Unit 6: Careers, Community Helpers, & Role Models Belonging in Books™ Bundle

Belonging in Books Unit 6 Bundle: Careers, Community Helpers, and Role Models

If you’re looking for a low-prep, high-impact way to bring purposeful comprehension instruction into your PreK–1 classroom or homeschool, this resource is for you! Part of the Belonging in Books curriculum, this unit supports deep thinking, joyful reading, and inclusive discussion using 8 powerful anchor texts:

A Chair for My Mother by Vera B Williams
Brave Ballerina The Story of Janet Collins by Michelle Meadow
Counting on Katherine by Helaine Becker
Helpers in My Community by Bobbie Kalman
The Carpenter's Gift by David Rubel
The Librarian of Basra by Jeanette Winter
The Paper Kingdom by Helena Ku Rhee
The Proudest Blue by Ibtihaj Muhammad and S.K. Ali

This bundle of books focuses on the theme of careers, community helpers, and role models, helping students explore how everyday people use their skills, talents, and compassion to make a difference. Throughout this unit, students will focus on key comprehension skills such as summarizing, identifying problem and solution, determining main idea and key details, making inferences, analyzing cause and effect, visualizing, making predictions, and recognizing text features.

As students engage with both fiction and nonfiction texts, they will examine how individuals overcome obstacles, serve their communities, show courage, and lead with integrity. By connecting across multiple texts, students will build a deeper understanding of how small actions can create meaningful change while strengthening their ability to retell stories, analyze character growth, and explain how ideas are developed in informational texts. This unit not only builds strong comprehension skills but also encourages students to see themselves as capable contributors to their own communities.

Each Belonging in Books unit is built around a high-quality read-aloud and carefully designed to:
✔️ Teach comprehension through rich, age-appropriate conversations
✔️ Build vocabulary and language skills in context
✔️ Explore story elements and text structures
✔️ Practice key comprehension strategies
✔️ Support synthesis using a paired companion text
✔️ Center student voices and diverse perspectives

What’s Included:
5-day lesson arc (20–30 minutes/day):

• Day 1: Connect & First Read
• Day 2: Vocabulary Exploration
• Day 3: Story Elements or Text Structure
• Day 4: Comprehension Skill
• Day 5: Paired Text & Synthesis Discussion

+Semi-Scripted daily lesson plans
+Thoughtful discussion questions
+Printable graphic organizers
+Visual Vocabulary and child-friendly definitions
+No Prep student practice sheets
+Anchor chart templates
+CCSS Alignment
+Student “I Can” statements
+Lesson plans for a culminating project or hands-on response
+Companion text suggestion and extension ideas

Each book in Belonging in Books can be a stand alone week of learning, or you can dive into an entire thematic unit of quality mentor texts that connect through themes, character experiences, comprehension strategies, and text structures.

Want the entire curriculum? Grab the Complete Curriculum Bundle!