Students discuss and compare differing versions of "Little Red Riding Hood" and other tales about wolves in cumulative read-aloud sessions and text set explorations.
Comparing Fiction and Nonfiction with "Little Red Riding Hood Text" Sets
Animal Study: From Fiction to Facts
Students listen to fiction and nonfiction read-alouds and explore selected Websites to identify factual information about animals. This lesson focuses on ants, but can be adapted to any animal.
Designing Elements of Story in Little Blue and Little Yellow
In this series of four lessons, students will explore key elements of design in Little Blue and
Little Yellow to learn about setting, character relationships, and plot.
Stapleless Book
The Stapleless Book can be used for taking notes while reading, making picture books, collecting facts, or creating vocabulary booklets . . . the possibilities are endless!
Introducing Ideas and Vocabulary with the Concept Sort
A Concept Sort is a vocabulary and comprehension strategy used with students to introduce new topics and/or familiarize students with new vocabulary.
Diagram It! Identifying, Comparing, and Writing About Nonfiction Texts
Students compare the traits fact and fiction by using a Venn diagram to compare fiction and nonfiction books about Native Americans.
Junie B. Jones Introduces Literacy Mystery Boxes
Like Junie B. Jones, students will be saying "Wait till you hear this" after listening to a Junie B. story and creating mystery boxes to help retell the story.
Shared Poetry Reading: Teaching Print Concepts, Rhyme, and Vocabulary
The rhyme and reason behind this lesson is that students will need to develop important reading skills to increase their reading fluency.
Family Ties: Making Connections to Improve Reading Comprehension
Families are all about connections between people. In this lesson, students read three books about different families and make text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world connections to those texts.
Choosing the Right Book: Strategies for Beginning Readers
Students make purposeful choices for their reading materials, thinking about their reasons for reading a book and using strategies to match books to their abilities.
The Charlotte Huck Award for Outstanding Fiction for Children is announced today.
Students read and discuss an award-winning book before writing their own story that demonstrates compassion.
Ezra Jack Keats was born on this day in 1916.
In celebration of Keats' birthday, students write stories that include some characters from Keats' books and practice using collage techniques with the Collage Machine.
Celebrate Cynthia Rylant's birthday!
Students work in small groups or as a class to map the plot of a selected Cynthia Rylant story and create original literary works using the plot diagrams.
Today is Leo Lionni's birthday.
As a child growing up in Holland, Leo Lionni taught himself how to draw and later became an author and illustrator of children's books. Leo Lionni is the winner of four Caldecott awards.
Celebrate National Library Week!
Students learn more about libraries as part of National Library Week.
Today is D.E.A.R. Day!
April 12 is known as D.E.A.R Day! D.E.A.R. stands for "Drop Everything and Read," a national month-long celebration of reading designed to remind folks of all ages to make reading a priority activity in their lives.
Jon Scieszka was born in 1954.
Students review Scieszka's tips for encouraging young people to read and then create their own, sharing ideas with adults in their community through a letter.
Gary Soto, poet and children's writer, was born on this date in 1952.
Using one of Soto's stories, students take part in share stories about their families, describe their street/neighborhood, or compose an acrostic poem using the Acrostic Poems interactive tool.