The Biggest Tomato / All About Hydroponics
Rosen REAL Readers: STEM and STEAM Collection
Fiction and nonfiction pairs provide opportunities for students to analyze and compare different perspectives. This pairing supports thinking across texts by illustrating how different authors treat a similar topic. Excitingly, this pairing contrasts craft and structure of fiction with craft and structure of informational texts. In the fictional narrative, The Biggest Tomato, follow the story of a young scientist as she wins the science fair with her huge tomato. Brightly colored illustrations captivate while on grade level text and vocabulary build reading confidence. This fiction book is paired with the nonfiction book, All About Hydroponics, for connecting across texts and comprehension through connection strategies. This volume about hydroponics, geared toward the early reader, explains the system of plants grown without soil. This fascinating way of growing plants was partially developed to save space as these plants can grow vertically. Start a discussion with your readers about this fairly new idea of growing plants without soil and what can help make vegetables big, with this well paired theme set.
