Rooms Within Rooms: read-along
Rooms Within Rooms as a read-along for the projector: 12 pages, 1313 words, level 13, grade 8.
Page 1 of 12
In 1665 a man looked at a slice of cork and named what he saw cells. He was wrong about what they were. So was almost everyone after him, and getting it wrong turned out to be useful. The man was Robert Hooke, and his word, from the Latin for a small room, outlived his mistake. What he had seen were the empty walls of plant tissue. His weak microscope could not show whether anything had ever lived inside them. This essay follows how the picture of the cell was redrawn again and again, and what the textbook definition still leaves out.
Keys: ← → or Page Up and Page Down turn the page, Space starts and pauses the voice, Home and End jump, F fills the screen. Tapping the right side of a page goes on; the left side goes back.
How to use it
- Press Full screen (F) to put the book on the projector.
- Press Read to me (Space), or read it yourself and turn pages with the arrow keys or a tap. Pick the Pace that suits the class.
- After the last page, three questions come up to talk about.
About this book
- Level 13, Grade 8
- 12 pages, 1313 words, about 10 minutes aloud
- A true book, gentle
Related
About Rooms Within Rooms
Since 1665 the cell has been redrawn again and again, from empty cork walls to a factory with bacteria-descended engines inside. A history of what we saw, what we got wrong, and the definitions that still have exceptions.
Words to preview
- nucleus (NOO-klee-us)
- cell's gene room
- ribosome (RY-boh-sohm)
- protein builder
- mitochondrion (my-toh-KON-dree-on)
- cell's power plant
- chloroplast (KLOR-oh-plast)
- sunlight catcher
- hemoglobin (HEE-moh-gloh-bin)
- oxygen carrier
- cytoplasm (SY-toh-plaz-um)
- cell's inner soup
Questions that fit any book
- What is one new thing you learned from this book?
- Which page told you the most? What did it say?
- What would you still like to find out about this?
Questions
How long does Rooms Within Rooms take to read aloud?
It has 12 pages and 1313 words, so about 10 minutes at the Steady pace and a little less at Quick. If you stop to talk on the way, plan for more.
What reading level is Rooms Within Rooms?
Level 13, Grade 8. The library numbers its levels from 0 to 18 and puts the level of a book on its cover; level 13 sits at grade 8. A level is a guide for choosing, so look at the pages yourself.
Whose voice is it?
Your browser's own. Read to me uses a speaking voice already on the computer, so it sounds like that computer and works without a sign-in. Voices differ: some light each word as it is spoken, and some do not, in which case the highlight follows a steady pace instead. Some browsers use an online voice; if yours does, the browser, not us, sends the words of the page to its speech service. If no voice is installed, turn the pages and read it aloud yourself.
Do students need an account?
No. Nothing is asked of anyone and nothing is sent to us. Project the page, or share the link and let students open it on their own screens.
Where does this book come from?
It was written for Peabody's library as a true book. It is not copied from a textbook or another site.
Nothing you do here is sent to us. The voice is your browser's own. No sign-in, no ads.