syllable in them in our story today.

Our first word is increasing.

Can you say that word with me?

Increasing.

I'm going to write down three lines, because I hear three word parts in the word increasing.

Now I need to think about the sounds I hear in each of those word parts.

I hear I, N, C, R, E, S, E, N, increasing.

Now it's time to think about the letters that represent each of these sounds.

I, N, C, R, E, S, E, N. Something doesn't look right right here, though.

I think this is actually supposed to be a vowel team.

I think this is supposed to be ea that works together to make that long E sound.

Now let's put these word parts together, and see what word we built.

In crease ing.

Our word is increasing.

The storekeeper was increasing the price of the bananas.

Great job, readers.

Are you ready to try our next word?

Our next word is department.

Can you say that word with me?

Department.

I'm going to write down three lines, because I hear three word parts in the word department.

Can you write three lines down on your paper?

Now we need to think about the sounds that we hear in each of those word parts.

D, E, P, R, T, M, E, N, T. Did you get them all?

Great job.

Now we need to think about the letters that represent those sounds.

D, E, P, R, T, M, E, N, T. This doesn't look right though, it's missing something.

This word part's missing a vowel.

I'm gonna put an A in front of this R, because they can work together to say R. Department.

Let's put all of these letters together to spell our word.

Department.

When we went grocery shopping, I asked my mom if we could stop by the toy department.

Great job, readers.

We've got one more word.

Are you ready to give it a try?

Our last word is argument.

Can you say that word with me?

Argument.

I hear three word parts in the word argument.

So on our papers, let's write three lines.

Now let's think about the sounds that we hear in each of those word parts.

R, G, U, M, E, N, T. Argument.

Now it's time to think about the letters that represent these sounds.

R, G, U, M, E, N, T. Does something look silly to you?

This first word part's missing a vowel, isn't it?

Let's put an A in front of that R. When I put all of my letters together, I've built the word argument.

I had a little argument with my sister the other day.

Readers, I'm so proud of how hard you worked helping spell these words with different types of syllables in them, great job.

(soft music) (speaking in foreign language) - Readers, hi.

Today, we are gonna focusing on keeping track of our reading by the use of a five finger retell.

When we retell a story, we need to be thinking about what are the most important details?

One way we can do that is that we can listen, and we can think about the five finger retell.

One, characters, two, the setting, three, a problem.

Is there a problem that needs to be solved?

Four, what are the events that happen either before or after the problem to help us figure out a solution?

And then don't forget, we need to be thinking about the theme, the message or the life lesson that the author wants us to learn about.

The last time we read this book, "Marley Dias Gets It Done, And So Can You", with a special permission from Scholastic Publishing, we figured out that we don't have a solution yet.

That's where we left off.

"What difference does it make?

I didn't know at the time, I was just articulating my own personal frustration, but I had run smack up against an issue that affects millions of students, both in America and around the world.

I would later learn that fewer than 10% of children's books published in 2015 featured a black person as the main character.

And that's a problem, frankly, it's unfair.

Don't get me wrong.

I was already reading books with black girl protagonists at home, but the only books we'd read at school were slave narratives set in the 18th and 19th centuries, or stories with stressed out girls from the civil rights movement.

While these stories are extremely important, because they portray the strength and resilience of black girls throughout history, they can get depressing and disappointing when it's all that schools offer.

The range of black girl experiences is so much broader and deeper, and richer than that.

There's an expression.

How can you be it if you can't see it?

Meaning if the examples of black characters, black astronauts, fashion designers, and forensic archeologists, and tech entrepreneurs, and ballet dancers, and movie directors, and presidents of the United States don't exist in fiction, or in the movies, or on TV, then how would we even know it was a possibility, an option to be any of those things ourselves?

I understand that logic, I do.

And it may be true for many people.

Although I, myself, don't 100% accept it.

I believe in the power of our imagination.

That's what creativity and originality are all about.

After all, there hadn't been a black president before Barack Obama.

There had been civil rights leaders, and senators, and professors, but not a president until boom, Barack Obama happened.

And then there was.

And with Barack came Michelle Obama, the one and only black first lady, and Sasha and Malia.

If representation isn't an absolute necessity though, that doesn't mean it's not majorly important, or deserved, or that it doesn't make a difference.

Lots of books offer important lessons about how to deal with complicated issues.

If the characters don't reflect you, if you can't relate to them, it can be more difficult to absorb the morals of the stories.

