imagine two pieces of land separated by miles of water how would you connect them that is a problem real Engineers had to solve to connect Michigan's lower and upper peninsulas I'm Mrs defal and today I want to learn with all of you about how the maol bridge was built from 1950 to 1960 before we learn all about the maol bridge we need to know what a peninsula is because Michigan is made of two of them a peninsula is a piece of land almost surrounded by water because Michigan's Southern shore of the Upper Peninsula and the northern shore of the lower Peninsula were separated by Lake Michigan to the west and Lake hiron to the east Engineers needed to figure out how to build a bridge to connect these two peninsulas even before I jump into my reading I know that Engineers had to choose to use the tools available to them like hammers wrenches screwdriver and drills all of these tools are sitting right here in front of me but once I learn how these tools work I have to choose to pick them up and use them the same is true for us as readers we choose to use our decoding strategies as tools to help us build our comprehension so we understand what we read today we are going to read a passage with words that have many syllables when words have around three or more syllables we call them multi- syllabic words words because multiple means many it can be tricky to read multi-lab words so we are going to learn how to decode those words to support our comprehension just like the Mao Bridge connects Michigan's upper and lower peninsulas we are going to learn how to build a bridge of understanding from the words we read on the page to our brains where all our learning takes place I've been researching The Mao bridge and wrote a paragraph based on my research from the following sources let's read this passage together which is missing some multisyllabic words The Mao Bridge also known as The Mighty Mac was built in the 1950s the bridge stretched 5 miles across the Straits of menol it was known as a the Mighty Mac opened on November 1st 1957 tourists drove along I75 from Mao City to St ignis traveling from the lower to the upper provided tourists with countless opportunities the economy grew in Michigan's upper skipping all those words is confusing I don't understand what we read I bet you can guess some of those words based on what we've already discussed today when we read from the lower to the upper what's your guess right Peninsula good guess but let's not guess when we read guessing is like using a screwdriver when you need a hammer it might get the job done but there's a better tool to use let's decode this word together since every syllable or word part has a vowel let's break up this word there are four vowels e i u and a so I anticipate there will be four parts pen inula let's read the word together peninsula rather than guessing we must use our tools as readers to decode multisyllabic words to decode Peninsula we used a flexible decoding tool we have many tools to help us decode but if we choose to not use those tools reading is going to be harder if not impossible let's use our decoding strategies to read some more multi- about let's decode this word using a covert strategy which is like going on a secret mission to decode a word first look for affixes which are word parts that hold meaning two affixes we need to look for are prefixes at the beginning of a word and suffixes at the end of a word are there any word parts or affixes we already know I know Shan is a suffix which means state of I don't see a prefix at the beginning but I do see two vowels U and E this helps me to know I have two additional parts or syllables to decode sus pen let's read the word together suspension a suspension bridge is a type of bridge that has a roadway hanging from many cables that are anchored at the ends now let's read this word are there any word parts we already know super jumps out at me and I also see the word structure because this word has two words super structure it's a compound word once I use this strategy to break it up into two smaller words it's easier for me to read it's important to decode it's also important to understand super reminds me of superheroes so I understand that part of the compound word I also know that a another name for the Mao bridge is Mighty Mac which sounds like a superhero's name structure means building or construction with the Mighty Max stretching 5 miles across the water it sure is a super structure as readers we are a lot like the people who had to choose to use the tools available to them to build the bridge the mecho bridge would never have stretched from the lower Peninsula to the Upper Peninsula without people who used their tools as readers we have the tools that help us decode multi-cab words so keep building your reading skills by using what's in your toolbox