UNIT:
Lesson: 5
Text Title
Article from the Indianapolis Star by Natalia E. Conteras: “For 50 years, this organization has been helping and empowering Latinos in Central Indiana.”
Main Idea
La Plaza is a Latino-led organization whose mission is to support Latino families in Indianapolis. La Plaza offers families a variety of supports, including educational resources to help students thrive in school and apply to college; translation and interpretation services; and mental and physical health programs, which were especially important during the COVID-19 pandemic. Reporter Natalia E. Contreras summarizes La Plaza’s important work not only to celebrate the organization’s 50th anniversary, but also to make the experiences, contributions, and advocacy of Latino Hoosiers more visible. Contreras accomplishes this by using interviews, anecdotes (short stories), and statistics to make La Plaza’s positive impacts very clear and engaging for the reader.
Essential Question
The unit essential questions developed through this lesson are…
- In what ways have Latino individuals and organizations in Indiana advocated for their
communities?
Content Objective
By engaging in this lesson, students will know/understand that……
- La Plaza is a Latino-led organization that has supported Latino families in Indianapolis for fifty years.
- Some of the key ways that La Plaza has supported the Latino community has been to offer educational supports (such as college application guidance); health supports (such as counseling); and social supports (such as helping people to find jobs and housing).
- The Latino community has been an important part of the broader Indianapolis community for a century, but their experiences and contributions have not always been made visible by mainstream media and historical records/resources.
Literacy Objective
By engaging in this lesson, students will strengthen their ability to…
- Determine the main idea of a nonfiction article.
- Analyze and explain how an author uses multiple forms of evidence to support their claims, particularly in the context of a news periodical.
Standards Alignment
- Determine two or more main ideas of a text and explain how they are supported by key details; summarize the text. (RI 5.2)
- Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in a text, identifying which reasons and evidence support which point(s). (RI 5.8)
