Watch a Slideshow: Mary Celeste - Mystery at Sea
Ask: What do you think happened to the people on the Mary Celeste? Explain.
Students will examine the real-life mystery surrounding the disappearance of the crew of the Mary Celeste in 1872.
Lesson Plan - Secrets of the Ghost Ship
Learning Objective
Text Structure
Problem and Solution, Chronology
Content-Area Connections
World History
Standards Correlations
CCSS: RI.3.1, RI.3.2, RI.3.3, RI.3.4, RI.3.5, RI.3.6, RI.3.7, RI.3.8, RI.3.10, L.3.4, SL.3.1
NCSS: Time, Continuity, and Change
TEKS: Social Studies 3.3
1. Preparing to Read
Preview Words to Know
Project the online vocabulary slideshow and introduce the Words to Know.
- navigation
- theories
Set a Purpose for Reading
As students read, have them underline clues about what happened to the ship’s crew.
2. Close-Reading Questions
1. What is the author’s purpose in the first three paragraphs of the article?
The author’s purpose in these paragraphs is to grab readers’ attention by describing the spooky scene when the Mary Celeste was found floating in the Atlantic Ocean.
(RI.3.6 AUTHOR’S PURPOSE)
2. According to the article, how is a ghost ship different from a regular ship?
The article explains that a ghost ship is one that is found at sea with no crew on board.
(RI.3.8 COMPARISON)
3. According to the article, what are two theories about what happened to the Mary Celeste crew?
One theory is that pirates attacked the ship. Another theory is that the captain, worried the ship was sinking, got everyone on the ship’s lifeboat.
(RI.3.2 KEY DETAILS)
3. Skill Building
FEATURED SKILL: Cite Text Evidence
Use the Skill Builder “Be a Text Detective” to have students practice citing text evidence in response to true-or-false questions from the article.
(RI.3.1 TEXT EVIDENCE)
Text-to-Speech