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Graphic organizer Grade 9 English Language Arts

From Field Note to Public Sentence at Oakbourne

A grade 9 organizer that moves six fictional operator log notes through four columns, from shorthand to a public sentence a resident could read without help.

Objectives

  1. Students will identify what a reader outside a plant would need from a technical shorthand note.
  2. Students will replace or define a technical term without losing the meaning of the note.
  3. Students will write a public sentence under a fixed word limit for a general reader.

Vocabulary

Backwash
Backwash is when a treatment plant reverses the flow of water through a filter to flush out the dirt and particles it has trapped. It is like rinsing out a dirty sponge so the filter can keep working well.
Clearwell
A clearwell is a large storage tank at a treatment plant that holds finished water right after it comes out of the filters. It gives the disinfectant enough time to work before the water is pumped out to homes and businesses.

Also: shorthand, jargon, residual, coagulant

Teacher overview

Operators write log notes for other operators, in a shorthand built for speed, and those notes become the raw material for anything the public later reads. This organizer moves six fictional notes across four columns, from the shorthand to a public sentence a resident could read without help. The misconception this organizer addresses is that plain language means shorter language. In the exemplar every note gets longer on the way across the page, because a reader outside the plant needs a term defined and needs to be told whether anything reached the tap, and both of those additions cost words.

From Field Note to Public Sentence at Oakbourne — Grade 9 English Language Arts
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Organizer

The situation. The Oakbourne Water Treatment Plant and all six notes below are fictional and were written for this organizer. Operators keep a running log through each shift. The notes use shorthand and assume the reader works at the plant.

Terms you may need.

  • Turbidity means cloudiness in the water.
  • Alkalinity is a measure of how well water resists a change in acidity, and it affects how much coagulant a plant needs.
  • A filter is backwashed when clean water is pushed backward through it to rinse out what it caught.
  • Chlorine residual is the small amount of disinfectant still in the water out in the pipes.
  • A coagulant is a chemical that makes fine particles clump so they can settle or be filtered out.
  • The clearwell is the tank of finished water at the plant, before the water is pumped to town.
  • Exercising a valve means opening and closing it to keep it working.

The six notes.

  • Note 1. "0410 turbidity spike after filters. Filter 3 to waste. Backwash started."
  • Note 2. "Chlorine residual low at Ridge Road sample tap. Raised feed at the booster station."
  • Note 3. "Coagulant feed pump 2 failed. Switched to pump 1. Rebuild kit ordered."
  • Note 4. "Raw water alkalinity dropped after the storm. Adjusted coagulant dose."
  • Note 5. "Annual valve exercising on Marsh Lane. Two valves found partly closed. Opened fully."
  • Note 6. "Clearwell level low overnight. Filled from Well 3. No service interruption."

Directions. Complete every cell. The last column must stay under twenty-five words and must be a sentence a resident could read without asking a question.

Note What a resident would need to know from this The term that must be replaced or defined Public sentence, under twenty-five words
1
2
3
4
5
6

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Completed Exemplar
Note What a resident would need to know from this The term that must be replaced or defined Public sentence, under twenty-five words
1 Cloudy water was caught at the plant and did not go out to town Turbidity, and backwash This morning the water leaving one filter turned cloudy, so operators kept that water from reaching town and rinsed the filter.
2 Disinfectant was running low at one edge of town and was corrected Chlorine residual The disinfectant level measured low at one sampling point on Ridge Road, so operators increased the amount added at the nearby booster station.
3 A pump failed, a spare took over, and treatment continued Coagulant, and feed pump One of the two chemical pumps failed, the second pump took over at once, and a repair kit has been ordered.
4 A storm changed the raw water, and the plant adjusted for it Alkalinity, and coagulant dose Rain changed the chemistry of the river water coming in, so operators adjusted the amount of treatment chemical to match it.
5 Routine maintenance found and fixed two valves that were partly shut Exercising a valve During routine maintenance on Marsh Lane, crews found two water valves partly closed and opened them fully.
6 Storage ran low, a well made it up, and no one lost water Clearwell The plant's storage tank ran low overnight, operators refilled it from a backup well, and no home lost water service.

Differentiation

Support

Give these students the second column already filled in, so the work begins at choosing the term to define. Provide the six public sentences in scrambled order and ask students to match each to its note before writing any of their own. Allow the word limit to be treated as a target rather than a rule.

Extension

Ask these students to write a second version of the sentence for Note 1 aimed at a reader who called the plant angry about cloudy water at the tap, and to mark what changed. They may also name the one note in the set that they believe should never be reported to the public at all, with a reason.

ELL supports

Pre-teach turbidity, residual, coagulant, and clearwell with one labeled drawing of the plant showing where each belongs. Allow students to say the public sentence aloud before writing it. Provide a sentence frame: "Operators ____ because ____, and no home lost water."

Extensions

Ask students to count the words in each shorthand note and in their public sentence, then to write one paragraph on which notes grew and why. The pattern usually shows that a note grows most when a reader outside the plant needs both a definition and an assurance.