Character Study Continued & Building Stamina

This past week we continued with our Character Study. Our focus last week was on how the setting impacts the character's traits, actions and motives.

Monday I read aloud The Name Jar by Yangsook Choi and modeled how the setting impacted the character in the beginning of the story. When I approached the middle of the story, during the read-aloud, I stopped, and students turned and talked discussing what the character was doing and how the setting impacted her actions and feelings. When the book was finished we summarized the story using the SWBS strategy (Somebody, Wanted, But, So) and finally recorded the character's feelings at the end and discussed how they changed from the beginning to the end. Can I say this was a wonderful read-aloud! We will definitely read again for future lessons such as: theme, sequencing, and cause and effect. This book would also make a great read-aloud to compare and contrast cultures.



Here is the anchor chart found on Pinterest that I used with students to introduce how to summarize the plot.

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Finally and most importantly this week, we have been working on building our stamina. After our read-aloud, students grabbed their "Just Right Book" and silently read. Our goal for this past week was 6 minutes, which we accomplished. We are moving to 7 minutes next week! Our goal is 20 minutes by December. On Mondays and Tuesdays students only silently read and on Wednesdays students respond to their thinking using the graphic organizer for the week based on the skills taught in Reading.

Next, week's Reading focus in on PLOT if Tropical Storm ISAAC stays away from southern Louisiana. Although, it doesn't look too good for us here.