How can educators expect kids to love instead of dread reading, when they never see themselves in the stories they're forced to read?

Since most kids have to go to school, being in class every day can be a way to give kids hope, or the opposite if a teacher or a school doesn't see that all kinds of books and experiences are important.

If there are no black girl books as part of the school curriculum, then how are we expected to believe all that stuff that teachers and parents are constantly telling us about how we're all equal?

If we're all equal, well, then we should all be represented equally.

If black girl stories are missing, then the implication is that they don't matter.

I didn't like it, so I had to do something.

A hashtag is born, but what was I going to do?

I had a few thoughts on the subject.

Over pancakes and juice that afternoon, I came up with an idea.

I would collect books, of course, lots of them.

I would get donations of not 100, not 500, but because it seemed like an appropriately huge number, a thousand books featuring black girls as the main characters.

I'd get a thousand books, and I'd give them away wherever they were needed most, and soon everybody would be reading about awesome us.

A hashtag.

That was the way to start, a hashtag, because if there's one thing I'd learned from watching slime and cat videos on YouTube, social media is powerful.

My biggest challenge in going viral was to come up with something fun, catchy, unforgettable.

Yes, a hashtag was born, #1000BlackGirlBooks.

My mom posted the hashtag first, and her friends also used it, because at the time, I did not have my own social media account.

As for what happened next, and how I started a movement, well read on."

Writers, we have brainstormed some amazing ideas on how we could solve a problem in our community.

Today, we have a new focus.

It is to ARMS.

We're gonna think about what could we add?

What could we remove?

What could we just move?

And maybe even substitute, then we'll use the strategy COPS to think about capitalization, our overall writing, punctuation, and of course, our spelling.

The local animal shelter needs donations to help take care of the animals they have for adoption period.

Do I need to add, remove, move, or substitute?

Not yet.

It's important that we donate supplies to the local animal shelter.

One reason to donate is that it's important to give food to help take care of the animals.

Do we need to add?

You make a decision, author, do you wanna add?

Another reason is that without our help, some animals might not get collars or toys.

Can you imagine that?

I'm thinking right now that I wanna remove the collar part, 'cause when I added can you imagine that, I want it to have more emphasis as an (gasps), I can't imagine my life without toys.

Toys.

Can you imagine that?

The last reason we should give to the animal shelter is because it's important to make sure the animals have a clean place to live.

To add, remove, move, or substitute?

It is important to donate to the animal shelter to help provide food, toys, and keep the shelter clean.

I don't think we need to add anything.

I don't think we need to remove, or move, or substitute, but I did find something that I think I want to, well, I guess substitute and add maybe by adding some different capitalization, and some different punctuation.

What do you think, should I try?

Okay, let's try.

It is important to donate to the animal shelter.

I have an idea about adding an exclamation point to really kind of make my reader understand how important it is, and how I feel about it.

What do you think?

Okay.

But now we have a problem.

We have some editing to do using our ARMS strategy first, and then our COPS strategy.

So I'm thinking, it doesn't make sense anymore, and I might need to add, help me out.

It's important to donate to the animal shelter, to help provide food?

I'm gonna need to think about how I can add some words to make it make sense, and make it a complete sentence.

It is important to donate to the animal shelter.

Why?

Ooh, maybe I could say to add on, it will help provide, or I could say to add on, these donations will help, right?

(upbeat music) Let's add a flap.

I have an idea.

It's important to donate to the animal shelter to add on, these donations help to provide food, toys, and keep the shelter clean.

I'm gonna put my flap right down here.

One way I'll know is that then I can take my little arrow if I need a little line that reminds me, oh yeah, that's what I wanted to say before the word help.

Today we have used the ARMS strategy.

What can I add?

What can I remove?

What can I move?

And what can I substitute?

As we read, we also used our thinking to make sure that we followed the COPS strategy.

What about our capitalization do we need to be mindful about?

Our organization?

Of course our punctuation, and don't forget our spelling.

Great job today, writers.

Oh, what, scholars, you did an amazing job today.

Remember friends, while you're doing your reading, you can always keep an eye out for those tricky vowel teams.

Don't let them trick you.

(speaking in foreign language) We'll see you next time on Read, Write, ROAR.

- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by the Michigan Department of Education, the state of Michigan, and the W.K.

Kellogg Foundation.

Additional support by, and by viewers like you, thank you.

(upbeat music)