HMH Storytown 2008 Grade 6
Theme 6 Lesson 27
Title: The Incredible Quest to Find the Titanic by Brad Matsen
Suggested Time: Five, 45-minute lessons
Common Core ELA Standards
RI.6.1, RI.6.3, RI.6.4, RI.6.5, RI.6.10; W.6.2, W.6.4; SL.6.1; L.6.1, L.6.2, L.6.4
Teacher Instructions
Refer to the Introduction for further details.
Before Teaching
Read the Big Ideas and Key Understandings and the Synopsis. Please do not read this to the students. This is a description for teachers, about the big ideas and key understanding that students should take away after completing this task.
Big Ideas and Key Understandings
Nonfiction texts give facts about a topic. This selection highlights facts about the Titanic and how the mystery of why it sank was solved.
Synopsis
This nonfiction story is about the luxury liner Titanic that collided with an iceberg and sank in 1912. Details are given about the ship, the journey, and the catastrophe that the ship encountered during its maiden voyage. Facts are also given about the explorers who found the location of the ship’s wreckage, the attempts they made to reach it, and their discovery of the real cause for the sinking of the ship.
Read entire main selection text, keeping in mind the Big Ideas and Key Understandings.
Re-read the main selection text while noting the stopping points for the Text Dependent Questions and teaching Vocabulary.
During Teaching
Students read the entire main selection text independently.
Teacher reads the main selection text aloud with students following along.
(Depending on how complex the text is and the amount of support needed by students, the teacher may choose to reverse the order of steps 1 and 2.)
3. Students and teacher re-read the text while stopping to respond to and discuss the questions and returning to the text. A variety of methods can be used to structure the reading and discussion (i.e.: whole class discussion, think-pair-share, independent written response, group work, etc.)
Text Dependent Questions
Text Dependent Questions
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Answers
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When did the Titanic sink and how many years later was it discovered by researchers? (page 695)
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The ship sank in 1912 and was discovered 73 years later.
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The word luxurious means “expensive, fancy, and splendid.” Reread the first paragraph on page 697. What are two other words the author used to describe the liner that have meanings similar to luxurious?
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The author also described the liner as “elegant” and “splendid”.
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What can the reader learn about the Titanic's size and power based on the author's description of the ship? Use details and quotes to support your answer. (page 697-8)
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“Titanic was huge, but it was also the most modern, comfortable ship ever.” “…the mighty engines came to life.” Because the author describes Titanic as a great ship with mighty engines, the reader learns that it was huge and powerful.
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Reread the last paragraph on page 698. What decision did the Captain make that may have contributed to the sinking of the Titanic?
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The weather was good and everything was working perfectly. So the Captain increased Titanic’s speed.
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How does the author describe an iceberg on page 699? Why is this significant to this text?
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An iceberg is huge and floats like an ice cube in the water. Only about 10% sticks out above the water. The rest of it is hidden beneath the water’s surface. Icebergs break off from enormous, slow moving rivers of ice called glaciers. It’s significant because the Titanic hit an iceberg and that caused the wreck.
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Reread the first paragraph on page 700. How does the author describe the demeanor of the passengers? Why do the passengers feel this way? Use details and quotes from the text to support your answer.
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The passengers just ate dinner, some already went to bed. They felt safe. “Everyone felt safe. The newspapers had proclaimed Titanic to be unsinkable, and everyone believed them.”
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How does the reader know that Captain Smith was aware of and concerned about the threat of icebergs? Site evidence from page 700.
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“The officers in charge of Titanic that night had been warned about icebergs by other ships. Captain Smith posted two lookouts near the front of the ship.”
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Reread pages 700-701. How did the Titanic sink?
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Although the lookouts saw the iceberg and the captain ordered the ship to turn and reverse, it did not make it in time and hit the iceberg. “The huge submerged portion of the iceberg collided with Titanic's underwater steel plates. The iceberg slid along the starboard side of the ship. Ice fell on Titanic's forward deck.” There was a failsafe in case any part of the ship was damaged, but there was too much damage for it to work “All four of Titanic's forward compartments were flooding with water.”
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Rereads pages 701 and 702 and explain why so few passengers survived the sinking of the Titanic. Use details and quotes from the text to support your answer.
[The teacher may decide to edit this question to ask for the ‘three main reasons’ to prompt a full answer if scaffold is needed]
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“There were only enough life boats for less than half the people aboard” and at first the passengers didn’t realize they were really sinking and didn’t want to get in the boats. “During the first hour after he [the captain] gave the order, many passengers thought there was no real danger. Many were not willing to get into the lifeboats. Some boats were lowered into the ocean partly full.” Also, the water was so cold that even though people had life jackets or something else to keep them afloat, they died due to the extreme cold. “Hundreds of others who had gone in the water in life jackets or clinging to wreckage died before the rescue ship arrived.” So, many more people could have been saved if they would have gotten into the lifeboats and if there had been enough boats for everyone. More would have survived if the temperature had not been so cold.
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Why did it take a year to prepare to explore the wreckage of the Titanic? What was so special about the wreckage and diving in the ocean? How was the wreckage finally explored? pages 704-705)
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The wreck was very deep in the ocean, which causes problems with pressure, temperature, and light. “Diving into the deep ocean is always dangerous. The water put enormous pressure on Alvin's hull. Outside, the water was nearly freezing, and the cabin grew colder as they descended. The dive to Titanic would take 2 ½ hours. No sunlight reaches the deep ocean.”
The wreckage was finally explored by using a special submarine, the Alvin and a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) called Jason Jr. The men in the submarine used the ROV to explore the wreck. The submarine and ROV were brought close to the site with the crew on the ship, the Atlantis II.
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What condition did Ballard and his crew find the Titanic? Quote directly from the text how the author described the wreckage. Why was it in this condition? (pages 706-707)
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“Ballard saw the two huge anchors still in their places. He saw that the bow had driven deeply into the mud. Everything was covered with rust. Crabs and sea worms were living all over the wreck. All the wood on the ship had been eaten away. The explorers could clearly see rails, one of the ships cranes, and the remains of the bridge. The wooden wheelhouse had completely vanished.” It was in this condition because it was three miles below the surface of the ocean and had been there for over seven decades.
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Explain why it wasn’t easy for the crew to explore the wreck. (pages 708-709)
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They made 15 dives that summer. It was not easy. The wreckage was very deep. There were technical difficulties with the submarine (the battery light going off), they hit a davit from the wreck and almost did not recover, and weather also influenced the releasing and retrieval of the submarine from the ship, the Atlantis II. They almost lost ROV in bad weather, too.
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The heading on page 709 is “Mystery Solved.” Reread this section and explain how the mystery was solved.
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The mystery of how the Titanic sank was solved. “Using Jason Jr's cameras, they could see part of the iceberg damage on Titanic's side. It looked like the iceberg had not cut a gash in the ship after all. Probably, the force of the collision had caused rivets to break. Then, the plates on the side of the ship came apart at the seams. Water flooded in. No ship could have survived. Ballard and other explorers confirmed the theory that the steel plates had come apart.”
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Vocabulary
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KEY WORDS ESSENTIAL TO UNDERSTANDING
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WORDS WORTH KNOWING
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TEACHER PROVIDES DEFINITION
not enough contextual clues provided in the text
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Page 695: wreckage
Page 697: luxurious
Page 702: panic
Page 703: expedition, explore
Page 704: tether, hatch, submersible
Page 705: pressure
Page 709: collision
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Page 697: passageways, reserved
Page 704: contraption, domain
Page 706: murky
Page 707: columns, particularly
Page 708: cradle
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STUDENTS FIGURE OUT THE MEANING
sufficient context clues are provided in the text
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Page 698: voyage, destiny
Page 700: lookouts, steered, course, bridge, plates
Page 701: afloat, aboard, compartments
Page 702: dreaded
Page 704: descent
Page 706: ascent
Page 708: remains
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Page 697: lavish, splendid, (upper) decks
Page 698: coincidence, gusty, cast (off)
Page 700: strolling, proclaimed
Page 701: doomed
Page 704: cramped, checks
Page 705: switched (on)
Page 706: expert
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Culminating Task
Write a short essay explaining why the story of the Titanic is especially tragic. Include details and quotes from the text to support your answer.
Answer should include:
The grand liner was thought and touted to be “unsinkable”.
It was the “greatest ocean liner of its time”.
The author implies that the captain may have had the ship going too fast (last paragraph page 698) and that if they had been slower, may have stopped on time.
There were not enough lifeboats for the number of passengers “there were only enough lifeboats for less than half the people aboard”, and the ship was not even full!
The captain knew there weren’t enough lifeboats and didn’t prevent this problem.
Many people did not get in the life boats when they had the opportunity, because they didn’t believe at first they were in danger. “During the first hour he [the captain] gave the order, many passengers thought there was no real danger.” So, there were lifeboats that were lowered only partly full.
The water was so cold that many people died even though they had life jackets or wreckage to keep them afloat.
It was also so tragic that SO many people died. Only a fraction (712 out of thousands) of passengers survived.
Additional Tasks
Vocabulary: Students will complete a “word web” using each vocabulary word. Web activities may include drawing illustrations, writing sentences, giving antonym/synonym, writing definitions, etc.
Create a tree map listing the three classes of passengers on board Titanic and describing their traveling accommodations.
Describe the relationship between a glacier and an iceberg.
Complete a research project with a partner or small group on the Titanic with library books, online sources, and videos.
Show clips from a documentary on the Titanic and its wreckage and compare/contrast it with the text.
Reread the sections called “Luxury Liner” on page 697 and “A Closer Look at Titanic” on page 706. Use the information to write a three paragraph diary entry from the point of view of either:
a first class passenger seeing the Titanic for the first time or
an ocean explorer seeing the wreckage of the Titanic for the first time.
Use specific details and at least three examples from the text to support your ideas.
Note to Teacher
There is additional vocabulary that may need to be addressed (such as glacier, astern, stern, ROV, titanium).
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